Archive for April, 2009

The Armidale and University communities will have an opportunity to experience something of the rich diversity of Japanese culture when the University of New England stages its annual Japanese Cultural Day next week.

That experience will include Japanese music, dance, martial arts and food in an event next Thursday evening, the 7^th of May, organised by staff and students of Japanese in UNE’s School of Arts.

Entry to the program of performances, beginning at 6 pm in UNE’s A1 Lecture Theatre (Arts Building) will be free, and there will be an interval during which Japanese food (sushi packs) will be available for $7.50.

The program will begin with songs performed by UNE students of Japanese, followed by a dance performance and a kendo demonstration by students from Japan’s Chubu University who are studying at the UNE English Language Centre. Kendo is a modern Japanese martial art, based on traditional swordsmanship, in which practitioners wear protective armour and use a shinai – a weapon made from bamboo.

After the interval there will be a performance of music for koto (13-stringed instrument, pictured here) by Ms Sayaka Nunotani from Osaka, who is an International Business student at UNE. This will be followed by a martial arts demonstration by local masters – Jonathan Sensei (aikido) and Antony Sensei (iai-jutsu, a Japanese art of swordsmanship) – and their students. The program is scheduled to finish at 8.30 pm.

Kiyomi Yamada, a Japanese lecturer at UNE, said everyone would be welcome at the event, which would celebrate not only Japanese culture, but relationships between the discipline of Japanese at UNE and the wider University and Armidale communities.

A generous bequest of $1 million is strengthening the University of New England’s long-held position as a leading provider of education in Classical Greek and Latin.

The Vice-Chancellor, Professor Alan Pettigrew, launched a new lectureship in Latin – the Charles Tesoriero Lectureship – during a ceremony at UNE on Friday. He explained that the new lectureship had been made possible through the generosity of Dr Charles Tesoriero, “a past and greatly valued staff member at UNE”.

Professor Pettigrew and the Chancellor, the Hon. Richard Torbay MP, thanked all those – including family members and colleagues – who had assisted in establishing the bequest. Dr Torbay said that Charles Tesoriero, who died in 2005 at the age of 32, was “very sorely missed”, and that the “extreme generosity” of the bequest was “a testament to his passion for the Classics”.

Professor Pettigrew said that Dr Tesoriero, who held a lectureship in Classics at UNE from 2001 until 2005, had been “a charismatic teacher and dedicated researcher”. “His outstanding contribution to the teaching of both Latin and Roman history and civilisation, and to curriculum development in Latin language and literature, was appreciated and acknowledged by staff and students alike,” he said.

He described current – and future – initiatives in the teaching of Classics at UNE, including the development of online Latin and Greek units to be offered Australia-wide and overseas, saying that the Charles Tesoriero Lectureship would be the “cornerstone” of these initiatives in the teaching of Latin language and literature.

Dr Tamara Neal, one of the executors of Charles Tesoriero’s Will, was present at the ceremony, during which Greg Horsley, UNE’s Professor of Classics and Ancient History, read a statement from the other executor – Ron Tesoriero, Charles’s uncle and godfather. “We are pleased that the University was enthusiastic about putting into effect the lectureship that Charles wanted,” his statement read, “and we are also pleased that the University was willing to supplement the amount of the bequest to ensure that the lectureship will be able to endure into the future.”

“Charles believed that the teaching of Latin was a means of exposing students to the foundations of Western culture and language,” Mr Tesoriero’s statement continued, “and he regretted that Latin, a language that had traditionally been regarded as important, was no longer considered as relevant.

“He was also very much aware of the limitations that existed for others to have academic opportunities at a teaching level in Latin at university.

“His concern for them moved him to provide for two monumental acts of philanthropy. He bequeathed one million dollars to this university (UNE) and another one million dollars to the University of Sydney so that new lectureships could be established.”

“It is my hope that those who benefit from Charles’s bequest will not only advance the cause of promoting a love for the classics, but will also learn something of the motives for philanthropy – that concern for others that we of the family will always have as our memory of Charles,” the statement concluded. (Full text of statement.)

Clicking on the image displayed here reveals a photograph, taken at last Friday’s launch, of (from left) Professor Alan Pettigrew, Dr Tamara Neal, and the Hon. Richard Torbay MP.

An internationally competitive award from the Australian Government is allowing a senior Bhutanese education official to conduct research at the University of New England that will help in the development of Bhutan’s national education assessment program.

Dr Phub Rinchen (pictured here), Secretary of the Bhutan Board of Examinations, is spending four months in UNE’s School of Education, where his research is preparing him to coordinate a National Education Assessment in literacy and numeracy for Grade 6 students throughout Bhutan in November.

Dr Rinchen’s visit to UNE, which is funded by an Australian Government Endeavour Award, is the most recent development in a long-standing relationship between the University and Bhutan’s Ministry of Education. This relationship began in 1992 with the Bhutanese Multigrade Attachment Program which, over a period of about 15 years, enabled teachers at small, remote schools in Bhutan to receive specialised training at UNE. Dr Rinchen studied at UNE as a part-time student from 1992, graduating with a Doctor of Education degree in 2001.

In 2003 he coordinated Bhutan’s first National Education Assessment for Grade 6 literacy and numeracy, and the assessment in November will be the second. While at UNE he will be working closely with academics in the School of Education, and he will also spend some time in Sydney working with the Educational Measurement and School Assessment Directorate of the NSW Department of Education and Training.

Professor Len Unsworth, Head of UNE’s School of Education, said that Dr Rinchen’s visit “further consolidates the very strong relationship between us and our Bhutanese colleagues”.

“Our staff members will have the opportunity to interact with a very high-ranking education official from Bhutan,” Professor Unsworth said. “Having an experienced person from a different culture cast a critical eye over our assessment practices will provide us with important feedback.”

“Over the years, we’ve learnt a lot from each other,” Dr Rinchen said. “When we were setting up the Royal University of Bhutan a few years ago, UNE was one of our models. Our ties continue to strengthen, and there are many avenues for future collaboration between UNE and the Bhutan Ministry of Education and the Royal University of Bhutan.”

He pointed out that Australia and Bhutan both have many rural communities with small schools, and said he had visited many such schools in NSW.

Dr Rinchen arrived at UNE on the 1^st of March and will return to Bhutan at the end of June. “I feel highly honoured – as well as privileged – to have this opportunity of a professional development program, sponsored by the Australian Government’s Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations, to improve national education assessment in Bhutan,” he said. “I am also highly indebted to UNE’s School of Education for hosting the program; the support from the University, and Associate Professor Tom Maxwell (my supervisor), is excellent.”

The Endeavour Awards program provides opportunities for citizens of the Asia-Pacific, Middle East, Europe and the Americas to undertake study, research and professional development in Austrlaia. Awards are also available for Australians to do the same abroad.

THE PHOTOGRAPH of Dr Phub Rinchen displayed here expands to include Professor Len Unsworth (right) and Associate Professor Tom Maxwell.

While the thoughts of most people were on preparations for Easter, a large group of enthusiastic Year 11 and Year 12 students was getting a taste of life at the University of New England.

Around 90 students from eight Mid-North Coast schools visited UNE on Thursday 9 April. They came from Westport High School (Port Macquarie), Port Macquarie High School, Kempsey High School, Wauchope High School, Wingham High School, Bulahdelah Central School, Great Lakes Senior School, and Taree High School.

After experiencing the residential college lifestyle with a night’s stay at Austin College on Wednesday 8 April, the students awoke to a day filled with university activities. UNE’s Kim Ayres, the coordinator of the schools’ visit, said that her aim had been “to show the students the many wonderful opportunities that UNE has on offer”.

The large group was broken into smaller, more personal groups, each with their own UNE tour guide. The students were then taken around the University and were given the opportunity to participate in a program in which staff from each of UNE’s academic Schools gave short talks on their specific disciplines.

“The day really gave the students an overview of the areas of study they might like to consider undertaking in the coming years,” said Bill Timmins, Careers Adviser at Westport High School. “Kim has put together an extremely valuable educational experience for these Year 11 and 12s.”

The students were also able to see UNE’s sporting and study facilities, and were given an idea of the extensive support and social networks available to them.

The day has been deemed a success by staff and students alike. “I was really thankful for all their help,” said Tabitha Francis, a Year 12 student at Westport High School. “It helped a lot of us to make the decision about what we want to do next year.”

UNE is hoping that school visits such as this will become more common, as a way of enabling school students to discover their options and successfully plan for their future.

THE PHOTOGRAPH displayed here shows Kyara Stennett from Wauchope High School absorbing information in a UNE laboratory.

Psychologists at the University of New England are offering free treatment to people suffering from phobias.  The Phobia Elimination Program seeks to eliminate both the fear and the avoidance sufferers experience as a result of their phobias.

The director of the program, Dr John Malouff, knows first-hand the debilitating effects of having a phobia. He suffered from a terrible fear of water and diving from an early age and as a result did not learn to swim until he was an adult.

Dr Malouff said that through a program of gradual, controlled exposure — the same techniques as will be used in the Phobia Elimination Program — he was able to overcome his fear and is now not only a confident swimmer, but was recently able to go down a waterslide for the first time in his life.

“Phobias can be extremely limiting,” Dr. Malouff said. “If you are terrified of giving a speech, for instance, you can probably never work as a teacher or rise within an organisation. Fear of flying may prevent you travelling overseas.”

“While some phobias may concern things that can be dangerous — spiders, snakes, heights — others are about things that are usually harmless. Some people are scared of grasshoppers, for instance.”

“All these kind of phobias can be treated using cognitive behavioural therapy, and that is what we’re offering in our program, with clinical psychology students providing the treatment under my supervision.  Our goal is to eliminate phobias in three sessions.”

Anyone interested in entering the Phobia Elimination Program can make an appointment at the UNE Psychology Clinic in Armidale on (02) 6773 2545.

A philosopher from the University of New England is making accessible to a general audience an approach to life that he believes can be of vital interest to everyone.

Professor Michael Fox (pictured here), whose newly-published book The Remarkable Existentialists reveals the human faces behind – and the human concerns of – one of the most influential philosophies of recent times, describes the subjects of his book as “educators of the spirit”.

“The existentialists,” he says, “uniquely in modern times, revived philosophy’s original mission, which was to help people develop in self-knowledge, inner freedom, and personal and social responsibility.”

The Remarkable Existentialists examines in detail the life and work of Soren Kierkegaard (1813-1855), Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900), Martin Heidegger (1889-1976), Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980), and Simone de Beauvoir (1908-1986). “These philosophers address – directly, honestly, and with passionate involvement – themes that are central to the experience of being human,” Professor Fox says. “And although the heyday of the existentialist movement has passed, its wide-ranging influence continues. This influence is particularly obvious in literature and the arts (beginning with the literary works of Sartre and de Beauvoir themselves), theology and psychology. For example, Heidegger’s writings on death have had a monumental impact on the development of the hospice movement.”

In an “Afterword: Existentialism as a Way of Life”, Professor Fox writes: “Existential philosophers present their thoughts with passion and in a spirit of confrontation and mutual involvement with the reader.” Ideas such as theirs, he says, “are there for appropriating and applying, for making into the vehicles of change and progression from one life state to the next”.

The Remarkable Existentialists, which presents the philosophers as real people wrestling with the central problems of existence, will enable readers to apply the ideas it discusses in developing their own lives. Its style of presentation reflects Professor Fox’s own philosophy of teaching and outreach, developed in the classroom over many years. “I believe you can be scholarly and still convey difficult ideas in a digestible and entertaining fashion,” he says. “In this book I try to get inside the heads of the thinkers a little more than other people have done – what they saw as problems, and who they wanted their readers to be.”

Michael Fox is an Adjunct Professor in UNE’s School of Humanities, and Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario, Canada. His main fields of research are nineteenth-century European philosophy, existentialism, the philosophy of peace, and environmental philosophy. His previous books include The Accessible Hegel (2005), Deep Vegetarianism (1999), and The Case for Animal Experimentation: An Evolutionary and Ethical Perspective (1986).

The Remarkable Existentialists is published in the United States by Humanity Books, and distributed in Australia by Footprint Books, Sydney.

The University of New England is celebrating the career – and 90^th birthday – of one of its most distinguished scientists: Emeritus Professor Robin Stokes.

Professor Stokes (pictured here), who turned 90 on Christmas Eve last year, was UNE’s first Professor of Chemistry, holding the position of Professor of Physical and Inorganic Chemistry from 1955 until his retirement in 1979.

He lives in Armidale, and will be the guest of honour at a celebratory reception and lecture in UNE’s Lewis Chemistry Lecture Theatre this Wednesday afternoon (22 April). Drinks at 4.30 pm will be followed by a public lecture on Professor Stokes’s life and work by Professor Ken Marsh from the University of Canterbury in New Zealand, who was a student of Professor Stokes in the 1960s and a lecturer and Associate Professor of Chemistry at UNE from 1966 to 1985. The presentation of a commemorative plaque to Professor Stokes by the Vice-Chancellor, Professor Alan Pettigrew, will be followed by a dinner at “Booloomimbah”.

Born in England and educated in New Zealand and Cambridge (UK), Robin Stokes became a world-renowned authority on the chemistry of solutions. His book Electrolyte Solutions (1959), written in collaboration with Robert A. Robinson, is a classic text in the field, and he is author/co-author of two other important books, several book chapters and conference proceedings, entries in encyclopaedias, and more than 130 papers in peer-reviewed journals spanning the 50 years from 1940 to 1990.

A review of his career in a recent issue of the international Journal of Solution Chemistry said that Electrolyte Solutions “remains one of the most cited references” in the field, and described one of Professor Stokes’s book chapters as “a concise and lucid introduction to the thermodynamics of liquid solutions”.

His published work has been cited more than 15,000 times in the scientific literature, and he modestly attributes this recognition of his work by the scientific community to his belief in the intrinsic “goodness of measured fact”.

Professor Stokes is a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry, and a Fellow of the Royal Australian Chemical Institute. Among his many awards are the Meldola Medal of the Royal Society of Chemistry (1946) and the Queen’s Jubilee Medal (1977). His work is remembered in the Australian Chemical Institute’s R.H. Stokes Medal for Electrochemistry (of which he was the first recipient), and in the name of the Stokes Chemistry Building at UNE.

For more information on the public lecture, ring Dr Trevor Brown at UNE on (02) 6773 2872.

THE PHOTOGRAPH of Emeritus Professor Robin Stokes displayed here was taken at UNE in the early 1980s.

Pauline Hams, whose passion for archaeology led to her graduation from the University of New England earlier this month, has won a prize for a study that has taken her as far as the Museum of Ancient Corinth in Greece.

Ms Hams (pictured here) has been awarded the Charles Ede Essay Prize for 2008. The annual prize is for an essay, by a student at UNE, about – or inspired by – exhibits in UNE’s Museum of Antiquities.

After studying part-time for her Bachelor of Arts degree, majoring in archaeology, Ms Hams is now enrolled in UNE’s Graduate Diploma in Humanities program. Her prize-winning essay concerns the mysterious, diminutive female figures known as “phi figurines”, found throughout the Mediterranean region and dating from the second millennium BC, examples of which are included in the UNE collection.

Resembling in shape the Greek letter “phi”, these clay artefacts left by the Mycenaean civilisation have been variously interpreted as votive offerings to an “Earth Mother” goddess, or “divine nurses” protecting the entombed remains of dead children. The examples in the Museum of Antiquities are dated at around 1200 BC.

Ms Hams said that her UNE degree program had given her “the most incredible experience”. She has been studying part-time since 2003, combining study with home and family, overseas travel, and even a full-time job in Bermuda as coordinator for a marine research vessel. She lives with her husband at Invergowrie, where they are setting up a small organic farm.

For the future, she hopes to be able to make some practical application of her archaeological knowledge and skills in the field of Indigenous archaeology.

Her essay won Ms Hams a cheque for $150 and book purchases to the value of $100. John Harris, who chairs the Museum of Antiquities committee and who presented Ms Hams with her award, said the prize was donated annually by the London-based antiquities dealer James Ede in honour of his father Charles Ede, who began the firm’s long association with the museum. The UNE Museum of Antiquities is celebrating its 50^th anniversary this year.

Mr Harris and the museum’s Curator, Dr Pat Watters, are calling for entries in the 2009 competition, in which the total value of the prize will be increased from $250 to $500.

THE PHOTOGRAPH of Pauline Hams displayed here expands to show John Harris presenting her with the Charles Ede Essay Prize for 2008 in the UNE Museum of Antiquities.

The University of New England is proudly supporting innovation in the New England Northwest region through a major award recognising excellence and innovation by organisations and individuals in the region.

The Prime Super Northern Inland Innovation Awards recognise the contribution made by regional businesses and individuals to the economic prosperity and well-being of the region’s communities and residents, as well as showcasing and promoting initiatives, products and services from the region that display innovation.

The awards are given in five categories: Agriculture/Horticulture and Associated Services, Tourism/Leisure and Related Services, Professional and Retail Services, Manufacturing and Engineering, and Research and Education.

Nominations are invited from individuals and businesses currently producing or developing innovative services or products in accordance with the definition “What is Innovation”?

Finalists will be selected by the Northern Inland Regional Development Board’s Innovation Awards Committee and invited to attend the Innovation Expo on Saturday,  May 30, 2009 and the awards night to be held that evening. Finalists will also be invited to showcase their products and services at the expo.

UNE’s chief development officer, Chris Patton, said: “UNE is pleased to support these awards as a way of encouraging regional innovation. They certainly fit with UNE’s strategic goal of achieving regional to global impact.”

Mr Patton strongly encouraged UNE staff to nominate for the awards, noting that UNE was a centre of innovation in many if not all the award categories.

Nomination forms can be completed online at http://www.niia.com.au. Applications need to have a photo and 200 words about the business, group or individual and their innovative idea attached.

The University of New England has marked a first in rural and regional NSW by offering its students internships to work with rural and regionally based state politicians.

The scheme run in conjunction with the NSW Parliament has been offered at metropolitan universities for some years.

Wearing all three hats, UNE Chancellor, Speaker of the NSW Legislative Assembly and Member for Northern Tablelands Richard Torbay launched the regional initiative on campus today.

“I am looking forward to having two of the students in my office,” he said.

“The insights gained at the workface will be invaluable to those who participate. I’m sure many of them will find politics in action rather different and more robust that in books or lecture theatres and that is the aim of the project.”

Through the new scheme at UNE up to 10 students in their final undergraduate or any postgraduate year.

They will work up to 150 hours in an MP’s office on special projects and accrue six credit points towards their degrees. Students have been invited to submit written applications and those successful will be selected through an assessment and interview process.

They will be assigned to the offices of rural and regional MPs who agree to join the program.

“It is about time this program was extended to include students from regional universities,” Mr Torbay said. “It has been very successful in Sydney and very popular with students.

“This first program at UNE is a pilot but I am sure that our students will jump at the opportunity to experience politics at the coal face and to undertake some projects that can make a real contribution.”

Mr Torbay congratulated Dr Dan Riley, Dr Belinda Beattie, Ms Airlie Bell and Ms Julia Perryman for working with Parliament to establish the program at UNE.

Further information, contact Richard Torbay on (02) 6772 5552/0427 635 029.