Two Rhodes PhD students won two out of four coveted medals for emerging scientists or practitioners at the South African National Committee for the International Association of Hydrological Sciences (SANCIAHS) National Hydrology symposium recently.
Ahmed Desai won a gold award for his work entitled ‘Development of a hydraulic sub-model for the Revised Desktop Reserve Model’.
Another Rhodes PhD student, Jane Tanner won a silver award for her presentation entitled ‘Improving conceptual understanding of surface and ground water interaction processes’.
Four ‘emerging scientist or practitioner’ awards were available to the younger participants who are in the early stages of their careers. The other two medals went to the University of Kwa-Zulu Natal students (both PhD candidates), Hartley Bulcock and George Waswa, who won gold and silver awards respectively.
The awards were adjudicated by an independent panel of eight senior career participants and decided on the basis of objectives of the research, potential of the research to contribute to water research or practice, quality and structure of the presentation, and the ability of the presenter to answer questions and participate in the resulting discussion.
Mr Desai and Ms Tanner are both supervised by Prof Denis Hughes of the Institute for Water Research at Rhodes University, who is also a Vice President of IAHS.
The theme of the symposium was entitled ‘Science and Practice for Sustainable Water Resources’. The symposium took the format of poster presentations supported by short PowerPoint presentations, as well as a limited number of plenary presentations.
The 15th SANCIAHS National Hydrology Symposium was hosted by Rhodes from the 12 – 14 September with the Institute for Water Research acting as the local organisers.
Award winners from left to right: Jane Tanner: silver award, George Waswa: silver award; Hartley Bulcock: gold award; Ahmed Desai: gold award.