Eleni Routoula

Elected: June 2025
Membership grade: Associate Member

Eleni is a university teacher at the School of Chemical Materials and Biological Engineering at Sheffield. Alongside teaching activities, Eleni leads the School's Employability strategy, being instrumental in liaising with employers to understand what they value in graduate engineers and creating opportunities and resources for students to develop these qualities. She initiates and maintains fruitful interactions with industrialists across various sectors, connecting the industrial perspective with the classroom and facilitating positive outcomes for companies and student cohorts.

Eleni manages a school-wide summer research internship program alongside coordinating final year research projects, and supporting PhD researcher progression. Recognised as a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, she has research interests around engineering education, where her focus is on embedding employability in the curriculum, student reflections and how they change as cohorts mature, and critical thinking and how it can be developed through AI tools.

Having been fascinated by chemistry and understanding how things work, Eleni pursued an MEng, an MSc and a PhD in chemical engineering. Through various experiences her interests shifted from “understanding” to “developing”, and from “processes” to “people”. She discovered a passion for supporting others' development, which led her to pursue diverse roles after my PhD in the remit of training and chemical engineering, before being appointed at the University of Sheffield. Through her role, Eleni has the opportunity to contribute to holistic educational perspectives, supporting the development of students to professionals.

Eleni has been an Associate Member of IChemE since her student years, and an active volunteer in initiatives such as the National Early Careers Committee, the Young Engineers Awards for Innovation and Sustainability, and the Sheffield Branch. She enjoys being on the interface between education and application, and values opportunities to support greater causes and give back to the community while further developing my skills.