Occupational hygiene bursaries

A British Occupational Hygiene Society product story

Edited by the Engineeringtalk editorial team Oct 10, 2006

First round of Bursary Awards announced by BOHS.

The British Occupational Hygiene Society (BOHS) is delighted to announce the first three recipients of its recently launched bursary programme.

Nik Rowley, studying for an MSc in Occupational Hygiene at the University of Manchester, and Bernice Ndubuokwu and Peneyambeko Alina Munkawa, who are both studying for an MSc in Occupational and Environmental Health and Safety Management at the University of Portsmouth, have each been awarded a bursary to cover one year's tuition fee from September 2006.

There were several high quality applications for this first round of awards, and so congratulations are extended to all three worthy winners.

With free student membership of BOHS and an allocated mentor also part of the award, BOHS looks forward to mutually beneficial relationships with these excellent students at what is hopefully the start of their successful careers in occupational hygiene.

Nik is 33, has a BSc in Occupational Health and Safety and is currently a Health and Safety Officer with Leeds City Council.

He is at a point in his career where he would like to specialise, and his background as a Chartered health and safety practitioner has directed his interest increasingly towards occupational hygiene.

Without this BOHS bursary, Nicholas would have had to self-fund his MSc entirely.

He says of his future career aims, "Given time and experience as an Occupational Hygienist I would ultimately like to make an impact on the UK industry as a whole by working for the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) in offering workable occupational hygiene guidance and not simply enforcement." Bernice is a 46 year old Senior Occupational Health Officer at Shell Petroleum Development Company in Warri, Nigeria with a wealth of occupational health nursing experience and qualifications.

Mid-way through her Msc, which to date she has been self-funding with some difficulty, she has already seen the benefit of her specialist occupational hygiene learning when working alongside the hygienist in her occupational health department's team.

In Nigeria "there is a dearth of qualified occupational hygienists and consequently those few qualified can not adequately cope", according to Bernice; furthermore, "only a handful of multinational companies have fit-for-purpose hygiene services for the promotion and protection of the health of their workers".

She is keen to practice as an occupational hygiene professional, to use her experience and to transfer her knowledge in the development of effective occupational hygiene solutions in Nigeria.

Peneyambeko Alina, 31, is an Occupational Health Officer with the City of Windhoek, Namibia, and a qualified Nurse with additional degrees in Occupational Health Nursing, and Health Sciences and Social Services.

She is currently working at establishing her own occupational health, safety and hygiene consultancy, with the goal of building the capacity to deliver comprehensive services across all industries throughout Namibia.

In her view, there is poor enforcement of occupational health, safety and hygiene law in her country, due to "lack of specialised skills, inadequate collaboration between relevant Ministries and subsequent poor government support" and she has a passion to address this.

Part way through her MSc at Portsmouth, Peneyambeko has been funding her studies herself.

BOHS's bursary scheme is for students wanting to gain a higher education qualification in Occupational Hygiene, with up to five bursaries every year to be awarded biannually, each of up to £4,000 towards the payment of academic fees.

The closing date for the next round of applications is 31st January 2007.