JOHN O’HARA

John O'Hara is a 54 year old Canadian educator who has worked at the leading edge of education and community development for over 30 years. He is a qualified teacher, lecturer, social worker and librarian and has taught at every level in elementary, secondary, college, University and special education.
He has been a County Advisor for Further Education and a National Adult Training Development Consultant for the former Manpower Services Commission in the UK.

John has developed several pioneering and innovative educational initiatives including: creating the UK's first Adult Training Agency model, the first computerised Adult Training Brokerage and educational voucher scheme. John created the partnership that received the first British Government funding in 1993 for developing ICT based Community Learning Networks utilising the latest in IT strategies.
John is the founder of the South Bristol Learning Network and received over 1 million pounds to establish the British prototype Community Learning Network through developing the skills and knowledge of local long term unemployed adults.
The South Bristol Learning Network was created in 1993 to"…support lifelong learning by creating opportunities to access and shape the emerging Information Superhighway for the participation and benefit of the local community." The South Bristol Learning network experience has been the development platform for many other initiatives including BEON, which was the first full scale trial for National Grid for Learning and the ISI Initiative in the UK.
John created the CyberSkills model, which is one of the most influential and successful Information Society Awareness Raising programmes. This was possible thanks to a partnership with ICL to market and develop the CyberSkills programme in over 10 countries and 90 plus sites including a Knowledge and Leadership Skills Transfer process for developing the skills of the staff of local Information Society development agencies.
John has delivered over 250 presentations on the Information Society and Community development in over 15 countries to key local partnerships and government agencies. John created and obtained the funding for the development of the International CyberSkills Association and as it's first Chairman and Chief Executive implemented the key development strategies for the Association which has had over 50 member organisations developing and delivering local Information Society awareness strategies to over 100,000 people in 10 countries.
John has attracted over 4 million pounds of funding and grants for his educational development ideas over the last 10 years including grants from the Kellogg Foundation, USDA, EU and various UK government departments. He is currently working to develop an International Information Society Leadership Foundation and a Private sector lead Alliance to benefit community learning through partnerships that support sharing the learning opportunities of Corporate Universities.
John is an Information Society Adviser and Educational Consultant to private sector companies such as ICL and Community groups such as the Old North End Community Media Project in Burlington, Vermont. John is a Board member of the Centre for Civic Networking based in Washington and works globally to foster partnerships that promote "People First" in the Information Age.
John is proud to be involved in the Global Junior Challenge and looks forward to it continuing to develop international collaboration in the development of ICT and services for young people.