A visiting expert from the United States will draw on information collected in both the US and Australia when he examines farmers’ attitudes to retirement and succession planning in a public seminar at the University of New England tomorrow.

John Becker, Professor of Agricultural Economics and Law at Pennsylvania State University, will present the seminar, titled “Agriculture’s future: succession planning in Australia and the US”, at 4 pm on Thursday 24 July in UNE’s Lewis Seminar Room (Economics, Business and Law Building).

“There is a clear trend that the farm population is ageing,” Professor Becker said. “In the United States there are three times as many primary farm operators over the age of 65 as there are under the age of 35. This means that a significant number of these primary farm operators will be turning over ownership of their production enterprises in the near future.”

“In addition,” he said, “there are disconcerting projections about how it is increasingly difficult to find young people to continue with family traditions of farming. The sustainability of small family-owned and operated farms depends on farm succession planning.

“Farm succession planning refers to a comprehensive approach to plan for the transfer of a family business from one generation to the next. Studies have shown that low numbers of farm families have individually designed succession plans. Many families do not know how to develop a plan or where to start. Incomplete or inadequate farm succession planning often results in heirs who are incapable of running the farm business, family conflict, prolonged legal battles, and division of family-owned and operated farm business assets to satisfy heirs who want to ‘cash in’ their share of the business rather than invest in it.

“Relatively little is known about why families wait to make farm transfer arrangements. This is a substantial problem in farm succession, since the process is complex, potentially costly, time-consuming, and challenging. My presentation will draw on a variety of sources to discuss what is known about farmers’ attitudes towards retirement and succession planning, and the issues these data reflect.”

He said those sources would include data from a survey of American farmers that he had been involved with, and data from a survey of Australian farmers carried out by Dr Elaine Barclay from UNE’s Institute for Rural Futures. “There are many similarities between the situation in Australia and the United States,” he said.

Professor Becker is nearing the end of a six-month visit to UNE, where he has been working in UNE’s Australian Centre for Agriculture and Law with the Centre’s Director, Professor Paul Martin.

The Deputy Prime Minister, the Hon. Julia Gillard MP, visited the University of New England today to officially open three new educational facilities to which the Australian Government has contributed a total of almost $11 million.

They are the School of Rural Medicine, the new building for the Oorala Aboriginal Centre, and the Dixson Library’s Learning Commons – built with the aid of Australian Government funding of $6.5 million, $1.3 million, and $3.1 million respectively.

In opening the School of Rural Medicine, the Deputy Prime Minister (who holds, among other portfolios, that of Minister for Education) said the School had been “built on the shoulders of a very special partnership”. That partnership – the Joint Medical Program – is an expansion of the highly successful University of Newcastle medical program in partnership with UNE, Hunter New England Health, and Northern Sydney Central Coast Health.

Ms Gillard (pictured here) referred to the shortage of doctors, nurses, and other health professionals around Australia, and added that those shortages were most acute in rural and regional areas. She said there was “overwhelming evidence” that medical professionals trained in a rural setting were likely to devote all or a part of their professional life to service in such a setting. Professor Ian Wronski, Pro Vice-Chancellor, Faculty of Medicine, Health and Molecular Sciences at James Cook University, reinforced that message.

“This is an historic moment for the University, the New England region, and rural and regional Australia,” said the Head of the School of Rural Medicine, Professor John Fraser. “We see the School of Rural Medicine as being a strategic hub in rural health.”

Professor Fraser, along with the Chancellor of UNE, Mr John Cassidy, and the Vice-Chancellor, Professor Alan Pettigrew, emphasised the distinctive contributions of all the participants in the project – mentioning particularly the local health professionals. Professor Pettigrew thanked the University of Newcastle’s Vice-Chancellor, Professor Nick Saunders, Dean of Medicine – Joint Medical Program, Professor Michael Hensley, and Pro Vice-Chancellor (Health), Professor Mike Calford, and the Chief Executive of Hunter New England Health, Dr Nigel Lyons, all of whom were present at the opening.

When opening the Oorala Aboriginal Centre’s new building, Ms Gillard said that Indigenous Australians were under-represented in the nation’s education system, and that it was important to work towards “closing the gap”. “This is a very special Centre,” she said, referring to the work of Oorala as a study and educational advisory centre for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students at UNE, and to the “passion” of its staff, led by the Director, Diane Mumbler.

She said that, when Aboriginal students arrived at university, it was important for support to be available.

Ms Mumbler thanked everyone who had enabled the newly-housed Centre “to become a really successful cultural centre” in addition to its student advisory role.

After an inspection of the Learning Commons in the Dixson Library, Ms Gillard said she was impressed by its “sense of space and light” (in contrast to the law libraries of her own university days), and the opportunities for students to use “the best of technology” and work together in groups. She said the Government believed it was “important for students to have access to the learning tools of the 21^st century”.

The Learning Commons provides physical and electronic infrastructure for both distance-education and on-campus students. It has meeting rooms and informal group discussion areas, electronic media booths, problem-based learning rooms and a Medical Reserve to support the Joint Medical Program, and social spaces including lounge areas and a coffee and snack facility.

UNE’s Acting Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Academic Services), Eve Woodberry, said the Learning Commons represented “a change in philosophy” – a recognition of the more “social” way of learning of today’s students.

THE PHOTOGRAPH of the Deputy Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, displayed here expands to include her in a photograph, taken in the Anatomy Laboratory of the School of Rural Medicine, with first-year Bachelor of Medicine students Daniel O’Hara (left) and Daniel Tilley, and the Vice-Chancellor of UNE, Professor Alan Pettigrew.

More than 90 students working towards postgraduate degrees through the University of New England came together at the University last week to share their research experiences.

Many of the students were from overseas, and at least 15 of them travelled to Australia specifically for this event – the 3^rd Annual Postgraduate Research Conference within UNE’s Faculty of The Professions. The conference, which ran from Tuesday the 15^th to Friday the 18^th of July, was – like its two predecessors – titled “Bridging the Gap between Ideas and Doing Research”.

In welcoming the postgraduate researchers, Professor Victor Minichiello, Pro Vice-Chancellor and Dean of the Faculty of The Professions, pointed out that many of them had attended at least one of the two previous “Bridging the Gap” conferences, and that the numbers attending had increased over the years. “This demonstrates the value and support the conference is providing to students,” Professor Minichiello said.

“The program is truly interdisciplinary and international,” he said, “with students travelling to UNE from South Korea, Hong Kong, Vietnam, the United States, and other parts of the world. It’s inspiring to see the innovative research projects being carried out by these postgraduate students and to listen to their presentations.”

“Research training is one of the most rewarding activities of academic life,” said Professor Peter Flood, UNE’s Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research), also speaking at the opening session. Professor Flood, too, referred to the growing number of research students in the Faculty.

The conference, convened by Associate Professor Rafat Hussain and Dr Terrence Hays from the Faculty of The Professions and organised by the Faculty’s Sue Whale, provides a friendly atmosphere for students to present their research and get feedback from academics and fellow students.

Carina Bossu (pictured here), a Brazilian student, is in the final months of her PhD program at UNE. She attended the inaugural “Bridging the Gap” conference in 2006, but was in Brazil at the time of last year’s conference. “It’s a great opportunity for postgraduate students to get to know each other and learn about each other’s research,” she said.

Emilio Morales, from Chile, is nearing the end of his first year of PhD research into the feasibility of quality-related beef branding in Australian supermarkets. He said he had received useful feedback on his own research, and valuable information on the research process in general.

Andrew Close, an Australian working at the International School of Geneva in Switzerland, was in Armidale for the conference and to meet – for the first time – the supervisor of his Doctor of Education project, Dr David Paterson. “It’s fascinating to see the process of research in real life,” he said, “and to get to know other people in a similar situation.”

Among the keynote speakers at the conference were two distinguished visitors to UNE: Professor Brian Paltridge from the Faculty of Education and Social Work at the University of Sydney, and Mr Bill Lawrence AM, Deputy Chief Executive of the Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care. Professor Paltridge, the author of several books on academic writing, spoke about the factors that variably influence the style and structure of each postgraduate thesis, while the title of Mr Lawrence’s address was “A Research Framework for Safety and Quality in Health Care – the Challenge of Putting Policy into Practice”.

THE PHOTOGRAPH of Carina Bossu displayed here expands to include Andrew Close (left) and Emilio Morales.

The University of New England hosted a three-day workshop last week as part of a government-funded initiative that is enhancing the teaching of Indonesian at several Australian universities.

Lecturers in Indonesian from UNE – the leader of the Regional Universities’ Indonesian Language Initiative (RUILI) – were joined by their counterparts from the three other universities collaborating in the project: the University of the Sunshine Coast, the University of Tasmania, and Charles Darwin University.

The aim of the project is to develop and deliver Indonesian language programs based on common curricula, and including advanced units that can draw on the individual expertise of academics from any of the four universities.

Last week’s workshop, on the 10^th, 11^th and 12^th of July, was the third since the project was launched at the beginning of last year with a grant of $369,000 from the Australian Government. The workshop participants discussed the curriculum materials they have created together so far, and future developments.

“The project has enabled us to develop new online materials by collaborating creatively,” said UNE’s Stephen Miller, the RUILI Project Coordinator and convener of the workshop. “Working towards common, standardised curricula has proved incredibly productive.”

Also at the workshop were two academics from Mataram University on the island of Lombok – the Indonesian university that provides in-country language tuition for students from the four Australian universities. Their presence enabled the strengthening of links with their Australian colleagues, and the discussion of initiatives such as professional development for the Indonesian language teachers employed on Lombok as part of the project.

In officially opening the workshop, UNE’s Acting Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Academic Services), Eve Woodberry, said that the study of Indonesian was “critical” for Australia – particularly considering the important trade and tourism links between the two countries. She said that projects such as RUILI were “wonderful for the sharing of information and knowledge, and the consequent development of products that are more widely accepted”.

The project is establishing an “open” Web site that will enable Indonesian-teaching universities anywhere in the world to contribute to this collaborative development of teaching materials. The Web site will be launched at the biennial conference of the Australian Society of Indonesian Language Educators next year. There is also scope within the RUILI project for the delivery of the new, collaborative Indonesian language programs – using UNE’s highly successful “Blended Model” – to universities other than the four participants.

“The RUILI project has established the network we need,” Mr Miller said. “While it wouldn’t have happened without the current government funding, which ends in May next year, our collaboration will continue into the future.”

A PHOTOGRAPH of participants in the RUILI workshop can be seen by clicking on the image displayed here. Stephen Miller is second from right. The photograph, taken at the official opening, also includes Eve Woodberry (third from right) and Associate Professor Herman Beyersdorf (right), Acting Transitional Head of the School of Arts.

The Australian Poultry Cooperative Research Centre (Poultry CRC) based at the University of New England has won a major international award from the World’s Poultry Science Association (WPSA).

The Association’s Industry/Organisation Award was presented to the Poultry CRC’s Chairman, Dr Jeff Fairbrother, and Chief Executive Officer, Professor Mingan Choct, during the closing ceremony of the 23^rd World’s Poultry Congress in Brisbane earlier this month. The award, presented every four years at the Congress, was in recognition of “an outstanding contribution to the development of the poultry industry”.

Dr Roel Mulder, General Secretary of the WPSA, said there were many organisations throughout the world doing great work in advancing poultry science, but the Poultry CRC was “well ahead of its nearest rival for the award”.

Twenty researchers and staff members from the Poultry CRC’s headquarters and from UNE’s Poultry Research and Teaching Unit attended the Congress at the Brisbane Convention and Exhibition Centre, which ran from the 30^th of June till the 4^th of July and brought together about 2,500 leading poultry scientists from around the world. It was the first time that the event has been held in Australia.

“This award, and the CRC’s role in this preeminent gathering of the world’s poultry researchers, acknowledges the work of the CRC to date,” Dr Fairbrother said, “and should deliver confidence to producers and Australian governments that a top research organisation has the Australian poultry industry’s future in hand.” Professor Choct said the award was “truly an honour for the CRC and all its participants”.

The Poultry CRC is a joint venture between numerous academic, industry and government institutions, designed to perform research (often collaboratively) and to use the results to enhance the competitiveness, vitality and sustainability of the Australian egg and chicken meat industries. Its researchers have made important advances at local, national and international levels.

Professor Choct said that this major award, and the fact that 33 of the CRC’s researchers had given presentations at the Congress – many of them by invitation – demonstrated the respect that the CRC and its researchers had earned around the world.

Earlier this year Professor Choct was awarded the international poultry industry’s Gordon Medal when he presented the 25^th Annual Robert Fraser Gordon Memorial Lecture at the 2008 conference of the British Society of Animal Science in Scarborough, UK. The Gordon Lecture is organised by the R.F. Gordon Memorial Trust in association with the UK Branch of the WPSA. (See the posting on this Web site for Wednesday 14 May.)

THE PHOTOGRAPH displayed here shows Dr Jeff Fairbrother (left) and Professor Mingan Choct after receiving the award for the Poultry CRC.

St Albert’s College at the University of New England was a temporary home for more than 240 young people from Belgium, Germany and The Philippines last week before they dispersed to billets throughout the Armidale Diocese.

The young people – pilgrims on their way to this week’s World Youth Day celebrations in Sydney – spent several days at St Albert’s, where they had a chance to meet each other and gain their first experiences of Australia. They saw kangaroos in the University’s deer park, marvelled at the flocks of colourful parrots that visit the campus, and toured University facilities such as Sport UNE.

“It’s our part of World Youth Day,” said the Master of St Albert’s College, Geoff Johnston. “In this – ‘phase one’ of their pilgrimage in Australia – we enable them to settle and acclimatise before they move out into ‘phase two’: their ‘Days in the Diocese’.”

Felix Moseler is one of a group of 22 high-school students from Ahlen in Germany that stayed at St Albert’s. He said that he was excited about the prospect of meeting people from so many different cultures, and impressed with his first taste of Australia. The Ahlen group has been raising money for their pilgrimage for the past 18 months through jobs such as gardening and catering.

After a special Mass at St Mary’s and St Joseph’s Catholic Cathedral in Armidale last Thursday morning, followed by a civic reception at the Ex-Services Memorial Club, the pilgrims dispersed to their billets with families throughout the Diocese – the Ahlen group going to Uralla.

During those ‘Days in the Diocese’, the young pilgrims attended a bush dance and a fireworks display, saw sheep-shearing at a local station, and experienced many other aspects of Australian culture and the natural environment of New England.

Yesterday [Monday 14 July], all the pilgrims travelled to Sydney in preparation for the arrival of Pope Benedict XVI, and their World Youth Day experience will culminate with the Papal Mass at Randwick Racecourse on Sunday 20 July.

THE PHOTOGRAPH displayed here shows World Youth Day pilgrims from Belgium at St Albert’s College.

Wendy and Graham Hyde have retired after devoting all their working lives – a combined total of nearly 83 years – to the University of New England.

In June 1966, Graham Hyde began work as an electronics apprentice in the University’s Physics Department, and in November of the following year his future wife joined the University as a secretary in the Department of Sociology. They celebrated their 38^th wedding anniversary on the 14^th of February this year.

In a farewell function at UNE’s “Booloominbah” earlier this month, Professor Margaret Sedgley, Pro Vice-Chancellor and Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, pointed out how unusual it was these days for an individual – let alone a couple – to devote their whole career to one employer.

Professor Sedgley, who has worked closely with Mrs Hyde in the administration of the Faculty, commented on her “encyclopaedic knowledge” of the Faculty and its teaching programs, and said she had been “a wonderful support”. Mrs Hyde ended her UNE career as Faculty Adacemic Manager – a position she held from late 2003.

Her career led her through secretarial positions in the Departments of Sociology, Physiology, Rural Properties, and Animal Science before she was appointed secretary to the Dean in the Faculty of Rural Science in 1981. She became secretary to the Dean of the Faculty of The Sciences in 1990, before her appointment as Student Administrative Officer for the Faculty in 1991. “I’ve really enjoyed working at UNE,” she said at the farewell, “and particularly with the students.”

Graham Hyde spent most of his career in Physics (except for three years in Ecosystem Management), rising to the position of Senior Technical Officer.

After the birth of each of their two sons – Mark and Craig – Mrs Hyde had a break from UNE of several years. More recently, she undertook a Bachelor of Arts degree program through UNE as an external student, graduating in 1992.

Mr and Mrs Hyde have seen many changes at UNE over their 40-odd years of employment, including what Mrs Hyde referred to as “a big change in culture” during the period of the amalgamated “Network UNE” in the early 1990s. Recently, she has been closely involved in the structural reorganisation that has seen the integration of Arts and Sciences into the one Faculty – with a consequent increase in opportunities for interdisciplinary collaboration in teaching and research. At the same time, she played a major role in the University’s process of academic renewal, which included the creation of new degree programs to address the needs of a changing educational, employment, and social environment.

Professor Sedgley said at the farewell that much of the success of the academic renewal process within the Faculty had been “really Wendy’s achievement”. ‘It’s been the culmination of her years at UNE,” she said.

The Hydes are looking forward to travel and recreation in their retirement. They have bought a caravan (and a vehicle to pull it) and are planning an extensive tour of northern Australia next year.

A PHOTOGRAPH of Wendy Hyde (left) and Professor Margaret Sedgley, taken at the farewell function, can be seen by clicking on the image displayed here.

The University of New England is stepping forward to address the current serious shortage of social workers in rural and regional Australia.

UNE is introducing a degree program in social work that will capitalise on the University’s regional location, and its expertise in preparing graduates for professional practice in rural areas.

The first students in UNE’s Bachelor of Social Work program will be enrolled at the beginning of next year. The course will be available to both on-campus and distance-education students.

The program will be unique in its focus on the practice of social work in rural areas. “It builds on UNE’s strength in providing rural-focused professional training in related and complementary fields including medicine, nursing and criminology,” said Professor Victor Minichiello, Pro Vice-Chancellor and Dean of UNE’s Faculty of The Professions. “It is grounded on the philosophy that ‘those who are trained in the bush stay in the bush’.”

Professor Minichiello said that the new UNE program would prepare graduates for any professional social work position – in either government or non-government agencies or community services – while maintaining its special focus on rural areas, including Aboriginal communities.

Professor Alan Pettigrew, the Vice-Chancellor of UNE, said that the “strong rural focus” of the course represented “another major contribution that UNE will make to addressing critical workforce shortages in rural and regional Australia”. “We have received tremendous support from social workers – and agencies that employ social workers – in our area,” he said.

“The development of this new interdisciplinary Bachelor of Social Work program has been facilitated by the recent restructure of the University that has created opportunities for academic disciplines to work together,” Professor Pettigrew explained. “The accreditation body – the Australian Association of Social Workers – has specifically mentioned the interdisciplinary team approach as one of the obvious strengths of the program.”

Among the disciplines contributing to UNE’s social work program will be Counselling, Social Science, Law, Psychology, and Indigenous Studies.

Ros Giles, a reviewer of social work programs for the Association and Chair of its National Practice Standards Committee for Social Work, visiting UNE last week as part of the accreditation process, said the UNE program would “complement the current range of programs across Australia with its rural focus, and help in developing the rural workforce”.

She said that it was currently “impossible” to fill many of the positions for social workers in rural agencies, and that “training locals to stay local will address that”.

Professor Minichiello said the commonly-held view that rural communities are more socially cohesive than urban communities was – in general – “a myth”. “In rural communities the population is more widely spread and, as a result, social networks are more difficult to rely on,” he said. “The higher suicide rate is an indication of this.

“And, considering the likelihood of increasing economic difficulties, the need for social work services in rural communities will be enormous.”

A PHOTOGRAPH of Professor Alan Pettigrew (right) and Professor Victor Minichiello with Dr Myfanwy Maple, the Course Coordinator for the Bachelor of Social Work degree program, can be seen by clicking on the image displayed here.

A documentary drama written and directed by Barbara Albury, an Adjunct Senior Lecturer in UNE’s School of Arts, will be a highlight of NAIDOC Week celebrations in Armidale this week.

Who is Frank Archibald? will be performed tomorrow (Friday 11 July) at 11.30 am in Armidale Town Hall. It will follow the annual march by Aboriginal people through the streets of Armidale. Entry to the 30-minute drama is free.

Who is Frank Archibald? explores issues of race, assimilation and reconciliation in the 1950s and ’60s by focusing on the life of Frank Archibald, an Elder of the Gumbainggir people and a revered member of Armidale’s Aboriginal community, who died in 1975.

“Frank Archibald became a symbol of hope for his people,” Ms Albury said. “He was a strong advocate for Aboriginal rights, and believed that education was the way forward for Aboriginal people. His vision and courage as a spokesman for his people are recognised in the annual Frank Archibald Memorial Lecture held in his honour at the UNE Oorala Centre.” (This year’s lecture is at 7.30 this evening. See the posting on this Web site for Thursday 3 July.)

The play was originally commissioned by Daisy William, Director of the Aboriginal and Regional Cultural Centre and Keeping Place, as one of a series of short plays depicting the history of Armidale.

“The production is a blend of documentary information, the original songs of Frank Archibald, traditional Aboriginal children’s dances, and projected images depicting the ’50s and ’60s,” Ms Albury said. “The documentary information was gathered from newspaper cuttings, published literature, and a recorded interview with Gracie Gordon, Frank Archibald’s last living child.”

The cast of Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal actors includes two UNE students: Lesley Vale and Methuen Morgan.

THE PHOTOGRAPH displayed here shows Shane Levy in the role of Frank Archibald.

A two-day forum in Moree next week will focus on research projects and management initiatives undertaken in the Lower Gwydir wetlands and channels over the past few years.

“Many of the research projects on this high-conservation-value ecosystem are nearing completion, and this forum will give researchers and managers an opportunity to explain their work to the community at large,” said the convener of the forum, Dr Glenn Wilson from the University of New England.

“The Moree community and landholders will have an opportunity to learn about individual projects, how these complement each other, and ways in which the findings will be used by managers of the catchment’s rivers and wetlands,” Dr Wilson said.

The forum, on Tuesday the 15^th and Wednesday the 16^th of July, is being jointly hosted by the Border Rivers-Gwydir Catchment Management Authority and Moree Plains Shire Council. The first day, at The Max Centre, Balo Street, Moree, will comprise a series of research and management talks, with time for questions and for viewing research and organisational displays. On the second day there will be a bus tour to view river and wetland sites in the Lower Gwydir wetlands area, where landholders, researchers and managers will talk about maintaining both healthy and sustainable farming in this unique landscape. Attendance is free apart from a $20 charge for the forum dinner on Tuesday evening.

Among the presentations will be a report by Dr Wilson on research conducted through UNE and the Cotton Catchment Communities Cooperative Research Centre (Cotton CRC), and funded by the Australian Government, that has produced useful insights into how fish, planktonic animals, water chemistry and wetland plants respond to environmental and other flow releases from Copeton Dam.

The Gwydir Wetland System covers an area of 102,120 hectares and provides more than $200 million of irrigated agricultural products in the Gwydir region. It is listed in the Directory of Important Wetlands in Australia.

Next week’s forum has gained the support of a wide range of agencies, including UNE, the NSW Department of Environment and Climate Change, the Murray-Darling Basin Commission, the Border Rivers-Gwydir CMA, Moree Plains Shire Council, the Gwydir Valley Irrigators Association, the NSW Department of Primary Industries, and the Cotton CRC.

For more information on the forum contact Dr Glenn Wilson on (02) 6773 3078 or 0429 837 082 (e-mail: glenn.wilson@une.edu.au).