Margaret Sheil

Early years

Margaret Sheil was born in Sydney in August 1961. As a teenager, she regularly visited the Department or Chemistry at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) where her mother, a nurse, was seconded to work on a scientific study to monitor lead levels in the blood of children exposed to petroleum. Obtaining a Bachelor of Science and a PhD in Physical Chemistry from UNSW, Sheil accepted her first post-doctoral position at the University of Utah, followed by another at the Australian National University.

University

Returning to Australia in 1990, Sheil accepted a lectureship in chemistry at the University of Wollongong, was promoted to Professor of Chemistry in 2000 before becoming Dean of Science in 2001. The University of Wollongong Council appointed her to the role of Pro Vice-Chancellor (Research) in 2002, and then Deputy Vice-Chancellor ( DVC Research) in 2005. Under the leadership of the DVC Research, the University of Wollongong underwent a major change in the strategic direction to boost research outcomes and develop a high performance research culture. As a part of this change, research activities were restructured with the previous 35 research centres/institutes reduced to 12 and research resources redirected to these areas of research strength.

Sheil's career has followed the path of a researcher in the field of chemistry, in university leadership roles and as the Chief Executive Officer of the Australian Research Council (2007-2012). In that role she led the development of the Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA) evaluation of Australian University Research. She is a Fellow of the Royal Australian Chemical Institute (RACI), the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering (ATSE), and was made an inaugural Fellow of the Australian and New Zealand Society for Mass Spectrometry (ANZSMS) in February 2014. Professor Sheil is a member of the Advisory Council of the CSIRO Science Industry Endowment Fund (SIEF), a member of the Clunies Ross Awards Committee of ATSE and the Australia Indonesia Centre. In 2016 Professor Sheil joined the Board on the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) and the ATSE Board. She has previously been a member of the Prime Minister’s Science, Engineering and Innovation Council (PMSEIC), a member of the University Advisory Board for Coursera, the National Research Infrastructure Council, the Cooperative Research Centre Programme and served as an Education Specialist on the Board of the Australian National Selection Commission for UNESCO. Throughout her career, Sheil has sought to find ways to progress the participation, success and recognition of girls and women in STEM (Science Technology Engineering and Mathematics) fields. Most recently, Professor Sheil gave the 2014 Diana Temple Memorial Lecture at the University of Sydney charting her own experiences and life history against the backdrop of the changing constraints and opportunities that applied to women during those decades.