AsianScientist (Aug. 12, 2013) – The first Muslim woman to hold office in an Australian parliament has been honoured by the UNSW School of Chemical Engineering at its annual Women in Engineering Awards.
Dr Mehreen Faruqi, an environmental engineer and the newly appointed Greens Member of the NSW Legislative Council, received the Judy Raper Award for Leadership in Engineering.
Dr Faruqi fled her native Pakistan in the early 1990s after the Soviet-Afghan war and moved to Australia with her husband, infant son, and just two suitcases. A civil engineer in Pakistan, she joined UNSW in 1993 as a researcher, and later completed her Masters in Engineering Science and her PhD at the University.
After roles in industry and government, and starting her own consultancy firm, she returned to UNSW as a visiting fellow with the Institute for Environmental Studies and later as an Associate Professor in the Australian School of Business.
Nearly one-third of the staff and 44 percent of undergraduate and postgraduate students at the UNSW School of Chemical Engineering are women.
The awards are named after influential female engineers with strong ties to the School. Professor Judy Raper, the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research) at the University of Wollongong, received her PhD from UNSW and was the founding Director of the Center for Particle and Catalyst Technologies.
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Source: UNSW; Photo: Britta Campion/UNSW.
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