The University of Western Australia has a continual roll call of awards, scholarships and prizes presented to staff and students.

To recognise these achievements, an article is published on the UWA news page on the website and in UWA Forward on the first week of every month. If you know of great awards or achievements across the University please email [email protected]

Name: Emeritus Professor Marcus Atlas AM

Achievement:  Emeritus Professor Marcus Atlas AM won the Alcoa Community Award at The Western Australian of the Year Awards. The honour was in recognition of his global contribution to the field of ear and hearing health. Emeritus Professor Atlas, a UWA graduate (MBBS '82), is director of Ear Science Institute Australia. He has helped turn the not-for-profit organisation into a world-leading ear and hearing medical research institute.

Name: Professor Andrew Whitehouse

Achievement:  Autism researcher Professor Andrew Whitehouse was named Western Australian of the Year in the HBF Professions category. Professor Whitehouse, a UWA graduate (PhD '06), is the Angela Wright Bennett Professor of Autism Research at Telethon Kids and UWA and Director of CliniKids. Professor Whitehouse has generated research advances that have transformed clinical care for the approximately 500,000 Australians on the autism spectrum. He led the development of the first Australian guideline for the diagnosis of autism and, more recently, the first Australian guideline for supporting autistic children.

Name: Dr Iain Grandage

Achievement: Perth Festival Artistic Director Dr Iain Grandage was the recipient of the Woodside Arts and Culture Award at the Western Australian of the Year Awards. The UWA graduate (BMus '94 and DMus '17), was recognised for his vision and a strong commitment to WA’s vibrant arts community. Grandage has been artistic director since 2020 and his term runs to the 2024 Festival. The composer and music director is known for celebrating local and Noongar artists and stories in the Festival’s programs.

Name: Angela Burvill

Achievement: Angela Burvill has been awarded a Davis McCaughey Cambridge Australia Scholarship, which is jointly funded by the Cambridge Trust, Pembroke College and Cambridge Australia Scholarships. Dr Burvill completed a Bachelor of Science in 2017 and a Doctor of Medicine in 2020 at UWA. Cambridge Australia Scholarships, established in the 1980s, is a not-for-profit organisation that provides scholarships for outstanding Australian graduates to undertake Masters and PhD degrees at the University of Cambridge.

Name: Forrest Hall

Achievement:  UWA’s Forrest Hall won an award at the WA Architecture Awards 2023. Forrest Hall by KHA (Kerry Hill Architects) was recognised in the category of Residential Architecture - Houses. Forrest Hall supports the Forrest Research Foundation, which drives research and innovation capacity in Western Australia by awarding fellowships and scholarships to emerging local and international researchers. The building contains 43 self-catered apartments exclusively for Forrest Research Foundation Scholars and Fellows, each equipped with an outdoor terrace or balcony and river views. There is also a multi-purpose room for seminars and functions available for the University community to use.

Name: Dr Anna Waterreus

Achievement: Dr Anna Waterreus, from UWA’s School of Population and Global Health, was a finalist at the 2022 Australian Rotary Health WA Mental Health PhD Awards. Dr Waterreus was recognised for her doctorate ‘The Impact of Cannabis Use on the Outcomes for Men and Women with an Established Psychotic Disorder’. The awards recognise local researchers from universities in Western Australia who have completed an excellent PhD thesis in a mental health field. The selection panel considers how the research makes an outstanding contribution to the understanding and promotion of mental health, or understanding, prevention or treatment of mental illness.

Name: Professor Llandis Barratt-Pugh

Achievement: Honorary Research Fellow Professor Llandis Barratt-Pugh, from UWA's Business School, was presented with the Ray Barker Award for Distinguished National Service to Vocational Education Training Research at the 25th Australasian Vocational Education and Training Research Association (AVETRA) Conference in Melbourne. The award recognises the distinguished long-term and exemplary contributions to VET research in Australasia by AVETRA members. Professor Barratt-Pugh is an inaugural member of the association and in 25 years there have only been five recipients of the award.
Professor Barratt-Pugh is also a member of a AVERTA collaborative research team that received $400,000 in funding from the Victoria Skills Authority.  The project will collate global and national research evidence in a range of strategic areas to advise the Authority on policy development and best practice, as well as Authority staff development. The program will run from 2023 to 2025.

Name: William McDonald

Achievement: William McDonald, a Masters student at UWA and the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR), took out the Astronomical Society of Australia’s Bok Prize 2023 for outstanding research by an Honours student or eligible Masters student. William’s winning entry, titled How dark matter behaves in colliding galaxy clusters, expands our understanding of the dynamics of dark matter by modelling the large-scale separation of dark matter and gas that occurs when clusters of galaxies collide.

Name: International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research

Achievement: The International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR) has been awarded a Gold Pleiades Award for its work in promoting diversity and inclusion initiatives. The Pleiades Awards are issued by IDEA (Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, Astronomy).

Congratulations UWA staff and students.

Image above: Professor Andrew Whitehouse, Emeritus Professor Marcus Atlas AM, Dr Iain Grandage (Credit: Jessica Wyld)