Industry Engagement

Centre Engagement, Outreach. Mentorship and Training

The Centre is involved with wide-ranging engagement, outreach and training/​mentoring activities tied to delivering on our vision, mission and objectives. An overview and examples of each follow. 

Engagement

Engagement refers to the Centre’s collaborative efforts with industry and others, which includes significant Centre-orchestrated and organised events. Further, we have a growing base of Centre followers and advocates on our Social Media channels. 

Learn more about our work and major events in our Annual Reports, or join our growing community on LinkedIn (www​.linkedin​.com/​c​o​m​p​a​n​y​/​c​o​e​m​i​n​e​rals/), Twitter (X) (twit​ter​.com/​C​O​E​M​i​n​erals) or Email us (info@​coeminerals.​org.​au)

Outreach

Centre outreach supports Objective 4 of Centre’s strategic Plan: to establish a positive impact of COEMinerals with the community’. As such, outreach activities are an integral part of life at COEMinerals and they take many forms such as public speaking/​lectures, visits to schools, University open days, expos, STEM activities, sponsorship, guest speakers, industry association and community engagement, media and blog coverage of Centre activities and many more. 

In 2023, COEMinerals PhD and ECRs embraced wide raning community outreach, particularly with school-aged children in support of STEM learning. Key activities include the Centre’s two educational outreach programs: Minerals Magic – hands on primary and high school minerals-science which is a hands-on activity that helps demonstrate the importance and challenges involved with improving mineral processing Science and Engineering Challenge – activity development for primary and high schools

Centre outreach provides the opportunity to spark curiosity, and to challenge, question and learn from others. The Centre’s PhDs & ECRs gain professional development opportunities during the planning, preparation, roll-out and interactions through outreach activities and events and as they role model and advocate for student and community participation in STEM topics, subjects and careers. 

Through Centre outreach, the community and industry gain insights into the importance of minerals, and mineral processing, for society and the move to cleaner energy technologies, aling with an introduction to the science behind the Centre’s groundbreaking research and invention.

Currently, the Centre’s two main educational outreach programs are:
1. Minerals Magic – hands on primary and high school minerals-science which is a hands-on activity that helps demonstrate the importance and challenges involved with improving mineral processing
2. Science and Engineering Challenge – activity development for primary and high schools

1. Minerals Magic

The COEMinerals’ School Outreach Team’ — comprising PhDs and two ECRs representing multiple Centre-nodes and supervised by A/​Prof Elham Doroodchi, Centre Chief Investigator (UON) – is creating Science Kits’ for school outreach, as part of a multi-year activity that began in mid-2021

Following a trial in 2022, a train-the trainer workshop of the Centre’s educational program Minerals Magic’ outreach was conducted by the Minerals Magic School Educational Outreach Team during the COEMinerals Annual Conference in 2023. This enabled other node members to implement the activity and by end of 2023 to more than 800 primary and high school-aged students, who are now inducted’ to Minerals Magic. With a hands-on approach, workshop attendees take part in science experiments that utilise ingredients and items that can be purchased at low cost or found in many homes, including coffee and chickpeas. Desktop experiments such as the Minerals Magic activities showcase mineral processing fundamentals and raises the awareness of why minerals matter for our future’. It also introduces the Centre’s research, which is helping to make the minerals sector more efficient and sustainable. Depending on location and format, these events are sometimes supported by lab tours.

Member overview and comment on Minerals Magic outreach activities:
PhDs Matthias Orchard and Yang (Sabrina) Yang and Jessica Li (UoA)
coordinated and delivered a COEMinerals outreach program as a Mining and Extraction’ activity for years 9 and 10 students on Energy, Mining, and Resources at University of Adelaide in 2023, demonstrating mineral processing fundamentals and encouraging STEM studies PhD Jessica Li, (UoA) shared that they delivered a
sorting challenge: desliming mineral grades using: flour, cocoa powder, skittles, sprinkles Coarse Particle Flotation concept: students can visualise how bubbles attach to chickpeas and pop up and down, and the difference between cooked and uncooked chickpeas (akin to what happens in mineral processing) using sparking water, a spoon and a transparent cup; and a fine particle flotation concept challenge: similar to above, but with higher complexity, and using coffee grinds and sand with an effervescent tablet in water

PhD Margaret Amosah (UON) shared:
As a member of the COEMinerals Outreach Team, I had the privilege of conducting engaging Minerals Magic experiments for high school students during UON Children’s University’. The experience not only helped me enhance my communication skills but also provided valuable insights from the intellectually curious minds of the school students. The best part for me was seeing the surprise and excitement on the students’ faces during the experiments. They asked a bunch of questions, showing they were really into it. Understanding STEM is crucial, and through outreach we can explain engineering to students in ways they can easily understand. I have observed how helpful these outreach events are because I have witnessed students appreciate them and ask questions that show they want to know more about engineering. My experience with outreach has been a lot of fun. Beyond imparting engineering insights to students, these experiences offer a valuable opportunity for me to develop essential soft skills, step outside the confines of the lab, and embrace a more relaxed and enjoyable side of professional engagement.“

PhD Syam Murali Mohan (UON) shared:
Delivering Minerals Magic to primary and high school students was definitely an eye-opening experience. I had to learn how to communicate complex scientific ideas to students in an understandable and digestible way in order to keep them continuously engaged in the topic. There is particularly a very notable difference in communicating the same scientific concepts of mineral processing to primary vs high school students! Seeing the students make the connection between the experiments they did at a desk and the real-world mineral processing concepts of froth flotation was extremely rewarding, and I wish that I had been taught more applied scientific concepts back in my home country of Malaysia! Teaching students about STEM concepts is extremely important as they make up the future workforce that would lead the world to improved technological innovations. Specifically in terms of mineral processing, this outreach engagement may inspire some students to build a career in the minerals industry which is currently experiencing a decline. An increased influx of workforce in the minerals industry will support the extraction of critical minerals essential for constructing renewable technologies, vital for addressing climate change impacts for current and future generations.”

2. Science and Engineering Challenge

Supporting a national STEM outreach program, there are three COEMinerals teams developing games for the Science and Engineering Challenge (SEC) as part of a Centre working group, lead by COEMinerals CI Prof Mohsen Yahyaei (UQ)

The teams moved from concept to prototype in 2023 for 2 x science and engineering challenges associated with filtration and size classification, as well as conceptualising another game based on a flotation challenge. All three games have been designed to have various levels of complexity, making them suitable for primary and high school students. They can also be complex enough for national competitions, according to the school outreach program managers at UNSW.
A Particle Sieving Game’ prototype will be ready for wider testing at the next COEMinerals conference. The game team’ consists of PhDs Syamsundar Menon and Virat Gurung (UON). The conceptual design of two other games has been completed by a Water Filtration Game Team, consisting of PhDs Daniel Dodoo and Azeez Aregbe, as well as Dr Eirini Goudeli (UOM). The Separation of Hydrophobic Materials game team consists of PhD Candice Brill (UQ) and ECR Dr Lucia Dzinza (UQ).

Signature Lecture Series

Coordinated by Centre Chief Investigator Professor George Franks (UOM), invited eminent scientists or industrialists from around the globe join COEMinerals team members to deliver a topic update via the Centre’s prestigious Signature Lecture Series. These lectures enable Centre members and other interested parties to join a video-call presentation to learn from and engage with research and industry experts from Australia and around the world. Speakers are well-respected and internationally acclaimed. They each explore a topic relating to modern mineral processing, spanning the technical to the philosophical, as well as incorporating community insights and providing context to wider challenges in solving aspects associated with creating sustainable change and circular economy. In this friendly forum, speakers tend

to share their personal views and spur curiosity, questions and new ideas from attendees. Signature Series lectures are shared with our wider community here.

Training and Mentoring

Training and Mentoring are core to Centre activities, ensuring our ECR & PhD members have opportunities to be engaged in wide ranging personal and professional development and growth opportunities over the course of their time with the Centre, and as they are upskilled and trained to be future sector leaders. The Centre aims to provide outstanding developmental experience for its members to equip them with the skills and knowledge beneficial to their growth as persons and professionals, and to inspire, by exemplifying what a career in research can be and thus produce a model for future endeavours”.

The Future Leaders (training) Program

This program incorporates tailored training plans for PhDs and ECRs along with all-member learning and skill-building opportunities. A key objective of the program is to ensure COEMinerals PhDs and ECRs have the opportunity to gain professional development and personal growth over the course of their tenure within the Centre of specific relevance to their growth as a person and to their career stage. Our overall aim is to ensure they are trained as a new generation of research, STEM & minerals sector leaders. The training plans cover the following categories:

  • Mentoring
  • Academic Development
  • Professional Skills
  • Other (incorporating technical, innovation/​commercialisation, etc)

In 2023, the Future Leaders Program (FLP) initiative continued with a focus on various aspects of academic development, professional skills and
technical proficiency. We seamlessly integrated online workshops with face-to-face training sessions during our COEMinerals Annual Conference. Several CIs delivered technical training sessions tailored to their areas of expertise in particular in the areas of process control, design and synthesis of peptides and proteins and RAFT polymerisation:
From basic to advanced. Feedback from FLC, saw us deliver training called Mineral Processing 102’. The course introduced participants into fundamentals and applied areas of
mineral processing. The course was delivered by Dr Simon Iveson (UON) over a 1 year period.

Mentoring

Training and mentoring is a key focus of the Centre. In 2023, mentoring took on a twist with a focus on job application process which included resume writing for both industry and academic fields. The session included tailored advice from a panel of HR expert, industry and academia who answered questions from the Future Leaders relating to interview and resume writing. In addition, at the annual conference we held an industry mentoring panel session featuring technical experts who spoke on the importance of industry/​academic partnership.

Leadership training

Participant feedback from ECR Dr Lucia Dzinza (UQ), who participated in a COEMinerals’ Leadership Course in 2023:
I found the ECR leadership training to be a very useful course. It was informative and interactive. From a researcher’s perspective, it was insightful,
and touched on lots of relevant topics including, the importance of focusing on areas of interest as a researcher, including the best ways to get funding/​collaborations, writing papers, how to make the best use of conferences, how to make time for important tasks, how to avoid procrastination, how
to deal with perfectionism, the types of distractions we experience in our workspace and how best to deal with them. Overall, I extremely enjoyed being
part of the course!”

Site visits, industry engagement and other exceptional experiences

Where possible the PhD and ECR training opportunities include industry engagement, site visits and tours which provide hands-on experience and create direct connections with the minerals sector, which assist with making industry connections, sparking new ideas and spurring conversations that may lead to new research insights and/​or future career path opportunities for Future Leaders.

PhD Sajid Hassan (UOM) shared:
Engaging in collaborative work with the industry enhances professional development by providing a unique opportunity to bridge theoretical knowledge with real-world applications, fostering a dynamic skill set that is both relevant and impactful in the
evolving professional landscape.”


ECR Dr Nilanka Ekanayake (UOM) shared:
Participating in a collaborative industry project has refined my skills as an engineer, including tasks ranging from crafting technical reports to adept project management and meeting tight deadlines! We have gained valuable insights helping to identify and address certain design issues as a result. This adds an extra layer of interest to my work. The experience of being among the few females in this equipment development field is not only encouraging, but holds significant personal value as it will help equip me for a role with industry.”

Internal Seminars

As an example of our ongoing commitment to teaching and learning, each month the Centre provides two short-seminars (each about 20 minutes in duration) that deep-dive into scientific or technical content which is highly applicable to academic learning, and which provides an opportunity for connectivity for teams across the Centre. We also run a weekly training program covering end-to-end minerals processing techniques, challenges and how we’re solving them. These presentations are for team-members-only

International Learning Experiences 

See a 2022 student case study here.



Learn more about our Future Leaders on-site and industry experiences, and Centre outreach and engagement activities in our Annual Reports.