A former Charles Darwin University student has taken out a major training award in Western Australia.
Dr Michael Cheah, who completed his doctorate in marine science at CDU under Professor David Parry, has won the WA Education Department’s Trainer of the Year award.
Dr Cheah is a lecturer in marine science and aquaculture who now teaches at the Central West TAFE in the northern coastal town of Geraldton.
Last year he was highly commended for his skills as a lecturer in the WA Premier’s Teacher of the Year award and clinched the TAFE award this year for his work with students in enhancing their training opportunities in aquaculture.
His students have benefited from his efforts in finding them work placements in the local fishing industries, particularly with silver perch, marron and yabby farming.
Dr Cheah moved to Geraldton in 1996 to help drive aquaculture training in the coastal town and now works from a new $12 million centre called the Batavia Coast Maritime Institute that combines training with research into fishing and aquaculture.
The institute also possesses a $1.5 million training and research vessel with facilities for pearl oyster seeding.
A measure of Dr Cheah’s success as a trainer is that one of his students, Johanna Swoboda, was awarded the Vocational Student of the Year award at the same ceremony in Perth.
Originally from Malaysia, Dr Cheah completed his first degree at the University of Science in Malaysia in 1975 and went to the United States to undertake a Masters’ degree at Auburn University in Alabama.
When it came time to study for his doctorate in 1993, Dr Cheah chose Charles Darwin University (then Northern Territory University) because, he says, its new marine research facilities and staff were highly regarded. He graduated in 1996.
‘The staff were very supportive and I enjoyed my studies under my supervisors Dr David Parry, Sue Renard and Dr Chan Lee,’ he says.
Dr Cheah also won the University Post-Graduate Research School scholarship while at CDU, and lectured part-time in marine science.
‘I am most appreciative of the support CDU gave me in many different ways during my time there,’ he says.