Alumni Focus
A whale of a time
As a young girl growing up on a farm outside Canberra, with family trips to the South Coast her only connection to the sea, Dr Vanessa Pirotta dreamed of one day working with whales. A Masters and PhD in Biological Science from Macquarie University later, marine biologist Dr Pirotta has well and truly exceeded her childhood ambitions. Still, at the heart of her research, her pursuit of innovativ...
Third-culture kid
Who is Andrew Nip? It’s a good question, and one he’s spent a long time trying to understand. Having spent his formative years between Hong Kong and Australia, Andrew says he identifies as both Chinese and Australian. After completing a combined Bachelor of Arts (Psychology) and Bachelor of Human Resource Management at MQ, he moved to Shanghai, where he is thriving in what he calls the middle ...
Citizen of the world
Wasin Praditsilp graduated from MQ in 2019 with a PhD in International Communication. But that doesn’t begin to cover his research into soft power and how a country like Thailand can harness its gentler attributes when influencing other nations, or how Wasin’s decision to enrol at MQ would be a driving factor in connecting Thais studying in Australia … Speaking with MQ alu...
Moving mountains
MQ Sports Ambassador and semi-professional tennis player Joya Nicolas dreams of competing in the French Open. The clay surface, the crowds, the competition; she’s preparing for it all. But she’s also preparing for life beyond the court with a Bachelor of Psychology, bringing in her love of art therapy, listening to people’s stories and building connections. Now at the end of her degree, one ...
Owning (hi)story
There’s no doubt the world of work has changed. Obviously, more of us are working from home, but there’s another significant shift that is much more subtle. Who we are as a person, our background and our values, is not only enriching the work we do, it’s having an impact on the world around us and how we see ourselves as a society. For Craig Middleton – who credits being able to follo...
Together we rise
There’s always more to a story than first meets the eye. Assistant Principal and MQ Bachelor of Education alum Stephanie Salazar recently came to the public’s attention for winning a Commonwealth Bank Teaching Award, with a feature in the Sydney Morning Herald and airtime on ABC Sydney to boot. Few people work in isolation, however, especially in teaching, and Stephanie is keen to acknowle...