Celebrating our values in action

This year's Swinburne Vice-Chancellor's Awards recognised and celebrated the remarkable contributions of individuals and teams that are bringing the university’s new values of One Swinburne, Future-focused, Engaged, Accountable and Empowered to life.  

The 10 award categories recognise excellence across Swinburne’s teaching, research and professional areas.

Speaking of the award winners, Swinburne Vice-Chancellor and President, Professor Pascale Quester said, “These are the people who have gone above and beyond the realms of their roles, putting the collective success of the university first, and paving the way for the new and different type of university we want to be.”

The 2022 winners are as follows:

Vice-Chancellor’s Teaching Excellence Award (Vocational Education)

Individual: Sally Allen-Beyer

Sally led the design and development of the Diploma of Justice blended delivery model – a model that reflects the changing needs of students to support their overall success.

Vice-Chancellor’s Teaching Excellence Award (Higher Education)

Individual: Paul Hernandez Martinez

Paul is recognised for excellence and innovative teaching practices by using storytelling and a unique meta-narrative to motivate and engage mathematics students.

Vice-Chancellor’s Research Excellence Award

Individual: Qiang He

Qiang He receives the excellence in research award for pioneering the world's research on enabling fast, resilient and secure 5G applications for software vendors.

Team: Crushed But Okay – Kath Albury, Anthony McCosker, Dan Golding, Angus Veitch, Joanna Williams

Crushed But Okay is a world-first social media campaign targeting heterosexual men with the goal of modelling respectful online interactions related to intimacy, crushes and relationships.

Vice-Chancellor’s Research Excellence Award (Early Career)

Individual: Sara Webb

Sara’s work and early career research is both multi-faceted and exciting, demonstrating a high level of excellence in her first year as a postdoctoral research fellow. She contributes to the fields of astrophysics, space science, human-machine learning, education and communication.

Vice-Chancellor’s Reconciliation Award

Individual: Sadie Heckenberg

Sadie is an inclusive leader, outstanding researcher and is recognised for her commitment and excellence in leading the Indigenous Research Strategy implementation across Swinburne.

Team: Launch of Co-Ground Swinburne, our Social Enterprise Café supporting indigenous outcomes – Rhiannon Jones; Vince Persi; Yolanda Wosny; Max Halden; Sarah Gates; Simone Hamlin; Sadie Heckenberg; Vicky Peters; Dean Licciardo; Petrina Davidson

A resilient, committed and truly collaborative team who overcame lockdowns, countless obstacles, and three years of setbacks to successfully launch Co-Ground Swinburne, our new social enterprise café located in the newly named Yirrwinbu space at the Hawthorn campus, in July 2022.

Vice-Chancellor’s One Swinburne Award

Individual: Carolyn Beasley

Carolyn achieves beyond her role of Academic Director, Research Training in the School of Social Science, Media, Film and Education (SSMFE) by continuously striving to improve the higher degree by research (HDR) student experience.

Team: Swinburne Sarawak’s Inaugural Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) Week 2022 – Ai Ling Choo; Chiu Mei, Esther Lo; Ee Sia; Elammaran Jayamani; Emily George Jimbai; Hadi Nabipour Afrouzi; Hieng Tiong Su; Hui Kian, Audrey Chong; Jeremiah Idek Angking; Jiuan Jing Chew; Lee Tung, Daniel Tan; Md Bazlul Mobin Siddique; Ming Ha Lee; Nee Shin, Victor Bong; Nurlida Mohamad Salleh; Ping Ping Chung; Richard Belanda Dagang; San Chuin, Angelia Liew; Yee Lee, Elaine Yeu; Yiing Chee Tan; Christina Amanda Chueh Ping Yin; Fei Siang Tay

This week-long event was the first-of-its-kind in Sarawak, bringing together stakeholders from government, community and industry to share knowledge, build partnerships and engage in technical-level discussions on sustainable development.

Vice-Chancellor’s Future-Focused Award

Individual: John McCormick

John’s research is the definition of future-focused. Through his diverse skills, he has collaborated across multiple research domains including the creative arts, medical technology, energy, climate futures and the emerging metaverse – and many more.

Team: mDetect: Commercialising Swinburne disruptive scanning technology for safety and survey - Jerome Donovan; Craig Webster; Eryadi Masli; Alan Duffy; Shanti Krishnan (mDetect: Commercialising Swinburne disruptive scanning technology for safety and survey)

mDetect is a spin-out company from Swinburne responsible for ground-breaking research that uses particles from space to help mining companies scan dam walls that safely store highly toxic mining waste by-products.

Vice-Chancellor’s Engaged Award

Individual: Liz Clapp

Placement Coordinator Liz embodies the value of Engaged through her delivery of a key partnership engagement strategy that directly addressed the significant challenges faced by the early childhood education sector in the aftermath of COVID-19.

Team: Sovereign Advanced Manufacturing Industry Capability Development – Debbie Lim Oh; Lisa MacKinney; Sanjida Topa; Adriana Mare; Roleen Sharma; Jenny Bungur; Ros Hore; Sharad Menon; Dong Ruan; Krishnamurthy Prasad; Md Morshed Alam; Nathan Edwards; Novana Hutasoit; Rizwan Abdul Rahman Rashid; Xiaodong Huang; Enzo Palombo; Yong-Bin Kang; Katia Wilson; Kirandeep Dhillon; Rose Firkin; Siew-Queen Chin; Nishar Hameed; Suresh Palanisamy; Syed Masood; Muhammad Awais Javed; Scott Wade; Prem Prakash Jayaraman; Walter Chetcuti; Girish Thipperudrappa; Krys Stachowicz; Michael Culton

This diverse team of research staff and HDR students have been delivering research solutions ranging from materials processing to advanced manufacturing and industry 4.0, successfully securing more than $7 million in research funds for the university in the past decade.

Vice-Chancellor’s Empowered Award

Individual: Tobias Blackwood

Tobias felt empowered to find a solution to a curriculum problem that would ultimately increase academic readiness for students studying the Diploma of Design (UniLink) and progressing to the Bachelor of Design.

Team: Empowering the Next Gen via Space Station Experimentation – Rebecca Alfred; Caitlin Ingham; Kim Ellis Hayes; Sara Webb; Huseyin Sumer; Rebecca Allen; Virginia Kilborn

The Swinburne Youth Space Innovation Challenge is an original and innovative program that brings together our own Swinburne researchers and students, with high school students from across Australia to empower and inspire the next generation of space scientists.

Vice-Chancellor’s Accountable Award

Team: Program Outcome Assessment System leading to Engineering Full Professional Accreditation (Sarawak) – Charlie Chin Voon Sia; Chean Hung Lai; Elizabeth Eu Mee Chong; Esther Chiu Mei Lo; Hieng Tiong Su; Hong Siang Chua; Jia Chi Lai; Jiuan Jing Chew; Jubaer Ahmed; King Kuok Kuok; Kok Heng Soon; Kwan Yong Sim; Lawrence Sii Ying Ting; Lisa Yong; Ming Ha Lee; Pui Ching Chai; Ting Soon Ling; Lock Hei Ngu

This team of committed and accountable staff from Swinburne Sarawak led a five-year project that ultimately resulted in achieving full professional accreditation for the first time for all engineering courses delivered at Sarawak from the Engineering Accreditation Council Malaysia.