A new Assistant Professor of Teaching

TWelch Photo

We are pleased to announce that a new faculty member will be joining the NBK Institute of Mining Engineering as Assistant Professor of Teaching. Ms Antonina Welch, formerly Team Lead for Geotechnical, Archaeology and Indigenous Relations at the City of Vancouver, will join our department in January 2022.

Antonina hopes to leverage her private and public sector experience to advance the mining curriculum to include the soft skills future engineers need to succeed in their careers. Having worked closely with the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh Úxwumixw (Squamish Nation), and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations in the past, she hopes to bring more awareness of indigenous knowledge, cultural empathy, and safety to engineering students. She hopes to highlight indigenous communities’ critical role in the mining sector and bridge the gap between technical experts and local communities.

She will support the redesign of the mining engineering curriculum, develop ways to include sustainable development concepts and project management skills in courses, and further involve industry professionals to engage with students and provide opportunities for career planning and networking.

As a UBC engineering grad, she is excited to take her learnings and apply them to improve students’ overall mining engineering experience. In her spare time, she can be found fishing on Vancouver Island or enjoying the many excellent restaurants Vancouver offers.