Waikato Earth & Ocean Sciences announce winners
university-of-waikato
Tue Nov 29 2011 13:00:00 GMT+1300 (New Zealand Daylight Time)
Waikato Earth & Ocean Sciences announce winners
Tuesday, 29 November 2011, 12:19 pm
Press Release: University of Waikato
29 November 2011
Waikato Earth & Ocean Sciences announce postgraduate conference winners
Waikato University’s Department of Earth & Ocean Sciences announced three major prize winners at its 2011 postgraduate conference.
The John McCraw prize for best overall presentation went to Tanya O’Neill. John McCraw is the founding chair of Earth Sciences. Tanya’s presentation covered the recovery of the Antarctic soil environment from impacts of visitors.
The conference has been held annually for more than 20 years and showcases a diverse range of student research.
“An ability to communicate research findings effectively has always been an important facet of student training in the department,” says conference convenor Professor David Lowe.
“We ask PhD students and second-year masters students to present short oral papers on their work and the students take the job very seriously by dressing smartly, preparing well and presenting high-quality papers.”
The Michael Selby Prize for Best Overall Oral paper went to Megan Brink whose topic was Vertical and Lateral Variations in the Ongatiti Ignimbrite, Southeast of Te Kuiti. Michael Selby was Waikato University’s first Deputy Vice-chancellor and a staff member of the department.
Stephanie Lee won the PhD oral prize with her study on heat flow in the Southern Taranaki Basin.
Megan, Tanya and Stephanie each received $500 prizes.
Tanya is the inaugural recipient of the Landcare Research Murray Jessen Memorial Doctoral scholarship and has been based at Landcare Research since late 2008 carrying out her PhD. Her research investigates the cumulative impacts and recovery rates of the Antarctic soil environment following human disturbance and she aims to be finishing her thesis next year.
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“I was delighted to win the award because all of the presentations were of a very high standard,” says Tanya. “And to receive it from Professor McCraw himself was a real privilege”.
Prize money sponsors are Emeritus Professors McCraw and Selby, Solid Energy, Waikato Regional Council, Newmont Waihi Gold, SCION, NIWA, Geoscience NZ (Waikato Branch) and local businesses Mark T. Mitchell, Consulting Geotechnical Engineers and Tonkin & Taylor.
“We are delighted to be so well supported by these generous and loyal sponsors in this initiative because the work these students are doing is important and it’s great to have their efforts rewarded,” says Professor Lowe.
The best PhD Poster prize of $300 went to Yu-Tuan Huang with Katherine Liu ($200) runner up. The runner up in the best PhD oral paper was Amir Emami who won $250. Judges special merit awards went to Max Arrowsmith, and Kerri Lannigan. Other winners were Anna Lawless, Josh Mawer, Emma Chibnall and Chris Morcom.
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