Director of the Australian Institute of Criminology (AIC) Professor Adam Graycar will be guest speaker at a University of Queensland graduation ceremony tonight.
The University will hold its final two graduation ceremonies at 6pm and 8.15pm at Mayne Hall, which is to be adaptively reused. Future ceremonies will be at the $21 million UQ Centre, opening late June.
Professor Graycar, appointed Adjunct Professor in Social Policy at UQ in 1997, and an Adjunct Professor at the University of Hong Kong in 2000, will address Arts and Social and Behavioural Sciences Faculty graduands at the 8.15pm ceremony.
• Commonwealth Federation Fellow Professor Robert Clark, the Director of the Australian Research Council Special Research Centre for Quantum Computer Technology, will be speaker at the 6pm ceremony. Professor Clark has attracted total research funding of more than $30 million over the past 10 years and is the co-inventor of nanoscale products and a process for fabricating a quantum computer.
Other graduands of media interest include:
6pm ceremony:
• Elizabeth Krenske who attained a Grade Point Average of 7 (the maximum) in her Bachelor of Science (Hons Class 1) last year will receive a University Medal at 6pm and accept an award as the 2002 Alumni Graduate of the Year. The UQ Alumni Association makes the award to the student with the highest Grade Point Average on completion of their degree. She is now pursuing her passion for science by undertaking postgraduate study at the Australian National University in Canberra, researching synthetic aspects of phosphorus chemistry.
• Valedictorian Christopher Pettigrew, who graduated earlier this week at UQ with his Bachelor of Laws degree, tonight receives his Bachelor of Science degree majoring in Biochemistry and Microbiology. A research assistant to Dr Sophie Dove in the Centre for Marine Studies, he spent an exchange semester studying abroad last year at the University of Nottingham. Mr Pettigrew will discuss university as being an important formative period in people’s lives in which they gained independence and develop new life skills. Mr Pettigrew’s current research centers on coral bleaching and coral pigments. He plans to commence an honours degree next semester, and hopes to be admitted as a solicitor. His family including his sister, Catharine, a UQ PhD student in speech pathology and former valedictorian, and his parents, Professor Alan Pettigrew and Mrs Pettigrew will attend the ceremony. Professor Pettigrew is CEO of the National Health and Medical Research Council.
• Chelsea Bond will be awarded a University medal for her Bachelor of Applied Health Science (Indigenous Primary Health Care) degree studies with first class honours. Chelsea graduated with her Bachelors degree in 1998 at the age of 19 years, having received membership with the Golden Key National Honour Society and a Qld Health Rural Health Scholarship. Upon graduating, Chelsea commenced employment as an Aboriginal Health Worker in Dalby and it was during this time that she undertook her Honours degree. Her honours thesis involved the exploration of environmental health issues within a rural Aboriginal community from a sociological perspective. Mrs Bond, who is an Associate Lecturer and researcher in the Indigenous Primary Health Care Division of The University of Queensland is currently employed on an urban Indigenous health promotion project in the Brisbane/Logan/Ipswich areas.
Chelsea is also a member of the 2002 National Youth Roundtable and is the first member of her family to attend University. Proudly identifying as Aboriginal and South Sea Islander, Chelsea was first inspired in her studies and employment through her own experiences as a young Indigenous person. Her parents and husband will attend tonight`s ceremony.
8.15pm ceremony:
• Valedictorian Amanda Layzelle will discuss how university means different things to different people. For her, it was a journey of discovery about herself and others. Ms Layzelle, who graduated in Arts with a double major in political science, received five Dean’s commendations for high achievement. Ms Layzelle works in human resources in the Department of the Premier and Cabinet, and plans to further her human resources studies in the future. Her brother, Mark, who is undertaking an Economics degree at UQ, and her family will attend tonight’s ceremony.
• 78-year-old Dr Douglas Mercer will be awarded his PhD in history at the 8.15pm ceremony, just over half a century after receiving his Bachelor of Engineering (Mechanical and Electrical) at UQ (in 1946). The following year (1947), Dr Mercer was awarded honours, and subsequently undertook a Master of Engineering (Electrical) degree at UQ in 1960, and a Postgraduate Diploma in Arts (in Applied History) in 1997. (see separate news release)
Media: Further information, Jan King, telephone 0413 601 248.
