Elevated learning of the building as originally conceived for things like the chancellery or a convention centre or public access , we ’ ve cleared the top four floors entirely .

The chancellery will join in with the people further down in the building and we ’ re going to sub-let the top four floors of that building to industry partners . We call it the flipped campus model .

We ’ ll be sub-letting to a law firm in the top two floors . And the partners of that law firm will be adjunct teachers into the law school .

The students studying law will have access to the firm throughout their degree , not just as one internship , but the back office , the front office , how everything works from the financing to running of a firm . It ’ s fully integrated with industry , same site , same location , same timing .

VU ’ s vice-chancellor talks new projects , flipped campuses and block models .

Adam Shoemaker interviewed by Wade Zaglas

Vice-chancellor and president of Victoria University , Professor Adam Shoemaker , was on the cusp of marking his first year at the helm of the university when he spoke to Campus Review about the university ’ s vertical campus , which is the biggest in Australia and aims to keep clusters of disciplines together .

A key feature of the campus is that the top two floors are sub-let to a law firm , fostering greater industry exposure to law students studying at the campus .

Construction has also begun on the $ 1.5 billion Footscray Hospital adjacent to VU ’ s Footscray Park campus , which Shoemaker added would become a world-class health and education precinct .

The above projects highlight the university ’ s commitment to “ having industry at the core ” of everything it does – a strategy that incorporates the “ flipped campus ” model . Another example is the Victoria University Whitten Oval , which was the Western Bulldogs ’ VFL / AFL home for generations and remains the squad ’ s training base and administrative headquarters . Here , VU PhD students and others studying sports science , mechanics , sports tracking and even remedial massage receive all-important authentic experiences .

While Shoemaker said the situation the sector finds itself in is still “ really challenging ”, he added it has forced the sector to “ reinvent itself ”. He also talks about how proud he is that VU has been able to maintain high satisfaction and employability levels throughout the pandemic , attributing much of this to the university ’ s block model .

CR : Tell us about the exciting projects occurring at VU , including a new vertical campus . At 26 stories and opening on the day after Anzac Day in the west of Melbourne , it ’ s going to be quite a massive enterprise and a big experiment in learning . You might call it elevated learning , but we ’ re talking about it as the place where you can do the block model on the city block as it were , so , you ’ re literally going to be there .

What ’ s distinctive about it , I think , is that we will be focusing on certain disciplines , but they will be drawn not just from higher education , but from vocational education as well . So , for example , health therapies offered in two different parts of the university on two different floors joined by a staircase in the middle . So it ’ s going to be quite special .

We used to have business being taught on about four different campuses . Students find that works and it ’ s certainly been successful , but all the feedback we ’ ve had is it ’ ll be far more easy to do the following : instead of having the top , say , four floors

I believe there ’ s another project involving the hospital ? It ’ s very fortunate in terms of timing , of course . Hospitals , especially in the west of Melbourne , have been under incredible strain during COVID . They ’ ve been the busiest in the whole of Australia in terms of the number of COVID-19 cases . So there ’ s a crying need .

You can just imagine the wait lists that have existed in the west . Up to four years for hip , knee and joint replacements . The new Footscray hospital is being built as I speak and will be ready in about fourand-a-half years ’ time . It is the largest single health infrastructure build ever in the state of Victoria . It ’ s one and a half billion dollars .

So I think the advantage of that is , and we saw that when I worked at Griffith University , having a university and a hospital co-located is immensely powerful and not just in terms of crossing the road for research and treatment , but imagine a national centre of excellence in preventative health that ’ s actually located in a hospital .

That ’ s one of the dreams that we have and in fact , it ’ s planned for . We see this as being not your typical hospital in which it ’ s just about treatment – it ’ s about prevention as well . So health , public health , prevention and treatment are all in the same zone and in the same large campus area .

How do you see the state of higher education in Australia at the moment ? I think the general term people use is ‘ a state of flux ’, and that ’ s probably a

Campus Review Vol 32. Issue 01 - January 2022 | Página 26

Elevated learning of the building as originally conceived for things like the chancellery or a convention centre or public access , we ’ ve cleared the top four floors entirely .