Meet Craig, your acting TAFE Organiser
Queensland Teachers' Journal, Vol 131 No 1, 20 February 2026, page no 4.
Craig Adam has stepped into the acting TAFE Organiser role for the next six months, while David Terrauds steps away to negotiate the next TAFE and CQU certified agreements. Here he shares a bit about himself.
My working life has seen me work across various disciplines, and I came to teaching quite late. I left school in 1989 to take up a plumbing apprenticeship and have been in and around plumbing in one way or another since then, having worked in both new and maintenance roles in domestic housing, commercial, and the mining industry up and down the east coast of Australia.
As a teacher, I’ve been employed at TAFE East Coast since 2019, as a member of the Nambour Plumbing Team, where I am one of the Nambour Branch Reps. Prior to this I was employed through the Department of Education as a manual arts teacher at a local high school, after finishing my education degree as a mature-aged student.
My interest in the work that the QTU officers do was initially sparked after my team took part in a stage 4 programming dispute, where, as Branch Rep, I found myself representing my team several times at the Queensland Industrial Relations Commission.
This interest led me to ask if I could shadow David, and I got the chance to do this for three days in late November 2025. This short stint gave me the chance to get a better feel for what the role of the TAFE Organiser looks like.
David took me out for branch meetings, visiting the Toowoomba, Warwick, and Bundamba campuses. While I enjoyed meeting like-minded teachers from a different part of Queensland, what I found really interesting was that several of the concerns raised by these members at the meetings were shared not only across those campuses, but also my own. When the opportunity to put in an expression of interest to be an acting officer was advertised, I applied and my application was accepted!
I have come into the role endeavouring to do the best job that I can, and with the support of the organising team, the Branch Reps across the state, and rank and file members, I am sure that I can succeed in doing so.
I’ll be out visiting branches over the coming term, and I love the fact that this will give me an opportunity to meet my fellow TAFE members. Come to your branch AGM and introduce yourself. I look forward to meeting you all.