Pharmacy students at Charles Sturt University’s (CSU) Orange and Wagga Wagga Campuses will have the opportunity to meet and talk with the head of the peak employer organisation, the Pharmacy Guild of Australia, Kos Sclavos, during his visit to CSU on Tuesday 23 May. A Brisbane-based community pharmacist, Mr Sclavos took up the post as National President of the Pharmacy Guild of Australia in November 2005. During his visit to the Wagga Wagga Campus, Kos Sclavos will meet with students in Orange via video-conference as well as hold face to face meetings with students and CSU academics, including Head of the CSU School of Biomedical Sciences, Associate Professor Lyn Angel on the Wagga Wagga Campus. With the Pharmacy Guild representing 4 500 pharmacy owners across Australia, Mr Sclavos is the recipient of a number of industry awards including Pharmaceutical Society of Australia’s Young Pharmacist of the Year 1999 and Australian Institute of Pharmacy Management’s Pharmacy Manager of the Year 1993.  

Business in the Central West will be the topic of discussion when 18 officials from the consular missions of Australia’s leading trading partners visit Charles Sturt University (CSU) on Wednesday 10 May. The Central West Region Economic Forum will be attended by officials from India, the Philippines, China, Japan, Switzerland, New Zealand, Sri Lanka, Ireland, Slovenia, Serbia, Peru, Uruguay and Ecuador. The forum organised by Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) also involves the Department of State and Regional Development, Orange City Council and Charles Sturt University. CSU will host the Forum at the Orange Campus.  

Students completing postgraduate courses in Captive Vertebrate Management at Charles Sturt University (CSU) visited the Western Plains Zoo, Dubbo last week to work closely with the Zoo’s habitants. The students, travelling from as far away as  Darwin, Perth and California, spent the week working closely with Dubbo Zoo veterinarian Dr Tim Portas. The courses developed in co-operation with Western Plains Zoo were the first in Australia to offer specialisation in captive vertebrate management. Students are provided with the knowledge and skills to manage zoos and wildlife parks based on a thorough understanding of animal behaviour, the requirements of captive reptiles or birds, preventative medicine, reproduction biology and zoo and exhibit design principles. Dr Portas showed students an ultrasound image of eggs in the reproductive tract of one of the Galapagos tortoise females.  Last year the turtles laid but all the eggs were infertile. Dr Portas is more confident that the new eggs will be fertile because of a positive reproductive examination of the males.

The first Canadian students from Charles Sturt University (CSU), Ontario to do their practicum teaching experience in Australia have started work at North Wagga Public School.  The three Canadians are among the first group of Bachelor of Educational Studies (Primary Teaching) students at CSU, Ontario which began in August 2005 with 114 students. The one-year postgraduate teacher education program which operates between CSU in Australia and school boards in Ontario, prepares candidates to teach in Ontario elementary or primary schools. Juanita Germaine, 34, of Barrie, Ontario; Deb Gross, 24, of Hamilton, Ontario and Kristin Larion, 23, from Paris, Ontario will spend three weeks teaching kindergarten and year 2/3 students at North Wagga Public School. All three said the opportunity of practice teaching in Australia as well as CSU’s reputation in teacher education were factors which attracted them to the CSU program. Four other CSU Ontario students are doing their practicum teaching in Dubbo at the same time.  Professor Tom Lowrie, head of CSU’s School of Education, said the Australian practicum experience was an exciting component of CSU’s Ontario program which he hoped would be expanded. Read more here.

A $100 000 scholarship will enable Charles Sturt University (CSU) PhD student Jodie Ivers to conduct research into the way people manage their electricity usage . Ms Ivers is the recipient of Country Energy’s inaugural Energy Efficiency Research Scholarship. The industry scholarship will allow the postgraduate student to research renewable energy or an area known as demand management. “Demand management could be changed using new technology such as  a “smart meter” in people’s homes. The meter could tell the resident how much electricity is being used at any time and how much it is costing,” explained Ms Ivers. At peak times, an alarm would alert a resident to warn them the cost will escalate. And why aren’t more people taking up the option of green electricity? “This is what I have to find out. Basically what I’ll be doing is finding out what consumers think about renewable energy, what they know about it, what their attitudes towards green electricity are and trying to find ways to increase adoption and awareness,” said the CSU student. Originally from the central west town of Oberon, Ms Ivers now lives in Bathurst. “I like the socially responsible aspect of research, so I would love to see my work make a difference in what’s happening in regional areas, and reduce the amount of fossil fuels that we are using,” added Jodie Ivers.

The title of 2006 Royal Bathurst Showgirl has been bestowed on Charles Sturt University (CSU) communication student Jennifer Browning. Studying the double degree of Bachelor of  Sports Studies/Bachelor of Arts (Communication/Journalism), as well as holding down a cadetship with the National Radio News (NRN) on CSU’s Bathurst Campus, Ms Browning went to school in the city and is now undertaking her university studies in Bathurst.  “I think being an ambassador for the city of Bathurst will be wonderful,” said Jennifer Browning. She says her communications and interview training was a distinct advantage in the competition. “I am an NRN cadet so we are always immersed in what’s going on around us both in the community and on a national level.” The ten young women were judged on local knowledge, current affairs, deportment and personality. Next stop for the CSU student is a two day course in deportment and personal presentation skills in Dubbo, before the Central West zone competition.

The boys-only Dead Bones Society meets under the gigantic jaw of a T. rex for its third session on Thursday 13 April. The writing workshops at the Australian Fossil and Mineral Museum in Bathurst have been so successful that more sessions are planned for the rest of this year and next. Teenage fiction author, Charles Sturt University (CSU) tutor and literacy consultant Paul Stafford says the ‘comedy horror’ workshops are aimed at gifted nine to 12-year-olds with an interest in writing and science. “It’s like a secret club because boys love that kind of thing. A creepy old museum at night is pretty exciting.” The boys are mentored by male teacher education students from CSU where Paul Stafford graduated with a degree in print journalism. Penny Packham, public programs officer at the museum, says the CSU students help the boys focus and express their ideas. “It’s giving the students an opportunity they don’t otherwise have. They are incredibly enthusiastic and quite happy to offer their time.” The workshops have been so successful the museum is looking to expand the program and run similar workshops for girls.

Described as an ardent and vocal supporter of the pharmacy program at Charles Sturt University (CSU), Ian Dean has been awarded a Companion of the University. Mr Dean has worked in the pharmaceutical industry in Australia, Canada, Europe, New Zealand, UK and the USA. From 1990 to 2003, Ian Dean was Registrar and Chief Executive of the Pharmacy Board of NSW. In presenting the Companion of the University, Dean of the CSU Faculty of Health Studies Professor Mark Burton said “Ian Dean has advocated on behalf of staff, students and the University as a whole in various pharmacy and industry forums and most notably within the NSW Government”. “His understanding of the role that CSU plays in the recruitment and retention of rural pharmacists contributed significantly to the establishment of the first Professor of Rural Pharmacy in Australia at CSU in 2005,” Professor Burton added

Every time actress Alexandra Davies features in another dramatic scene as Cate McMasters, Registered Nurse and Ambulance Paramedic at All Saints General Hospital, the phones run hot at Charles Sturt University (CSU). That’s because CSU is one of the few universities in Australia to offer the double degree Bachelor of Nursing/Bachelor of Clinical Practice (Paramedic). Veronica Madigan, senior lecturer and PHC (pre-hospital care) course coordinator, says CSU started pre-hospital care education in Australia and was the first to offer the double degree. This year it was the most popular double degree to enrol at CSU. “The television drama All Saints has a couple of nurses who are also fully trained paramedics.You see them in their two uniforms at different times in the show so one day they might be a triage sister and in the next scene they might be out on the road as a paramedic,”  Veronica Madigan explained. In Menindee (population 980, 110 kilometres south-east of Broken Hill) there are no doctors but there are Advanced Care Nurses who are also paramedics. “At night they instantly revert to the ambulance service. When there’s a call out they are the ones who jump in the ambulance and retrieve the patients and decide whether or not they need to be flown out or taken on-road to Broken Hill. The diversity is amazing and one of the reasons our students are keen about this course.”