Great Scot December 2019 Great Scot 158_December_ONLINE | Page 81

LEFT TO RIGHT: CAMERON FORBES (’99), CHRIS KOHLER (’06), OLIVER SZYMANSKI (’10), MICHAEL FILIUS (’10), TOM JARMAN (’11)
1990s
On leaving school, JASON ANDREW (’90)
completed a Masters in International Studies
at Sydney University, where he also played
first grade rugby and was selected in various
representative teams. He has now been in the
financial services industry for over 20 years,
and recently sold his business to an overseas
listed company. He founded a financial
technology start-up, developing the first block
chain financial platform of its kind in Australia.
In 2010 Jason completed an Executive
MBA with IE Business School in Spain, and
has undertaken various executive education
courses at Stanford, Cambridge and Hong
Kong Universities. He serves on the board
of Life Education Victoria, and is the current
President of Power House Junior Rugby. A
huge rugby union fan, earlier this year Jason
took his family to Japan for the Rugby World
Cup (his sixth World Cup). He currently lives in
Williamstown with his wife Katrina and three
children, Maximus (aged 11, who will start in
Year 7 at Scotch in 2020), and twins Austin and
Celeste (nine years old).
ROB ASHTON (‘97) and his wife Eliza have
welcomed a son, Balthazar Charles Ashton,
born on 7 September 2019; a brother to Tiger
and Axel.
CAMERON FORBES (‘99) is a Special
Counsel at law firm Clayton Utz. Cameron has
been very active in the legal profession, recently
serving as Young Lawyers’ President of the
Law Institute Victoria, and also serving a three-
year term as a Director of the Law Institute
Victoria. Cameron and his wife Catherine were
married in the Littlejohn Chapel at Scotch in
November 2017, with many Old Boys in the
congregation. Their son, Jacob, was born in
June 2017, and is booked to attend Scotch.
Cameron also maintains his connections
to Scotch College Perth and Scots College
Sydney, both of which he attended prior to
finishing his schooling at Scotch College
Melbourne, when his father’s job changed.
2000s
CHRIS KOHLER (’06) is a co-host with
Shelley Craft of Your Domain, a Saturday
morning real estate program on Channel
9, launched in September. Among many
business-related appointments, Chris was
formerly a business reporter for The Australian,
and he has been business editor at Domain,
a presenter on Foxtel’s Your Money and Sky
News, and he is currently a property and
business news reporter on Channel 9. Chris
comes from a sound journalistic background:
his father, Alan, is a finance presenter on ABC
TV and a former Editor of The Age, and his
mother, Deborah Forster, is a journalist and
author.
After leaving Scotch OLIVER SZYMANSKI
(‘10) enrolled in a History/Criminology major
at Monash University. He finished his double
bachelor degrees in 2015, having twice
lived in London during this period. While in
London Oliver played competitive soccer,
which has become an important part of his life
since leaving Scotch. Travel has also figured
prominently in Oliver’s post-Scotch life. As
well as his two periods in London, Oliver lived
in New York, where he completed 200 hours
of yoga teacher training, which he describes
as one of the highlights of the past few years.
He followed up his History studies with a
Biomedicine course at Deakin University and
also achieved Chartered Financial Analyst
credentials.
But none of these disciplines really captured
Oliver. He told Great Scot he has now found his
true love and passion in Psychology, which he
is studying at Monash University, with the aim
of becoming a clinical psychologist.
Post-school, MICHAEL FILIUS (’10)
worked as a Resident Academic Tutor in
McMeckan House at Scotch while studying
Arts/Commerce at Deakin University, majoring
in Indonesian language. Michael’s knowledge
of the Indonesian language helped while he
explored Asia, and he eventually landed a
job in Hong Kong, starting in the toy industry,
managing sales and distribution. Frequent
world travel for his work left Michael wondering
– where to next? After three years in Hong
Kong he was offered the opportunity of a
lifetime to launch a new telco, Virgin Mobile
UAE, in Dubai, and that’s where he’s now
based.
Michael has continued playing football since
leaving school, first with Old Scotch, then with
the Hong Kong Dragons and now in the AFL
Middle East for the Dubai Dragons, joined by
a number of Old Boys. As he says, no matter
where you go in the world, you can’t escape
the Scotchies. Michael married his beautiful
Italian wife Giulia in Tuscany during September.
Scotch has another Australian team
representative: congratulations to TOM
JARMAN (’11), who was a member of the
Australian team which competed at the World
Fly Fishing Championships in Tasmania (30
November to 8 December). Tasmania has a
wild population of both rainbow and brown
trout, which gave Tom and his teammates plenty
of challenges as they took on the world in this
major annual event.
www.scotch.vic.edu.au Great Scot
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