Campus Review Volume 28 - Issue 8 | August 2018 | Seite 30

ON THE MOVE
campusreview.com.au
GOVERNOR TO
CHANCELLOR
Edith Cowan University
has named former
WA governor Kerry
Sanderson as its fourth
chancellor.
She takes over from Dr Hendy Cowan,
who is retiring after 14 years in the role.
Sanderson said she was looking forward
to joining a dynamic and interesting team
that is already receiving weighty accolades.
“ECU is leading in a number of important
areas, including being the top public
university in Australia in terms of student
experience, its involvement in many
important new areas such as cyber security
and the well-known WAPAA which has so
many outstanding students,” Sanderson said.
Sanderson will commence her three-year
term on 1 January 2019.
INDIGENOUS PVC
FOR EDITH COWAN
Air New Zealand recently announced
that it will be serving a newly developed
piece of food technology, known as the
‘Impossible Burger’, to its business-class
customers. It’s essentially a vegieburger,
but the ‘impossible’ element is introduced
by an ingredient called haem. This is
an iron-containing molecule that gives
meat its red colour and characteristic
flavour, but is also found in plants. So by
extracting haem from the roots of soy
plants, the inventors of this burger claim
to have created an authentically meaty
alternative to the real thing. The word
haem comes from the Greek for ‘blood’,
as found in words like haemoglobin,
which might be rather off-putting for
most vegetarians, even if they know its
origins aren’t necessarily meaty. But
existing vegetarians aren’t really the
target of this product. The makers of
the burger, the Californian company
Impossible Foods, are researching more
sustainable ways of mass-producing
food, and see this as a means towards
replacing animal-based production,
while keeping the carnivorous population
happy. So if you start seeing haemburgers
appearing on restaurant menus, it might
not be a typo.
Written by Dr Adam Smith, convenor of
the Editing and Electronic Publishing
Program at Macquarie University.
28
ECU has elected a new
pro-vice-chancellor
(equity and Indigenous).
Braden Hill will join
the team in January
next year, moving from Murdoch University.
Hill’s research areas include Indigenous
education, identity politics, queer identities
in education and transformative learning.
He is currently the chief investigator on a
project exploring the lived experiences of
Indigenous LGBTQI people to better inform
community health organisations in their
working with queer-identifying Aboriginal
and Torres Strait Islander people.
Hill’s portfolio will include leading ECU's
Centre for Indigenous Australian Education
and Research, Kurongkurl Katitjin.
SOCIOLOGIST
HEADS TO ACU
The Australian Catholic
University (ACU) has
appointed Professor
Zlatko Skrbis as
deputy vice-chancellor
(students, learning and teaching).
He will replace Professor Anne Cummins,
who is retiring after nine years in the role.
Skrbis will head to ACU in November
2018. Still at Monash, he is the outgoing
senior pro-vice-chancellor (academic).
A sociologist, Skrbis is the principal
chief investigator on the multi-wave ARC
Discovery Project ‘Social Futures and Life
Pathways of Young People in Queensland’.
VC and president Professor Greg Craven
said Skrbis is widely revered for his hands-
on approach to supporting research and
innovative learning and teaching methods.
GERMOV AN IDEA
FOR CHARLES STURT
Professor John
Germov will take up
the role of provost and
deputy vice-chancellor
(academic) at Charles
Sturt University (CSU). Germov has been
busy driving education innovation, program
agility and leadership across the University
of Newcastle’s academic strategies.
CSU vice-chancellor Professor Andrew
Vann said Germov will be able to use his
extensive network and understanding of
regional Australia to improve the way the
university delivers higher education.
Germov said he strongly believes in the
transformational role university education
plays in widening participation and creating
an informed citizenry with a cosmopolitan
outlook.
PENNY FOR ASIAN
THOUGHT
The University of
Melbourne’s Asialink
– a centre focused
on promoting public
understanding of Asian
countries and Australia’s role in the region –
has a new group CEO in Penny Burtt.
Asialink chairman and former Australian
Minister for Trade Andrew Robb said Burtt’s
appointment is a “signal of the strategic
importance” of the centre’s work.
Burtt said driving closer Australia-Asia
relations has been her personal and
professional passion throughout her
career. “More than ever, Australia needs
independent and credible platforms to
engage our partners in Asia, inform and
help shape decision-making.”
BRIGHT PICK FOR
SUNSHINE COAST
The University of the
Sunshine Coast has
appointed Professor
Gary Thomas as its first
dean of Indigenous
education and engagement.
Thomas has worked in Indigenous
leadership roles across several Australian
universities, most recently the Batchelor
Institute of Indigenous Tertiary Education.
In 2016, Thomas was an external advisor
on USC’s Embedding Aboriginal and Torres
Strait Islander Knowledges Working Party.
USC’s emphasis on the student
experience was a drawcard for Thomas.
“I am looking forward to seeing how our
engagement with Aboriginal and Torres
Strait Islander people shapes what we do at
USC,” he said.