For NAIDOC Week, we would like to share profiles of Indigenous engineers and their work.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people represent 2.5 per cent of the Australian population, but just 0.5 per cent of total engineering students.
Brendon McNiven, a structural engineer and Principal at Arup, who chairs the Victorian Indigenous Engineering Winter School (VIEWS) believes there are compelling reasons for increasing the number of Indigenous engineers.
“As a country, we need to continue to address reconciliation and reinforce that engineering as a profession is behind other professions, like the medical profession, which is getting close to population parity.”
“Engineering is about problem solving and creativity. At the moment we have mostly westernbased perspectives. Having engineers with other perspectives will open our eyes to different knowledge systems, increase the diversity of inputs, produce stronger solutions and give us additional ways to approach complex problems.”
One of the most successful education initiatives designed to encourage Indigenous students to study engineering is the Indigenous Australian Engineering Summer School (IAESS). The school was established by Engineering Aid and has been running for 20 years.
Grant Maher from the Gumbaynggirr mob on the North Coast of NSW attended the first IAESS at the University of Sydney and is the inaugural chair of the Indigenous Engineers Group supported by Engineers Australia.
He now works as a Senior Façade Engineer at Inhabit and says, “The key to getting more Indigenous people interested and involved in engineering is getting them to broaden their horizons about what engineering is and what you can achieve.
Being an engineer, you can help yourself, your family and your community through numerous pathways such as improving housing, developing schools, designing water treatment plants or other infrastructure projects. Getting people to understand that will start driving the numbers and getting them wanting to be involved.”
His comments are echoed by Dennis Jose, a Wanyurr man from the Yidinyji Nation in Far North Queensland. Jose is a civil engineer with a masters in environmental engineering and owner of Jabin Project Management – a 100 per cent Indigenous company that provides infrastructure services to remote communities.
“We have to get better at promoting engineering. Following a path is easier if somebody has walked it before. I want to be that pathway and show Indigenous children that engineering can be a rewarding career.”
Maher is planning to launch the Indigenous Engineers Group at the Australian Engineering Conference in Brisbane in November and hopes it will create a support network for Indigenous engineers and encourage more Indigenous people to enter the profession.
“Indigenous people are connected to community, they have a social responsibility and are connected to the land. Having that bond and wanting to help on a more global scale than just doing something to help themselves is what makes a really good engineer.”