Captain Marnie Munns Awarded Honorary Doctorate for Gender Equality Leadership

Captain Marnie Munns BSc MSc FRAeS has been awarded a Doctor of Engineering Honoris Causa by the University of the West of England, recognising her outstanding contribution to gender equality work and her pivotal role as researcher, gender champion and role model across the aviation industry. The honorary doctorate was conferred on 23rd July, 2025, celebrating Captain Munns' tireless efforts to create a more inclusive and diverse aviation sector.

The recognition comes at a crucial time for the industry, as aviation faces significant challenges in building a sustainable pipeline of skilled professionals. Captain Munns' research and advocacy work has been instrumental in highlighting the barriers that prevent greater diversity in aviation roles, particularly in training positions where representation remains critically low.

Her research into the pilot trainer pipeline has provided key insights into the systemic issues that affect career progression in aviation. Through comprehensive global surveys involving hundreds of commercial pilots, pilot trainers and newly qualified pilots, Captain Munns has identified the key enablers and barriers that influence whether pilots progress into training roles. This research is particularly significant given the industry's pressing need to recruit and train 110,000 new pilots globally, with projections indicating 300,000 will be required within the next decade.

The timing of this honour is particularly fitting, as Captain Munns prepares to share her expertise at the 23rd European Aviation Training Summit (EATS), taking place from 4-6 November 2025 at the Estoril Congress Centre in Cascais, Portugal. Together with Sue Durbin, Professor in Human Resource Management and leader of the Human Resources, Work and Employment Group in the Faculty of Business and Law at the University of the West of England, she will host a special Women in Aviation Training (WiAT) session that promises to be one of the summit's most impactful workshops.

Women in Aviation Training, launched in 2023, represents an important Halldale-led initiative focused on providing practical ways to support women across the entire aviation training industry. The programme extends its reach far beyond pilots and instructors to embrace women in all fields, including students, management and administration professionals, cabin crew training specialists, below wing operations and maintenance functions. WiAT welcomes contributions from across the training spectrum, from airlines and ATOs/Ab Initio programmes to academic institutions, regulatory bodies, OEMs and industry providers.

Both Captain Munns and Professor Durbin are active WiAT members, exemplifying the initiative's commitment to bringing together professionals from diverse backgrounds within aviation training. The success of WiAT's community approach is further demonstrated by fellow member Helen Heenan, who recently achieved her PGCert in Psychology in the Workplace from the University of Aberdeen. Helen's academic pursuit was inspired by attending the EAAP - European Association for Aviation Psychology conference in Gibraltar in 2022, which sparked her interest in organisational psychology.

Her achievement represents the kind of professional development and career advancement that WiAT seeks to foster amongst its members.

The hands-on session will begin with presentations from both Captain Munns and Professor Durbin, before moving into facilitated round table discussions designed to produce tangible outcomes on key issues and practical solutions. At its core, WiAT brings together a community of motivated individuals to support and encourage growth and ambition whilst empowering meaningful change. The initiative offers guidance and tools through experiences and stories from fellow professionals, sharing insights, facts and information from within the industry, and providing a forum to network and collaborate with the intention of providing every member with a community network and a useful toolkit of information to fulfil their personal goals. Their presentation, titled "The Pilot Trainer Pipeline: what are the barriers and enablers for commercial pilots to progress into this role?", will draw directly from Captain Munns' extensive research findings.

The presentation will explore critical aspects of the trainer pipeline challenge, including pilots' intentions to apply for trainer roles, their experiences of application procedures, and the transparency of requirements. Particularly relevant will be the discussion of why there are so few female pilot trainers and what concrete actions can be taken to address this imbalance. Captain Munns' research, conducted through a global survey of just over 700 male and female commercial pilots, pilot trainers and ab initio pilots, provides unprecedented insight into the perspectives of the industry's future training pipeline. The findings from 364 male and female commercial pilots offer a comprehensive view of the skills believed to be most important for pilot trainers and highlight the information gaps that currently exist around the role. As the airline industry continues its post-pandemic recovery and expansion, the strategic importance of addressing the pilot trainer shortage cannot be overstated. Captain Munns' work provides the training community with essential data to better understand not only the barriers that prevent progression into training roles, but also the enablers that can be leveraged to create a more diverse and inclusive trainer workforce. The EATS WiAT workshop, open to men and women, represents an opportunity for the aviation training community to engage directly with this research and work collaboratively towards practical solutions. The round table format ensures that participants will leave with actionable outcomes rather than merely theoretical discussions, reflecting Captain Munns' commitment to driving real change in the industry. The Women in Aviation Training session at EATS promises to be a landmark moment in addressing these challenges, bringing together Captain Munns' research expertise with practical, collaborative problem-solving to help build a more inclusive and effective training pipeline for the aviation industry's future.