Our Staff

Karen Sturzaker
Technical Director
Over 15 years experience as an educator in schools, both primary and secondary, and as a lecturer, unit coordinator and teaching coach in the tertiary sector.

Extensive experience leading and managing staff and project teams to facilitate the achievement of project objectives in a global environment with respect to project scope, quality, timelines, budget and risk; providing high level project management including: project conceptualisation, planning, implementation, analysis, assessment and review, administration and financial management and risk management.

Has a wide range of experience working in the online and face-to-face environment as a facilitator and content developer of programs of units for undergraduate early childhood and primary education pre-service teachers and adult learners. Managed a suite of practicum units, working collaboratively with a broad range of stakeholders such as content developers, instructional designers, facilitators and unit coordinators to ensure that all units were of high quality, engaging and achieved the required quality assurance standard.

Worked extensively with stakeholders in a coaching capacity in online and face-to-face content delivery to identify staff training needs and provide coaching to improve performance and to contribute to overall professional development, including designing and implementing effective metrics for measuring success and providing input into continuous development and improvement.

Dr. Gel Alvarado-Santos
Principal Project Manager
Extensive project and program management, support and coordination experience, with superior ability to research, plan, document, implement, evaluate and monitor outcomes to improve administrative efficiency and output.

Excellent background in research, development, evaluation, and project/program implementation and management across different sectors in education and at local, state wide, national and international levels. Worked across a diverse range of areas in teacher education, early childhood, vocational, P-12 education, tertiary education, adult education, science education, environmental education, environmental conservation, resource management, informal and non-formal education, and nutrition education.

Extensive experience visiting schools and working with school leaders, teachers and students in undertaking research about teaching and learning, teacher and school building leader preparation, participation, processes and outcomes of education and training, comparative studies, and policy research and analysis.

Extensive experience in public speaking and facilitation, briefing sessions, conferences, workshops and seminars.

Also experienced in teaching in formal and nonformal settings across a diverse range of age groups (kindergarten, elementary, middle school, high school, college, and adult).

Highly experienced in liaising, building and maintaining effective and collaborative working relationships with individuals and groups at all levels and in both formal and informal contexts.

Well-developed technical and non-technical report writing skills with high-level data analysis skills, knowledge and experience with database management, quality assurance and reporting tools.

Anu Harsh
Project Manager
Over 10 years’ experience in the education sector ranging from programme administration, programme quality improvement, faculty academic quality improvement to project management.

Has more than four years of experience in end to end management of domestic and offshore, medium to large size projects.

Anu has a track record of successful, efficient and cost-effective completion of more than 40 projects. She has successfully led four medium size change projects to maximise efficiency and improve user satisfaction by optimising available resources and processes.

Anu specialises in continuous quality improvement, data analysis, data integration, and writing reports. Additionally, she has successfully led accreditation and evaluation audits for academic and non-academic institutions.

Chrissie Straw
Project Manager
Competent, personable communicator across diverse cohorts with the ability to listen and interpret needs to determine solutions whilst building strong rapport with colleagues and clients.

A qualified educator with classroom and leadership experience in teaching primary and secondary physical education and mathematics, leading and managing departments and staff and raising attainment and pass rates of students in significant qualifications.

Has worked in schools that regarded collaborative professional development as one of the foundations for improving student outcomes enabling growth in pedagogical practices through reviewing and sharing.

Has participated in ‘Learning Studies’ with Cambridge University performing inquiries into areas of teaching such as; Differentiation or Assessment for Learning.

Chrissie’s experience working with a range of educators in a rigorous environment has enabled her to continually review her own and others’ practice including contributing to schools’ overall performance for student outcomes.

“Imagine people like pieces of coal, you take a piece of coal out of the fire, eventually its glow will diminish; you put it back in the fire, it continues to glow for a lot longer”.

Samuel Hill
Project Manager
Samuel joined the Cambridge Education team as a project manager in 2020. He has been the lead for the Effective Mentoring Program and has recently taken responsibility for the financials for PLC and VCAL.

He has successfully led several projects of varying size. Responsibilities have included programme management, cost control, conducting stakeholder coordination and communication sessions; report writing and coordination.

Sam is an Urban Planning & Design graduate, his studies focused on urban development, environmentally sustainable design, community engagement and transport planning in relation to the sustainable growth of densely populated urban areas. Experience focused on creating enhanced environmentally sustainable design options in a complex urban setting.

Caroline Hendry
Assistant Project Manager