“Before my first year I was still undecided on what career path to take, so I took a range of papers - Geography, Computing and Surveying - and ended up mixing all three subjects together by taking the Geographic Information Systems (GIS) programme. I knew about GIS before I started University, and had looked into the programme before signing up.
“The diverse range of geography, programming, database and surveying papers delivered a good picture of what career paths could look like in GIS, working in development or analysis in the office and an option of getting out in the field.
“Our classes were small, giving a more personal feel, and we often took to the street with handheld GPS units capturing live data to work on.
“My favourite areas of study were around management issues in GIS, cartography and map production and learning about how aircraft and satellites capture data and photography from space.
“The GIS courses all use leading edge software which helped in getting immediate employment in New Zealand. It meant I came into that environment very knowledgeable - other staff were asking me questions from day one!
“I'm currently working in Brisbane, Australia, as the sole GIS Analyst on a multi-million dollar concept study for a natural gas project.
“This project will extract gas from coal seams and compress the gas to fuel power stations and also provide gas for home use across the world.
“My role involves working with my client and our engineers to design facility layouts and locations, new road networks, the routing of pipelines and placement of well systems across approximately 11,000 square kilometres of project area in Queensland.
“If you're keen on this area of work, you could start to get a feel for reading and using maps and GIS software like ArcGIS and Google Earth. This will give you a huge advantage if you can become efficient in the use of software and computers early on. This is what I feel has given me a distinct advantage so far during my career.”