Jay Polandaya has found a fantastic balance in his role as an IT teacher at Chisholm Institute of TAFE.
He’s able to combine his love of teaching and helping others to succeed, with his passion for IT –especially cyber security.
Jay, who was born in the Philippines, has an incredibly impressive education history, with many qualifications under his belt.
As a child Jay wanted to be a journalist, but was encouraged to study civil engineering and computer engineering at university.
But Jay didn’t love engineering and steered his career into telecommunications and IT. This led to further studies and Jay studied to become a Cisco certified engineer and instructor. He then decided to establish a start-up company, studying a Bachelor of Business Management and a Master of Business Administration to help him achieve his goals.
Despite knowing just one person in the country, Jay migrated to Australia on his own in 2009. He then undertook some Australian qualifications - a Certificate IV in IT Networking and Advanced Diploma in Network Security.
As part of his IT work in Australia, Jay began training staff on the job. It was this work that led him to discover his love for education. He studied a Certificate IV in Training and Assessment to enable him to become a vocational educator.
“I started teaching (workplace training) in around 2009 or 2010 and I fell in love with it,” Jay says. “It allows me to combine my passion for IT with teaching and training.”
About seven years ago Jay joined Chisholm as a teacher in the IT and cyber security department and he hasn’t looked back.
He loves teaching his students about cyber security and sharing his industry knowledge. One of his favourite parts of his role is seeing his students find jobs.
“We have a side project where the students propose their own project to create their own network design or infrastructure,” Jay says. “We invite industry experts and managers to come to class to see the projects… some are so impressed they hire our students. I have over 100 student success stories in landing a job in the industry and I’m proud to be a part of their success.”
According to the Australian Government’s JobOutlook, the demand for ICT security specialists is growing, with very strong jobs growth expected in the next five years.
This is no surprise for Jay, who says cyber security is “needed more than ever” and he enjoys ensuring his students have the skills to secure information and protect themselves against cybercrime.
“Learning the fundamentals of securing your personal information and financial accounts is really important,” he says. “Having knowledge on how to protect yourself against scams and viruses will help you to not to fall into a trap or into the hands of cyber criminals.”
Jay travels four hours a day to work at Chisholm, but he says it’s worth it.
“I love helping students and helping them grow in their chosen career and I am grateful to Chisholm for the opportunity.”
