"Growing up in an outdoors town and choosing Outdoor Education at school prepared me well for the physical and mental demands of working in a field environment." - Daniel Glanfield (class of 2018)

"I joined the New Zealand Army in February 2019, completing the four-month recruit course in June. I joined as an Armourer, which is a workshop trade within the Royal New Zealand Army Logistic Regiment. 

After basic training, I attended the Nelson Marlborough Institute of Technology (NMIT) in Blenheim for nine months, staying at the Air Force Base Woodbourne, where I completed a Level 3 qualification in Mechanical Engineering. I then moved to Trentham, Wellington to complete the Basic Armourers Course, where I learnt to repair small arms, including pistols, rifles, shotguns, light machine guns, and basic grenade and rocket launchers. After that, I was posted to Linton (Palmerston North) to continue developing my skills. Over the next three years, I moved between Linton and Trentham to complete two more armourers courses focused on sectional weapons. These included larger machine guns, mortars, more complex grenade machine guns, the 25 mm cannon used on our Light Armoured Vehicles (LAVs), and the 105 mm L119 Light Gun. One of the unique parts of the apprenticeship is that we get to fire every weapon we repair. This is unique, as most soldiers will only have the opportunity to fire four or five of the different weapon systems used by the New Zealand Army. During this time, I also completed a Level 4 qualification in Mechanical Engineering.

I was then lucky enough to be deployed to Antarctica for three weeks to assist with the annual offload of stores and equipment. For the

past two and a half years, I have been posted to 16 Field Regiment in Linton, where I service and repair the L119 Light Gun and 81 mm mortar systems. During this posting, I had the opportunity to assist on a training exercise in Papua New Guinea, where I completed jungle survival training and won the fastest time through an obstacle course and to light a fire with only sticks. My time was 5 minutes, and the next closest was 22 minutes.

I have also been selected for the New Zealand Army Football Team over the past two years and have attended multiple competitions throughout the North Island of New Zealand. Last year, I travelled to Sydney, Australia, to compete against the Australian Army, Royal Australian Air Force, and Royal Australian Navy football teams.

I decided to join the Army after the Defence Careers recruiters visited Wakatipu High School and after attending a Defence Careers Experience Week at Burnham during Year 12. Growing up in an outdoors town and choosing Outdoor Education at school prepared me well for the physical and mental demands of working in a field environment. I also developed valuable leadership skills while assisting at branches during Year 13. Mr. Mac was also a huge influence and a great mentor throughout my time in Outdoor Education classes and on school camps.

I believe Wakatipu High School's values closely align with the New Zealand Army's core values of Courage, Commitment, Comradeship, and Integrity. I think the lessons I learnt at Wakatipu helped me understand and demonstrate these values more quickly than many of my peers when I joined the Army."

Daniel Glanfield in Antartica.

Regionals match between NZDF and NZA.

Survival skills training in Papua New Guinea.

Glanfield servicing mortars.