International students and academic staff from the Charles Sturt University (CSU) Study Centre in Melbourne will get a taste of a regional city when they take on a local cricket side near Wagga Wagga on Saturday 21 August. On Federal Election Day and almost two months ahead of the start of the local cricket season, the CSU Study Centre team known as the Yarra Dragons will take on the Kooringal Colts Cricket Club from Wagga Wagga at the Borambola Sport and Recreation Centre. The CSU Study Centres in Melbourne and Sydney are operated in conjunction with Study Group Australia (SGA), a leader in education and training for international students. The cricket match has been in the pipeline for some time as an opportunity to give the students studying in Melbourne a taste of a regional campus and community.  The inaugural cricket match between the CSU Study Centre in Melbourne and the Kooringal Colts will be held from 9am to 3pm when a new perpetual trophy will be presented to the winning side.

Research students from Charles Sturt University (CSU) involved in a wide-range of projects for the future of farming will gather in Wagga Wagga next week. The Future Farming Industries Cooperative Research Centre (CRC) will host the postgraduate conference at CSU in Wagga Wagga from Tuesday 17 August to Thursday 18 August.  The students will present their research to expert panels for their feedback and questions. On Wednesday 18 August from 10.45am to 12.30pm, Chief Executive Officer of the Invasive Animals Cooperative Research Centre, Mr Tony Peacock will explore the use of Web 2.0 technology and the reading of community perceptions in making the conduct of research more relevant while also providing greater impact. From 1.15pm to 3pm  Co-Director of the Climate Change Research Centre at the University of NSW, Professor Andy Pitman will report on the core science of Climate Change as reported by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.   Attending the postgraduate conference will be CSU students with the Future Farming Industries CRC: Mr John Broster from the School of Agricultural and Wine Sciences. His PhD is titled, Shelter belts and lamb survival rates’ Ms Felicity Cox’s PhD is Understanding sheep grazing of complex native pastures to better manage natural resources and production outcomes Ms Lauren Howard’s PhD is Relationships between agricultural extension service providers and sustainable agricultural systems Mr Matthew Gardner’s PhD is How does Chicory affect the nitrogen cycling of pasture systems? Ms Catherine Gulliver’s PhD is Improving reproductive efficiency in ewes: manipulating maternal nutrition to increase ovulation rate and alter the sex ratio of offspring Ms Felicity Gummer’s PhD is Relationship between earliness and vigour across a range of cereal species Mr Tim Hutchings’ PhD is Managing financial risk on Australian farms Gina Lennox’s PhD is Absentee ownership of rural land: trends, modes and implications Meredith Mitchell’s PhD is The ecology of Microlaena stipoides in grazing systems Ms Susan Orgill’s PhD is Investigations into the role of perennial pastures in building soil carbon (C) in phase farming systems Eloise Seymour’s PhD is Consideration of community values in regional natural resource decision making Mr David Waters’ PhD is Mechanisms of nutrient retention in biochar-amended soils of south-east NSW Ms Bree Wilson from the School of Agricultural and Wine Sciences is doing a post doctorate on biocontrol of aphids.

An exhibition of snapshots of rare and unusual plants and animals that highlights the diversity of life around the Riverina region is on show in the Albury Library-Museum from this Saturday 14 to Sunday 22 August. The exhibition, which shows the vital role of biodiversity in sustaining life on Earth, is being held as part of the 2010 International Year of Biodiversity. Photographers and researchers living and working in Albury-Wodonga have donated their work to the exhibition, titled Region’s Best Biodiversity Photographs, to illustrate biodiversity at its best. Visitors will see a water beetle hunting and catching a native fish, aerial photographs of pink algae that stain the landscape, goannas wrestling in a battle for dominance as well as rarely seen reptiles, frogs and mammals. A story is attached to each of the 24 images in the display, which is linked to other events being held in the region.

Two leading local science organisations are joining forces to present National Science Week 2010 in the Border region. Charles Sturt University (CSU) and the Astronomical Society of Albury Wodonga (ASAW) will present a program of science activities for local school students at CSU’s Thurgoona site from Wednesday 18 to Friday 20 August. Students from the Murray School of Education at CSU in Albury-Wodonga will join with Society members to run hands-on experiments and activities around the University, including investigating the cosmos, craters on meteors and discovering plants and animals in the Thurgoona wetlands. Over 700 students in Years 3 to 8 from 14 primary and high schools in NSW and Victoria will take part in the three-day event, which is funded by the Federal Department of Industry, Innovation, Science and Research.  

More than 150 high school students will gather in Wodonga to see the latest in high technology learning on the Border, with exhibitors from many institutions including Charles Sturt University (CSU). Lecturer from the School of Computing and Mathematics at CSU in Albury-Wodonga, Ms Maumita Bhattacharya, said the sessions were important for Border students to find out more on what is available for them in the Information Technology industry. “During the forum, I will be joined by Charles Sturt University computing lecturer Mr Anthony Chan to help students find their place in IT. It depends on their interests, abilities, skills and ambitions, and we will show students how they can find their way through the information maze,” Ms Bhattacharya said. The forum will be held between 10.30am and 2pm on Friday 13 August in the Wodonga Civic Centre, Hovell Street, Wodonga.

Two Charles Sturt University (CSU) students in Wagga Wagga are doing their bit to promote a healthier environment and community through a bicycle recycling project. Ms Alyssa Ng and Mr David Bate initiated the project which gives a second chance for abandoned bikes.  “About 20 old bikes abandoned at Kurrajong Recyclers in Wagga Wagga were donated to Charles Sturt University in 2009,” Ms Ng said. “With the assistance of students and staff from TAFE NSW Riverina Institute, the bikes have been repaired and repainted.” Facilitated and resourced by Riverina Institute’s Outreach Service, the bikes were repaired in the Riverina Institute’s automotive workshops by automotive and panel and paint pre-apprentice students. The bikes will be available free of charge for CSU students to use around the campus from the start of 2011. “We want this project to provide an environmentally friendly alternative form of transport for students, promote healthy lifestyles and encourage recycling.” The bikes will be handed over from Riverina Institute to CSU students from 11am on Friday 13 August near the Student Administration building.

A nursing lecturer was recognised with an award last week for more than 10 years teaching service at Charles Sturt University (CSU) in Dubbo. Ms Lyn Croxon, lecturer at the School of Nursing, Midwifery and Indigenous Health in Dubbo, said she had seen many changes during this time. “It is easy to stay in a profession which you enjoy, and the last 10 years at Charles Sturt University have been demanding but a lot of fun,” Ms Croxon said. “I teach both theoretical and clinical classes to on campus and distance education students. For the last year I have been Course Coordinator for the Bachelor of Nursing. This degree is taught to over 1 500 students across the University’s five campuses and by distance education. I coordinated the clinical placements for students across the Greater Western Area Health Service region for eight years and appreciate the support that the regional health services offer to our students. When I call or visit a health facility in the region, I often find I am speaking to a Charles Sturt University graduate who has returned to a local health facility to work as a Registered Nurse.”

Accessibility and human rights, instead of rigid funding models, should be the priorities when planning health care services for rural and remote Australia says Charles Sturt University’s (CSU) Professor of Rural and Remote Pharmacy Patrick Ball. “A model of health care funding for rural and remote Australia should be developed based on fundamental human rights and access to services rather than ‘bricks and mortar’,” Professor Patrick Ball said. The CSU academic studied two communities in central west NSW between 2006 and 2008 as part of his examination of the provision of health services outside metropolitan Australia. “The two communities were similar and only a short distance apart but had very different health care needs due to transport links and proximity to a city. We have the evidence to show that what is needed by rural and remote areas is more flexibility in allowing individual communities to meet their health needs and more emphasis on access to services rather than what hospital and which health facilities are located where.” Professor Patrick Ball will present a free public lecture on his research, What Health Services Should Rural Australia Have? from 6pm at the Deniliquin Council Chambers in Civic Place in Deniliquin on Wednesday 18 August. Read more here.

On Left-handers Day this Friday 13 August, an elite group of Charles Sturt University (CSU) dentistry students will celebrate their uniqueness and the fact their left handedness won’t be an issue in their oral health profession with dental equipment now built to compensate for left-handed dentists. Based on a conservative estimate, 10 per cent of the world population is left-handed which is reflected in the dentistry course with three of the 25 second year Bachelor of Dental Science students being left-handed. “In the past some dental equipment such as chairs and instruments were designed with only right-handed dentists in mind,” senior lecturer Dr Sabrina Manickam from the School of Dentistry and Health Sciences at CSU in Orange said. “Charles Sturt University students are lucky enough to have state-of-the-art equipment at their disposal that caters for both left and right-handed people.”