New Zealand Army officer Second Lieutenant Paul Cocker has earned two significant awards across the Tasman.

He has won the Student of Merit Award for the Royal Australian Signals Regimental Officers Basic Course and also the Lieutenant Colonel J P O'Brien Award for all-round performance.

A total of 34 students, including four New Zealanders, attended the three and a half month long course at the Defence Force School of Signals at Simpson Barracks, Macleod, Melbourne. The course covered the physics and technical theory behind radio and the technology behind radio waves and digital circuits.

"This was the first time a kiwi had won the award against the Aussie's. We had won the advanced course before but no one had ever topped the basic course," says 2LT Cocker.

"I was pretty surprised really. I thought one or two of the other guys would have got the academic one. I certainly didn't think I'd get both of them, so I was pretty pleased."

"We were taught how signals relate to the rest of the army and how it's employed in a tactical environment. We finished with a three-week field phase, where we got a turn as the commander of a detachment based at Puckapunyal."

Second Lieutenant Cocker says that after attending university he was inspired to join the military after hearing the war stories of a friend who was with the Air Force. He has been with the New Zealand Army for about four and a half years and is now Troop Commander of 22 Information Systems.

"I did my training at Waiouru then was posted to Burnham for three years. I was posted to Afghanistan for six months in 2005 and then last year was back in Waiouru at OCS before joining the 2nd Signal Squadron at Linton. For me, I like the fact it's always a different job every day. There is always variety and always new things to do."