Sam Cleveland - Gold Coast Health & Knowledge Precinct

Cohort’s Janine McQueen at the World Economic Forum HQ in Geneva

Cohort Innovation Space Program Manager Janine McQueen’s passion for the planet has springboarded her from the Gold Coast Health and Knowledge Precinct to the world stage.

She presented earlier this year at the World Economic Forum HQ in Geneva, taking a bag of rubbish from Cohort on stage to make her point.

“I don’t think too many people can say they’ve willingly taken trash from their work and flown it 16,000km,” says Janine.

“I wasn’t even sure it was going to get through customs,” she laughs.

The 27-year-old trekked to Switzerland for the annual Global Shapers Summit, a youth-led World Economic Forum initiative focused on local measures to address local environmental and social issues.

She presented to delegates from more than 130 countries on waste management systems; the bag of Cohort rubbish was shown off to illustrate the journey some recyclables take from Australia for offshore processing.

“We don’t have the infrastructure to process certain waste here,” she says. “For another country to be responsible for our waste is crazy—our waste is our resource, our responsibility.”

Janine and the 1,073 containers diverted from landfill through Global Shapers’ Good Karma Project at Griffith University’s Big AMP festival.

A PRODUCT OF THE PRECINCT

While it was certainly Janine’s drive and acumen that took her to the world stage, the people and places of the Gold Coast Health and Knowledge Precinct helped her along the way.

Having earned a 2020 degree in Business and Digital Media from Griffith University with a focus on sustainability, she crossed the Precinct and landed her first graduate job as Community Manager at Cohort.

It was by the coffee machine that Cohort Innovation Space’s COO Ariana Margetts suggested Janine get involved with the Gold Coast Global Shapers Hub, an NFP charity that utilises the co-working space.

“If I hadn’t had coffee with her that day, I wouldn’t have gone to Geneva,” says Janine.

LOCAL MEASURES FOR LOCAL IMPACT

The Good Karma Project, the Gold Coast Global Shapers’ flagship program, is a drink container recycling initiative in partnership with RECAN that collects 10c per container to fund ecology camps, tree planting and lantana clearing in Austinville Valley.

While driving growth for the impact-led local Global Shapers, Janine also began a tandem journey to put her study of sustainable business processes into practice at Cohort Innovation Space.

She successfully pitched a waste separation plan including a worm farm, switched the co-working space to eco-friendly suppliers and strived for B Corp Certification, one of the world’s highest environmental and social impact standards.

Studying and working within GCHKP, Janine says, fostered her desire to make an environmental difference in the Gold Coast community.

“I have been presented so many incredible opportunities right here, like the Griffith BusinessPLUS Program, participating in the National Innovation Games in 2019 and becoming a Griffith Global Mobility Ambassador after studying abroad in Norway and Hong Kong.”

“There’s so much on offer here, I think everyone should be checking out what’s happening in the Precinct!”

Students and faculty from the Queensland Academy for Health Sciences have opened 2023 with a string of national and international wins.

QAHS is based within GCHKP on the south side of Smith Street, where the Precinct anchor institution produces a steady pipeline of emerging STEM innovators.

The selective-entry secondary school delivers the globally recognised IB Diploma Programme, a tertiary preparation curriculum known for its academic rigour.

Already this year, QAHS graduates have representing Australian at the world’s largest high school science competition and senior QAHS leadership spoke at a global education forum.

QAHS students also dominated CSIRO’s CREST research awards, a long-running student science competition where academy students have an outstanding track record.

Principal Vanessa Rebgetz says she and her staff take educating their students “personally”.

“It’s personal to the degree that these students will be the leaders of tomorrow in many fields and their decisions and their humanity will create the future society each of us will live in,” she says.

Students and faculty from the Queensland Academy for Health Sciences have opened 2023 with a string of national and international wins.

QAHS is based within GCHKP on the south side of Smith Street, where the Precinct anchor institution produces a steady pipeline of emerging STEM innovators.

The selective-entry secondary school delivers the globally recognised IB Diploma Programme, a tertiary preparation curriculum known for its academic rigour.

Already this year, QAHS graduates have been selected to represent Australian at the world’s largest high school science competition and senior QAHS leadership spoke at a global education forum.

QAHS students also dominated CSIRO’s CREST research awards, a long-running student science competition where academy students have an outstanding track record.

Principal Vanessa Rebgetz says she and her staff take educating their students “personally”.

QAHS Deputy Principal Alita Lee presenting at the 2023 International Baccalaureate Global Conference 2023 in Adelaide

STUDENT SUCCESS

At the 2023 CREST awards, QAHS students brought home a record 10 gold, 50 silver and two bronze awards.

The result was in no way an anomaly—in the past 14 years, more than one third of the national Gold awards (which require at least 100 hours dedicated to a unique science project) have been given to QAHS students.

“This was a phenomenal achievement,” says Ms Rebgetz, “and recognition of what’s possible when students are supported to exceed their own expectations of themselves.”

A pair of students from QAHS’s 2022 class are also celebrating their selection to the Australian team competing at next month’s International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) in Texas, the world’s largest science competition for high school students.

Stanley Wey and Thien Tran will present their research at ISEF, which brings together students from 80 countries, after their success at the Australian Science and Engineering Fair (AUSSEF).

Stanley’s work compares spectra absorbency between UV-filters, 2-Hydroxy-4- methoxybenzophenone and novel Hydroxyapatite, as well as their impacts on marine ecosystems, while Thien has investigated the adsorption of anionic azo dyes by clay-alginate composite.

The pair are from QAHS’s outstanding class of 2022, which achieved average IB Diploma scores well above the global standard, and 19.3% of students scored at ATAR of 99+ and 69.3% achieved a 90+ ATAR.

QAHS STAFF IN THE SPOTLIGHT

Academy leadership were themselves honoured with a presentation berth at the International Baccalaureate Global Conference 2023 in Adelaide last month. More than 1,100 delegates attended from 342 schools across 34 countries.

Principal Vanessa Rebgetz and Deputy Principal Alita Lee delivered a workshop to delegates titled The power of grit in enabling personal success in the Diploma Programme, where they shared QAHS’s strategic student wellbeing program that honours resilience and persistence.

“Our workshop shared the evolution and practical takeaway strategies of our campus-wide student wellbeing framework we’re now at the three-year mark with,” says Ms Rebgetz.

“The strategy has already improved student academic performance, generated a common language for our learning community and reduced the number of academic behavioural incidents.”

Cohort sustainability star hits the world stage

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