Charles Sturt University (CSU) will celebrate the award of six green stars and ‘world leader’ status for environmentally sustainable features to a new building on its Thurgoona site. The Academic Accommodation Stage 3 (AA3) office building has received “a six star Green Star ‘World Leader’ certified rating under Office Design v2” from the national Green Building Council of Australia. Staff from the AA3 building, which is home to the academic staff and students of CSU’s School of Business and Information Technology, will be on hand celebrate the award at a morning tea at 10am on Monday 15 June. “The principles used in buildings at Thurgoona demonstrate a comprehensive, environmentally sensitive process that spans from site planning to selection of materials,” said Executive Director of the University’s Division of Facilities Management, Mr Stephen Butt. Innovative aspects of the building that receive special mention include reduced carbon dioxide production and energy consumption by 65 per cent, and the world’s first use of phase-changing materials in the concrete floor to reduce heating and cooling used in the building.

Before sunrise, a dedicated group of Charles Sturt University (CSU) students are focussed on evaluating the quality of meat carcasses. The students enrolled in animal, equine, agricultural and veterinary sciences arrive at companies like Cargill Beef Australia and Knights Meats in Wagga Wagga and the Junee Abattoir as early as six o’clock in the morning to learn about carcass evaluation and meat quality.  The student group is led by CSU’s carcass evaluation expert and fifth year Veterinary Science student Mr Richard Sanders.  “The importance of maintaining the flow of trained young experts in the speciality field of Meat Science to service the needs of the beef, sheep and pork industries is not lost on these companies,” said CSU Professor of Animal Production Peter Wynn. “The companies willingly make their facilities available each year for the education of our students.” The students will attend a carcass evaluation workshop sponsored by Meat and Livestock Australia in Armidale in early July.  They will then have a chance to participate in an elite national training workshop and selection in an Australian team to compete in international carcass evaluation competitions.  “None of these opportunities would be possible without the support of the management of these companies,” said Professor Wynn.

 

Television production students at Charles Sturt University (CSU) at Wagga Wagga have broken new ground in their on-going development of links with industry. The Society of Motion Pictures and Television Engineers (SMPTE) has agreed to the establishment of a CSU student chapter of the Society. The Society's Board of Governors approved the move during a meeting in Atlanta in the United States on Thursday 4 June. The move is the inaugural student chapter in Australia. Formed in 1916, the SMPTE is regarded as the leading technical society for the motion imaging industry. "This new relationship will give CSU students access to conferences, papers, scholarships, guest lectures and of course international industry contacts," said television production course co-ordinator Mr Patrick Sproule. "I believe the approval to form the CSU student chapter shows an enormous respect for the course at Charles Sturt University as well as the Society's recognition of the importance of investment in education in the TV and film industries. A special thanks to past chairman of SMPTE Australian Section, Mr John Maizels, for recommending the formation of the student chapter and shepherding us through due process." Meanwhile, the SMPTE Australian Section has donated $6 000 so 85 Bachelor of Arts (Television Production) students at CSU at Wagga Wagga can attend the SMPTE09 conference in Sydney in July.

The SMPTE provides its members in the motion imaging field with the latest technology information and education on a rapidly changing industry. The biennial SMPTE09 conference and exhibition will be held at Darling Harbour, Sydney from Tuesday 21 July to Saturday 25 July. CSU lecturer Mr Patrick Sproule from the School of Visual and Performing Arts at CSU at Wagga Wagga is available for interview from Wednesday 10 June.

The Charles Sturt University Equine Centre is pitching in to help the fundraising efforts on Saturday 13 June for injured horse rider Ms Annie Woodhouse. Ms Woodhouse, from Numerella near Cooma, is recovering from a road accident in March. Ms Woodhouse is the joint secretary and treasurer of the Capital Area Reining Horse Association (CARHA) which has regular competition days in Canberra and Wagga Wagga. The Association is organising the charity day at the CSU Equine Centre at Wagga Wagga to raise money for Ms Woodhouse’s living and rehabilitation expenses. CSU has waived the regular hire fees for its Equine Centre. Horse reining professionals Mr Warwick Schiller and Mrs Robyn Schiller will run a morning training clinic which will be followed by a barbecue lunch. In the afternoon, reining patterns will be run with commentary from clinicians and judges.

 

Commissioner of the Police Integrity Commission (PIC) in NSW, Mr John Pritchard and former Senator and Australian Democrats leader, Ms Lyn Allison will headline a national conference focusing on ethics in the community next week. The 16th annual Australian Association for Professional and Applied Ethics (AAPAE) Conference will be hosted by Charles Sturt University’s (CSU) School of Policing Studies in Goulburn, NSW from Tuesday 9 June to Thursday 11 June. Conference convenor and CSU lecturer in Policing Studies Dr Anna Corbo Crehan says around 50 delegates from universities and the professions are expected to attend to participate in discussion of issues in applied and professional ethics. Dr Corbo Crehan will present a paper entitled ’Appropriate police discretion and Indigenous over-representation in the Criminal Justice System’. Other presentations will focus on ethics in policing; the socio-legal ethics of vulnerable people; and ethics and money in sport.

The Australian Association for Professional and Applied Ethics Conference will run from Tuesday 9 June from 10am to 2pm on Thursday 11 June. Read the conference program here. Day registrations are available and people should arrive at the venue, the Best Western Centretown, Lagoon Street, Goulburn between 8am and 9 am on the Wednesday or Thursday. The after-dinner speaker on Wednesday 10 June is barrister Mr Stephen Keim, SC who acted for Dr Mohamed Haneef in 2007. The AAPAE formed in 1993 and is a non-partisan, non-profit national umbrella organisation formed to encourage awareness of, and foster discussion of issues in, applied and professional ethics. Contact CSU Media to arrange interviews.

A catalogue for an art exhibition at Charles Sturt University (CSU) in 2008 has been named a joint winner in the national Museums Australia Multimedia and Publication Design Award 2009. The catalogue for the exhibition, ELEMENTS: Dianne Fogwell was produced by the CSU Art Collection and designed by Eunice Song, the Creative Director of E-Com Consulting & Design. The judges comments included “‘being a book about a book’, it has a sensibility to the artist’s medium – the designer really understands typography”.The catalogue was produced to coincide with the exhibition held during graduation ceremonies at CSU at Wagga Wagga in April 2008. A total of 406 entries were received for the awards from over 100 Australian and international organisations. The CSU Art Collection is one of 17 collections short-listed in its group, Level A Exhibition Catalogue – Small (Under 64 pages). The entries were judged on their relevance, communication clarity and degree of usability. The winners were announced on Monday 19 May as part of Museums Australia’s National Conference in Newcastle.

For further information, contact CSU Art Curator Mr Thomas A. Middlemost on 02 6925 3666.

A Charles Sturt University (CSU) academic aims to draw attention to the impacts of climate change on low paid Australian workers. Sociology lecturer and co-author of the book Living Low Paid, Dr Helen Masterman-Smith will present a seminar in Sydney on Monday 1 June to discuss the barriers to social and workplace citizenship that low paid workers experience. These barriers are highly relevant to whether the Australian labour market and economy can actually deliver a ‘just transition’ to a low-carbon economy or whether such a transition will simply reproduce current labour market inequalities. “If employee engagement is seen as critical to greening Australian workplaces, what does the lack of voice and dignity that many low paid workers experience in their jobs mean for the feasibility of a just transition to a low-carbon economy?” asks Dr Masterman-Smith. “For all its shortcomings, delaying the emissions trading scheme to 2011 not only delays the necessary reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, it also delays the labour market transition to sustainable workplaces and work practices, which has health and other social implications.”

Dr Helen Masterman-Smith is a lecturer in the School of Humanities and Social Sciences at CSU at Wagga Wagga. She is a guest speaker at Sydney University’s Department of Political Economy Seminar Series on Monday 1 June from 1pm to 2pm, room 397 at the Merewether Building, Sydney University. Dr Masterman-Smith will present a seminar entitled 'Climate Change and the Political Economy of Everyday Life'. Her book, Living Low Paid: The dark side of prosperous Australia is published by Allen & Unwin.

 

Charles Sturt University (CSU) will mark its 20^th anniversary with a gala commemorative dinner at Bathurst on Tuesday 2 June. Some of the 300 guests will travel from overseas to attend the dinner. Dignitaries include the heads of other universities, politicians, business leaders, academics, staff and alumni. CSU’s Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Administration) and Chairperson of the 20^th Anniversary Committee, Professor Lyn Gorman, said the dinner is an opportunity to celebrate the University’s past and its future. “Charles Sturt University is Australia’s sixth largest university, and it has established itself as the University of inland Australia. It is the leading provider of distance education, with 57 per cent of our 35 000 students studying by distance mode in over 80 countries. Charles Sturt University will continue to support our regional communities and provide graduates for a range of professions needed throughout Australia and elsewhere in the world.”

Contact CSU Media to arrange interviews. The CSU commemorative dinner will be held at the CD Blake Auditorium at CSU at Bathurst from 7.30pm on Tuesday 2 June. Read more about CSU’s 20^th anniversary here.