August 2024

15 August 2024

It’s been great to see our campuses come back to life with students returning for Semester 2 – there’s nothing like the buzz created by students socialising over coffee in between classes. We can be confident about many more students contributing to a positive campus atmosphere next year after our 2024 Open Day series kicked off with a terrific turnout at our Melbourne campus on Sunday 4 August. We also held successful Open Days at Albury-Wodonga on Sunday 11 August and yesterday in Mildura.

Prospective students and their families have attended School presentations and talks, and been on tours of our health facilities, IT and science labs, research and innovation centres, accommodation, and sports facilities. Also popular was our new pop-up shop front promoting responsible use of AI. Our excellent Open Day app has also helped visitors plan their day on campus and do virtual tours of lecture theatres and labs.

Next up is Sydney on Thursday 22 August, followed by our combined Open Day in Shepparton with GOTAFE on Saturday 24 August, and finally Bendigo on Sunday 25 August.

Open Day is a real team effort across the University. Well done to everyone involved in making it such a success, including academic and support staff from our Schools, the Library, La Trobe Sport, Infrastructure and Operations, and the Future Growth team including Domestic Student Recruitment; Marketing, Digital and Insights; University Events; and Media and Communications.

Good luck to staff hosting our final three Open Days – and thank you to everyone who has volunteered their time to help prospective students and their families learn more about the great things La Trobe has to offer, whether through delivering presentations or in volunteer roles during our Open Days. Thanks to this huge effort we’re on track to have excellent enrolment results next year.

Meanwhile, there has been a lot of activity happening across our campuses. I’d like to mention a few recent achievements and activities.

Sydney success

I was pleased to join Federal Education Minister Jason Clare in Sydney on 26 July to launch the expansion of La Trobe’s award-winning teacher education pathway Nexus to NSW. Nexus has been incredibly successful in preparing teachers to work in rural, regional, and hard to staff schools across Victoria. The NSW project is supporting primary schools that are facing critical staffing shortages.

Well done to Joanna Barbousas, Miriam Tanti, and the team in our School of Education on the continued success of their evidence-based teacher education programs.

Innovation and impact

We hosted Victorian Government Minister Colin Brooks at our Melbourne campus in early July for the launch of the Bio Innovation Hub that is part of our University City of the Future Research and Innovation Precinct. The Hub supports early-stage biotechnology and agri-technology businesses, with industry partners already working in the Hub to develop regenerative and preventative medicines and other novel therapeutics.

The Hub is located in the former Thomas Cherry Building, along with our Digital Innovation Hub, which has been renamed the Jenny Graves Building in honour of La Trobe’s internationally renowned geneticist Jenny Graves.

It’s fitting that a building devoted to cutting-edge research and innovation is named after a scientist whose career so clearly demonstrates the way that research can advance knowledge and address national and global challenges.

In late July, we also launched the La Trobe Institute for Sustainable Agriculture and Food that will deliver solutions for nutritious food production around the world in the face of constraints including climate change, diminishing amounts of arable land, and a plateau in the yield potential of major crops. Well done to Tony Bacic and colleagues on creating an Institute that is taking a holistic approach to re-imagine the supply chain from “paddock to gut”.

Funding a national evidence-base

I was pleased to see that Jess Ison, Kirsty Forsdike, Felicity Young and Leesa Hooker from the La Trobe Rural Health School have been awarded $7.45 million in Federal Government funding to lead a new project to identify the most effective sexual violence prevention programs. The team will work with 12 organisations that will trial sexual violence interventions over a six-month period, with 10 projects selected for full implementation and evaluation.

Congratulations to the team on being funded to develop a national evidence-base about what works in preventing sexual violence. This is vital work addressing a terrible scourge on our society.

Celebrating Indigenous language and culture

The latest book published by the La Trobe University Press is Bina: First Nations Languages, Old and New by Indigenous linguists Gari Tudor-Smith and Paul Williams, and Felicity Meakins, Professor of Linguistics at the University of Queensland. It’s a powerful description of the diversity, resilience, and recovery of Australia’s First Nations Languages, which I encourage you to read.

The next book we’ll be publishing is an account of last year’s Voice to Parliament referendum, Broken Heart: A True History of the Voice Referendum, by Shireen Morris, who spent 12 years working with Indigenous leaders and the Cape York Institute on a constitutionally guaranteed Indigenous Voice. Shireen was also co-editor of the La Trobe University Press book Statements from the Soul: The Moral Case for the Uluru Statement from the Heart.

It's timely to publish these books because it’s Indigenous Week at La Trobe this week – an opportunity to celebrate Indigenous knowledge, culture, and communities across our campuses and affirm the University’s support for Indigenous Peoples’ push for voice, treaty, and truth as described in the Uluru Statement from the Heart. I hope you’ve been able to attend some of the events and activities held during the week and encourage you to watch the fabulous Welcome to Culture video that introduces the Indigenous cultures of the Traditional Lands on which our campuses are located.

I had the pleasure of watching the Nikki Visaj Indigenous Dance Class and Cultural Workshop at the La Trobe Sports Park yesterday, which was a great example of the engaging activities being held to mark Indigenous Week. Congratulations to Kaylah Sanders from the Indigenous Strategy and Education Office on organising such a fantastic event.

I also met with staff from our Nursing program and learned about the training we deliver to all nursing students about Indigenous health, some of whom were participating in the dance workshop. It was inspiring to talk with Rhiann Connor, one of the Lecturers in the program, about the way our Nursing students develop knowledge and skills required to work effectively and safely with First Nations peoples in healthcare environments.

Winning works

Two La Trobe University Press books have been recognised at the 2024 Australian Historical Association awards. Courting: An Intimate History of Love and the Law by Alecia Simmonds won the WK Hancock Prize for the best first scholarly book by an Australian scholar in any field of history; and My Tongue Is My Own, Ann-Marie Priest’s biography of poet Gwen Harwood, won the Magarey Medal for Biography.

Courting has also been shortlisted for the NSW Premier’s History Awards 2024 Australian History Prize, along with another La Trobe University Press book, Donald Horne: A Life in the Lucky Country by Ryan Cropp.

Further afield, Toby Walsh was in Shanghai in July for the World Artificial Intelligence Conference to promote the Chinese edition of his La Trobe University Press book Faking It: Artificial Intelligence in a Human World.

Congratulations to these authors and our partners at Black Inc. on the continued success of the La Trobe University Press. There’s no doubt we’re delivering on our mission to produce books of high intellectual quality, substance, and originality.

Cultural leadership

Congratulations to Professor of Public Engagement, Clare Wright, on being appointed to the prestigious position of Chair of the Council of the National Museum of Australia. No-one is better placed to oversee an institution that safeguards the nation’s historical materials and brings them to life through research and exhibitions.

As I mentioned in my last blog, Clare is also co-curator of the 2024 Bendigo Writers Festival.

It was also great to see La Trobe so well represented at the Mildura Writers Festival last month, with talks by our environmental humanities lecturer Lilian Pearce, historian Nikita Vanderbyl, and Melinda Hinkson, an adjunct researcher in La Trobe’s Climate Change Adaptation Lab.

Health innovation leaders

It was fantastic to see three La Trobe leaders recognised recently for their expertise in health program innovation and research.

La Trobe Rural Health School Dean Jane Mills has been appointed Chair of the Australian College of Nursing Rural and Remote Faculty; our Chair of Digital Health, James Boyd, has been appointed to the newly established Australian Council of Senior Academic Leaders in Digital Health; and Miranda Rose, Director of the La Trobe Centre of Research Excellence in Aphasia Recovery and Rehabilitation, won the 2024 Robin Tavistock Award for her contributions to aphasia research.

Congratulations to Jane, James, and Miranda for being recognised as leaders in their fields.

A celebrated history

I took part in a wonderful event at Wodonga TAFE on 1 August to celebrate the history of post-secondary education in Albury-Wodonga and recognise the central role played by Jim Sawyer, the inaugural chair of the Wodonga College of TAFE. Jim helped lay the groundwork for the establishment of La Trobe’s Albury-Wodonga campus, which opened on 1 January 1991. He is a passionate supporter of education and has generously donated $1 million to Wodonga TAFE and La Trobe for a three-year pilot project supporting students to study at the TAFE and progress to degrees at La Trobe in early childhood education and human services.

The occasion was an opportunity to hear reflections on the impact we have in Albury-Wodonga. It makes me so proud to work at La Trobe when I learn about the devotion of our colleagues and partners, who are so deeply committed to having a positive impact in the community.

Art on View

It’s well worth a visit to Bendigo to see the latest biannual façade commission at the La Trobe Art Institute on View Street. Artist Roberta Joy Rich has engaged with Southern African materials in the University’s collection to develop Lying Inside, which considers the repatriation of cultural materials and institutional responsibility for accessing, archiving, and administering objects. Lying Inside runs until 19 January 2025.

Upcoming events

There are some great La Trobe events coming up over the next month.

Following a terrific launch at Readings in Carlton and an event in Adelaide with Foreign Minister Penny Wong, Girt By Sea: Re-Imagining Australia's Security, the excellent La Trobe University Press book that offers an holistic analysis of regional security issues and was co-authored by Bec Strating, is finally being launched at La Trobe! Nick Bisley will be in conversation with Bec as part of the ‘Launches at the Library’ series curated by Clare Wright on 20 August. You can register here.

On 22 August, the Care Economy Research Institute is presenting a networking event at the Digital Innovation Hub as part of our ‘Industry: Lunch and Latte’ sessions that include a catered lunch and coffee cart with barista service. Three industry experts will talk about challenges and opportunities within Australia’s care economy. The session is free but it’s essential to book your spot here.

On 27 August, the Ideas and Society program will consider what can be done about the shocking epidemic of domestic violence facing Australia. Introduced by Jenn McIntosh, Director of The Bouverie Centre, Annabelle Daniel will moderate a discussion with renowned experts Jess Hill, Michael Salter, and Emeritus Professor Angela Taft, former Director of La Trobe’s Judith Lumley Centre. You can register here.

Looking further ahead, I encourage you to set 3 September aside in your diary for what promises to be a terrific event at the State Library of Victoria to coincide with a new production by our partners at The Australian Ballet, Oscar©, which is based on the life and writings of Oscar Wilde. Clare Wright has curated a fantastic panel, with Vice-Chancellor’s Fellow Dennis Altman to moderate a discussion with David Hallberg, The Australian Ballet’s Artistic Director; acclaimed writer Christos Tsiolkas; and La Trobe scholars Alexis Harley and Tobias Fulton. You can reserve your spot here.

In closing

As you can see, it’s been another busy month at La Trobe. We’re well into the second half of the academic year, and as you reflect on the year to date I encourage you to consider nominating a colleague for our 2024 Research Excellence Awards. Nominations are open to recognise staff who have demonstrated excellence in early and mid-career research, graduate research supervision, research impact, and industry engagement and partnering.

Finally, good luck to all those involved in our Open Days in Sydney, Shepparton, and Bendigo over the coming weeks.

Best wishes,

Theo