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Thursday, 28 June 2018

Bronwen Veale spends her days raising the aspirations of high school students, inspiring them to study at university. After work hours she’s a swing dancer, regularly performing and even DJing for other dancers in Perth.

The School Partnerships Coordinator in UWA’s Equity Outreach team loves how her job inspires students who didn’t think that UWA was within their reach.

“I love the variety in each day of going out to different schools and all the different events that we run on campus,” Bronwen says.

Bronwen came to UWA in 2016 when the Alcoa Foundation partnership with Aspire UWA was launched with the aim of raising the number of young people from the Peel region who enter university.

The region has historically had a significantly lower number of students enter university than the Western Australian average. Bronwen, Aspire UWA and the Alcoa Foundation aim to change this statistic. Their goal is to turn university study into the expectation rather than the exception amongst Peel high school students.

“A big challenge for the students is their geographical distance from UWA. When they come to campus it helps them to imagine their life as a student here and breaks down the barriers they once thought were there," Bronwen explains.

Through fun and inspirational events and activities, she encourages them to see the many benefits and opportunities that university study offers.

When she’s not inspiring high school students she’s inspiring dancers. Bronwen teaches Lindy Hop and solo jazz for Perth Swing Dance Academy and recently travelled to Dunedin in New Zealand for an international swing dancing event where she won first place in all three dance competitions she entered.

She’s been practising swing dancing for almost ten years, is an active member of the Perth swing dancing community, and has performed and competed at various events in Australia and overseas. Recently, she also performed alongside other local Perth dancers in a solo jazz routine, “Fierce”, at an event called Hullabaloo at the Perth Town Hall.

Bronwen’s career has long been focused on both education and science and has taken her to cities all over the world.

After graduating from university she spent two years teaching English in Japan. She’s worked in science communication and educational outreach for Scitech, taught in schools and spent a number of years working in science centres and museums across Canada.

Right now she loves being settled back in Perth, making a positive impact on the lives of Peel high school students through her role at UWA.

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