REANNZ is the Crown-owned company that deploys and manages New Zealand's dedicated Research and Education network. The REANNZ network network runs the length of New Zealand connecting all the universities, Crown Research Institutes, ITPs and wānanga to over 120 similar research networks around the world. My primary role was to support New Zealand's innovators and researchers nationally and globally through a range of advanced networking capabilities and solutions.

I joined Core Education the day before the major Christchurch earthquake on Feb 22, 2011. A week later I was contracted back to the MoE and spent most of 2011 working in Christchurch assisting with the MoE's response to the widespread damage and destruction, while trying to retain a sense of normalcy for the staff and students in the affected schools. This involved setting up new connectivity systems, servers, online curriculum services in a time of power breakdowns, high stress and damaged buildings and roads.For all that - this time was one of my personal career highlights.Other work at this time in other parts of New Zealand included helping schools through ICT reviews, cybersafety consultancy, supporting schools with the government's broadband rollout and other strategic, broadband-related work.

• Conceptualised and initiated deployment of the School Network Upgrade Programme (SNUP) in 2005. From an initial funding round of $12m and 300 small rural schools in 2005, this then developed into a flagship MoE programme with over $250m of investment and targeting the vast majority of schools in New Zealand.• Provided strategic advice for schools, Boards of Trustees and various education-facing private sector organisations regarding e-Learning and ICT implementation.• Part of the team of four that procured and delivered the TELA laptop programme to teachers from 2003 until 2011. During that time the ICT Unit at the MoE was leasing 77% of all laptops procured by NZ government agencies, with around 43,000 units in schools and 1300 being rotated in and out monthly across 2500-ish schools.• Negotiated over $60m of nationwide software deals for schools - Telecom (Schoolzone),, Microsoft Education Agreement, Apple software for schools (their first national agreement globally) and Symantec antivirus for schools . • Established the National Education Network Trial in 2008 - a $100K initiative that connected 22 innovative schools/clusters to the (then) newly launched KAREN (now REANNZ) network and a number of externally hosted content providers. In 2010 extra funding was appropriated to extend it to over 100 schools. In conjunction with the National government's national fibre rollout this project was then re-born as the Network for Learning (N4L). • Established the ICT Helpdesk for Schools - the national 0800-based ICT technical support service for schools• MoE contract manager for Project PROBE rollout for schools (2003-2005). Project PROBE (Provincial Broadband Extension) was a $45m MoE/MED programme to provide broadband to 895 rural schools who were not able to access any internet services (except via dialup).• Managed the initial contracts for cybersafety in schools with the original Internet Safety Group, the organisation that then became Netsafe.

Initial ICT advisory services for South Island schools....mainly around assisting schools with installation of networking and hardware for schools that were starting to deploy "the Internet". Windows 98 and Classic MacOS on the desktop, Windows NT4.0, Novell and AppleShare provided various flavours of server software. Mosaic, Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator were the browsers of choice. No You Tube or Google for another 5 years. ISDN connectivity was common, 128K if you were lucky..:-).

Started my teaching career at Hagley High School (as it was then). Geography, Social Studies and 6th Form Outdoor Education. Volunteered to the be the teacher with library responsibility and via that got the job of converting the card catalogue to a computerised library system (as many high schools were doing in the mid-90s). Went to see visit my colleague Andrew at Burnside HS and he said "and while you are doing that you should connect Hagley to the internet". So in 1995 we were high school #2 in the South Island to have an internet connection (AFAIK). The connection arrived via a 64K wireless connection from an aerial on the top of the Grand Chancellor Hotel in central Christchurch. Email for all staff was provided via Pegasus Mail running on our Novell 4.0 servers and connecting to a local ISP (Planet) via UUCP on an old 286 running MS-DOS 3.3. In 1997 that system was replaced with Windows NT4.0/Exchange with Outlook as the desktop client. Thanks always to Michael Burry (Technology Leasing and Computers Ltd) for his spiritual guidance at the time....

The League for the Exchange of Commonwealth Teachers has been facilitating teacher exchanges for over 100 years. In 1996 I swapped house, job, car and friends with the HOD Geography at a high school of 1200 students in coastal Essex. I taught Y7 to A Level Geography and took students kayaking on what passes for lakes in Essex.John and his family took up my position for a year at Hagley Community College in Christchurch.