Monash University > News and Events > Monash Memo

Ancora Imparo, March, 2009

February was dominated by the tragic bushfires. Many from the Monash community were affected. One staff member and one student lost their lives. A number of staff members lost their homes. Many others lost friends and relatives. Our Gippsland campus was most directly affected. Having been at the centre of firefighting relief and evacuee emergency accommodation and care one week earlier, the campus came under direct threat during the savage fires of February 7 and the following days. The staff of the campus responded magnificently. Once again, the campus became the centre of the firefighting and relief efforts. Several of our staff were directly involved in fighting the fires with the CFA. Everyone who contributed in some way is both thanked and congratulated.

One aspect of the tragic fires provided an illustration of the benefits that come to Australia from the international activities of Monash University. A team of experts came from Indonesia to help with disaster victim identification. Several of these experts had taken part in two training workshops conducted in Indonesia (in Bandung and Surabaya) by the Victorian Institute for Forensic Medicine (VIFM), which is affiliated with Monash University and headed by a Monash professor, Professor Stephen Cordner. When I met with the Indonesians to thank them for their participation, they emphasised the warm and collaborative relationship they have with Monash through the Institute and the mutually supportive activities of the two groups responding to disasters, whether natural or man-made in Australia and Indonesia.

The senior management summit was held in February. There were three major themes. The first was sustainability. There were three major parts to this -- the incorporation of sustainability themes into educational programs, coordination of research in sustainability and the environmental sustainability of Monash campuses. The Vice-Chancellor's Group (Environment) will oversee the preparation of a strategic plan for each of these with the education and research component being prepared and implemented in collaboration with the Academic Board and the campus environmental sustainability component in collaboration with the Strategy and Resources Committee.

The second theme was the identification of a simple and meaningful set of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and targets for the education, research, international, environmental, equity, administrative and financial performance of the university. While as Einstein said “everything that can be counted does not necessarily count; everything that counts cannot necessarily be counted” the University does need a set of indicators by which it can track its performance against its aspirations. For the last five years we have somewhat crudely set our target as being in the top three of the Group of 8 for a variety of indicators of varying validity. In many cases, the Group of 8 is not our most appropriate benchmark -- sometimes we should set our targets in absolute terms and sometimes we should benchmark against best practice internationally or in other Australian universities outside the Group of 8 or indeed sometimes we should benchmark against non-university institutions if they are performing better than the university sector. After much useful discussion, the KPIs and targets will now be worked through by a small committee.

The third theme that was discussed jointly with the University Council, was the future of the higher education sector following the Bradley and Cutler reviews. An excellent presentation by David Phillips of Phillips KPA introduced the topic and there was then a valuable panel discussion. This theme will be taken up further by the inaugural Universities Australia higher education conference to be conducted from March 4 to 6 when I will have the opportunity to present a National Press Club address.

Monash graduation ceremonies were held in Johannesburg and in Beijing in February. In Johannesburg, 230 students from Monash South Africa graduated in a moving and exciting ceremony. 2700 students are expected at the campus this year -- a far cry from 360 in 2003. In recognition of the increasing number of students at Monash from mainland China, we held our first graduation ceremony in Beijing. This was a wonderful occasion with the relatives of the graduands clearly appreciative of the opportunity to attend. The graduation address was delivered by the Australian Ambassador, Mr Geoffrey Raby, who also hosted a dinner for Monash and relevant local education and research authorities. Valuable meetings were held with the Chinese Scholarship Council, the Ministry of Science and Technology, the Chinese Academy of Science and the Ministry of Education and I was able to attend the opening of the conference of the Australia China Centre of Excellence in Stem Cell Sciences, a collaboration funded between Monash and Peking University Health Science Centre.

It is very clear that international activities such as these are very important in building research and education collaborations and in attracting high quality international students to Monash.