Learning Advisers

Learning Advisor Biographies

Barbara Adcock
Barbara was brought up on a farm in Southland, near Winton. Originally diary – 40 cows – it was converted to sheep in 1965.

Her early teaching was in Hawke’s Bay, where she taught in country schools. Barbara returned to Southland where she taught primary and did long term relief work in secondary schools. She worked in Lumsden at Northern Southland College for two years before moving to Invercargill, where she taught English at James Hargest High School. Barbara was involved in school major productions and the Southland Repertory Society.

Barbara settled in Christchurch in 1991 with her husband Ian. She has worked selling advertising and real estate before returning to teaching, mainly with long term relieving a number of secondary schools around Christchurch. In 1998 she was awarded a scholarship for full time study and began her masters degree, and completed a Diploma in Special Needs teaching at the Christchurch College of Education.

The following year, Barbara established her own learning centre, BrainMasters, in Riccarton. Within a short time she was catering for 120 students a week and had a staff of 3 full-time and 20 part-time tutors. BrainMasters tutored in a range of secondary subjects. The main work was with students with learning difficulties. At the end of 2005, Barbara closed BrainMasters and began work at Unlimited as the Learning Support Co-ordinator.

Since this time, Barbara has completed her masters degree in Educational Psychology. In 2009 she is working on the Internship course. This will mean that she can become a registered Educational Psychologist and continue to work in the area of learning difficulties and assessment. It is an area that will fit neatly with her work at Unlimited.

Always active, Barbara occasionally travels to Europe with Ian. Together they have built a house on a ten acre property near the airport where they are developing a garden and growing their own food. As a contrast to her other endeavours, Barbara has a passion for scrapbooking--a combination of photo album, design, and writing.

Braden Faavae
Braden started teaching at UPT in 2006. Braden believe's UPT is about diversity of interests in a community set up to support the development and nurturing of those interests.

Outside of school Braden has a passion for song writing, which he enjoys as often as he can. He plays in a band and is also spends time running and mountainbiking. In 2009 Braden would like to see every student at Upt have a passion and an interest that they can develop over the course of the year.

During the year, Braden plans to create a video production course, producing and broadcasting a range of videos and docos with students at the helm driving the process. He is very much in favour of self-directed learning and love the fact that UPT, as a school, celebrates, nurtures and promotes that vital component in its philosophy and charter.

Please feel free to make contact with Braden at anytime should you have questions or queries.

Brent Silby aka DJ "Maestro B"
Brent is a DJ and Philosopher. He has published papers in Philosophy of Mind in various journals and magazines, and has also self published a wide range of articles of Philosophical interest. He currently teaches Philosophy at Unlimited (UPT) in Christchurch City, New Zealand. Brent's main research interests include: Philosophy of Mind, Evolution, Philosophy of Religion, and Philosophy of Music.

Brent's goal is to open Philosophy to a wide audience, hence much of his work is described as "Cafe Philosophy"--interesting, highly accessible articles pitched at intelligent people with no specific background in Philosophy. Brent is on the executive committee of NZAPT (New Zealand Association for Philosophy Teachers), working with collegues to raise the status of Philosophy teaching in Secondary Schools.

After dark, Brent is DJ "Maestro B". He has DJ'd in many of the well known clubs in Christchurch city and is currently a resident DJ at Club 22, hosting the weekly "Like Thursdays" clubnight. Brent's DJ history spans back to the late 1980s. In 2006 he worked with a number of UPT students to set up the Audiodreams label. Audiodreams produces raves and dance parties primarily for the all-age market. Brent is also involved with the White Elephant Trust, producing raves and running DJ training. He currently DJs at regular club nights and raves around Christchurch and produces a weekly mixshow on 105.7FM PulzarFM. For more information: www.Maestro-B.com

Over the years, Brent has designed many arcade games over the years. His games are based on the traditional arcade formula and have been licensed to many high profile game sites. They can be played for free at his Def-Logic games site.

Brent's Websites
* Articles - Brent's Papers in Philosophy
* Certain Doubt - Philosophy Site
* DJ Maestro B - Brent's official DJ Site
* brentishouse - Brent's House Music Site
* Audiodreams - DJ Project
* Def-Logic - Brent's Games

Matt Davis
Matt was born in London in 1973 - The same year that Deep Purple released "Smoke on the Water", and on the same day that "Belly Dancing" became an accredited high school subject in the United States. Since then he has lived all over the world - Sweden, England, the United States, New Zealand. He says that he has been in Christchurch now for so long that he sometimes thinks that "The World" is simply a CIA conspiracy, created in a television studio to dupe the masses into believing that maybe there is something North of Rangiora...

Matt has many hobbies including Diving, playing the saxophone, and pulling convolvulus out of his vege garden.

Matt's has had a colorful life and has spent 2 years living in a tent perched on the edge of a cliff overlooking the Tasman sea, 1 year in a coma, and 10 years trying to master the Coltrane matrix. Matt's goal for 2009 is to learn to Kayak (without drowning in the process) and play the trumpet, possibly at the same time.

Miriam Denney
Born in Silverstone, college in Liverpool (Degree in Psychology and Biology), Miriam worked as a management accountant and then Broadband product manager for British Telecom in London and then Birmingham. She migrated to Christchurch in 2004 for a change of career.

She gained her teaching qualifications at the University of Canterbury College of Education. Miriam then joined Unlimited as an LA in 2005. She describes this as "a fateful event following an instinctual response to the philosophy and the idea of teaching without detentions". Her brilliant plan was to hang around Unlimited until someone gave her a job!

Miriam is passionate about the environment and is a keen mountaineer, traveller, tramper, seakayaker, skier, snowboarder, biker, and gardener). She enjoys caring for our environment and appreciating its wonders (biodiversity and how it all hangs together in Evolution).

Scott Franklin
Scott started teaching at Unlimited in 2008, one of the youngest Learning Advisors on staff, coming straight up from graduating in Dunedin. He grew up in Nelson, finishing high school and went on to spend several years at Otago University, studying a range of subjects but with the major focus being in Food Science and Chemistry.

He has a passion for science, teaching senior chemistry classes as well as foundation and level 1 science classes up in the school's lab room, along with the occasional food/cooking classes in the cooking area on the first floor. His homebase is always a mix of students from all walks of life, but works well with students who are hard workers and know where they want to go. In his free time he is a avid gym fan, hitting the gym several days a week, as well as offsetting that with his interest in computer games, playing the highly popular MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Roleplaying Game), World of Warcraft. Scott is currently planning on training up for a half marathon later on this year.