Classroom discipline will be the focus of the latest public forum in the Charles Sturt University (CSU) Edversation series. The media tell us that students are changing and that the old ways of developing classroom discipline are no longer useful or effective. The forum, led by a team of CSU educators, will consider the questions: are students in classes really different today? do we need new ways of working with student and what works best? and what are the roles of teachers, parents and students in contemporary classrooms? The CSU academics will be joined by primary and secondary school teachers as well as senior secondary school students. The forum will have time for comment, questions and discussion from the floor. The forum will be held from 6pm on Tuesday 30 October in the council meeting room, Wagga Wagga Civic Centre, Baylis St, Wagga Wagga.

Complaints can be a positive management tool, providing very good feedback about areas in need of improvement within an organisation, according to Charles Sturt University (CSU) Ombudsman Miriam Dayhew. The CSU Ombudsman will deliver a public lecture on complaints management on Wednesday 31 October in Tumut to discuss the current complaints system used by the University, with examples of how it has been used as a positive management tool. Ms Dayhew says staff, students and others have a right to voice critical comments and it is essential to have an effective complaints system in place to deal with issues as they arise. “By dealing with complaints at the outset, an organisation is more able to resolve them, thereby preventing them from escalating, costing time and resources, and can use the experience to identify faults and improve processes,” said Ms Dayhew. Ms Dayhew is responsible for developing and maintaining CSU’s complaint management systems.

During World War 2, the Japanese temporarily captured Kiska Island in the Bering Strait between Alaska and Russia and established a major military base. The move was seen as a threat to control Alaska. Cultural heritage manager and archaeologist with Charles Sturt University's (CSU) Institute for Land, Water and Society, Associate Professor Dirk Spennemann will present a richly illustrated talk on Thursday 25 October on his recent work on the uninhabited, remote and wind-swept island. Professor Spennemann visited the island at the request of the US Fish and Wildlife Service to research the big guns and military relics left on the island after it was abandoned by the Japanese in 1943. This free public lecture will be held from 6pm in conjunction with the Australian Army Museum in the Army Museum Theatrette, Murray Valley Highway, Bandiana, four kilometres east of Wodonga.

The head of Charles Sturt University’s (CSU) innovative Djirruwang Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Mental Health program, Wayne Rigby, is guest speaker of a meeting of carers and friends of people with a mental illness. The free information session in Queanbeyan, NSW on Thursday 25 October will examine the “what, why and how” of psychiatric medications. The event has been organised by the advocacy group Carer Assist. A veteran of the rural mental health field, Mr Rigby was recently honoured by the Mental Health Association NSW, who presented him with a 2007 Mental Health Matters Award in Sydney. Read more here.

Charles Sturt University’s (CSU) Centre for Inland Health is hosting a community symposium entitled Inland Health – Planning Together for the Future on Thursday 29 and Friday 30 November at CSU Wagga Wagga Campus. The meeting will bring together CSU researchers, staff and students as well as health service providers and community representatives from across southern NSW. The aim of the symposium is to discuss the current activities, priority issues requiring attention and future priorities. The event is supported by the University and Australian Health Management.

Work Choices is only the latest change in Australia’s industrial relations landscape. Charles Sturt University (CSU) industrial relations expert Dr Bill Robbins will discuss the first industrial relations revolution that began in October 1907 with the Harvester case during a free public lecture on Thursday 18 October. The case created a legal decision which became one of the most famous in the industrial, social and political history of Australia, and which also introduced the world’s first significant minimum wage. “On the centenary of the Harvester Living Wage case, it is worth reflecting on how industrial relations can affect the quality of life of the majority of Australians," said Dr Robbins, a senior lecturer in management and industrial relations with CSU’s School of Business & Information Technology. He has researched the management of Australian labour from Australia's convict origins to the contemporary Work Choices environment. The lecture, entitled A World First: the centenary of the Harvester case, starts at 6pm in the CSU Nowik Lecture Theatres, Guinea St, Albury.

Two innovative Charles Sturt University (CSU) research projects will focus on delivering improved education to the population of rural Australia. CSU researchers, lead by senior lecturer at the School of Teacher Education, Dr Linda Harrison, will conduct research into improving and maintaining quality and access in centre-based, government-regulated child care in Australia. Of major concern to CSU researchers is improving the adverse outcomes of poor quality child care, especially for more vulnerable children. A second CSU research team, headed by Professor Jo-Anne Reid, Associate Dean at the Faculty of Education, will focus on renewing rural teacher education and sustaining schooling for sustainable communities, in an attempt to avert a national crisis in attracting teachers and other professionals to rural areas. The two CSU research projects will receive over half a million dollars over the next three years under the Federal Government’s Discovery grant scheme.

A leading Charles Sturt University (CSU) and NSW Department of Primary Industries researcher is warning of dire consequences for Australia’s land, environment, farming industries and rural and regional communities in the face of the crippling drought. Professor Deirdre Lemerle, Director of the EH Graham Centre for Agricultural Innovation, says, “The current drought is having huge negative impacts on the Australian environment, its people, and our capacity to feed ourselves. Lack of water has drastically reduced local food production and food prices will go up for consumers.” Professor Lemerle also warns that “Australian farmers are highly skilled at drought management, but the droughts of the last few years are amongst the worst on record and are severely testing farmers' resilience. Drought is reducing land managers capacity to protect the environment and make a profit from production. Social and economic effects are causing depression, family disintegration and many other social costs. Government and industry must support land managers if Australia is to be self-sufficient in food production and for agriculture to remain environmentally sustainable," says Professor Lemerle.

Competing views on the role of God will be the subject of a public lecture in Orange next week. Titled Richard Dawkins’ burka – is his world view too narrow?, Professor David Goldney, Adjunct Professor at Charles Sturt University’s (CSU) School of Rural Management, will discuss The God Delusion, by British scientist and academic Professor Richard Dawkins. Although both are scientists, Professor Goldney is a self-described ‘Christian in the evangelical-orthodox tradition’. Professor Dawkins is an atheist, who currently holds the Charles Simonyi Chair for the Public Understanding of Science at the University of Oxford. “In the lecture I will examine Professor Dawkins’ major arguments and what I see as the common ground between Dawkin’s and my views, as well as areas where there is significant disagreement,” Professor Goldney said. “I will also chart a way forward to ensure that this debate will be constructive and life-changing, rather than vitriolic and life-denying.” The public lecture will be held at the conference room, CSU Orange Campus, Leeds Parade, at 6pm on Wednesday 24 October. CSU wine and cheese will be served after the lecture.