On Friday 3rd September the Graduate Research School held the AUT 3 Minute Thesis (3MT) final via livestream. This was the second time the AUT final has been held online after doing so for the first time in 2020. We had six finalists who had been shortlisted by our judges from the pre-heats: Dhelipan Mahenthiran, Madeline Hayward, Megan Burfoot, Mitali Nautiyal, Rashi Bhalla and Rezwana Karim Snigdha.
We had four prize winners this year: Overall doctoral winner, doctoral runner up, doctoral third place and Audience favourite.
This year we had our first ever two-time winner of 3MT: Congratulations to Megan Burfoot! Megan won the 2020 AUT doctoral competition and made it to the top eight in the 2020 Asia Pacific regional competition. In her 2021 presentation “The Classroom is Listening”, Megan describes her research, designing and testing a system to improve the acoustics in classrooms to reduce the harmful effects of excess noise. Megan wins a $500 research award from the Graduate Research School and a Surface Pro 7+ for Business and cover sponsored by ICT services and supplier partner Cyclone. She also advances to the Asia-Pacific finals later this year.
Madeline Hayward 
Dhelipan Mahenthiran 
Rezwana Karim Snigdha 
Megan Burfoot
In second place was Madeline Hayward with her presentation “Exploring police interactions with people experiencing mental distress in post-disaster Christchurch”. She receives a Surface Pro 7+ for Business and cover sponsored by ICT services and supplier partner Cyclone. In third place was Dhelipan Mahenthiran with his presentation “Fly Further with Hydrogen Copter”. He receives a 1-year membership to the AUT Sport & Fitness Centres and an AUT drawstring bag, drink bottle, CuppaCoffeeCup, and notebook sponsored by AUT Shop.
As well as our three placeholders, we also had an Audience Vote prize. Viewers were given the chance to vote for their favourite presentation of the afternoon. Congratulations to Rezwana Karim Snigdha whose presentation “Beyond the gender binary: Hijra in Bangladesh” was voted the audience favourite. She receives a $250 research award from the Graduate Research School and an AUT drawstring bag, drink bottle, CuppaCoffeeCup, and notebook sponsored by AUT Shop.
We would like to thank everyone whose support made this event possible: AUT Events for their technical support; our MC, Professor Mark Orams; our judges, Negin Ahmadi Saber Doust, Ngaire Rix and Associate Professor Nigel Harris; and our wonderful sponsors: ICT Services and supplier partner Cyclone, AUT Sport & Fitness Centres, and AUT Shop. Thanks also to everyone who tuned in, joined the discussion in the comments and voted for their favourite presentation.
Congratulations again to all our finalists for your informative and entertaining presentations. If you missed the livestream or would like to watch the presentations again you can now find them on the Thesislink YouTube channel here. Well done to everyone who took part in 3MT this year, we look forward to another exciting competition in 2022!
