Two Victoria students awarded prestigious Woolf Fisher Scholarships

Two Victoria University of Wellington students have been awarded prestigious Woolf Fisher Trust scholarships, worth around $300,000 each, to study for their doctorates at the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom.

Woolf Fisher recipients

Scholarships have been awarded to Athene Laws who is completing a BA Honours in Economics at Victoria and Rory Little who is studying towards a Master of Biotechnology.

Sir Woolf Fisher (1912-1975), co-founder of Fisher and Paykel, set up his Trust in 1960 to recognise and reward excellence in education. Today it has become one of New Zealand’s largest education trusts. He was later knighted for his outstanding contribution to industry and education in New Zealand.

Sir Noel Robinson, Chairman of the Trust and Sir Woolf’s nephew, says, “These young New Zealanders have been selected for their outstanding academic ability and leadership potential as well as their integrity, boldness of vision and capacity for work–qualities which Sir Woolf valued.”

Athene, aged 20, studied at Auckland’s St Cuthbert’s College before coming to Victoria.

“Athene is a superb student who displays terrific economic insight, so I’m not surprised that she’s been selected for this prestigious scholarship,” says her supervisor Professor Norman Gemmell, the Chair in Public Finance at Victoria’s School of Accounting and Commercial Law.

“She is by far and away the best student I’ve come across in an Honours year throughout my academic career.”

Athene has already won numerous awards for academic excellence. Her presentation at the 2013 New Zealand Association of Economists Conference won the Jan Whitwell Prize for best presentation by an undergraduate, honours or master’s student. Motu Economic and Public Policy Research also awarded her the 2013 Sir Frank Holmes Prize, a prestigious scholarship that recognises both general academic excellence and the strong quantitative skills required to support world-class research and high quality public policy. She won a Victoria Graduate Award in 2014.

Rory, aged 22, studied at Wellington’s Rongotai College before enrolling Victoria University. At Cambridge, he is aiming to study the mechanisms by which large enzymes known as ‘polyketide synthases’ make natural antibiotic products. The ultimate aim of this research will be to modify the enzymatic machinery to generate novel antibiotics that are effective against multi-drug resistant bacteria.

During his PhD study, Rory hopes to apply the specialist expertise he has developed as a Master’s student at Victoria, in engineering enzymes by directed evolution—a process of random mutation followed by artificial selection of improved enzyme variants.

In addition to his excellent academic record and numerous undergraduate and postgraduate prizes, his supervisor Dr David Ackerley says “Rory is a great colleague—he is not only very capable and hard-working, but he is also an extremely positive presence in the lab. We are very pleased that his talents and efforts have been recognised, but we will be sorry to lose him from our team."

A third Woolf Fisher scholarship has been awarded to 22-year-old Nelson Lam from the University of Auckland who is currently studying towards his BSc Honours in Medicinal Chemistry.

“We are investing in these young New Zealanders who aspire to return to New Zealand and have the potential to become leaders in their field,” says Sir Noel.

The Trustees congratulated those who were shortlisted and commented on the very high calibre of candidates and the difficulty of making the final selection. The other shortlisted candidate from Victoria University was Shane Rooyakkers, aged 22, a Master’s student in the School of Geography, Environment and Earth Sciences.

Background information
• The Woolf Fisher Scholarship funds up to three young New Zealand graduates to study for up to four years for a doctorate at the University of Cambridge (initially it was either Oxford or Cambridge)
• This Scholarship is one of the most valuable post graduate scholarships in New Zealand–worth around $300,000 per recipient (including an allowance of £13,000 per annum, payment of University and College fees, and an annual return fare home to New Zealand)
• In any one year there are around 10–12 Woolf Fisher Scholars studying in the UK
• The Scholars are under 30 years of age, have attended a New Zealand secondary school for at least two years, and have or expect to graduate with a first-class honours degree from a New Zealand university
• The Scholarships Committee of Universities New Zealand – Te Pōkai Tara administers a wide range of nationally available undergraduate and postgraduate awards.