Humanitarian engineering starts at home
In his March column for Engineers Australia, National President Merv Lindsay has highlighted the need to “better engage Indigenous Australians in the practice of engineering.”
He cites statistics that there are 153 Indigenous doctors, but only about 20 Indigenous graduate engineers.
As part of the Year of Humanitarian Engineering, Lindsay said Engineers Australia has committed to a Reconciliation Action Plan (RAP). He said it “recognises reconciliation is part of our Corporate Social Responsibility and that we, as an organisation, can make a difference.”
Lindsay said the organisation was now in the process of defining “achievable RAP commitments”.
One commitment will be supporting the Indigenous Australian Engineering Summer School, funded by Engineering Aid Australia. The scheme sees 20 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students from years 10, 11 and 12 hosted by universities in NSW, and now, also WA.
“Through the connections I have made with Indigenous Australians over the past few months, I am discovering that I can make a difference and, if enough of us make that discovery, the bricks will become a wall, and the walls become a building,” said Lindsay.
Read the full story in the March issue of Engineers Australia, out now.
