Former champion swimmer and PhD student address Year 12 students

Jun 29, 2004

Year 12 students from south western Sydney, the Shoalhaven and Southern Highlands converged on Wollongong on June 23 for a role model breakfast featuring former champion swimmer, Daniel Kowalski.

A PhD student in electrical engineering specialising in surgical simulation, Catherine Todd, joined Daniel as the other guest speaker.

Daniel was appointed a Sporting Ambassador for the United Nations and in this capacity visited some refugee camps on the Thai/ Cambodia border in October 1998. Daniel rated this as highly as any of his sporting achievements to date.

In November 1999, Daniel was chosen and given diplomatic status for a day when asked to speak on the floor of the United Nations General Assembly in New York. This was an Australia sponsored resolution calling for world peace during the up coming Olympic Games in Sydney in September 2000.

Daniel made the team for the 2000 Olympics in Sydney but due to continuing shoulder problems he only swam in the 4 x 200 metres relay (gold medal) but did not swim in the 1500 metres freestyle event.

More surgery was advised for Daniel and his left shoulder was reconstructed in December, and then the right one followed in March 2001, but again Daniel still wanted to swim and compete. An intensive program of rehabilitation had Daniel make his come back in December 2001 at the Melbourne World Cup when he won gold in the 1500 metres freestyle. Daniel has now retired from competitive swimming.

The other guest speaker was Catherine Todd who is a postgraduate student in the Faculty of Informatics, at the University of Wollongong. She is undertaking a Doctor of Philosophy in Electrical Engineering, specialising in surgical simulation, after graduating with Honours in a Bachelor of Electrical Engineering in 2002.

Catherine finished Year 12 at Cootamundra High School in 1996 and moved to Wollongong to pursue a career in electrical engineering. She began a cadetship at BHP Steelworks Port Kembla at the same time as starting her tertiary education, which effectively combined full-time work with part-time university studies.

In 2001 Catherine went abroad to Edmonton, Canada, as part of the University of Wollongong Exchange Program to study electrical engineering at the University of Alberta for two semesters. At the start of 2002, she returned to continue work at BHP on an engineering design team and undertake her final year thesis project in breast cancer detection and classification. For her postgraduate research, Catherine is simulating cochlea implant insertion to train surgeons in performing the operation.