A/Prof Juliana Kaya Prpic

Assistant Dean (First Nations Relationships) and Indigenous Engineering Education Specialist

Associate Professor Juliana Kaya Prpic is the Assistant Dean (First Nations Relationships) and Indigenous Engineering Education Specialist. She brings extensive experience in higher education, with a strong focus on intercultural learning, collaboration, and community-led projects. Since 2014, Juliana has worked in partnership with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities to design and deliver programs that integrate Indigenous perspectives into the engineering curriculum, foster parity of participation, and create pathways for community-led research.

She founded the Victorian Indigenous Engineering Winter School, inspiring Year 11 and 12 Indigenous students from across Australia to explore careers in engineering. This initiative received the University of Melbourne Award for Excellence in a Priority Area.

Juliana’s collaborative work with the Gunditjmara community on on-Country learning and research has been recognised with both the University of Melbourne Award for Excellence in Place-based Initiatives and the 2023 Engagement Australia Excellence Award for Indigenous Engagement.

Her current projects span diverse communities and contexts. In Mparntwe (Alice Springs), she is leading two capstone projects:

  1. Regeneration of Ankerre Ankerre, a sacred site, integrating Indigenous knowledge systems and engineering practice to restore the desert wetland and support cultural renewal.
  2. Grounded Futures: Indigenous Innovation in the Afterlife of Aircraft, which explores sustainable and culturally grounded ways of repurposing decommissioned aircraft in partnership with the Centre for Appropriate Technology and industry collaborators.

In the Bourke/Brewarrina region, Juliana is engaged in the STEM on Barwon Project, an outreach program that partners with schools to build pathways for young people to engage with science, technology, engineering, and mathematics through culturally relevant, community-based projects.

Juliana is also a key organiser of the 2025 National Indigenous Engineering Summit, aimed at bringing together leaders, educators, students, and community to share knowledge, strategies, and inspire collective action in Indigenous engineering education.

As co-editor of Indigenous Engineering for an Enduring Culture, Juliana contributes to shaping the national conversation on Indigenous engagement in engineering education. She also supervises postgraduate research exploring Indigenous engineering practices, knowledge systems, and transformative approaches to engineering education.