I had held no formal qualifications through most of my working career. In 2000, I began study at UNITEC Institute of Technology.

Though I continued in full time work at the Bay of Plenty Polytechnic (now Toi-Ohomai Institute of Technology), I undertook a full time programme of learning as well.

This resulted in the award of one of the first two Post Graduate Diplomas in Computing in early 2001.

In late 2001 I completed the dissertation component of the Master of Computing and I have now been awarded that qualification, with second class honours.

The dissertation was titled "An Analysis of Posting Frequency, Size and Source for an Electronic Mail Distribution List".