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USYD WELCOMES WIND MASTER Dr John Lynch, an internationally renowned American wind conductor has taken up his new teaching role at the University of Sydney’ s Conservatorium of Music.
Lynch is the first wind conductor to assume a full-time position in a tertiary music school in Australia.
He has more than 25 years of teaching and conducting experience and was previously at the University of Georgia, where he was director of bands and professor of music at the Hodgson School of Music for the last seven years.
He also has held prestigious residencies at the Vivaldi Conservatory in Italy, the Conservatory in Lithuania, and the University of Costa Rica.
VU ADDS POLITICS VET TO BUSINESS FACULTY Victoria University has announced the appointment of Dr Craig Emerson as an adjunct professor with its college of business.
Emerson has had a distinguished career in politics. His most recent appointments include: minister for tertiary education, skills, science and research; minister assisting the prime minister on Asian century policy; and minister for trade and competitiveness. He is also an accomplished economist, with a PhD from Australian National University.
He is the managing director of Craig Emerson Economics, which provides economic consulting services to businesses and governments, specialising in trade relationships with businesses in Asia.
ECONOMICS RESEARCHER TO LEAD TORRENS INNOVATION Professor David Round will join Torrens University Australia as research and innovation director.
Round’ s empirical research into contemporary economics issues has led to him being appointed to a number of regulatory and quasi-judicial positions at state and federal levels.
He has pursued research into market behaviour, failure, power and efficiency, and improving the performance of markets to enhance social welfare.
Round has held positions at Duke University, Wesleyan University and Lingnan University. He was recently at the University of South Australia, where he was director of the Centre for Regulation and Market Analysis.
UNSW APPOINTS DISABILITY CHAIR Associate professor Leanne Dowse has been appointed UNSW’ s chair in intellectual disability and behaviour support.
In her role, Dowse will help provide high-quality services and support for people with complex needs.
The minister for disability service, John Ajaka, said the NSW Government established the role as part of its commitment to improving services for people with intellectual disabilities.
“ Dowse brings a wealth of experience to the position, having worked as a practitioner, researcher and supporter to people with intellectual disability since the 1980s,” Ajaka said.
Finally, she is a long-time, leading member of UNSW’ s faculty of arts and social sciences.
UOW NAMES SCIENCE, MEDICINE AND HEALTH DEAN Professor Alison Jones has been appointed executive dean of the faculty of science, medicine and health at the University of Wollongong. She has been acting in the role since December last year.
Jones is an internationally recognised and research-active toxicologist and physician.
She has been dean of the Graduate School of Medicine at UOW since 2011. She is a director of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute and serves on the executive of Medical Deans of Australia and New Zealand.
Jones advises courts and sits on the Botany Bay Expert Steering Group, evaluating risks to the community from mercury and other toxins.
LEARNING CENTRE TAPS BRAIN EXPERT The Science of Learning Research Centre, led by the University of Queensland, has appointed a new director, professor Pankaj Sah.
Sah was formerly a member of the executive committee at SLRC and is a leader within the centre at research on understanding learning.
“ Professor Sah is renowned for his work in understanding the role of the amygdala – the area of the brain involved in emotional processing – in learning,” SLRC chief operating officer, Annita Nugent, said.“ He was awarded a PhD in neuroscience from the Australian National University in 1988.”
Sah has been deputy director, research, at UQ’ s Queensland Brain Institute since 2007.
STRICTLY SPEAKING
PALEO
The paleo diet is an extraordinary phenomenon. Paleo is short for paleolithic(“ relating to the Stone Age period”), with the first syllable pronounced to rhyme with“ pal” or“ pale” as you wish. Either way, paleo takes us back 200,000 years to our cave-dwelling, hunter-gatherer ancestors, but now with the romantic notion that their lifestyle was happier and healthier than ours, and that there was something about their diet to ensure it. Obviously, they didn’ t eat processed foods such as dairy products, but it’ s another, much bigger leap to assume that grains and legumes were not part of their food supply. Anyone who goes bushwalking comes across grain-bearing and bean-bearing plants, so we’ ve no reason to think that people began to eat such things only after the arrival of agriculture 10,000 years ago. Yet paleo diets without them are all the rage among the new-agers, to judge by the consumer businesses that are springing up to support them – paleo cafes on the fringe of Australian cities and country towns( one hopes the decor reflects the period of the cuisine). And there’ s paleologix, a mentoring system for paleo-acolytes who find the grainless, beanless, cheeseless diet leaves them a bit jaded and disinclined to continue. This back-to-the-future use of paleo looks doomed – paleo faileo, as the social media put it in a nutshell – even though nuts are allowed.
By emeritus professor Pam Peters, researcher with Macquarie University’ s Centre for Language Sciences.
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