Fortunately, she won one of twenty entrance scholarships to the University of Queensland in 1924 (after receiving the highest pass in the Senior Public Matriculation Exam), where she decided to study science, in particular chemistry.

[2] Hill continued to work as a UQ Fellow through 1929–30 on scholarship while she was studying her Master of Science, conducting research in the Brisbane Valley on the stratigraphy of shales in Esk and sediments in the Ipswich basin.

She was put forward for a UQ Foundation Travelling Scholarship by Professor Richards to study at the University of Cambridge's Sedgwick Museum, in residence at Newnham College, just as the Great Depression was taking effect.

[2] At Cambridge, Hill was a Fellow of Newnham College and the Sedgwick Museum and was supported from 1931 to 1933 on an Old Students Research Fellowship[2] while she worked on her PhD under supervisor, Gertrude Elles.

Hill continued to explore the theory that Australia had once been covered from north to south by an inland sea, as evidenced by the fossil corals she found in Mundubbera.

She received a further scholarship, Senior Student of the Exhibition of 1851 for two years and the Daniel Pidgeon Fund award from the Geological Society of London which enabled her to remain in England until 1936.

A number of Australian students were at Newnham College with Hill in this era, including Elizabeth "Betty" Ripper, who was also studying palaeontology, and Germaine Joplin.

She worked with Drs William Dickson Lang and Stanley Smith on Palaeozoic coral taxonomy, at the Natural History Museum in London.

[13][14] She worked 80–90 hours a week in between her coral research and in the cipher and coding of shipping orders in General Douglas MacArthur's division.

As a result of their meeting, Hill and Wells were able to work together on eight sections on coelenterates for the 1956 publication, Treatise on Invertebrate Paleontology, which continues to be updated today.

In 1964, Hill was awarded the Lyell Medal for scientific research and became the first Australian woman to be a Fellow of the Royal Society (of London).

Hill served on the Australian Academy of Science committees, becoming vice-president in 1969 and the first female president in 1970, following the death of David Forbes Martyn.

She also made statements in the late 1960s and early 1970s, to promote female enrolments in science, discouraged by the slow growth in the area, and push toward a campaign aimed at parents.

Hill made significant contributions to Australian earth science and was a pivotal role model in opening a whole new world of education to women.

[35][36] She mentored many students who went on to great success in the field of earth sciences, including Ken Campbell and Graham Maxwell.

[41] In 2016 Dr Gilbert Price and colleagues at the University of Queensland School of Earth Sciences located Hill's rock hammer and created a 3D model of it for an exhibition to celebrate her life.

[46] An astronomical observatory is being named for Hill at the Brisbane Girls Grammar School's Marrapatta Open Education Campus.