Ex-students grateful for their IT headstart
TWENTY years ago, Trinity Anglican School was at the forefront of new technology and among the first schools in Australia to introduce personal laptops for its students.
That decision made quite an impact on two of its senior students in the mid 1990s, Paul Yates and Alice Becker, who both went on to pursue careers in information technology.
“We were the first class to have laptop computers and that was game-changing,” says Alice, who joined Paul and 34 other students at a Class of ’95 reunion in Cairns at the weekend.
“I would never have done IT as a degree if I hadn’t had a computer. And we were the first ones to have computing as a subject.”
The former school captain went on to study IT and commerce at Bond University and is now a consultant with her own training company in Sydney.
Paul says the introduction of laptops at TAS and the chance to study Information & Processing Technology at school gave him a head start on other school leavers when he enrolled in computer science at James Cook University.
“That’s what got me into programming,” said the London IT manager, who flew in from England for five days to attend the reunion with former classmates.
Both were impressed with changes at the school, including the swimming pool and newly opened science building, but enjoyed familiar haunts such as the library and casting their mind back to school camps and inter-house sports days.
“I loved
it at the school,” Alice said. “I have very fond memories.”
The Class of ’95 included the first ever intake of Year 3 students at TAS.