The power of one: Nina Chen, Founder and Director of HETC, talks education, grabbing opportunity and transforming one country at a time.
Nina Chen is an entrepreneur and the Founder and Director of Harvest Education Technical College (HETC), an educational institute with two Brisbane campuses and over 3000 international and domestic students. HETC offers courses in business, hospitality and technology among a range of other study areas. Energetic and boundlessly passionate about her work, Nina is a young woman who has achieved incredible things in her career and she has a personal, fascinating story. Nina strives to help others less fortunate and as well as operating HETC she is constantly working on ventures overseas to improve third world countries. She is also a mum to three young boys.
Born in Guangxi Province in China, education is at the heart of Nina’s story. Both of her parents were teachers who aspired to move to Australia to provide more opportunity for their daughter. Her father, a music and PE teacher, moved to Australia to find work and learn English, leaving Nina and her mother behind in China. For five years he worked in Sydney as a chef while studying. It wasn’t until the Tiananmen Square Massacre in 1989, that Nina’s father was granted permanent Australian residency and her and her mother were able to migrate to Australia to be with him.
Watching her parents work menial jobs to establish a life in Australia, Nina became passionate about creating a better life for both her parents and the wider community. While she was still at university studying a Bachelor of Business she established Harvest Education Tutoring Centre, inspired by wanting to help mature age students reach their full potential. HETC began with Nina working in a small 50sqm office in a bad location and the rest, as they say, is history.
Nine is a movie buff and enjoys board games and table tennis in her spare time.
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