Recognises Old Collegians whose professional or volunteer accomplishments demonstrate a significant positive impact – locally, nationally or internationally. As an inspirational role model, they have made a difference to the lives of others through their dedication in giving back to the community.

Dr June Jones AM biography

This award celebrates achievement in the areas of innovation and entrepreneurship for alumni aged 40 years and younger. It recognises women who are pioneers in their field or fields. The recipient demonstrates trail blazing endeavours across community or professional life and has made her mark on the world through her commitment to furthering the interests of her chosen area of expertise.

Dr Patricia Kailis biography

In 2022, the award was presented to Professor Lennie Barblett AM (1977) in a hybrid pre-recorded presentation as she was unable to attend.

Lennie’s research focusses on curriculum development, pedagogy, and pedagogical leadership for effective early childhood. Embedded in this is her interest in the role digital technologies play in children’s learning, development and wellbeing, educator’s teaching and learning, and the connection and engagement of families.

In 2021, Lennie was named a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for her service to tertiary education and early childhood teaching. In the same year, she was also named winner of Engagement Australia’s Outstanding Engagement for Research Impact. She is also a chief investigator on the Australian Learning Frameworks Update project 2020-2022 and Kindytxt, a digital literacy texting program for families of kindergarten children.

In 2022, the award was presented to Professor Kathryn Holt (1999) and it was graciously accepted by her aunt and past PLC member of Senior Leadership, Jenny Rankin.

Katie is a computational biologist specialising in infectious disease genomics, and a Professor at Monash University and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

Katie has a BA/BSc from UWA majoring in Biochemistry, Applied Statistics and Philosophy, with Honours in Genetics, a PhD in Molecular Biology from the University of Cambridge and the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute on the genomics of typhoid fever, and a Masters in Epidemiology from the University of Melbourne.

Katie runs a computational genomics research group utilising genome sequencing to study the evolution and transmission of bacterial pathogen and hospital associated pathogens. Her lab is particularly interested in the global health crisis of multidrug resistant pathogens, and human and environmental microbiomes and their role in chronic disease, infectious disease, and horizontal gene transfer. They develop bioinformatics software when needed, including laboratory and computational methods for nanopore sequencing.

The winner of the Dr June Jones Award, which recognises an Old Collegian whose accomplishments demonstrate a significant, positive impact – locally, nationally or internationally, is an inspirational role model and has made a difference to the lives of others through their dedication in giving back to the community, is Diana deVos-Beck OAM (1960).

Diana has been heavily involved in the dance and ballet community locally and internationally. Diana has been the Principal Dancer with the West Australian Ballet (1962) and the Kalinka Dance Company (1972) and has danced with the Northside Ballet Company in Sydney (1972).

Diana created and ran the Diana deVos School of Ballet in New South Wales. In 1978, Diana passed the RAD Advanced Teachers Certificate examination and became a founding member of the Royal Academy of Dance Advisory panel of WA in 1982. She then in from 1997-99 was the chairperson of this panel and was the recipient of the Royal Academy of Dance President’s award in 2012.

In 1997, Diana co-founded the Terpsichore Dance Centre (TDC); a full-time dance school affiliated with the Northlake Senior High School to enable students to complete academic studies to TEE (HSC) level. Then, Diana became a lecturer of Dance at the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts (WAAPA) from 1999-2008.

Diana presented at the 26th Annual International Conference of the Association for Dance Medicine and Science in 2016 in Hong Kong where she presented on “The Role of Health in the Development of Classical Ballet in W.A. 1950 to 2016”.

In 2015, Diana was awarded the Order of Australia Medal (OAM) for Services to the Performing Arts and in  2017, she was awarded a Fellowship of the Royal Academy of Dance.

The winner of the Dr Patricia Kailis Award, which celebrates achievement in the areas of innovation and entrepreneurship for alumni aged 40 years and younger, was Kendall Whyte (2010).

Kendall is the 2021 recipient of the WA Young Australian of the Year for her work in the establishment of the Blue Tree Project.

Driven by the suicide of her brother, Kendall started the Blue Tree Project to reduce the stigma of mental illness.

Blue trees can now be spotted throughout Western Australia and indeed, Australia. A former PLC boarder, her work is helping thousands of people to understand mental illness and prevent suicide.

The inaugural award was presented to Donna Shepherd AM (1980).

Ms Shepherd is the Chair of the Board of Directors of World Vision International and the Managing Director of Creating Communities Australia.

She is a humanitarian, entrepreneur, and consultant. Her passion for social justice saw her move into international development, working with El Taller in Tunisia and lecturing in international development in masters programmes in the United States, Ecuador, and Australia.

At World Vision, Ms Shepherd launched the ‘It takes a world to end violence against children’ campaign in Addis Ababa in 2017.

In 2020 she was made a Member of the Order of Australia for her significant service to children through international humanitarian aid organisations.

The inaugural award was presented to Tasmin Venter (2008).

Ms Venter joined Shell as a graduate engineer and has been a trailblazer for women in engineering at the company.

Her role has taken her across the world and in the past few years she has worked on the Prelude FLNG, the first project of its kind to develop the world’s largest floating structure and the first floating LNG vessel.

Ms Venter’s most recent position as Reliability Engineer requires creativity and innovation for the FLNG, one of the most challenging oil and gas assets in the world.