The Queensland Conservatorium‘s new acting degree has received a stamp of approval from Academy Award winning actress, Dame Judi Dench.
“Drama training is essential for the development and encouragement of young performers, and this course supplies the skills and knowledge to build and sustain a successful career,” she said.
“The University offers the chance to work with dedicated and experienced tutors in superb facilities. This is a wonderful opportunity for those determined to follow their dream.”
The Bachelor of Acting will prepare graduates for a career on the stage and screen under the direction of internationally renowned teachers and performers.
British actor, director, writer and educator Jacqui Somerville will head up the new program.
Ms Somerville has worked at a host of prestigious theatre companies in the UK, including the Royal Shakespeare Company and Donmar Warehouse.
She said it was exciting to launch the new degree.
“The Queensland Conservatorium is at the cutting edge of performing arts education
Category: Griffith University Feed
Using art to tackle stigma of mental illness
Meryl Keioske has used her Honours thesis to tackle the stigma surrounding mental illness, producing an arresting graphic novel about her life with Asperger’s Syndrome.
The Queensland College of Art student has just graduated from a Bachelor of Digital Media degree with Honours.
She was diagnosed at the age of 18 with Asperger’s Syndrome – a form of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) which affects how people perceive the world and interact with others.
“I always felt different to everyone else, and I felt ashamed of it for many years,” she said.
“I think there is a lot of stigma attached to being on the autism spectrum – you are perceived as an outcast or a weirdo.
“Part of doing this project was attempting to come to terms with it, and learning to accept myself for who I am.”
Meryl hopes projects like hers will improve understanding of ASD and break down stereotypes.
“We’re not all like Rain Man, people
3D technology brings history to life
A Queensland College of Art PhD candidate is using cutting-edge 3D technology to preserve the country’s oldest human footprints.
Chris Little was invited to Mungo National Park as part of his research into heritage preservation.
The world heritage site contains Indigenous footprints known as the Willandra Trackways – the oldest footprints ever found in Australia and the largest set of ice age footprints in the world.
Heavy winds have exposed fresh footprints and Chris was invited to 3D scan the footprints to document and preserve the trackways.
“With 50,000 visitors a year, the footprints are at risk of damage and deterioration,” he said.
“Scanning is the perfect way to record and preserve the past.
“3D printing the trackway scan data will provide a tactile experience, giving a true sense of distance, depth and scale.”
Chris is also keen to use interactive augmented reality to bring the site to life.
“We want to combine the 3D scans with an interactive augmented reality
Griffith Aviation partners with Qantas for Future Pilot Program
Bachelor of Aviation students at Griffith University could become future pilots with Qantas thanks to a new partnership.
The Qantas Future Pilot Program provides students with access to experienced pilots during their degree, with selected students invited to complete an intensive 12-week Airline Transition Course.
Graduates can then transition to employment with QantasLink and complete their training under the supervision of QantasLink’s experienced training team and become qualified as First Officers flying the airline’s Dash 8 200/300 or Q400 fleet.
The program is open to a potential pool of 300 students in the next few years.
QantasLink Chief Executive Officer John Gissing said the program would build the next generation of exceptional pilots from within Australia’s top aviation schools and provided students with unparalleled benefits and job certainty not available with any other training program.
“Aviation students will have an enormous head start to their career as a pilot. They will not only benefit from a direct
Additional mathematics support for Griffith College students
From Trimester 1, 2018, Griffith College will commence delivering a slightly modified program structure for the Diplomas of Engineering, Science and Health Sciences. These programs contain courses that require fundamental mathematics skills so the College has developed and embedded additional modules to help support students, called Essential Mathematics.
The Essential Mathematics modules will be delivered in the first trimester of the diploma to provide students with a solid underpinning mathematics knowledge to help students succeed.
Essential Mathematics is non-weighted and competency based (pass/fail), which means that it does not count towards their GPA (grade point average). It is, however, compulsory and must be completed in order to graduate.
All students will complete a mathematics diagnostic test during orientation to determine their current mathematics knowledge. If they succeed in this quiz, they may be exempted from the Essential Mathematics modules.
Students who are required to include Essential Mathematics in their diploma will complete their diploma
New hope for sufferers of urinary tract infection
New understanding of a bacterium that causes urinary tract infection (UTI) is providing fresh hope for sufferers of this common condition, following a breakthrough by a Griffith microbiologist.
Dr Matthew Sullivan, from Griffith’s School of Medical Science and Menzies Health Institute Queensland, fought off 270 other leading researchers with the award of a major international accolade at the 20th Lancefield International Symposium on Streptococci and Streptococcal Diseases (LISSSD), for his work uncovering a genetic regulator that controls the severity of UTI streptococcal disease.
Dr Sullivan presented his research on how streptococci cause UTI, which he published earlier this year in the prestigious Journal of Infectious Diseases.
In recognition of the impact of his work, LISSSD 2017 awarded Dr Sullivan Best Poster on Streptococcal Infections, an esteemed international accolade judged by infectious disease physicians, clinical microbiologists and researchers in the field of infection.
Among the most common infections
UTIs are among the most common infections in
Indonesian officials learn about Australian fiscal policy
A member of both APEC and the G20, Indonesia has the largest economy in South East Asia which, since the Global Financial Crisis, has experienced strong sustained economic growth around five per cent. With a population over 260 million, more than ten times Australia’s, Indonesia is the world’s third largest democracy.
In 2017-18 Australia will provide close to $300 million in bilateral foreign aid managed by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, a key objective of which is to improve economic institutions and infrastructure critical to Indonesia’s development.
Under Griffith Asia Institute’s APEC Study Centre banner, a group of 25 Indonesian government officials from the key national agencies responsible for devising and implementing fiscal policy in Indonesia – the National Development Planning Agency (Bappenas) and the Ministry of Finance – recently visited Canberra to hear presentations from senior Australian government officials on site at Commonwealth Treasury, Department of Finance, and the
Revamped Tourism Dashboard boasts interactive insights for experts and discerning travellers
The Global Sustainable Tourism Dashboard, a joint project between researchers at Griffith University and the University of Surrey, has received a major face-lift, enabling it to better inform researchers and travellers with interactive insights about destinations around the world.
Launched in January following the declaration of 2017 as the United Nations International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development, the Dashboard builds on data provided through the World Travel and Tourism Council, Amadeus and EarthCheck, among other organisations, and incorporates knowledge from established initiatives such as the Global Sustainable Tourism Council and the International Tourism Partnership.
Employing a newly implemented Power BI interface created in partnership with Acclario Digital, users are able to explore visual data on topics including Poverty Alleviation, Dispersion of Travel, Carbon Emissions, Sustainable Production, Protected Areas, Gender Equity and Security.
Though the platform was designed more for decision makers than with the average tourist in mind, Griffith Institute for Tourism Director Professor Susanne Becken said, “The discerning
Bird expert tweeting to the world on bird feeding
As Australia reveals its bird of the year, Griffith University’s resident bird expert has shed light on the other issue the country is always torn on – feeding them.
Professor Darryl Jones, of the Environmental Futures Research Institute, has released the first ever book on a topic that almost everyone has tried.
Hailed as the country’s go-to magpie expert, it’s fitting the much maligned bird rated number one in The Guardian’s Australian Bird of the Year vote.
Professor Jones covers the reasons for and the implications of feeding birds in the wild in The Birds At My Table looking all international aspects of bird feeding and speaking with everyone involved in the field.
“This is the first detailed history of the practice and confronts many of the controversial aspects, such as do birds become dependent on the food we provide? Does feeding actually benefit the birds? Does it spread disease? Should people be encouraged to feed
Nationalism, populism… or pragmatism in an evolving context?
It’s not uncommon to see China under President Xi Jinping labelled as ‘nationalistic’ and ‘populist’ – along with Trump and Brexit. But should they be lumped together? And how should foreign business engaging with China react?
Adjunct Professor Clinton Dines shared his thoughts on these and other questions at a public event hosted by Griffith Asia Institute this month, chaired by Professor Sara McGaughey. With over 36 years of business experience in China, there are few better credentialed than Clinton Dines to speak on these issues.
Adjunct Professor Clinton Dines
“Populism isn’t new”, says Clinton. “It’s a feature of developed world democracies. Essentially, these things are driven by the electoral process, enabled and magnified these days by social media and by an increasingly emasculated mainstream media who get more and more of their information from social media, amplifying the effect. It’s underpinned, since the global financial crisis in particular, by mistrust in the