Rabab Ward

Rabab has 45 years of post-doctoral experience in leadership, education and research. She was IEEE Division 1X Director, President of Signal Processing Society, Director of a research institute of 160 professors (1996-2007), held high leadership positions at University of British Columbia and was member of advisory boards and committees of international organizations including NRC, NSERC, NSF, RSC, BC ASI, PIMS, QNRF. She has published widely in signal processing and applications. Her work was transferred to US and Canadian industries.

Rabab holds many firsts for women in engineering, e.g., the first woman to join the professional engineering society in her country of birth, Lebanon (1967), to be appointed as lecturer in engineering in Zimbabwe (1975), as professor in engineering in British Columbia (1981), and the first woman holding a Ph.D. to be appointed as professor of electrical engineering in Canada. In 1972, she was the second woman to earn a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from Berkeley.

Rabab is Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, Member of the (USA) National Academy of Engineers and Fellow of the IEEE, the Canadian Academy of Engineers, and the Engineering Institute of Canada. A winner of multiple awards including the Machlachlan Award (2007), the top professional engineering award of the Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists in B.C, Canada for demonstrating “engineering at its best” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CYKE_mfrkw , and the 2008 IEEE SPS Society Award for technical achievements and leadership in the profession. She and her research had a wide impact on society.

Her research interests are mainly in signal and image processing and their applications to multimedia, medical imaging, face recognition, infant cry signals and brain computer interfaces. She has published 240 refereed journal and 340 refereed conference papers, and holds ten patents. She developed an improved method for processing mammograms so that 68% of breast cancer could be detected a year earlier than was previously possible, pioneered self-paced brain computer interfaces which allows people with mobility impairments to control various devices at any time they wish, and developed a way for cable television operators to automatically test their systems without having to interrupt TV signal transmission.

Rabab is professor emeritus of Electrical and Computer Engineering at UBC, Canada, she was the Science and Engineering Coordinator at UBC (2008-2015). In a national competition, Dr. Ward secured a $22.4 million grant which resulted in the creation of a new building in 2005 which was then the only centre in the world housing all equipment related to human-centered technologies.
She has supervised and graduated 47 Ph.D. students and over 50 research Master students. She was honored with the most competitive UBC Killam Senior Mentoring Award (2014) https://www.grad.ubc.ca/awards/killam-awards-excellence-mentoring, whose criteria include supporting diverse students to reach their full potential in ways tailored to each individual. A goodwill ambassador in popularizing the power of engineering, a pioneer and role model for women in engineering, Rabab has volunteered countless hours to speak to high school and undergrad students about engineering and to reach out to prospective women engineers.