Keen young mathematicians from 39 secondary schools throughout northern NSW met at the University of New England last Friday (11 May) for a day of stimulating competition.

The 260 students, accompanied by 65 teachers and parents, travelled to UNE for the University’s annual Year 8 Mathematics Day. It was the biggest number of participants in the history of the Mathematics Day, which is now in its 18^th year.

Working in 65 teams of four, the students had an enjoyable experience of cooperative problem solving and applying mathematics to real-life situations.

“They absolutely love it,” said Brad Giffin, a mathematics teacher at Dorrigo High School who accompanied eight of his students to UNE for the day. “They’re challenged but not stressed. They all have smiles on their faces. And, in addition, it’s a social outing for them.”

Mr Giffin has been bringing teams of students from Dorrigo to the Mathematics Day for the past 11 years, and uses the opportunity to show them around the University’s campus – including its residential colleges and sporting facilities.

Pip Terry, one of Mr Giffin’s students, confirmed that she and her team-mates were enjoying not only the mathematical challenges but also the social side of the day. “We’ve caught up with some of our friends from NEGS (the New England Girls’ School) and PLC Armidale,” she said.

One of two teams from Uralla Central School won the trophy in the central schools division, and a team from Armidale High won the trophy for high schools. The other Uralla team came second in the central schools’ division, with a team from Manilla Central School coming third. Second and third in the high schools division were teams from O’Connor Catholic College (Armidale) and Bellingen High School. Students from Macintyre High School (Inverell) and The Armidale School tied as winners of the “construction” competition, which challenged the teams to build the tallest free-standing tower from the materials provided.

The Year 8 Mathematics Day is sponsored each year by the New England Mathematical Association, the UNE-based National Centre of Science, ICT and Mathematics Education for Rural and Regional Australia (SiMMER), and UNE’s School of Education.

At the end of the day on Friday, UNE’s Professor John Pegg, the Director of SiMMER, thanked everyone involved, and particularly the teachers from the New England Mathematical Association who had devised the questions and answers. He also acknowledged the support of those teachers who, after bringing students to the Mathematics Day for many years, were now approaching their retirement.

The University of New England’s inaugural Peace Festival, incorporating the annual Nonviolence Film Festival and a new Peacebuilding Conference, got under way this week with public forums and an exhibition in the Dixson Library.

Dr Marty Branagan, a lecturer in Peace Studies at UNE, said the festival had “grown organically” out of the film festival, which is now in its third year. “It’s complementing our teaching program by allowing people to engage in more informal discussions about nonviolence,” he said.

The exhibition, Transforming the Human Spirit, presented by the international Buddhist peace organisation Soka Gakkai, was opened on Monday 7 May and will continue till Friday 18 May. It is complemented by a display titled Ain’t Gonna Study War No More, featuring books, posters, buttons t-shirts and other protest movement ephemera. The display includes one of Dr Branagan’s paintings inspired by his aspirations for social and environmental regeneration.

The Peace Festival program this week has included public forums on “Creating value in activism” (with a panel including Dr Rebecca Spence, a UNE-based peace worker, Adam Blakester, a board member of Greenpeace Australia, and Greg Johns, the General Director of Soka Gakkai International Australia), and “Nonviolence: how most revolutions really occur” (with Dr Marty Branagan). A public forum on “Grassroots activism: activism and the democratic process”, with Angela Gates, will be in the Dixson Library’s Letters Room at 11.30 am on Monday 14 May.

Nonviolence Film Festival

The Nonviolence Film Festival will open in UNE’s Lewis Lecture Theatre at 1 pm on Monday 14 May. The film festival, which will continue till Friday 18 May in the Lewis Lecture Theatre at 1 pm (except for a 2 pm start on Thursday), aims to show the effectiveness of nonviolence against injustice and oppression through a public series of free lunchtime documentaries about significant nonviolent campaigns in Australia and abroad. These include the rescue of the majority of Danish Jews from the Nazi Holocaust (Monday 14 May), the first major strike held by Indigenous Australian workers in Western Australia (Tuesday 15 May), the overthrow of the Philippines dictator Ferdinand Marcos after 20 years of rule (Wednesday 16 May), logging blockades in the subtropical forests of northern NSW (Thursday 17 May), and a satirical take on global free trade (Friday 18 May).

Amnesty International will mount a stall at the film festival, and discussions with Peace Studies staff members will follow each screening. Dr Branagan said that the week-long festival of free films presented by UNE Peace Studies could help people to understand the potential of what he called “the world’s most powerful philosophy of social change”.

Peacebuilding Conference

A major component of the Peace Festival is the conference, Cultivating Peace: Context, Practices and Multidimensional Models, that will begin on Thursday 17 May and continue till Saturday 19 May. Members of the public are welcome to attend the conference sessions (entry by donation) in the UNE Arts Theatre. A keynote address by UNE’s Professor of Peace Studies, Helen Ware, will be at 1.20 pm on the first day of the conference, and that afternoon, starting at 2.30 pm, there will be talks about peace building and conflict resolution in the Solomon Islands, China, Zimbabwe, and India/Nepal.

The conference sessions on Friday 18 May, when the countries under discussion will include East Timor, Ivory Coast, Pakistan and Kenya, will begin at 9 am with a keynote address by Dr Tony Lynch, a UNE philosopher, and continue till 5 pm. Saturday’s sessions, starting at 9 am and continuing till 1.30 pm, will include critical discussion around current theories and practices in peace building.

The conferences speakers – mainly international postgraduate students – are from countries including Kenya, Bangladesh, Japan, Sierra Leone, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Nepal, China, Hungary, and Yap State. One speaker is travelling  to  Armidale  from the University of Peace in Costa Rica.

For more information on the Peace Festival, contact Dr Marty Branagan at marty.branagan@une.edu.au, or phone him on (02) 6771 4948 or (02) 6773 3951.

A free public lecture in Armidale Town Hall on Wednesday 16 May will address the question “Why have weeds survived against our best efforts to control them?”

In his Inaugural Lecture as Professor of Weed Science at the University of New England, Brian Sindel will outline “three secrets for success in controlling weeds”.

Professor Sindel’s lecture, titled “Why weeds: a tale of survival”, will explain why we have weeds and why we need to control them. He will also review the history of weed survival in the Armidale region and its impact on people and agriculture. “Weeds cost the Australian economy a damaging $4 billion a year,” he says.

The lecture will deal with management tactics for local weeds such as serrated tussock, saffron thistle (pictured here) and fireweed.

Professor Sindel has been examining weeds for more than 30 years and has taught at UNE for the past 18 of those years. His work is widely published in scientific journals, and he is recognised as a leading expert in the field. His one-hour lecture, which will draw on the most up-to-date research in discussing weed management tactics, will be of interest to everyone – including, in particular, graziers, agronomists, lifestyle farmers and home gardeners. “Everyone has to deal with weeds,” he says. “They are everyone’s business.”

The lecture will begin at 6.30 pm. Drinks and canapés will be provided in the Town Hall foyer after the lecture, when Professor Sindel will offer his expertise to help members of the audience identify weeds that may be lurking in their garden.

To help with catering arrangements, please e-mail the organisers at events.pr@une.edu.au by Tuesday 15 May if you are intending to go to the lecture.

Student residents at the University of New England’s Austin College have created a work of art that expresses their individuality as young adults and symbolises their connectedness as a community.

They have creatively celebrated the supportive network of social bonds within the College by inter-connecting photographic portraits of themselves using individually decorated strings that criss-cross an entire room.

The creation of the Austin College Safety Net has been led by two Austin residents – Samantha Young and Max Dowden – who worked with the local community arts organisation Beyond Empathy in designing the project. Samantha and Max are in their third year of the Bachelor of Social Work degree program at UNE, and their collaboration with Beyond Empathy has been a community placement undertaken as part of their degree program.

The completion of the project was marked by a “launch” at Austin College on Friday 4 May. “We always have the launch at the end of a project,” explained the Executive Director of Beyond Empathy, Kim McConville. “It’s actually the beginning of the movement forward inspired by the project.”

“As we usually work with disadvantaged groups, it’s been a challenge for us – and a wonderful experience – working with a community of university students,” Ms McConville said. “It’s been a harmonious partnership with UNE Social Work, and a pleasure to work with Sam and Max.”

She said that, from a purely artistic perspective, the Safety Net was “an example of lifting the bar” in the quality of such works, and she thanked the Sydney-based photographer Wendy Kimpton and the local artist Myfanwy Gulliver for their contributions to the project. (Both Ms Kimpton and Ms Gulliver were at the launch.)

She also thanked her colleague Narelle Jarry, Beyond Empathy’s Project Manager, for her work as one of Samantha and Max’s supervisors (together with Samantha Ackling, a former Head of UNE’s Robb College and current casual academic in UNE Social Work).

“The collaboration has involved all of us sitting down and seeing how we could celebrate a group of young people looking after each other,” Narelle Jarry said.

Dr Myfanwy Maple, Coordinator of Social Work at UNE, said that this kind of innovative project, based on the placement of social work students in a non-government agency focusing on social change, provided fertile ground for further collaboration between the University and community services. She also thanked the Head of Austin College, Andrea Gledhill, for her support of the two students undertaking a placement within the College.

Max said that working on the project with Beyond Empathy had helped him and Samantha “appreciate the power of art and how it can change people”.

“We organised the portraits because we wanted to identify and celebrate you as individuals,” said Samantha, addressing her fellow Austin College residents. “We also asked you to answer questions about what Austin means to you, and to create your own individual string for the installation.

“In the process you found that there are lots of people you’re connected to – and that in the end we have a ‘net’. There’s always someone there to catch you.”

The ‘Safety Net’ image displayed here expands to show Samantha Young and Max Dowden with the installation in Austin College.

A forum at the University of New England on Friday 11 May will examine the potential of the cooperative movement to help rebuild regional Australia.

Hosted by UNE and the Community Mutual Group (CMG), the forum will address the value of cooperatives from a regional perspective, and how to go about establishing them at grassroots level. It will also explore their successful operations in Australia and other countries. This year – 2012 – is the International Year of Cooperatives.

Friday’s forum, titled Creating Regional Prosperity through Cooperative Business Models, will be in UNE’s Lewis Lecture Theatre, starting at 2 pm and continuing till 4 pm.

Associate Professor Jo Barraket from the Australian Centre for Philanthropy and Non-profit Studies at Queensland University of Technology, and Melina Morrison, Director of Australia’s International Year of Cooperatives Secretariat – both acknowledged experts on cooperatives – will be guest speakers at the forum. Other speakers will include Professor Alison Sheridan, Head of UNE’s School of Business, Economics and Public Policy, Tony Wilson, Deputy Chairman of NORCO, and Mr Peter Tregilgas, Executive Officer of Regional Development Australia for Mid North Coast NSW and author of Social Enterprise Australia.

Professor Sheridan said that the forum would be a useful source of information for teachers and researchers within her School, which has a particular focus on regional business. “It will open up important conversations for us,” she said.  “We welcome the opportunity to discuss – with businesses themselves – the role of co-operatives in regional development.”

The organiser of the forum, CMG’s Executive Director- People, Communities and Credit, Valerieanne Byrnes, said the strength and viability of members owning and directing their own organisations had gained momentum since the global financial crisis. “Business cooperatives came through the GFC in all countries without the consequences experienced by other business types,” she said. “They remained rock solid when many large corporate entities went to the wall.

“As a result, many economists and commentators are now re-examining the cooperative model because it is controlled by members, has a long-term view for the community it serves, and is more flexible in how it deploys its capital, borrows money, and distributes profits. It allows for innovation and shared operations that can be extremely competitive, profitable and successful.”

She said that with small businesses in the regions struggling on many fronts, the cooperative business model could hold the key to overcoming many of the challenges.  Cooperatives of like-minded individuals and enterprises could deliver the necessary scale to be competitive and still serve members’ interests, she said.

Prospective students travelled to the University of New England from as far away as Mount Gambier in South Australia to gain knowledge and experience of living and learning on campus at today’s UNE Open Day.

Some came with a particular interest in one of the many fields of teaching and learning at which UNE excels. Mitchell O’Donoghue, from Great Lakes College Senior Campus at Tuncurry, was looking into animal science courses, and talked to UNE’s Dr Wendy Brown, who coordinates the Canine and Equine major of UNE’s unique Bachelor of Animal Science degree program. “I liked what I heard,” said Mitchell, who has seven dogs of his own, has worked with a horse trainer, and has done work experience at Dubbo Zoo.

Carl Sully, a Year 12 student from Quirindi High School who has an ambition to study sport science at UNE, said the day had given him “an insight” into what was involved.

Carl, who lives at Werris Creek, added that he had been impressed by the friendliness of the staff and students at UNE.

The friendliness of the campus was an aspect of UNE life that the Chancellor, Richard Torbay, and the Vice-Chancellor, Professor Jim Barber, both emphasised in welcoming the Open Day visitors. “At UNE you’re going to make friends – and they’ll be friends for life,” Mr Torbay told them.

He said that not only the UNE community, but also the wider Armidale community, “cares about its students”.

“We offer you not just an education but a way of life – an educational experience not just for the mind, but for the heart and soul as well,” Professor Barber said.

More than 1,000 prospective students visited the campus today. As well as travelling in school groups from throughout northern NSW, they came from farther afield accompanied by their parents. Paige Kiehne, from Centenary Heights State High School in Toowoomba, came with her mother Shirley Kiehne to look around the residential colleges as well the academic campus. “I looked at a few of the colleges – and liked them,” Paige said.

The visitors enjoyed the free lunch and entertainment provided – entertainment that included music from two bands, games and competitions.

Sarah Wilson, UNE’s Marketing Manager, pointed out that, by providing a program of informative talks by lecturers in several of the university’s main lecture theatres, Open Day had given the visitors a genuine taste of life on campus. “That experience included the personal contact with lecturers so readily available at UNE,” she said.

This year’s Open Day is extending into a second day, making it available to those unable to attend on a week day. The program on Saturday 5 May will be particularly helpful for distance education students, who will be able to find out – and ask questions – about online learning and library resources at UNE, while tours, a free lunch and entertainment will also be provided.

THE PHOTOGRAPH displayed here shows Mitchell O’Donoghue talking to UNE’s Dr Wendy Brown about  programs in animal science.

New compositions by two University of New England lecturers will be among the highlights of the 6^th New England Bach Festival that starts on Thursday 3 May and continues till Sunday 6 May.

The new works by Steve Thorneycroft and Benjamin Thorn will be performed in a late-night concert, titled “Minimalist Meditations”, in Armidale’s Uniting Church on Friday 4 May.

The concert, beginning at 10 pm, will comprise compositions that either rework Bach pieces or use Bach themes and motifs in a new context.

Benjamin Thorn’s works for the concert include JSB Mandalas, which interweaves themes from several of Bach’s works, and Genug, a reworking of the chorale Est ist genug, so nimm, Herr, while Steve Thorneycroft has written Bach through the looking glass and has collaborated with his fellow composer and performer Steve Tafra on A Reichian reinvention of Prelude #1.

Steve Thorneycroft and Steve Tafra presented a lecture during the 4^th New England Bach Festival in 2008 on their arrangement for two guitars of Bach’s Goldberg Variations, which they presented in a concert performance during that year’s festival.

Dr Thorn, the Artistic Director of the New England Bach Festival, is a lecturer in creative arts education at UNE, and Steve Thorneycroft is a UNE music lecturer. The festival regularly draws on the musical performance talents of UNE staff members and students in a program of concerts that also includes performances by celebrated visiting musicians. This year’s program includes performances by the Melbourne-based harpsichordist Peter Hagen, the baroque group Alchemy, the string trio Terzina and the Lucid Dance Theatre (all from Brisbane), and Australian Baroque Brass.

For the full program, go to: http://www.nebachfestival.com/.

Professor Martin Thoms is hoping that, after five months’ research on the banks of the Mississippi as a Fulbright Senior Scholar, he’ll return home with knowledge that will further his already-significant contribution to the management and protection of Australia’s rivers.

Professor Thoms (pictured here), Head of Geography at the University of New England and an independent scientific auditor for the Murray Darling Basin Authority, will be working at the U.S. Geological Survey’s Mississippi River Monitoring Field Station at La Crosse in Wisconsin and at the nearby Winona State University. He is one of only two Australian recipients of Fulbright Senior Scholarships in 2012.

His aim is to develop skills in the use of new technologies that will help Australian scientists to document the resilience of our rivers in response to major environmental disturbances (such as dam building and climate change) in the past, and thus assess their current and future capacity for resilience.

The cutting-edge technologies employed in these investigations include the use of radioactive isotopes in examining organic deposits in a river system in order to reconstruct the “food web” within that system at different periods in the past as well as in the present.

“The complexity of the food web – a picture of who’s eating what – is an indication of the health of the system,” Professor Thoms explained. “The more complex the food web, the healthier it is. Using these techniques we can build up a time line of the complexity and integrity of riverine landscapes, and correlate that with known changes in climate, land use, and river management.

“Our research group at UNE is in the midst of doing this for the Murray Darling Basin and other large river systems. We’ve been working with our American colleagues, and have been able to record the impact of disturbances such as dam building. And these new technologies will extend the boundaries of our work.”

His interdisciplinary research group is conducting projects on the Macintyre River, the Narran Wetlands, and the Darling and Lower Murrumbidgee Rivers, as well as reconstructing past food webs in the Murray Darling Basin. Two of his research students will be joining him in Wisconsin, and he’s hoping that his Fulbright Scholarship will strengthen and extend the links he has already established with the U.S. Geological Survey and Winona State University. “They’re really interested in how we at UNE are able to get our science out there and used on the ground,” he said, “and how they could build similar collaborative relationships with their own communities.”

Professor Thoms, who is President Elect of the International Society for River Science, will leave Armidale for North America at the beginning of June. He will take up the Fulbright Scholarship at the end of that month after co-hosting a conference at Banff, in Canada, about the impact of wildfires on river ecosystems, and working with scientists at the University of Montana’s Flathead Lake Biological Station.

While excited at the prospect of a laboratory and research vessel of his own on the Mississippi for five months, he sees the Fulbright Scholarship as an opportunity for the advancement of Australian river science in general – an interdisciplinary science that would be aimed at the management not only of rivers themselves, but also of their surrounding landscapes.

Secondary students in Years 11 and 12, along with their parents and friends, will be able to find out all they want to know about living and learning at the University of New England when the University stages its annual Open Day on Friday 4 May.

The University is expecting more than 1,000 prospective students – including many school groups from throughout northern NSW – to visit the campus on the day.

Starting at 7.30 am with breakfast at the residential colleges, Open Day 2012 will include the opportunity to gather a wealth of information about UNE courses by talking to representatives of all the academic Schools, and to attend informative lectures about academic programs within those Schools.

The lectures will also cover topics such as how to apply to UNE, HECS, and scholarships, and current students will be on hand to answer questions about their UNE experience.

Tours of the academic campus and Sport UNE, and tours of the residential colleges, will run from 9 am to 2.30 pm. The day’s program will include a free lunch, entertainment from two bands, games, and competitions.

Speaking in UNE’s Central Courtyard at 12 noon, the Chancellor, Richard Torbay, and the Vice-Chancellor, Professor Jim Barber, will welcome all the visitors. “Open Day is our traditional showcase, allowing our future students to experience UNE’s renowned academic, sporting and accommodation facilities, support services, and academic staff,” Professor Barber said.

“This year we are offering a program that extends over two days,” he said, “allowing greater flexibility for those who can’t attend on Friday.”

The Open Day program on Saturday 5 May, running from 9 am to 1 pm, will be particularly helpful for distance education students, who will be able to find out – and ask questions – about online learning and library resources at UNE, as well as obtain course advice and experience a campus tour. A free lunch and entertainment will also be provided on Saturday.

The University of New England’s Chancellor, Richard Torbay, used his keynote address at Mary White College’s 49th Annual Chancellor’s Dinner to discuss the impact of rapidly changing online technologies on higher education.

The gala event at Mary White last Friday (27 April) recognised the academic success – as well as service to the community – of Mary White residents.

Mr Torbay told the staff and students at the event that advances in online technology had changed the way in which UNE delivered its courses.  “The use of online technologies and social media are second nature to most students, and they expect that their courses will incorporate up-to-date online offerings,” he said. “For example, in our medical school, all first-year students have been issued with iPads for their coursework and students use video links to participate in medical simulations at the University of California, Irvine.

“In the months ahead, UNE hopes to utilise online technologies to remotely manage farms, deliver health care in retirement villages, and deliver numeracy and literacy programs into homes.”

Mr Torbay said that the possibilities presented by new social media were far-reaching. “For instance, this was demonstrated at the dinner when I ‘tweeted’ about the event and was contacted via ‘twitter’ by students in the room,” he said.

Mr Torbay said the annual Chancellor’s dinner was about recognising and celebrating the hard work of Mary White residents.

The Head of Mary White College, Trent Pohlmann, said that three students – Myles  Kwa, Ali Morrison and Nikola Beilby – were  recipients of the Chancellor’s Award for Academic Excellence. “Myles, Ali and Nikola are worthy recipients of the award and have worked hard to achieve their academic results,” Mr Pohlmann said.  “Cara Kajewski, a medical student, has also been recognised, with a Senior Common Room Scholarship for her efforts that included volunteering during the Queensland floods.”

Mr Torbay congratulated Myles, Ali, Nikola and Cara on their achievement.  “These students are role models for the College and the community,” he said, “and follow in the footsteps of many outstanding Mary White alumni including Dame Bridget Ogilvie AC and the Mayor of Albury, Alice Glachan.”