Darren Stephens

(further contact details on request)

I have developed systems in both commercial and academic environments, using a variety of technologies. I have also been an experienced, qualified teacher and supporter of teaching activity in the HE sector. I have worked successfully with clients of many types and am able to accept responsibility, adapt and work within rapidly changing environments, both individually and as a part of a team.


Experience

IS Specialist (Web)

Durham University

Developer within the University's web team. Working with a variety of tools and frameworks, including PHP (mostly Laravel), node, and react.

May 2016 - Present

Academic Support Specialist

University of Hull

Teaching & academic support for a number of UG and PG modules; design of courses, preparation of teaching materials and assessment. delivery of teaching; previously some management and admin of dedicated network provision, and technical support for selected academic and research activities.

Nov 1999 - May 2016

User Interface Engineeer

Tradezone International Ltd

Front-end design and development for a B2B eCommerce system, which was a company spun-off from its parent, Onyx Internet (see below). Work included liaison with back-end team to resolve development issues.

Aug 1998 - Nov 1999

Web Design Consultant

Onyx Internet Ltd

Work on both internal and external projects for a wide range of customers, from small businesses to local government and similar sized organizations (e.g LSCs). This work was a mix of development and client-facing activity.

Jun 1997 - Aug 1998

Education

PgCert in Research Training

University of Hull

Credit-based research training as part of PhD study.

2016

PgCert in Management in Higher Education

University of Hull

HR, management, and project management components.

2011

PgCert in Higher Education

University of Hull

HE teaching qualification that conferred HEA accreditation

2009

MSc Information Technology

Teesside University

Masters degree encompassing software engineering, data management, and various programming techniques.

Oct 1994 - Oct 1995

BSc(Hons) Physics

Durham University

Undergraduate degree, member of Collingwood College

Oct 1988 - Jun 1991

Skills

Programming Languages & Tools
Communication Skills

Experience of preparing and delivering teaching materials, technical reports and briefing documents and other written content. Presenting material for a variety of audiences, including lectures, seminars and laboratory teaching. Client-facing skills in previous commercial and current project work.

Intellectual Skills

Have demonstrated, in work and research, the ability to work effectively and constructively, both in teams and alone, managing my own workload and time. Have often had to self-train quickly when learning new skills, then teach or train others.


Professional Interests

My research interests have previously been concerned with the engineering quality of web based systems and metrics to measure it. However, I began working in several other areas, connected to memory, curation and archival. Part of this research involved working with social media, Mediawiki, Wikimedia and related technologies.


Professional Qualifications, Awards & Certifications

  • British Computer Society Chartered Member [MBCS CITP] (since 2004)
  • Association for Computing Machinery Professional Member (since 2008)
  • Higher Education Academy/Advance HE Fellowship [FHEA] (awarded 2009)
  • ITILv3 Foundation (2017)
  • ITILv4 Foundation (2020)
  • ACM member
  • BCS memeber
  • BCS memeber
  • Advance HE/HEA Fellow

Other Information