Student stories

Reading an old National Geographic magazine as a teenager sparked Dr Jayson Ibanez's love affair with the critically endangered Philippine eagle. He's spent his life and career dedicated to researching and conserving it.

Yvonne always planned to go to university, but young motherhood put her plans on pause – at least for a decade or two. Starting her first degree in her late 30s didn't slow her learning down in the slightest. In fact, Yvonne turned two very different degrees into a whole new career. 

Darwinites really have Yuba’s sister to thank for inspiring her brother to study here in the Territory. The community service champion kept hearing that Darwin was a “great place to live and learn”. He's been using skills in leveraging technology from his postgraduate IT degree to boost efficiency in a cause close to his heart — volunteering.

Becoming a small-town pharmacist is a dream come true for Lauren, who has spent a lifetime involved in the health of her community. She just needed the right online program to support her goals.

Successful serial entrepreneur Dr Mark Englund has had a life-long fascination with all things technical. A supportive mother and a chance encounter with an inspiring engineering academic changed the course of Mark's young life, leading to him study engineering in the Territory before taking the tech world by storm.

After leaving the geoscience space to focus on raising her family, Lana felt that retraining was the way to get where she wanted to go professionally. Always fascinated by health and the human body, she discovered CDU's Bachelor of Health/Master of Occupational Therapy dual degree and never looked back.

A move to the Northern Territory sparked a decades-long love affair with basketry and weaving for Dr Aly de Groot. Her career in the arts industry has always centred around advocating for Indigenous fibre and textile artists and educating the wider community about art and environmental issues.

While volunteering as a medic with St John Ambulance, David encountered incredible nurses who would inspire him to change careers. He enrolled in a Bachelor of Nursing at CDU before finding an unexpected knack for advocacy, working to promote and defend tens of thousands of his fellow nurses and midwives in Queensland.

From an early age, Jaisy's fascination with the world's grand infrastructure sparked a curiosity within him. From the pyramids of Giza to futuristic wonders like Dubai's Burj Khalifa, he wanted to know how these structures were made and how could he create his own architectural marvels. He's one step closer to his goals now that he's studying engineering at CDU.