New students will ease into life at Charles Sturt University (CSU) in Bathurst with an Orientation Week program starting on Monday 21 February. The theme ‘Superher-O’ links the activities on all CSU campuses. In Bathurst approximately 982 students are expected to enrol in 2011 in undergraduate courses such as psychology, paramedics, teaching, nursing, management and marketing, and a range of communication disciplines. Head of Campus at CSU in Bathurst, Mr Col Sharp, said, “We expect nearly a thousand new students to commence study on Bathurst campus next week. The students, their parents and supporters will be formally welcomed to both the campus and the wider Bathurst communities on Monday. This will be part of a comprehensive orientation process that will see them introduced to the University and then closely supported throughout much of their first year.” As well as orientation activities during the day, a range of entertainment activities for new students are scheduled each evening, including discos with DJs, a live band and an outdoor cinema screening on the library lawn.

A play by a Charles Sturt University (CSU) lecturer about the behind-the-scenes workings of a television current affairs unit will have its world premiere in Bathurst on Thursday 24 February. The Sand Dwellers, by Ms Kay Nankervis, lecturer in broadcast journalism at the School of Communication and Creative Industries at CSU in Bathurst, explores and lampoons the world of ratings-driven commercial television current affairs programs. Ms Nankervis said, “This is a big, complex collaboration which has drawn on creative talent from the people of Bathurst, the Bathurst Theatre Company, Local Stages-BMEC, and staff and recent graduates of the School of Communication and Creative Industries, for set design, TV logos, actors, multimedia production, and overall production management. I’ve enjoyed great support from the School throughout the development of my script, as part of my University research work, which has enabled me to interview practising current affairs journalists and managers about the play’s subject matter.”

Staff and students at Charles Sturt University (CSU) are being urged to do their bit for Clean Up Australia Day. CSU Green is calling for volunteers on its five major campuses - Albury-Wodonga, Bathurst, Dubbo, Orange and Wagga Wagga - to participate in the national event on Friday 4 March, the day designated for schools. Volunteers are encouraged to register their interest in the clean up on their local campus through the Clean Up Australia Day site here. “We hope to see staff and students and their family and friends turn out between 8am and 11am to pick up rubbish and conserve the local environment,” CSU Green’s Ms Nicole Hyde said. “The event will be a positive start to the commencement of on campus classes during the week. Volunteers are asked to bring along some gloves to wear and of course a hat and sunscreen.”

A Charles Sturt University (CSU) academic will address a dinner in Bathurst on Tuesday 8 March to celebrate the 100th anniversary of International Women’s Day (IWD). Associate Professor Leonora Ritter, an Honorary Fellow in the CSU Division of Learning and Teaching Services, will speak about the achievements of women in the past century and draw attention to what she thinks needs to be achieved in the future. Outlining her speech, Professor Ritter said, “We seem to have made more progress in masculinising women to suit a patriarchal world of aggression, competition and oppositional politics than in feminising the world. I believe we need to ‘feminise’ men and the public sphere by promoting creativity, collaboration, communication, empathy and adaptability.” Professor Ritter will also address a CSU Senior Women’s Forum IWD breakfast at 8am at the University on Tuesday 8 March.

Senior students from high schools in the region will gain information and insights about communication courses they can study when they attend the MyDay promotion at Charles Sturt University (CSU) in Bathurst on Tuesday 15 March. CSU Prospective Student Adviser, Ms Fran Dwyer, said, “This MyDay will focus on journalism, public relations, theatre/media, advertising, and commercial radio. About 40 students from 14 schools around the central west will attend general information sessions and interactive sessions with academics from the relevant disciplines and courses.” Participating schools include All Saints College, Cowra High School, Gulgong High School, James Sheahan Catholic High School, La Salle Academy Lithgow, Lithgow High School, Mackillop College, Mudgee High School, Muswellbrook High School, Oakhill College, Portland Central School, Red Bend Catholic College, St Mary’s Senior High School, and St Stanislaus College.

The move to university is being made easier for new students with the introduction of a mentor program at Charles Sturt University (CSU) in Bathurst and Wagga Wagga. The Student Mentor Program offers new on-campus and distance education students extra support during their first year at CSU. The student mentors are trained by the University’s Division of Student Services and then matched with new students in a similar course. The support offered by the new program includes information from the student mentor on where to go for academic assistance or information about CSU. The contact between mentor and the new student can be direct or via the telephone or by email. The volunteer scheme has so far attracted 35 mentors.  . “I found my first year at university rather daunting and confusing, so I feel the Student Mentor Program is one way these feelings can be alleviated in new students,” Bachelor of Arts (Psychology, Animation and Visual Effects) student Ms Georgina McMahon explains. “My role is to oversee the program, making sure mentors are offering new students the correct support. It is hoped this program will discourage any struggling new students from giving up and dropping out of university.”

A visiting decision-making expert from the United Kingdom will present a seminar for psychology academics and students at Charles Sturt University (CSU) in Bathurst on Wednesday 20 April. The organiser of the seminar, Dr Stephanie Quinton, a psychology lecturer at the CSU School of Psychology in Bathurst, says that guest lecturer Dr Mandeep K Dhami, who lectures at the Institute of Criminology at the University of Cambridge, will present a series of studies whose findings have implications for the psychology of decision-making as well as the criminal justice system. “Dr Dhami’s presentation, titled Simply Criminal or Legally Simple?, will argue that generally accepted perspectives on crime and justice - which assume that people use compensatory decision strategies that weight and integrate all of the available and relevant information in order to make a decision - may be wrong,” Dr Quinton said. “She will assert that the decision-making of both offenders and court judges, by contrast, can be best described as ‘non-compensatory’; that is, they rely on simple ‘fast and frugal’ personal investigative methods that ignore much of the available and relevant information, and base decisions on one piece of information alone.”

Lecturers at the Charles Sturt University (CSU) School of Human Movement Studies will deliver four presentations at two free seminars for participants in the 25th CSU Bathurst Half Marathon and 10 kilometre Run to be held on Sunday 1 May. CSU lecturer Mr Peter Micalos said the seminars, at 6pm to 8pm on Tuesday 22 March and Tuesday 5 April at the CSU gym lecture room, will provide runners with current scientific knowledge about how to enhance their performance. “The first seminar on Tuesday 22 March will include presentations by Head of the School of Human Movement Studies, Professor Frank Marino, who will examine the question How will you hydrate for this event?, and Dr Rob Duffield’s presentation, Post-training recovery; recent evidence on best practice, will detail recent CSU-based research on positive and negative recovery practices following exercise. The following seminar on 5 April will examine Why should endurance athletes include weight training exercise? and Dietary fats and performance; the good, the bad, and the ugly,” Mr Micalos said.

About 50 senior students from 12 high schools in the region will gain information and insights about nursing and paramedic courses they can study when they attend the MyDay promotion at Charles Sturt University (CSU) in Bathurst on Tuesday 29 March. CSU Prospective Student Adviser, Ms Fran Dwyer, said, “This MyDay will provide general information sessions and interactive sessions with academics from the nursing and paramedic disciplines and courses at Charles Sturt University. These are important disciplines with increasing employment opportunities and expanding career options, so we aim to confirm the students’ interest in these fields.” Participating high schools include Canowindra, Coolah, Crookwell, Bathurst, Kelso, La Salle Lithgow, Mudgee, Orange Christian School, Orange High, Peak Hill, Springwood, and Henry Lawson Grenfell.