Medal and course winners
These medals and prizes are awarded to the overall top performing student from each course.
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These medals and prizes are awarded to the overall top performing student from each course.
This medal is awarded to students across the University who have fulfilled the requirements of the Doctor of Philosophy, met an overall level of excellence, and whose work has been judged as the doctoral thesis for that year. This award is proudly supported by Monash University.
Dr Xin (Cindy) Zhang obtained her PhD in 2021 from Monash University, where she worked with Professor Patrick Sexton and Professor Denise Wootten in the structural biology of the glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor. Following graduation, she was recruited as a Postdoctoral Fellow in the same laboratory at Monash University aligned to the ARC Centre for Cryo-EM of Membrane Proteins, and recently being awarded ARC DECRA fellowship (2023-2026).
Her background is in cell biology, biochemistry, structural biology (in particular cryo-EM), molecular biology and pharmacology, and have applied these to provide molecular insights into proteins that are critical for human health and novel drug discovery. Her particular interest is to understand the dynamic process of how diverse ligands bind to and activate GPCRs that are involved in many physiological processes and diseases.
"It’s my great honor to receive the prestigious Mollie Holman Award. It presents the great effort during PhD and the quality of supervision I received from Professor Patrick Sexton and Professor Denise Wootten. Special thanks to my family and friends, who all supported me toward this achievement."
The Vice-Chancellor’s commendations for thesis excellence are awarded annually for outstanding doctoral and research master’s thesis excellence. A maximum of five commendations are awarded each year. This award is proudly supported by Monash University.
Dr Akosua Adom Agyeman obtained her Bachelor of Pharmacy degree from the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in her home country Ghana. Subsequently, she pursued a Master of Science degree in Clinical Drug Development at the William Harvey Research Institute, Queen Mary, University of London, and her PhD at Monash Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Center for Medicines Use and Safety.
Her doctoral research focused on the optimization of antibiotic combination dosing strategies to combat multidrug-resistant bacteria that can cause life-threatening infections under the supervision of Associate Professor Cornelia Landersdorfer. Akosua is currently employed as a Research Fellow at the University College London, working on SARS-CoV-2 viral dynamic modelling.
“I’ve come to believe that whatever situation I find myself, there is always an opportunity to create a success story out of it. I do my very best, remain optimistic, and leave the rest to God.”
This medal recognises the student who has achieved the highest score across all units of their pharmacy degree. The Pharmacy Gold Medal winner also receives the Neil Naismith Award. These awards are proudly supported by the Pharmaceutical Society of Australia (Victorian Branch) and Therapeutic Guidelines Limited.
Alex Lotric is currently undertaking her pharmacy internship with Alfred Health, a leading tertiary hospital network in Melbourne. She was keen to put learnings from her undergraduate degree at Monash University into practice this year, and working at The Alfred has provided a dynamic and innovative environment to do just that.
Alex is passionate about improving the medication management of each of her patients and working collaboratively with other healthcare professionals. Alex’s short experience working in hospital pharmacy has already provided her insight into the significant impact that a pharmacist can have on patient care, which is enhanced by the increasing scope of practice available to pharmacists.
Post her internship, Alex is keen to apply for a SHPA foundation residency program to further develop her clinical pharmacy skills. She has a particular interest in areas such as oncology and haematology and hopes to one day work in this space. Alex is excited by the broad skillset that her Pharmacy degree has provided and knows she has a rewarding and dynamic journey ahead. In particular, she is keen to explore opportunities in leadership, education, and research as she moves forward with her career.
“Studying pharmacy has enlivened my passion for learning about the interplay of medicines and diseases and imparting this knowledge to patients and their families. I have my family, peers and teachers to thank for this achievement, who have all provided immense support throughout my pharmacy journey. I hope to do them proud as I embark on my career."
This medal recognises the student who has achieved the highest score across all units of their pharmaceutical science degree. This award is proudly supported by Faculty of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences.
Yuchen Lu always has a different answer when she is asked about her favourite place in the world. She loves staying in the hospitals and watching how medicine is prepared. Inspired by her interest, she decided to become a pharmaceutical scientist.
During her journey at Monash University, Yuchen developed a holistic and integrated understanding of the drug discovery pipeline and the pharmaceutical industry around the world. The fact that many current treatments may not be able to cure diseases while others have side effects or individual variations further enhances her passion for pharmaceutical research. Given that Yuchen prefers more translational and bedside research opportunities, she eventually chose Europe as her future workplace. The accurate, cutting-edge and comprehensive drug discovery and development knowledge and skills that Monash had taught her have prepared her to pursue a Master's and a PhD degree in pharmaceutical science.
"I hope there will be a day when I can meet and communicate with my old friends and lovely lecturers with more competent skills and different perspectives of science from another side of the world."
This prize is awarded to the pharmaceutical sciences student with the highest honours mark. This award is proudly supported by Shimadzu.
Jack McDonald completed his honors year in the Analytical and Structural Neuropharmacology Laboratory under the supervision of Dr Emma Van Der Westhuizen, Dr Celine Valant and Professor Arthur Christopoulos. Through a thorough in vitro pharmacological characterisation, Jack’s project uncovered new information about the signalling profile of drugs acting via M4 muscarinic receptors, a validated target for the treatment of neuropsychiatric diseases. His honours project was published in ACS Neuroscience under the title: “Biased profile of xanomeline at the recombinant human M4 muscarinic acetylcholine receptor”.
Jack is currently undertaking his PhD with the Molecular and Translational Drug Discovery Laboratory under the supervision of Dr Greg Stewart, Associate Professor Jess Nithianantharajah and Professor Chris Langmead. In his PhD Jack hopes to characterise novel GPCR targets with disease modifying properties for the treatment of neuropsychiatric diseases.
"Follow the science!"
This prize recognises outstanding performance in the Monash Intern Training Program. This award is proudly supported by Pharmaceutical Defence Limited.
Jacqueline (Jacqui) Wall completed her internship at Northeast Health Wangaratta (NHW), one of the major hospitals in North-Eastern Victoria. Having grown up in Gippsland before moving to Melbourne for her university studies, Jacqui wanted to move back to a regional area to complete her internship.
Jacqui completed a Bachelor of Biomedical Science at Deakin University before transferring into the integrated Bachelor of Pharmacy (Honours) / Master of Pharmacy degree as a graduate-entry student. The Monash University Intern Training Program and Intern Foundation Program helped Jacqui to incorporate the theory she learned throughout her degree into her clinical practice.
Jacqui continues to work at NHW as a registered hospital pharmacist. Although she finds the fast-paced environment of hospital pharmacy challenging, Jacqui values compassionate care and works hard to incorporate this into all aspects of her practice. Throughout 2022, Jacqui has worked as a clinical supervisor and mentor to the current group of pharmacy interns. She thoroughly enjoys teaching others and hopes to step into an education role in the future.
"The Monash University Intern Training Program helped me to incorporate my theoretical knowledge into my clinical practice. I am grateful for my family, friends, colleagues, and Monash University staff who supported me throughout my pharmacy training."
This prize recognises the student with the highest marks across all units of the Master of Clinical Pharmacy. This award is proudly supported by Pharmacy Guild of Australia.
Qiantong (Amanda) Hua is a hospital pharmacist at Peninsula Health with ten years of clinical experience. She completed her Bachelor of Pharmacy in 2012 graduating with honours from Monash University before returning to study in 2018 to complete Masters of Clinical Pharmacy.
While working as a clinical pharmacist, Amanda gained experience in a variety of fields including development of local clinical guidelines, decision support tools within electronic health record system and maintenance of IV infusion pumps drug library. Recently Amanda undertook an acting role as the Senior Infectious Diseases/Antimicrobial Stewardship pharmacist at Peninsula Health between 2021-2022. Amanda found her experience overseeing the evolution of new COVID-19 treatments challenging yet rewarding, at a time when there was rapid and frequent emergence of novel pharmaceutical options for management of SARS-CoV-2 infections.
Amanda also has keen interests in research and education of fellow pharmacists. She has contributed to several research article publications and presented at the 2020 Society of Hospital Pharmacists of Australia Virtual Congress on her research project, which evaluated the effect of refining drug-drug interaction alerts in electronic health record system. Following the completion of her Master’s degree, Amanda became a mentor for the Foundation Pharmacist Residency Program at her workplace.
"Completing the Master of Clinical Pharmacy course has advanced my clinical knowledge and skills. It has contributed significantly to my career progression. Hard work does pay off!"