Short Biography Alexander Hayes is a researcher, educator and artist living in Bungendore NSW Australia which is a vibrant rural community just outside of the nation's capital of Canberra, Australia. Currently completing a Doctor of Philosophy at the University of Wollongong (UOW) Faculty of Informatics, School of Information Systems & Technology (SISAT), Alexander has also completed undergraduate degrees in Bachelor of Arts (Primary Education) at Edith Cowan University, Western Australia followed by a Bachelor of Arts (Fine Art) Honours at Curtin University of Technology, Perth Western Australia. Alexander has worked within the private, public & community service sectors across the primary, secondary, vocational training (VET) and tertiary sectors in Australia and New Zealand as a lecturer, teacher, project manager, e-learning facilitator and specialist projects consultant. Alexander is co-founder of Streamfolio Pty. Ltd, formed in 2009 to meet the growing demand for rich media portfolio applications that interface neatly with wearable, location enabled point-of-view video camera technologies. Streamfolio is one of many projects where Alexander Hayes has prototyped concepts in collaboration with others where mobile, wearable, location enabled technologies form the backbone for workforce development, learning & teaching. Married, father of four children and an active community member, Alexander Hayes enjoys time with family and friends, golf, attending community events, cycling and the occasional holiday fishing with no bait on the line. Alexander has worked with ethnically diverse communities, in rural and remote Indigenous Australian townships.
Press Biography Alexander Hayes is a Project Officer, Training & Communications with the Australian National Data Service (ANDS) located at the Australian National University, Division of Information in Canberra ACT Australia. Alexander is an academic researcher and professional educator currently completing a Doctor of Philosophy at the University of Wollongong in Australia. An avid interest in technology has recently spurned Alexander to pursue investigative research into the implications of wearable technologies that are location enabled and rapidly being deployed across many government and non-government sectors. With a background in teaching and fine arts, Alexander has lead a number of entrepreneurial ventures with others that have practically informed research whilst maintaining a collaborative and open focus for findings. Living in Canberra, Australia, Alexander is a Director of two companies, member of IEEE and RNSA as well as engaging in cultural, sports and community events. Contact: admin@alexanderhayes.com | 0427996984 | Skype:alexanderhayes
Autobiography I was born in Sydney Australia and lived in the inner metropolitan suburb of Bexley until the age of 11 years. I have a brother David Peter and sister Alison Margaret. My parents were both immigrants from Scotland, moving to Australia at a time when the manufacturing industry and the social service industry were in a boom time. My Father is a trained horticultural gardener and my Mother is a career nurse with 45 years' service and a Gold medal award recipient in her training. We moved as a family to Kirrawee, a leafy national park suburb in the Sutherland Shire in 1979. I attended Kirrawee High School through to Higher School matriculation (HSC) with an average graduation mark (many distractions is my excuse). In late 1986 with the push from parents I enrolled in an Associate Degree in Land Management at Lismore College of Advanced Education but decided it was not a vocation I wanted to pursue and returned to Sydney soon after. In 1987 I enrolled in an Associate Diploma of Applied Sciences through Armidale TAFE and spent the next two years thoroughly enjoying my contact with the Sciences discipline and the social life of the University of New England. In early 1990 I learned that I was to become a Father of my wonderful eldest Daughter Kamahli-Jae Mason-Hayes who is now 21 years of age and living in Perth, Western Australia. I then immersed myself in a small entrepreneurial business of house maintenance before working with Pickfords Allied in Homebush before the Olympics was decided upon. In 1992 Charlene ( Kamahli's Mother) and I moved to Western Australia and with the support of Dale Mason ( Charlene's Father) I was encouraged to make application for entry into a Bachelor of Arts, Primary Education at Edith Cowan University in Bunbury Western Australia. The next three years were an exceptionally tumultuous time in my life with a separation from Charlene and subsequent intensive studies with an Arts major graduating in 2005. I achieved an Outstanding Students ATP award in 2004 and absolutely respect the time I had with Lecturers like Carol Hogan and Rosa Madigan. In 2005 I commenced and completed an Associate Degree in Performing Arts at Edith Cowan University which was a stepping stone into understanding rigour of character. I loved my time with incredible Artists including Geoff Lummis, Pat Bandurski, Russel Sheridan, Linda Scrolys, Jenny Doherty and many others who became colleagues and friends alike. During that time I met Ullissa Hull and we lived happily, engaging and spending much needed breaks in the south-west "gods" country of Western Australia. We were married briefly and separated after a tragic house fire in Margaret River WA all within that period of time also. In 1996 I was approached by three former lecturers from Edith Cowan University about becoming the inaugural pre-school Teacher for Bunbury Community School. That year was an instrumental experience in understanding the dynamics of becoming a professional educator. During 1996 and 1997 I worked with the Department of Family & Children's Services (now DOCS) also and it was through this contact with children from extreme hardship backgrounds that I became passionate for service to the broader community as an educator and in harnessing educative arrangement as a catalyst for social change rather than an interventionist....etc. In 1997 I opened Alexander Hayes Fine Arts Gallery in Bunbury and after a short and radical stint I learned of my own aspirations to pursue a creative enterprise beyond strictly marketing other peoples works. I met a great mate Daniel Oxenburgh, Author & Poet at Bunbury Regional Art Gallery where I had recently been awarded a prize in printmaking for my own art works. I met Vera Hughes, mother of three amazing kids Luke, Justine and Toby and we traveled across Australia to Sydney by van with kids ( mad ! but fun). In 1997 I moved to Perth, Western Australia and worked for a year with Daniel in his natural pesticide company whilst attending the second year of a full Bachelor of Arts (Fine Art) degree at Curtin University with fantastic mentors like ted Snell, Harry Hummerston, Ben Joel and many others who became firm friends and colleagues. I was awarded a role as a Lecturer in some of the first online transitions from WebCT to Moodle as an Open Learning Australia degree offered externally...in the year of Windows 98! In 1998 I married Dimity Gregson and in July my second beautiful daughter Amelia Manon Hayes was born. We lived in Mt. Lawley, Perth Western Australia and moved to leafy Darlington in the foothills of Perth in 1999. I again rejoined the Department of family & Childrens Services and worked as a Senior Education Officer, mentor and Academic Tutor for another two challenging years whilst completing my Arts Degree part-time. I exhibited and created art works extensively during this period also. During 1998 - 1999 I worked between the communities of Perth, Northam, Kellerberrin, Muckinbuddin and Kellerberrin as a Numeracy / Literacy Lecturer for the Ministry of Justice ( including a number of senior roles in Casuarina and Woorooloo Prisons), C.Y. O'Conner TAFE and the Department of Education (DET WA). In mid-1999 I worked with a dear friend Craig Golding and his father, Tony Golding in a structural recoating business in hot and sweltering Perth. In the year of Y2K I was in the third cataclysmic year of the Fine Arts Degree and spent a considerable amount of time stretched between audio installations with fellow Artists Doikno Pasilan, Graham Hay, Paul Carstairs, Caspar Fairhall and numerous amazing projects with Rob D. Muir which took us to all parts of the country. A short stint with an architectural shade sail ( picture luxury yachts) company and then it was back to a full-time role as Interactive Arts, Media and New Media teacher at Thornlie Senior High School in 2001. That was a very steep learning curve but one that prepared me to work as Lecturer with TAFE WA, Midland TAFE in Perth Western Australia. In 2001 I completed my Bachelor of Arts (Fine Art) and immediately enrolled in the Honours program at Curtin University which set the scene for my academic achievements to date. At the same time I was exhibiting extensively as a practising professional Artist and working at Midland TAFE as an Arts Lecturer and as a Numeracy / Literacy Lecturer with the Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander 'Nalla Maya' course. I count these times as some of the most incredible contacts I've made with Indigenous Australians and feel honoured to have had the opportunity. In 2001 with help of Artist Time Burns, Western Australia I directed a 40 hour film shoot of Artist David Gregson predominantly in Kellerberrin, WA which was made into a documentary production many years later screened via the Australian Broadcasting Commission. I graduated from the Bachelor of Arts (Fine Arts) Honours program in early 2002. It was during this time that the respected Artist David Gregson, Father of Dimity and Grandfather of my daughter Amelia Manon passed away. In 2002 I exhibited with Daniel Oxenburgh in a co-joint publication "Quicksilver" and exhibition of artworks at Gomboc Gallery, Middle Swan, Perth Western Australia. The book has since been republished in a limited edition softcover. In 2002 I was recruited and awarded a role working with "disadvantaged, at-risk and marginalised youth" through the Swan City Youth Service in conjunction with Midland TAFE where certificates of General Education for Adults were offered in very tailored programs for learners " who don't fit in with the on-campus mob...". This was the start of an incredible learning experience for me working with amazing people like Molly Naser and her team at SCYS in engaging young people in learning experiences such as urban art, curatorial programming, web design, life skills ( cooking) and numerous other practical programs. One of my students Broday Rahaley took over my role years later and is still today an exceptional individual that I had the pleasure to be an educator with. It was during this time that I began using SMS communication with my students and during that year I was invited to speak at a number of DET WA conferences about my educative arrangement practices. I also mad my first contact in that year with the WA FLAG representative for the Australian Flexible Learning Framework (AFLF) In 2002 I commenced a Doctorate of Creative Arts ( Art) at Curtin University which due to the complexities of time and life I postponed in 2003. The Doctorate was co-jointly supervised between the School of Arts and the Faculty of Australian Studies with a distinct creative vernacular focus to the projects I engaged within. Dimity and I separated during this time and I moved to a unit I purchased in Maylands, Perth. Soon after, in 2003 I met Claire Yates, a fellow colleague at Swan TAFE and I became a step-father to Chaim Yates who I believe now towers over me with his amazing skills :) We travelled extensively as a family unit and our international visits became a feature of the interweb - my first formal engagement with m-learning Through 2003 and 2004 I continued working with Midland TAFE as an IT lecturer ( hard core .PHP and .HTML code writing) , as a Numeracy / Literacy lecturer and also worked with an equally inspiring educator who ran the JETA program through Curtin University. Zoy Crizzle and I fast found synergies in our life experiences and I learnt a lot about myself from her courage to help others in dire straits in their own lives. I built many trial websites during that time and became self-taught in open source and early web 2.0 applications. In late 2003 and early 2004 I was invited to participate in a trial project engaging young people using SMS technologies as part of a curricula activity as part of an E-learning Innovations trial. The team was lead by Jill Jamieson, Challenger TAFE and then began a flurry of speaking appointments across Australia as the project unfolded. Soon after commencing this project and still working with the SCYS cohort I was promoted to a Senior Education Officer role with the Swan Directorate, TAFE WA. The 'TxtMe' project proved instrumental in an initiation to join forces as a national body of like minded practitioners and with my instigation the Australian Mobile Learning Network (AMLN) was formed. The association with greats like Caryl Oliver, Marcus Ragus, Daniel Dacey, Anne Paterson and others brought us in contact with the global community and afforded us an opportunity to present as a cohort in an international conference. Through out 2004 I worked as a key Facilitator in a number of WA Learnscope and innovations projects with a mobile learning focus with Pilbarra TAFE, TAFE NSW and other conjunct industry stakeholders including the remote Indigenous communities of Punmu, Jigalong and Parnngurr. My extensive work with the Parnngurr community and the Headmistress of the community school, Trish Everett led to great communications between the community and the hosts of the mob log platform in the United Kingdom. My numerous visits to Sydney in 2004 led to an invitation to apply for a Special Projects role with the Centre for Learning Innovation DET NSW under the management of Peter Holden. My Father during this time fell ill and with the breakup from Claire Yates I moved reluctantly to Sydney to take up a new role ( exciting ), help my family ( rewarding ) and to make contact with my birthplace. My contract at CLI led to a Senior Education Officer role working with an e-standards team conducting professional development within the DET NSW framework. I also worked under contract as an E-Learning Designer with the "Engageme" Educational Resources project at that time. During 2004 and 2005 I came in contact with Leigh Blackall, Stephan Ridgway, Sean Fitzgerald and a number of other TALO contacts who were communicating through a Google chat list. Many debates later we all gathered for an 'un-conference' in New Zealand travelling together in an incredible "posse" of educational technologists. I learnt a great deal from greats like Jo Kay, George Siemens, Rose Grozdanic, Teemu Leinonen, Conrad Glogowski, Barbara Dieu and many other colleagues and friends. We still irregularly communicate on the same themes and others that have emerged since. Around this time I met Geoff Lubich at Pilbara College at a FLAN event who astounded me with his use of wearable video technologies with his students. I also Keynoted at Edayz05 and met Leo Gaggl which consolidated a union which has resulted in the formation of Streamfolio Pty. Ltd. I am a shareholding Director in that company to this very day and proud to say that every new day brings bigger possibilities for the use of a video portfolio In mid 2006 after returning from New Zealand I was appointed as Senior Education Officer with Learnscope NSW where I had the privilege and honour to work with Robyn Jay facilitating teams spread across metropolitan, rural and remote regions of Australia, conducting professional development activities and building connected workforce capacity using a range of innovative and emergent communication technologies. This was my first "cutting-of-teeth"in the virtual worlds (MMORPG) and OER (wiki) space where I soon learnt to balance an avatarian identity and that of the physical identity also ! I also met Bill Wade during this time and MobilizeThis06 brought together our creative thoughts around engaging young people and others in discourse as to the importance of mobile technologies and the affects of these technologies in an educational setting. The Learnscope experience was very involved, required a great deal of stamina and high level reporting, putting me in contact with literally thousands of colleagues from across Australasia. I thoroughly enjoyed working with great minds like Robby Weatherly, Maree Jasinski, Maret Staron, Dianna Khabbaz and hundreds of others as part of a rich tapestry of enthusiasm and extraordinary goodwill. I also met Jane Hayes, my beautiful Wife and life companion at a function in Orange NSW during that time and the rest is history. In 2007 I was reappointed for a further 6 months as Senior Education Officer with the third iteration of the Framework (AFLF) and therein lay a huge amount of air and car travel between Sydney, Orange and elsewhere. I moved in late 2007 to the rural community of Orange NSW enjoying great golf and the cold weather :) My first days as Alexander Hayes & Associates Pty. Ltd. commenced in early 2008 and the birth of my amazing eldest son Ethan William Hayes in August of that year. Specialist E-Learning consultancy soon tested every available financial capacity ( and mental ) to remain servicing literally hundreds of contacts and multiple businesses from varying sectors and key stakeholder groups including large LMS projects with TAFE NSW, change management and so on. I was shortly thereafter offered a role as an Industry consultant with TAFE NSW Western Institute working in conjunction with Country ( Essential) Energy Australia whilst balancing the fledgling development of Streamfolio in the background. October 2008 and I was back in Darwin at the MobilizeThis08 event hosted by Charles Darwin University with the team including Michael Coghlan and hundreds of other online participants. On the 28th March 2009 Jane and I were married in Orange with numerous family and friends who had travelled far and wide present. The significance of the bringing together of family, history and happenings has been profound. The activities of Streamfolio soon picked up in the middle of that year and in October we ran the AUPOV09 event bringing together multiple sectors around the concepts of wearable location enabled point-of-view (POV) technologies in an educational context. Mobilizethis09 and a number of other events brought to a head my thoughts around the importance of these technologies in a broader context and the implications in a socio-techical capacity so.....as one does, I enrolled in a second PhD. adventure, this time at the University of Wollongong under the supervision of the awesome Associate Professor Katina Michael, Faculty of Informatics, School of Information Sciences & technology with co-supervision from Professor Teemu Leinonen at the Aalto University, Finland. From the beginning of 2009 to July 2009 I was employed under Rose Grosdanic at the Australian Flexible Learning Framework "Brains Trust" project working with teams again spread far and wide predominantly supporting activities to ensure quality assurance of data input back from activities conducted during projects in the year prior. In May 2009 I was appointed Operations Manager for Streamfolio Pty. Ltd. and there again began travel to numerous client events, project management and online consultation literally sometimes 18 hours a day. According to my records I also served as a Consultant with the Australian African Fellowship (AAF) project at the University of Newcastle on a TVET Reform initiative managed by colleague Donna Hensley. In early 2010 my son Eamon Phillip Hayes was born, a bouncing bundle of joy and incredible strength. Yup....four children, across three states and life has never been busier. My role as Operations Manager for Streamfolio continued in 2010 and as a company we grew from a small startup to a recognised provider with over 191 clients. The concepts of wearable technologies expanded to include all education, training and affiliated industry groups and the role went from profoundly engaging to cataclysmically rewarding all in one year. We fought, battled, challenged and created an important integrated engine for rich media engagement and it is growing fast. In late 2010 it became apparent that Streamfolio needed time ( and lots of money) to take the current development iteration into production beyond the capacity at that time and subsequently I resumed my position as E-learning Consultant with clients conducting business needs analysis, providing project management & software development roll-out supervision and with Direction Australia served in three roles wrapped into one. 2011 was a particularly tough year with a change in many political camps and with the BFC happening I noticed many reservations from across cohorts who would otherwise engage positively to my service offers. 2011 was also a year of renovating our home in Orange, building gardens and spending substantial time writing papers for my PhD. and minding my boys, kicking the ball with them, spending glorious mornings in the park and "picking up Mummy" as part of one of the coldest winters on record. In the latter half of 2011 Jane interviewed for and was awarded the Area Manager role for the Canberra region with Wesfarmers Insurance and there began in earnest the next part of the journey which we are only finding our toes amongst at present. We now live in Bungendore NSW just outside of the capital Canberra Australia and I'm interviewing for roles and unpacking boxes. Life is full and good !
|
