The extraordinary efforts of researchers to share their expertise has been acknowledged at the 2021 ECU media awards.
This year ECU researchers have been featured in nearly 8,000 positive media stories around the world, reaching an audience of 9.8 billion.
In addition, ECU’s partnership with The Conversation has continued to grow, with 91 articles by 66 ECU researchers and higher degree by research students published this year.
This record number of articles was the equal highest contribution to The Conversation by Western Australian universities in 2021.
ECU Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research) Professor Caroline Finch congratulated the 2021 winners.
“This incredible group of people have worked tirelessly to help the community make sense of current affairs through high level media and thought leadership pieces,” Professor Finch said.
“This is great for raising ECU’s profile, but even more importantly, academics can make a huge impact on the world around them by sharing their expertise with the media.
“Associate Professor Erin Smith was the very deserving winner of the inaugural award for Outstanding Research Communication at the Vice Chancellor’s Staff Excellence Awards last week.
“She is one of a very talented and driven group of ECU researchers that deserve to be celebrated for their efforts to communicate their expertise.”
The winners of the 2021 ECU Media Awards are:
Conversation Awards
Most prolific author
- Professor Paul Haskell-Dowland from the Security Research Institute in the School of Science with 20 articles in the past 12 months
Most widely read story by an ECU researcher
- Dr Mohiuddin Ahmed from the School of Science for his article ‘New Chia cryptocurrency promises to be greener than Bitcoin, but may drive up hard drive prices’
Best newcomer
- Associate Professor Debra Dudek and PhD candidate Giselle Woodley from the School of Arts and Humanities for their article ‘Netflix’s Sex Education is doing sex education better than most schools’
Media Awards
Outstanding Research Communication (awarded at the Staff awards)
- Associate Professor Erin Smith from the School of Medical and Health Sciences
Highly commended media campaign
- Professor Rob Newton from the Exercise Medicine Research Institute in the School of Medical and Health Sciences for his campaign ‘Cancer breakthrough: Exercise may stop disease in its tracks’
Best media campaign
- Dr Nicola Bondonno from the Institute for Nutrition Research (INR) in the School of Medical and Health Sciences for her campaign ‘Growing evidence that fruit may lower the risk of type 2 diabetes’
Best media campaign by a Higher Degree by Research student
- Simone Radavelli-Bagatini from INR in the School of Medical and Health Sciences for her campaign ‘Eating more fruit and vegetables linked to less stress‘
Highly commended media campaign by a Higher Degree by Research student
- Jean-Michel Maujean from WAAPA for his campaign ‘Birdsong finds rhythm between science and art’
Highly commended expert media commentary
- Dr Rob Davis from the School of Science for his commentary about the NSW mouse plague that contributed to a government ban on the use of a potent poison
Best expert media commentary
- Associate Professor Flavio Romero Macau from the School of Business and Law for global supply chain commentary on a range of issues including the Suez Canal, Chinese ports and the Olympics.
More research insight and thought leadership is available at ECU’s newsroom.
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