Dr Alison Cooke

Alison Cooke

Alison is a two-fold graduate of Cambridge, having studied both her BA and PhD in Engineering at Murray-Edwards College. Her PhD thesis was on ‘The Aerodynamics and Mechanics of Shuttlecocks'.

Alison's engineering experience, which spans over 30 years, has been both varied and extreme: from living "in" the North Sea working as an offshore engineer with BP Exploration; to developing competitive manufacturing strategies with senior industrialists as RTZ Industrial Fellow based from Cambridge University Engineering Department. She has managed over 120 collaborative projects with industry, including sports engineering product development with the US Tennis Association and the England and Wales Cricket Board; and more recently sustainability projects on energy efficiency in the built environment with corporate partners such as Grosvenor.

In recent times, Dr Cooke has been an independent consultant in engineering and management, Alison established Cooke Associates in 2001. Alison also held responsibility for instigating and leading Cambridge University Engineering Department's first industrial tour to Taiwan and Hong Kong.

Her previous professional roles have included being an industrial mentor of graduate engineers for the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, lecturing in engineering design, manufacture and management, and technical writing for a large number of research publications. She has been associated with The Institution of Mechanical Engineers since 1984, a Fellow from 2008 to 2018, and a council member from 2009 to 2012. She was the International Coordinator of the Institution's Steering Group on Future Climate – Engineering Solutions project (2009 - 2013), which feeds into the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. She was until 2019 a trustee of Mayden Foundation which develops charitable web projects (2011 - present). Alison is currently a Mentor for Alumni of Murray Edwards College and also gives talks, by invite only, on the projects she has been involved with during her career.

Dr Alison Cooke was a Fellow of the Advance HE from 2001 until 2018.

Alison is married with two children. Whilst at College she was a keen sportswoman, and still has this passion today - she and her son won the Mixed Open event at the 2013 LTA Grade 3 tournament in Newquay and she recently represented England in the Four Nations - LTA article. Alison has more recently been interested in racketlon and won the 2017 O50s Hertfordshire open tournament - UK Racketlon report.