Workshop speakers

Claire Lyons from Aurecon has over 30 years infrastructure experience and specialises in Continual Improvement, Human Centred Design and Change Management. She is passionate about bringing people together to collaborate on opportunities to build understanding, shape choices and make better decisions. She has worked with many of Aotearoa’s large companies to design and run workshops and is excited to be do the same for this conference. With diversity of thought being a key element to success she knows that some great insights and connections with be made during the workshops.

Dacia Herbulock is Director and founding member of the New Zealand Science Media Centre, a publicly-funded initiative that supports high quality journalism by ensuring reliable information, experts and evidence are readily accessible whenever science is in the headlines.

With over 15 years of experience working on the front lines of breaking news, research, science and technology, the Science Media Centre is uniquely placed to provide insights on the ways controversial issues emerge and evolve in the public arena.

Dacia leads the Centre's long-standing initiatives to broaden New Zealand’s network of media savvy experts and improve journalists’ understanding of complex science issues. She joined the SMC at its launch in 2008 with a background in radio, documentary film and television news in the US, China and NZ.

She is an Adjunct Research Fellow with the School of Science and Society at Te Herenga Waka Victoria University of Wellington and serves on the Executive Committee of the Science Communicators Association (SCANZ).

Dr Sneh Patel is the project manager for the WeSTEM science in action programme at Te Hononga Akoranga COMET. This programme engages Pasifika youth in STEAM learning through hands-on scientific research experiences. Sneh also contributes to COMET’s data & advocacy work on campaigns including STEM outreach, attendance and Māori and Pasifika education. Prior to this, Sneh completed a PhD in chemistry, where her passion for STEAM education grew through working with and engaging young people through STEAM outreach activities.

Ying Yang is the STEM Project Manager at Te Hononga Akoranga COMET, an innovation hub that trials and develops community-based solutions for equitable, life-long learning. Ying chairs the STEM Alliance Aotearoa (a COMET-led initiative). The alliance brings together STEM industry leaders and educators, working in partnership to advocate for, and innovate towards, more effective STEM outreach and engagement. She is also the coordinator of the Curious Minds Participatory Science Platform, South Auckland region, a funding programme that has supported over 4,500 students to participate in youth-led science research in their local communities since 2015.