 He graduated from Georgia Southern University in 1989 with a degree in anthropology/archaeology and a minor in geology.He undertook doctoral studies in palaeoanthropology at the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) in South Africa under Professor Phillip Tobias, focusing his research on the shoulder girdle of early hominins; he graduated in 1994.In 1991, he began his long term work at the Gladysvale site.