Deputy Pro Vice-Chancellor Professor Beena Giridharan.
MIRI: Curtin University Sarawak (Curtin Sarawak) has appointed professor Beena Giridharan as the new deputy pro vice-chancellor on July 18.
She took over from professor Dr Ir Yudi Samyudia, making her the second non-Australian appointed to the post.
Dr Ir Yudi’s contract ended in December 2015 and he was the first non-Australian deputy pro vice-chancellor for Curtin Sarawak.
According Curtin Sarawak yesterday, Beena was a long serving academic staff at Curtin Sarawak with a proven track record.
She is expected to bring a wealth of institutional knowledge, strong intra-institutional networks and an ambitious farsighted educational vision to her role.
Curtin University’s vice-chancellor professor Deborah Terry when congratulating her is confident that Beena will provide academic, financial, strategic and administrative leadership to Curtin Sarawak, with a particular focus on academic operational efficiency.
Meanwhile Curtin Sarawak’s pro vice-chancellor, president and chief executive professor Jim Mienczakowski wished Beena every success in helping the university achieve its institutional goals and keeping it consistently moving forward.
Beena began her academic career at Curtin Sarawak in 2000 and moved on to senior academic positions in 2006. She was a visiting professor at the Virginia Commonwealth University, United States from 2007 to 2008.
She graduated with a BSc and MA from the University of Calicut, India before pursuing a graduate certificate in tertiary teaching and postgraduate research in education at Curtin University, Australia. She attained a doctoral degree in applied linguistics and education in 2011 from Curtin University, Australia.
Beena has been a Fellow of the Higher Education Research and Development Society of Australasia (HERDSA) since
2006, and serves as a mentor to aspiring HERDSA Fellows.
She is also a panel assessor for HERDSA fellowship portfolios. In 2006, she won the Carrick National Australian Award for University Teaching and the Curtin Excellence and Innovation in Teaching Award.
As a member of Australia’s Office of Learning and Teaching (OLT) ‘Learning without Borders’ project, Beena has investigated leadership roles in Trans-National Education (TNE) and internationalisation of curriculum.
She is also an associate editor for the IAFOR Journal of Education, USA, and reviewer for a number of international journals in higher education.
Among her publications are: a book on Vocabulary Acquisition Patterns in Adult Tertiary (ESL) Learners (2013), an international handbook on Transnational Education, several book chapters as well as numerous publications in journals and conferences.
In addition, she is often invited as keynote speaker and plenary speaker at higher education conferences both regionally and internationally.
Beena’s research and academic interests include ethno-linguistic studies in indigenous communities, vocabulary acquisition in ESL, higher education practices, and transnational education.