University of Tasmania

University of Tasmania
Motto	Ingeniis Patuit Campus ("The Field is Open to Talent")
Established	1890
Type	Public
Chancellor	Damian Bugg
Vice-Chancellor	Prof. Daryl Le Grew
Admin. staff	2,383 (2008) [1]
Undergraduates	16,487 (2008) [1]
Postgraduates	4,215 (2008) [1]
Location	Hobart, Launceston and Burnie, Tasmania, Australia
Campus	Urban
Affiliations	ASAIHL ACU
Website	www.utas.edu.au

The University of Tasmania (UTAS) is a public Australian university based in Tasmania, Australia. Officially founded on 1 January 1890, it was the fourth university to be established in nineteenth-century Australia. The University is a sandstone university and is a member of the international Association of Commonwealth Universities.^[2]

The University of Tasmania offers various undergraduate and graduate programs in a range of disciplines. The University has also been consistently ranked in the top 10 universities in Australia for research and boasts links with 20 specialist research institutes, cooperative research centres and faculty based research centres; all of which are regarded as nationally and internationally competitive leaders.^[3] The University has a student population of 22,000, including approximately 3,000 international students and 1000 PhD students.^[3]

Contents 1 History 2 Campuses 2.1 Libraries 3 Academics 3.1 Organization 3.2 Rankings 4 Research 4.1 Research Institutions 5 International focus 6 Student life 7 Tasmania Scholarships 8 Alumni 9 See also 10 References 11 External links

History

The University of Tasmania was officially opened on 1 January 1890, being founded by an Act of the Colony of Tasmania's parliament. Richard Deodatus Poulett Harris had long advocated the establishment of the University and became its first warden of the senate. The first degrees to graduates admitted ad eundem gradum and diplomas were awarded in June 1890. Referred to as one of the original sandstone universities, it was the fourth university to be established in Australia, and today maintains a strong reputation as a small to medium-sized university. The first campus location was the Queen’s Domain in Hobart, but as enrolment numbers grew and study interests expanded, the new campus at Sandy Bay was developed in the early 1940s.^[4]

The university was reorganised in 1991 when it merged with the Tasmanian State Institute of Technology, which became the Newnham Campus. The centre at Burnie was opened in 1995.

Reforms to Higher Education by the Australian Government in 2004 lead most Australian universities to increase their HECS fees. UTAS remained the only Australian university not to do this, until July 2008 when Vice Chancellor Professor Daryl Le Grew announced that the university would increase HECS fees by as much as 25% from 2009. This increase affected all units except education, nursing and mathematics.^[5][6]

The university and TAFE Tasmania are the only remaining institutions of higher education in Tasmania. The Australian Maritime College (AMC) integrated with the university in 2008.

In December 2009, the Dalai Lama was to be offered an honorary doctorate by the University of Tasmania when he would be visiting that Australian state, but that offer was withdrawn.^[7]

Campuses

The University of Tasmania has three campuses.The southern campus now encompasses a 100-hectare site in Sandy Bay, about 10 minutes from the city centre. This Hobart campus overlooks the estuary of the River Derwent and has the majestic Mount Wellington as its backdrop. The Tasmanian Conservatorium of Music and the Centre for the Arts lie in the heart of Hobart’s cultural precinct. Also in downtown Hobart is the Clinical School of the School of Medicine and the Menzies Research Institute, part of and a new education and research complex that encompasses health sciences. The northern campus is in the suburb of Newnham, looking down to the River Tamar, about 10 minutes from the centre of Tasmania’s second largest city, Launceston. The Academy of the Arts and the School of Architecture are housed in the Inveresk Arts Precinct, an award-winning, 17-hectare inner city site comprising arts studios, galleries, performance spaces, a museum and specialist workshops. Established in 1995, the vibrant Cradle Coast campus in Burnie is the newest campus and caters for researchers and students in the State’s north-west. Also in Burnie is the University’s state-ofthe- art Rural Clinical School.

• Sandy Bay^[8] - the Sandy Bay campus is set on 100 hectares of land in the suburb of Sandy Bay – a short distance from the centre of Hobart. Much of the upper campus is in natural bushland. Closer to the city centre are the Tasmanian Conservatorium of Music, the Clinical School (and more recently the medical sciences building) and the Tasmanian School of Art. About 10,000 students are enrolled at the Sandy Bay campus.

• Launceston - the Launceston campus is set on 50 hectares at Newnham overlooking the Tamar River, ten minutes from the centre of Launceston.Students studying Visual and Performing Arts and Architecture are located at the Inveresk campus. Over 5000 students are enrolled at both campuses.

• Cradle Coast - the Cradle Coast campus is located in the city of Burnie. This campus was established in 1995 as the North-West Study Centre.

The university also has a 334 hectare property located 20 km from the Sandy Bay campus. The University Farm is set in the cropping and grape growing area of Cambridge located in the Coal River valley, serving the teaching and research needs of the School of Agricultural Science.^[9]

Libraries

The University of Tasmania Library system comprises eight libraries:^[10]

1. Morris Miller (Sandy Bay)
2. Law (Sandy Bay)
3. Science (Sandy Bay)
4. Art (Central Hobart)
5. Music (Central Hobart)
6. Clinical (Central Hobart)
7. Newnham Campus (Launceston)
8. Australian Maritime College (Launceston)

Academics

University rankings (overall)

ARWU World[11]	303-401
Times Higher Education[12]	326

Organization

The University of Tasmania is organised into six faculties: arts; business; education; health science; law; and science, engineering & technology. In addition to these faculties, the university has six theme areas through which multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary collaborations in research and research training, learning and teaching, and community engagement are fostered. The theme areas are: Antarctic and Marine Science; Community, Place and Change; Environment; Frontier Technologies; Population and Health; and Sustainable Primary Production.

The Faculty of Law has a number of senior academic staff in that faculty are leading researchers in the areas of medical and bio-technological law and ethics, Freedom of Information, legal ethics and equity. The Faculty, with the Tasmanian state government, also operates the Tasmanian Law Reform Institute.^[13]

The University currently holds the secretariat role of the International Antarctic Institute established in 2006 in partnership with 19 institutions in 12 countries.^[14]

A partnership between UTAS and the Cradle Coast Authority established the Institute for Regional Development at the Cradle Coast campus in 2005.

Rankings

The University of Tasmania has remained in the top 300 universities in the world according to the Times Higher Education World University Rankings, though it has slipped from 161st in 2004 to 319th in 2009.^[15] Domestically, the Good Universities Guide awarded the university four-stars for teaching quality and research, and ranked UTAS in the top 20% of Australian universities overall.

Based on the 2008 Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU), issues by Jiao Tong University, the University of Tasmania is within the top 14 Australian universities and within the 42nd-68th bracket in Asia-Pacific.^[16]

Research

The university's priority research themes include^[17]

• Antarctic and Marine
• Community, Place and Change
• Sustainable Primary Production
• Population and Health
• Environment
• Frontier Technologies

Research Institutions

• Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies
• Menzies Research Institute

• Centre for Colonialism and its Aftermath • Centre for Law and Genetics • Tasmania Law Reform Institute • Centre for Aboriginal Education • Tasmanian Institute of Law Enforcement Studies • Tasmanian Aquaculture and Fisheries Institute • Institute of Antarctic and Southern Ocean Studies • Centre for Marine Science • Antarctic Climate and Ecosystems CRC UTAS astronomers are our planet hunters and stargazers, looking above to give us knowledge of our own history. • Australian Centre for Research on Separation Science • Australian Innovation Research Centre

UTAS geologists delve deep into the heart of the world to discover and manage its resources. Intense industry partnerships thrive in this area, as business and research move towards creating energy-efficient opportunities. • Centre of Excellence in Ore Deposits • Tasmanian Institute of Agricultural Research • Australian Food Safety Centre of Excellence

International focus

UTAS is truly an international university working out of Tasmania. While it maintains a strongly Tasmanian identity, its programs and research are genuinely international in vision and standards. The trend towards globalisation has largely defeated the isolation traditionally associated with an antipodean location. UTAS now plays a major role in helping Tasmania meet the challenge of internationalisation, maintaining a vision set on international rather than regional horizons. At UTAS there are staff and students from more than 70 countries. The University values the presence of its international students and is proud of the services it is able to offer them. Special academic and English-language support is available, along with extensive social assistance, including help in finding accommodation and information about Australian society. Formal links with other universities outside Australia bear witness to the University of Tasmania’s international standard and reputation. The University now has a large number of links and associations in Asia, as well as North America, the UK and Europe.

Student life

Until 2008, there were two separate student unions the Tasmania University Union (TUU) in Hobart and the Student Association (SA) in Launceston. Due to the abolition of compulsory student unionism in 2007, the SA and the TUU amalgamated into one Statewide Organisation representing all UTAS students.^[18]

The President of the TUU is elected to represent all UTAS students on all campuses, and both Hobart and Launceston have their own Vice-President and Student Representative Councils. Both the TUU State President and TUU State Postgraduate sit on University Council, which is the governing body of the University of Tasmania. In 2008, a Students Complaints website "The UTAS Blog" (www.utas.ws) was created and received support from the TUU.^[19]

The TUU is responsible for the overseeing of all the university’s many sports clubs and societies. Some of these include faculty-based societies, such as the Law Students, Medical Students and Engineering Students societies; societies related to various interests, such as TUMS (Tasmanian University Musical Society ^[20]), PLoT (Produces Lots of Theatre), The Anime Society; and various sporting clubs, including white water rafting, soccer, hockey, Touch Football,^[21] Australian Rules football, Rugby Union.

Student residences of the Hobart Campus include Christ College, Tasmania; St John Fisher College; University Apartments; Jane Franklin Hall; and Mount Nelson Villas. On the Launceston Campus, students may reside in Kerslake Hall, Leprena Hall, and Investigator Hall.^[22]

Tasmania Scholarships

The Tasmania Scholarships program supports the University’s commitment to offer students an exemplary learning environment. It attracts talented students, both locally, nationally and internationally. Industry contributions now make up the backbone of the Tasmania Scholarships program. The development and growth of this initiative into one of the most successful sponsored programs in the country is exceptional by any standard. Around 10 per cent of all domestic students at UTAS receive some sort of scholarship or financial assistance.

Alumni

There are around 50,000 graduates who are now scattered all over the globe. Tasmania alumni include Mary, Crown Princess of Denmark;^[23] Peter Underwood, Governor of Tasmania;^[24] Philip Lewis Griffiths, Acting Chief Judge of the Mandated Territory of New Guinea;^[25] Scott Brennan, Gold Medalist at the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics for rowing;^[26] Bill Mollison, "Father of Permaculture;"^[27] William Noel Benson, geologist; Hon Justice Peter Heerey, Federal Court Judge;^[28] Chief Justice Ewan Crawford, Chief Justice and Lieutenant-Governor of Tasmania;^[29] Hannah Yeoh, member of the Selangor State Legislative Assembly;; Dr.Halimah Ali, member of the Selangor Executive council and Selangor State Legislative assembly; Dato' Effendi Norwawi, former Minister of Agriculture Malaysia; Imam Sabri Samson, Chairman Islamic Council of Tasmania; Othman Hj Omar, General Manager for Selangor State Development Corporation; Charles Philip Haddon-Cave, former Financial Secretary of Hong Kong;^[30] Richard Flanagan, author and film director;^[31] Stephen Gumley, CEO of the Australian Defence Materiel Organisation;^[32] Neal Blewett, Australian politician; Simon Hollingsworth, Australian athlete; Constantine Koukias, Australian composer. and Prithviraj Sukumaran, South Indian Actor ^[33]

See also

• Mount Pleasant Radio Observatory
• Tom Samek creator of two murals in the Department of Engineering

References

External links

• Official website

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