I am currently the Director and an Earth Scientist with Murrang Earth Sciences. My work as Director within this company centres on steering the direction of the company, business development, and meeting business requirements. As a scientist I am focused on understanding how chemicals move through ecosystems, the implications of this movement, and implementing more sustainable and productive outcomes for agriculture and the environment as a whole. My expertise are in soil chemistry, surface water chemistry, surface/groundwater interactions, hydrogeochemistry, ecotoxicology, statistics, and catchment management. With a background in consulting, research, and project management, I am driven to find optimal solutions which enhance ecosystem health and agricultural productivity.

I was employed within the Site Assessment and Remediation group of Coffey Environments as an Environmental Scientist. The work undertaken for this role included soil, surface water, and groundwater sampling; well installation; hydrogeological testing; the writing of Contamination Management Plans; Phase One and Two Environmental Site Assessments; Groundwater Monitoring Reports; Waste Classification Reports; and Site Audits. I wrote proposals, managed invoicing, and was responsible for client and laboratory liaison for a number of projects. I was also responsible for the ordering and organisation of field work equipment.

I was initially employed in a temporary position at the Centre for Advanced Microscopy, replacing the Centre Manager while she was on leave. My role then continued and expanded to largely revolve around project management including renovation and refurbishment; branding and writing copy; web-page design and content; organisation of technical short-courses; student outreach; planning and successfully attaining approval for a new Master Degree program and related courses; organisation of Master Degree related marketing, asset acquisition, administration, and course content; and the organisation and execution of an international conference, including acquiring sponsorship, international speakers, and conveners.

The Australian National UniversityFor the Blue Planet course (Physical Geography; 1 st year) which focused on the subject of physical geography. The aim of this job was to help students source data; to create complex equations; to understand chemical and energetic flows through environmental systems; and to understand the manifestation of physical changes in systems described by fundamental physical and chemical equations. For the Environmental Chemistry course (2 nd year), which focused on the flows and analyses of inorganic chemicals within ecosystems. Students were taken out to a contaminated mine site where they systematically sampled a contaminated ecosystem. My role as the environmental scientist was to help students deduce the best location and means of sampling, and to identify factors which may influence the results of future laboratory studies. For the Water Resource Management course (3 rd Year; Post-graduate – Masters) which focused on the quantitative and qualitative management of water resources, particularly in Australia. This involved the teaching of basic statistics in order that complex data sets could be analysed and of basic qualitative analyses of water. In addition, an understanding of the chemical change in water as it infiltrates as rainwater, becomes rivers or groundwater and eventually becomes seawater; how to sample key environmental indicators within disturbed environments; and the process of environmental report writing was also communicated. University of Canberra – Canberra, 2006 I tutored first year university students in basic tertiary biology, including the principles of genetics, biochemistry, environmental chemistry, and physiology at the University of Canberra in 2006. Critical analysis of students work was related back to them through the marking of reports and assignments.

The Hunter Central Rivers Catchment Management Authority and New South Wales Office of Water entered into an agreement with the Australian National University to conduct research on the drivers of salinity and surface and groundwater interactions in the upper Hunter Valley. My task was to conduct this research within the 800 km2 catchment of Wybong Creek over a three year project time frame. This included organising the accommodation, administration, field work officers, mobile water laboratories, and equipment to support sampling expeditions which were up to three weeks long; the sample preparation, contacting of analytical laboratories, and identifying the analytical needs of water and soil samples; and the interpretation, presentation and publication of articles and a thesis relating to this data. Key outcomes - Conceptual and statistical analysis of large, complicated multi-analyte data sets; - Formation of baseline knowledge of a poorly published and complex geological area, for government utilisation; - Identification of different hydrogeochemical systems within the Wybong catchment and the origin of their respective solutes; - Deduction of the physical constraints on groundwater systems within the catchment; - Identification of regions of significant surface/groundwater within the catchment; - Identification of the origin of salinity within the catchment; and - Successful liaison between government, agricultural, and academic stakeholders in the project to produce useful knowledge for farmers, land and catchment managers, and academic knowledge on the subject of surface and groundwater interactions, and salinity.