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Our People

Jeff Laurie

Group Executive

Jeff brings to the role of Group Executive of EAA a broad background in education and business. A former Australian Trade Commissioner, he has worked primarily in business-related roles within the international education sector for the past 19 years.

Most recently Jeff worked with the international arm of the NSW Department of Education and Training, and prior to that held senior management and academic positions at several Australian universities, including UNSW, as well as managing his own international marketing consultancy business. Through these roles he developed skills in education business management, teaching, curriculum writing, alternate assessment development, flexible education delivery methodologies and business management within multiple cross-cultural contexts.

Jeff’s tertiary qualifications include an MBA, Bachelor of Business, Diploma in Business (Management) and a Diploma in Export.

A self-confessed workaholic, Jeff is also an acknowledged golfing tragic.

Michelle O’Dowd

Senior Manager, Executive and External Relations

Michelle is responsible for the customer relations area which includes working with schools and parents. She is responsible for the implementation of the Total Assessment Partnership (TAP) and the TAP consultants who provide support to schools. She is a member of the Marketing Team and is always interested in hearing how things can be improved for clients.

Michelle has a Bachelor of Education and a Masters of English, Literacy and Drama. She is an experienced teacher who has worked as an Assistant Principal, literacy consultant, university lecturer and as the project manager on various large scale projects with the Department of Education and Training for over 16 years.

Michelle brings her experience as a teacher and consultant to her position in customer relations with the aim of maintaining and enhancing an already high level of satisfaction with the International Competitions and Assessments for Schools (ICAS).

Michelle enjoys spending time with friends and family and entertaining her three and a half year old.

Penny Hutton

Assessment Manager

Penny is in charge of the development of effective and high quality tests in English, Writing and Spelling for EAA, and brings to her role a wealth of experience in teaching, educational policy development, and literacy testing.

Penny has a Bachelor of Education. Her career highlights include the development of educational policies to improve teaching and learning in the middle years of school, and the management of large-scale, full cohort literacy testing programs for NSW Department of Education and Training (including ELLA and BST Reading, Language and Writing). She has also written widely-published sets of support material for teachers aimed at enabling educators to recognise the specific literacy demands of their disciplines and make these explicit to students.

Penny is currently undertaking research in the early acquisition of literacy skills and enjoys “using my six grandsons as an excuse to buy great children’s literature!”

John Davidson

Senior Manager, Sales and Market Development

John has a strong background in education, sales and project management, most recently as the Global Practice lead for Sun Microsystems Learning Services and previously as Principal Consultant for IBM Learning Services and Education Marketing Manager at Apple. John has worked extensively overseas and brings a long history of marketing and selling learning solutions world wide.

John’s tertiary qualifications include a Master of Education, Graduate Diplomas in Education and Management and Bachelor of Engineering. John is also a Certified Project Manager.

John has two daughters and continuing his interest in education, his wife is a University lecturer. His outside interest is basketball where, until recently, he was a Board member of Basketball Australia and has been Chairman of the Women’s Professional league for the last 10 years.

Rob Gravestocks

Marketing Development Manager [Schools]

Rob Gravestocks is our new Marketing Development Manager [Schools]. It is his job to liaise with schools and to let them know what a fantastic, rigorous and good value set of offerings that EAA currently provides and continues to develop for future generations. In order to do this he is always keen to hear feedback from schools.

Rob comes to EAA with a long history working in the tertiary and TAFE sectors. He taught in both for a number of years before gradually moving over to marketing where he has worked for the past six years.

He remembers doing one of our maths tests many, many years ago at school but sadly wasn’t a medal winner.

Rob’s great passion is travel with Berlin being a favorite destination. Another frequent destination is Melbourne where he visits his 2 year old godson as often as possible.

Robert Dias

Operations and Marketing Publications Manager

Robert Dias manages Operations and Marketing Publications at Educational Assessment Australia (EAA) and is part of the Senior Management Team.

Robert joined EAA in 1993 and has worked in a variety of roles including Distribution, Data Capture, Facilities Management and most recently Operations Management and Marketing Publications as well as being responsible for the Customer Relations Team.

His hands-on experience and thorough understanding of all processes at EAA make him an invaluable member of the EAA team. As a member of the OH&S Committee, Robert also ensures the safety and well-being of all staff at the UNSW Global Rosebery site where EAA is located.

Mathew Vita

Project Coordination & Quality Assurance Manager

Mathew is the Project Coordination and Quality Assurance Manager at EAA and is part of the Senior Management Team. His role is informed by his broad experience in EAA’s project management and operations teams. He has developed EAA’s internal project management software to effectively monitor projects across departments, and has extensive experience in coordinating large scale assessments at a national and international level. He manages the relations with our international clients, and external service providers. As head of the Project Office, Mathew is responsible for planning and developing timelines, and coordinating the operations and budgets for all projects, ranging from the annual ICAS cycle, to 3 year government studies.

Mathew enjoys spending time with friends and family, most especially his 1 year old daughter who is a constant source of inspiration and entertainment!

Simon Buchanan

Systems Administrator

Simon Buchanan is EAA’s Systems Administrator, working to ensure the smooth running and continual improvement of EAA’s computer systems and network, whilst providing technical support to EAA’s staff and stakeholders.

Simon brings with him 13 years’ IT industry experience, having worked for companies in such diverse industries as textile manufacturing, banking, biotechnology, telecommunications, pharmaceuticals, education and the Internet. Having only recently joined EAA, Simon is particularly enjoying the professional yet personable culture and is sinking his teeth into a number of fresh projects.

In his own time Simon enjoys bodyboarding, road cycling, dabbling in web design, and DJing parties.

Janelle Ho

Senior Assessment Project Officer - Literacy

Janelle is responsible for much of the test construction for ICAS – Spelling and ICAS – Writing. She also works with Penny Hutton on the test construction of ICAS – English.

Janelle has worked in the field of English education for the past 14 years. She was previously the subject head of English within the Gifted Education Department in Raffles Institution, the leading boys’ school in Singapore, and has also managed education and training for adult international learners through her role as Studies Manager in a private vocational training college in Sydney. She has written a number of recently published papers on the subject of spelling education.

Janelle holds a Master of Education with a major in Teaching Second Languages and received a Dean’s Commendation. She has co-authored a series of spelling workbooks for K-6 titled Spelling Rules! (Macmillan Education Australia, published in 2006).

Janelle is particularly interested in the curiosities of spelling ability and the possible effect of curriculum on writing performance. She enjoys watching English premier league football.

Dr Sofia Kesidou

Senior Assessment Project Officer - Mathematics and Sciences

Sofia manages test construction for national and international assessments in science and mathematics, including the UNSW International Competitions and Assessments for Schools (ICAS) in Mathematics and Science, the International Assessments for Schools (IAS), and the National Assessment for Science Literacy (NAP-SL) program.

Previously she was a Program Director at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) managing the development of tools to support outcomes-based curriculum materials in science and mathematics as well as the development of research-based procedures for evaluating curriculum and assessment.

She was a co-author of AAAS's Benchmarks for Science Literacy, Atlas of Science Literacy and Resources for Science Literacy: Professional Development.

She has published numerous articles on student misconceptions, conceptual change, and curriculum development and evaluation in books and journals. Her research on the quality of US science textbooks received the 2003 Journal of Research in Science Teaching best research paper award.

Sofia holds a Ph.D. in science education from the University of Kiel, Germany, and a B.S. (Honours) from the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece.

Leigh van der Veen

Assessment Project Officer - Literacy

Leigh is responsible for much of the test construction of ICAS—English. She also works with Janelle Ho on the test construction of ICAS—Spelling and ICAS—Writing.

Leigh holds a Bachelor of Education in Primary Education (Honours) from the University of Technology, Sydney (UTS). She majored in English literature and completed her thesis on family history as a narrative. Leigh also holds a Postgraduate Certificate in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) from UTS.

Leigh has worked at EAA since 2003. She started as a cadet in the Cadet Scholarship program run by EAA. This 8-week program targets talented final year Education students and gives them the opportunity to participate in all aspects of test design and analysis. After her cadetship she worked on other literacy projects including government programs, and online testing.

Leigh has taught in south-west Sydney since 2005, most recently as an ESL teacher. She has also taught overseas in Bristol, UK.

Leigh particularly loves to travel and recently spent 6 months in France, where she realised how hard it was to be a second language learner! She is also passionate about writing and painting.

Dr Teo Saw Choo

Assessment Project Officer - International

Saw Choo designs and reviews the assessments for the international projects at EAA. She writes language items for the ICAS-English papers and examines the content of Maths, Science and Computer Skills papers to check that the content and language are culturally appropriate for use in overseas locations.

Saw Choo holds a B.A.(Hons); Dip.Ed., M.A. and a PhD in Linguistics from the University of Sydney. Her areas of expertise include testing and training in the field of literacy and TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) for children and adults. She has been a high school teacher in English (and other languages) and a lecturer in Sociolinguistics and Applied Linguistics at both Macquarie University and the University of Sydney.

Saw Choo has published fiction for speakers of English as a second language through the University of Oxford press and has recently completed volume 3 in a series of 5 reference books on English grammar.

Saw Choo has a keen interest in the observation and analysis of bilingual development in infants and children and has excellent subjects in her 4 tri-lingual grandchildren!

Kerry Tremaine

Assessment Project Officer - Special Projects

Kerry is primarily responsible for the test construction of ICAS – Computer Skills, AFLA (Australian Financial Literacy Assessment) and GAT (General Achievement Test).

Kerry has been involved as both a group leader and marker in large scale marking operations for state-wide assessments in NSW and ACT, including ELLA, BST Writing, the School Certificate and the Higher School Certificate. She has extensive teaching experience in state and independent secondary schools.

Kerry has a particular interest in boys’ education and the teaching of literacy through Social Science subjects. Her Saturdays are usually spent managing her son’s baseball and soccer teams.

Linda Gillies

Assessment Project Officer - Special Projects

Linda is one of two Assessment Officers in charge of Special Projects. She co-manages with Kerry Tremaine the test construction of several EAA assessment projects, including ICAS – Computer Skills, AFLA (Australian Financial Literacy Assessment) and GAT (General Achievement Test).

Linda’s areas of expertise are in English education, ESL (English as a Second Language) and Special Education. She has taught in secondary schools in Australia and the Philippines and has an ongoing involvement with the NSW Board of Studies. Linda was a member of the syllabus committee that wrote the course content for 2-unit Filipino for the Higher School Certificate. She has been part of the HSC Filipino examination committee for a number of years.

Linda holds a Master of Education from the University of Sydney. She has an active interest in Philippine community affairs, especially in relation to education issues. Through the Education Committee of the Ethnic Communities Council of NSW, Linda was instrumental in a successful submission to the NSW Minister of Education for the teaching of 2-unit Filipino in the Saturday School of Community Languages. In 1999, the first group of students were accepted at Bankstown SSCL and classes have run successfully since then.

Linda enjoys cooking and baking brownies for the chocolate lovers at home and at work.

Majeda Awawdeh

Assessment Project Officer - Mathematics

Majeda Awawdeh is responsible for the test construction of ICAS Mathematics. Majeda holds a Bachelor degree in Mathematics, a Bachelor degree in Education, and a master’s degree with honours in Mathematics Education from Haifa University. Recently, Majeda has completed a PhD degree in Mathematics Education from The University of New South Wales. In her PhD research Majeda has found evidence for the powerful effect of real life context in teaching complex concepts in Mathematics. She has two papers under review in refereed journals and is writing a third one.

Majeda worked for many years as a highs school Mathematics teacher.

She has joined EAA very recently and enjoys constructing high quality Maths tests.

Majeda believes that Mathematics is a logical science, cleanly structured and well-founded. Therefore, every one can do Maths.

Philip Thompson

Assessment Project Officer – Science

Philip is responsible for the design of science assessments at EAA and also manages a team of external item writers and reviewers.

Philip has a Bachelor of Science from UNSW and a Master of Education from Sydney University. He is a very experienced teacher having worked in a number of schools for over 30 years, Head of Science Department and extensive HSC marking, in Chemistry and Physics, as well as HSC item writing experience. He has also taught advanced computer applications at TAFE for a number of years.

Philip particularly enjoys the Snowy Mountains where he likes to fish in summer and ski in winter.

Michelle Robins

ELNA Manager

Earlier this year, Michelle Robins was appointed to manage a new project known as ELNA – the Early Literacy and Numeracy Assessment. ELNA is an online computer adaptive assessment tool that has been specifically designed for 4-8 year olds in their first three years of formal schooling.

Michelle’s educational background and experience includes a Bachelor and Masters Degree in Education (Information Technology in Education) from The University of Sydney and 12 years teaching experience with the NSW Department of Education and Training. Michelle is also a trained Reading Recovery teacher.

In a past life, Michelle enjoyed life as an ‘expat’ while working as Junior School Team Leader managing the Preschool to Year 2 department of an international school in Indonesia.

Prior to her appointment at EAA, Michelle was appointed Postgraduate Fellow at The University of Sydney to further her research interests in online learning communities while lecturing and tutoring in the early literacy program for pre-service primary teachers.

She also spent a number of years as a senior education officer with the NSW Department of Education contributing to the development of the Basic Skills Test and more recently, the National Assessment Program in Literacy and Numeracy, NAPLAN.

Michelle is most interested in the application of information and communication technologies to assessment, its transformative potential and the efficacies afforded to educational systems, schools, teachers, students and parents.

Cindy Li

Assistant Assessment Officer

Cindy is primarily involved in the test construction of ICAS - English, Spelling and Writing. She also assists other Assessment Project Officers, including Mathematics and Science, in reviewing items and in general administration. More recently, Cindy has been involved in the construction of the Early Literacy and Numeracy Assessment (ELNA).

Cindy has worked as a secondary teacher in west and south-western Sydney. She has a Bachelor of Education in English and History.

She began her career at EAA through the 2006 cadetship program, through which she has gained valuable training in all aspects of test construction. Cindy is committed to ensuring the high quality of the broad range of assessment products at EAA, from a test fairness and validity perspective.

In her spare time, Cindy likes to sing German madrigals and to get into yoga poses, but she is yet to master doing both at the same time.

Christine Ratcliffe

Executive Officer

Christine supports the Senior Management Team at EAA. She assists in the coordination of EAA business and corporate planning functions, management of the Quality Management System and provision of support to the Group Executive.

Christine came to EAA through the cadet scholarship program in 2008/09 after completing a Bachelor of Arts and Education from the University of New South Wales.

Since then she has taught English and History at secondary schools in Wollongong and is currently undertaking a Masters of Educational Leadership through the University of Wollongong.

In her free time she enjoys keeping healthy and traveling the Australian coastlines. She hopes to one day spend time seeing more of the world.

Dr Goran Lazendic

Senior Research Officer

Goran Lazendic conducts research in Psychometrics – a field of Statistics concerned with theories and methods of educational and psychological measurement.

Goran has a B.A. (Hons) from the University of Novi Sad, Serbia and a PhD in Psychology from UNSW, Australia. In his PhD research he examined how knowledge about relationships between objects is stored in the brain. He has lectured in Statistics at UNSW.

Goran’s current research interest is Item Response Theory and statistical data modelling. In particular, he is investigating how advances in modern measurement theory and Psychometrics could be utilized to improve test construction and results interpretation in the field of educational assessment.

Nathaniel Lewis

Data Analysis Manager

Nathaniel is EAA’s Data Analysis Manager. He works with a team of analysts and programmers to create new ways of presenting and interpreting assessment results. His work is instrumental in the ongoing improvement of the ICAS suite of products and the diagnostic benefits they provide for teachers, parents and students. He also consults on measurement and statistical processes for government and commercial clients in the field of educational and competency testing.

Nathaniel has a Masters of Education and is currently completing a Doctorate at UNSW with a focus on computer adaptive testing, diagnostic reporting & prognostics for teaching strategy. The results of this research will drive the development of tools that allow students' cognitive learning processes and assessment results to be made more accessible to students and teachers. Nathaniel describes his career highlights as ‘working alongside and being mentored by leaders in the field of Educational Measurement in both Australia and the US.’

Nathaniel has a particular interest in de-mystifying the statistics surrounding modern test theories and enjoys fishing, motorcycle touring and travel.

Jennifer Lau

Data Analysis Officer

Jennifer joined EAA in July 2008 after completing a combined degree at the University of New South Wales. She holds a B.Sc (Hons) in Psychology and a B.Com in International Business, both of which have equipped her with a range of skills, which she now brings to her role.

Jennifer's position as a Data Analysis Officer provides her with an opportunity to work with some of the best psychometricians in the country.

Jennifer is originally from Mauritius, a small island in the Indian Ocean, off the coast of Africa but her background is Chinese. She is fluent in French, enjoys spending time with her friends and has a passion for cooking.

Huong Doran

Data Analysis Officer

Huong’s responsibilities include analysing large data sets and elucidating the results for clients and colleagues. She works alongside the Data Analysis Manager to generate reports, apply Item Response Theory and conduct research into various aspects of educational assessment. She is also the Senior Editor of EAA's online newsletter, Assessment Foundations which is a resource for teachers into the many facets of learning and assessment.

Huong has a Masters degree in Organisational Psychology and brings her research, analytical skills and business acumen to the role. She is currently researching the prevalence and usability of computer adaptive testing in an educational context, and is particularly interested in its impact on diagnosis and achievement.

Huong enjoys sampling the culinary delights of the inner city, watching the cricket with her husband and reading a multitude of books to her daughter.

Amanda Scott

External Relations Coordinator

Amanda works with our Total Assessment Partnership (TAP) consultants who provide a direct support network to teachers. Amanda enjoys talking to teachers and is committed to helping them utilise the variety of innovative educational products and services offered by EAA.

Amanda has a long history with EAA which began in 2004 when, as a new education graduate, she was selected to take part in the eight week cadet scholarship program offered by EAA. At the completion of the cadetship Amanda went on to work with the Science and Mathematics test construction teams. She also helped in the initial development of an exciting new early literacy and numeracy assessment tool known as ELNA.

Amanda holds a Bachelor of Education in Primary Education (Honours) from the University of Technology, Sydney. She also has a Diploma in Gemmology from the Gemmological Association of Australia and has recently completed a Certificate IV in Marketing from Learn 4 Life, UNSW Global. She has worked as a specialist primary maths teacher and had the wonderful opportunity to teach English in China.

In her spare time you will find Amanda hunched over her jeweller's bench creating and losing all sense of time.

Bob Gardner

Purchasing officer

Bob is the Purchasing Officer at EAA and is responsible for the procurement of all goods and services. He has been employed in the education field for the past 29 years having worked at the University of Sydney for 20 years and EAA for the past 9 years.

He enjoys competing in and watching sport and has a particular interest in Athletics, Rugby League, Soccer and Basketball. He is married, has one son and lives in the Sutherland Shire.

Virginia Vita

Website Coordinator

Virginia joined EAA in 2001 working in the Data Processing area and remembers the many hours spent scanning, editing and processing the myriad of reports that EAA produces. She then moved to work in the Research and Assessment area as the Administration Assistant and eventually the Administration Coordinator where she was responsible for many tasks, some of which included the quality assurance checks on all ICAS reports, looking after Copyright for ICAS and organising the annual ICAS - Writing and ICAS - Spelling Marking Centres. She also worked on projects involving the NSW Institute of Teachers and the Australian Education Union.

After a year on maternity leave, Virginia returned to a new role of Website Coordinator. She is excited about her new role and hopes that she will make her mark here. She is very keen to make the website user friendly and is interested in any feedback or suggestions you may have. Please click here to send any comments or to ask website related questions.

EAA Customer Service Unit

The EAA Customer Service Unit are (from left to right): Fiona Annen, Dolores Majanggil, Jody Taleska (Manager), Betty Paul, Sally Au and Andreana Johnson

EAA Project Coordination Unit

The EAA Project Coordination Unit are (from left to right): Katerina Bednarova, Jennifer Cowing

EAA Data Processing and IT Unit

The EAA Data Processing and IT Unit are (from left to right): Daniel Paludi, Greg Smith, Ashwin Prekesh and Sasi Chitrapu

EAA Publications Unit

The EAA Publications Unit are (clockwise from top left): Nilesh Prasad, Tony Ma, Brian McMahon (manager) and Natalia Bochkareva

EAA Operations Unit

The EAA Operations Unit are (from left to right): Sally Matheson (Assistant Operations Coordinator), Debbie Hodges (Reception), Leanne Bladon (Operations Admin) and Michelle Brown (Reception).

EAA Finance Unit

The EAA Finance Unit are (from left to right): Emma Hu, Mandy Poon and Kate Chin (Finance Manager)

EAA Software Engineers

EAA's Software Engineers are (from left to right): Julia Ong, Jennifer Ng and Patrick Ellul

EAA Assistant Administration Officer

Jessica Fountain