Toowoomba woman’s Churchill Fellowship success

ZOE Eather is starting her Churchill Fellowship with the hope of making Australian communities more liveable.

Ms Eather, the creator of the Smart Communities podcast, is striving to provide more mobility options in regional towns to boost inclusion.

She also has a message that is particularly relevant today, on International Women’s Day.

“I’m proud to be recognised as an emerging leader in this [Smart Community] space,” she said.

“The only way we can have more women in STEM and keep women in STEM careers is by having equal opportunity.

“The Churchill Fellowships are an example of this. It’s a great opportunity for me to work towards making our communities more accessible, liveable and sustainable for all.”

She is one of only 112 Australians to be awarded a Fellowship by the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust in 2018.

Using her fellowship, she will visit the USA, Mexico, Canada, the UK, the Netherlands, Spain, South Africa and South Korea as part of her research.

“I will be travelling to a number of different countries to visit projects and people that are working in this space.

“I want real learnings from people who have experimented and trialled different types of mobility, and I want the lived experience of the current [transport] networks now.”

Her interest in Smart Communities began during a threemonth Women in Engineering International Exchange to Seoul, South Korea in 2016, where she explored a variety of advanced transport technologies with a focus on Smart Mobility.

She is a founding member of the Smart Cities Council Emerging Innovators and a board member of the Australian Smart Communities Association.

“Being recognised as a Churchill Fellow is a celebration of curiosity, they are ordinary Australians with extraordinary abilities and aspirations,” CEO of the Churchill Trust Adam Davey said.