Damien O’Flaherty has a Bachelor of Education and a Diploma of Teaching and is currently registered with the Board of Teacher Registration in Queensland. Together with the great leadership team of instructors, receptionists and administration staff Factor10 is second to none, and with the support of Damien’s sons, Dan and Ryan, both trained in the Martial Arts, Factor10 is clearly a total family who live the martial arts tradition.
Damien has developed extraordinary expertise and specialisation in education, with Damien’s teacher training originally in primary school, however he went on the develop expertise in adult education, teaching for some years before moving into senior management in a number of TAFE Institutes in Queensland. Damien was acting Institute Director for some time at both the Far North Queensland and Bremer Institutes of TAFE.
Our qualifications don’t stop there. It is often commented, however, that what sets Factor10 apart from other martial arts schools is that the programs of classes and activities are born out of sound educational leadership, an organisation strives for excellence whilst being mindful of both child development and adult education principles. As the founder and senior educationalist in the organisation, Damien takes seriously the education needs of all members, including their education in martial arts, health and lifestyle.
Damien comes into his own when noting his Martial Arts qualifications. As a 6th Dan black belt in Taekwondo and 5th Dan black belt in Hapkido, Damien is nowadays recognised internationally as a Master in the ancient Korean Martial Arts. Just as he provided extraordinary educational leadership in his other non martial arts vocations, he turned to martial arts as his full time profession in 1997 when opening Brisbane’s first full time professional Taekwondo and Hapkido school. With international acclaim as “Master O”, Damien more recently became Queensland’s first International Poomsae Referee, and still today Queensland’s first International Referee in sparring to hold dual recognition by the World Taekwondo Federation as an International Referee in the two traditional disciplines of Poomsae and Kyorugi.
Factor10 Martial Arts as an organisation recognises the need to provide a safe and accountable environment. With this in mind, our organisation is 100 per cent compliant with the Office of Child Protection’s requirement for staff and volunteers to hold a Blue Card (Working with Children check). Our staff train every month in updating their industry based First Aid and all instructors are fully accredited with Factor10 strict instructor and leadership accreditation program. Instructors who also coach at state, national and international Olympic style tournament events also hold government recognised coach accreditation that is sport specific to Taekwondo.
