Dr. Lara Wakeling
Associate Dean, Learning and Teaching
Campus
Biography
Professor Lara Wakeling is associate dean of learning and teaching and professor of chemistry. Lara works with academics, leaders and partners to improve teaching quality, assessment design and the student experience across higher education.
Lara’s scholarly work spans food science and the Scholarship of Learning and Teaching (SoLT), with a focus on assessment practices, student engagement, and teaching excellence. She is a specialist food chemist and science educator having delivered programs across diverse modalities, including international collaborations in China. Lara has received multiple Vice-Chancellor’s Awards and actively contributes as an assessor for national and institutional teaching awards.
Through her leadership role, Lara drives university‑wide initiatives that strengthen teaching quality and enhance the student experience. She played a pivotal part in developing and implementing the Co-operative model at Federation University. She is skilled at leading change in complex education environments and advancing staff capability development.
Fields of research
- Food chemistry and food sensory science
- Science, technology and engineering curriculum and pedagogy
More about Lara
Qualifications
- Bachelor of Applied Science (Honours), University of Ballarat
- Graduate Certificate in Education (Tertiary Teaching), University of Ballarat
- Doctor of Philosophy (Food Science), University of Queensland
Areas of interest
- Scholarship of Learning and Teaching
- Assessment practices
- Student engagement
- Food chemistry
Areas of expertise
Lara has extensive expertise in food science research primarily utilising her analytical chemistry skills to analyse various components in food. More recently Lara’s focus has been in Scholarship of Learning and Teaching (SoLT) research investigating student attitudes toward science, the value of course undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) for students and the implementation a co-operative education model to an Australian university.
Awards
- 2021: Federation University Australia, Vice-Chancellors Award for Contributions to Student Learning (as part of the Bush Medicine Team)
- 2014: Federation University Australia, Vice-Chancellors Award for Contributions to Student Learning (individual)
Past
- PhD student, Federation University, ‘The presence and role of thiamine and riboflavin in the malting and brewing industries’, associate supervisor.
- Master’s student, Federation University, ‘Microbes make miso happy! Analysis of microbial diversity of fermented koji and miso’, associate supervisor.
- Honours’ student, Federation University, ‘Investigating Ethanol in Non-Alcoholic Kombucha through Infrared Spectroscopy and Microbial Analysis’, supervisor.
- Honours’ student, Federation University, ‘Saccharification of carbohydrates in rice for the production of a boutique distilled alcoholic beverage in Cambodia’, supervisor.
- Honours’ student, Federation University, ‘Identifying the correlation between the growth of wine grapes and chemical development’, supervisor.
- Analytical chemistry
- Food chemistry
- Scientific communication
Specialist roles
- Associate dean, Learning and teaching
Professional association memberships
- Royal Australian Chemical Institute (MRACI)
- Institute of Food Technologists
- Publications
Food safety considerations in the production of traditional fermented products: Japanese rice koji and miso
- Journals
- DOI reference: 10.1111/jfs.13048
Microbial ecology of Australian commercial rice koji and soybean miso
- Journals
- DOI reference: 10.1002/jsf2.112