Mining leader Vanessa Guthrie AO opens doors to education for First Nations women

Not all women experience the same disadvantage or inequality. Vanessa Guthrie AO, a Curtin University Council member, understands this. She believes true equality for women cannot be achieved unless women of all backgrounds and circumstances are given the opportunity for a university education.

The youngest daughter of a carpet-layer from New South Wales, Vanessa discovered a passion for learning and curiosity early in life. Although discouraged by her peers from continuing her education after high school to just “get married and have kids”, Vanessa knew she wanted to work in an industry that combined her passions for the natural world and improving the quality of people’s lives.

Through her tertiary studies (Geology and Environmental Science), Vanessa went on to become one of the world’s foremost female leaders in the mining industry. She was recognised in the global top 100 list of inspirational women in mining in 2013 and was awarded an Officer of the Order of Australia (AO) in 2021 for her contribution to the mining and resources sector and for being a role model for women in business. Vanessa’s passion for learning has never ceased. Most recently, she was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Science for her contribution to sustainability in the resources sector at Curtin.

Vanessa believes her education was the key to allowing her to pursue such a successful and fulfilling career.

“I was a young woman during a period of significant social change in the mid-1970s where new opportunities were presenting themselves to women in Australia, including virtually free tertiary education. That hadn’t always been the case. By law, my mother had to give up her job when she married and had her first child. She couldn’t have her own bank account because she was married and didn’t have her own income. That is only one generation ago!”

Vanessa’s education enabled her to pursue a diverse career spanning thirty years in the resources sector. She has worked in various areas: operations, corporate development, environment, community, and Indigenous affairs. Today she is a director on various major mining companies’ boards.

“My career in mining has been rewarding, challenging, confronting and inspiring,” says Vanessa. “There are times when I have felt isolated and in despair wondering if I would ever be able to reach my full potential. While I’m grateful for the opportunities mining has afforded me overall, it has at times been a tough and challenging road.”

But for Vanessa, the hardship, glass ceilings and sexism she faced (she recalls with somewhat dry humour the memory of an exploration camp field hand refusing to work another day while she, a woman, was also working there) was nothing in comparison to the lack of basic equality and respect she observed towards Aboriginal Australian women. She says it was enormously confronting seeing the combined effects of racism and sexism that Aboriginal women were dealing with in the communities she travelled to during her work in regional mine sites.

“If I thought I had it hard as a woman, that’s nothing compared to what I was seeing Aboriginal women up against. And what was worse was that there were even fewer opportunities available to them to get out of situations many were facing, like poverty, family challenges, discrimination, lack of self-belief. Many Aboriginal women I knew didn’t know anyone in their families or social circles who had finished school, let alone gone to university, or had experienced other barriers to education themselves.”

Vanessa says the stories she heard led her to face her own privilege as a non-Indigenous woman. She realised that women of different class, cultures, ages, abilities, ethnicities and sexualities (to name a few) were facing different kinds of prejudice to herself, and that these factors were being amplified when added on top of one another.

In 2019, Vanessa decided to do something about it. She founded the Moorditj Yorga Scholarship to support Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander mature age women enter and succeed at Curtin University.

‘Moorditj yorga’ means ‘deadly woman’ in Nyungar language, the First Nations dialect of the Southwest region in Western Australia. ‘Deadly’ is an Aboriginal-English term to describe something that is ‘great.’ For Vanessa, the name means ‘strong woman.’

Jill*, a current Moorditj Yorga Scholarship recipient studying Indigenous Professional Practices, is a survivor of domestic violence, drug addiction and homelessness. She is using her degree to pursue a career in mental health services and have “a second chance in life.” Her dream is to support other Aboriginal people who might be experiencing the same mental health challenges she went through. In Jill’s own words, her journey from homelessness to university is “nothing short of a miracle”.

Vanessa is thrilled to see the positive impact the scholarship is having already.

“I want to live in a world where more Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women can build leadership roles to achieve positions of influence, not only in their own communities, but across Australia. Education can make that happen. I’ve seen it for myself, and I’ve seen it for others. The more women we have changing the dynamic at the top of industry, and different kinds of women, the quicker we will all reap the rewards that diverse leadership can deliver.”

*The recipient is using a different name for personal reasons.