Ara Foundation is governed by a group of trustees with a diverse range of experience and knowledge across a range of sectors.
Clive Jones
Chair
Clive Jones is a Director of management consultancy Metamorphis Digital and has over 20 years’ senior management and leadership experience in a range of industries including vocational education, international education, energy, telecommunications, central and local government. He holds a Bachelor of Technology degree and a Masters degree in Business Administration from Massey University.
Izzy Berliner
Izzy joined the Ara Foundation as a student representative in 2016 from the Ara Student Council. She has a strong focus on the student experience and is passionate about maintaining a strong student voice on the Foundation. She attended Ara from 2014-2016 and completed a Bachelor of Engineering Technology. She is currently a Civil Engineer at Beca and is also a member of the Canterbury Young Engineers committee and Engineering New Zealand.
Janet Wright
Janet Wright became a trustee in December 2019. She has more than 25 years’ experience in communications and has worked across a range of industries including agriculture, iwi, electricity and telecommunication
Janet brings strong communications and marketing skills to the Foundation and has a strategic focus on identifying growth opportunities. Janet will use this experience to further enhance the profile of the Foundation to Ara students.
David Fussell
David Fussell is an Investment Adviser at JBWere, an Australasian Wealth Management Specialist. Prior to his current role, David held commercial and institutional roles in the banking sector.
David is a graduate of the University of Canterbury, holding a Bachelor of Commerce with Honours; is a Financial Adviser and accredited NZX Adviser. David became a Trustee of the Ara Foundation in March 2019.
Cherrie Roache
Cherrie has spent the last 20 plus years in the Telco and IT industry in varied Senior Executive roles and portfolios. These have varied from leading challenging business change and transformation, mergers, and acquisitions through to Sales, HR, Service Delivery and Project Management. She sits on 3 Boards and has continued to develop experience at Governance.
Cherrie, of Samoan heritage, has lived in Fiji, New Caledonia, and Australia. This grounding has given her an appreciation for different cultures and an understanding of what it takes to build strong relationships and networks in new places. She is passionate about family, the development and enrichment of people through further study, sponsorship and mentoring into fulfilling Careers and is proud to call Christchurch home.
Julia Johnston
Julia is partner at Saunders & Co and is the partner in charge of the Wigram Office. Throughout her career Julia has worked in law firms as well as international accounting firms and specialises in Tax and Relationship Property. The combination of law, commerce and accounting gives Julia a broad skill base and her well-rounded approach and empathy enables her to give accurate and practical advice. Julia became a Trustee of the Ara Foundation in early 2022.
Darren Mitchell
Darren Mitchell is a skilled and experienced executive with a long and successful career in education management and leadership. He has been with Ara for the past 20 years.
Darren has been a member of Ara’s executive leadership team for 16 years. Before being appointed Ara’s Acting Chief Executive, he was the institute’s Deputy Chief Executive – Chief Operating Officer. In this role he had executive-level responsibility for the portfolios of finance, facilities management, ICT, organisational performance, strategic and operational planning, capital works and sustainability, and provided oversight across the total institutional budget of $116m with approximately 1,000 full-time equivalent staff.
At its fundamental core, Ara’s purpose is to transform people’s lives through education. This is something that Darren feels very passionately about and why he has committed a considerable amount of his working life to Ara. “My personal vision for Ara is to see it flourish in the new vocational education system and to be recognised as being at the forefront of provisioning contemporary vocational learning and teaching to the Canterbury region.”
After gaining a degree in accounting from the University of Otago, Darren spent the first decade of his career at a national chartered accounting firm where he provided advisory services to a wide range of clients and industries. Darren is a Chartered Accountant with Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand and has been the Chair of its public sector consultation committee. He is a trustee of the Ara Foundation, the Ōtautahi Education Development Trust, and of World Skills New Zealand. He also has strong relationships with key Government agencies and a proven track record in working collaboratively with stakeholders to deliver beneficial outcomes.