Word from Universities Australia’s comms conference is that Adam Redman, flak catcher in chief at Monash University, is returning to the private sector after two years at Clayton
Ipek Kurtböke from University of the Sunshine Coast is the new president of the World Federation of Culture Collections, which maintains a global database of 400 000 strains of micro-organisms. Dr Kurtböke studies antibiotic-producing bacteria.
Steve Baxter will become Queensland’s Chief Entrepreneur next month. Mr Baxter is an ISP and appears on TV’s eat-aspiring-entrepreneurs alive Shark Tank. He succeeds Mark Sowerby.
Former NSW state education minister and Nationals MP Adrian Piccoli is moving to UNSW to research the disparity in education for city and country school students.
Geraldine Mackenzie took over as vice chancellor at the University of Southern Queensland on Tuesday.
Eileen Webb from Curtin U’s law school is appointed a part time commissioner at theLaw Reform Commission of Western Australia.
The NSW Premier’s History Awards are announced
Australian history: Mark McKenna (University of Sydney). From the edge: Australia’s lost histories (MUP),
general history: Sandra Wilson (Murdoch U), Robert Cribb (ANU), Beatrice Trefalt, (Monash U) and Dean Aszkielowicz (Murdoch U) Japanese war criminals (Columbia UP),
community and regional history: Peter Hobbins, (University of Sydney), Ursula K Frederick (ANU) and Anne Clarke, (University of Sydney) Stories from the sandstone: quarantine inscriptions from Australia’s immigrant past (Arbon Publishing),
young people’s history: Christobel Mattingley, (independent author) Maralinga’s long shadow(Allen and Unwin),
multimedia history, Adam Clulow, (Monash U) The Amboyna conspiracy trial (Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media)
The Council for the Humanities Arts, and Social Science has announced the long-list for its Australia Book Prize Marco Duranti (University of Sydney), Conservative Human Rights Revolution (OUP). Tom Griffiths (ANU), The Art of Time Travel: Historians and Their Craft, (Black Inc). Kim Mahood (ANU), Position Doubtful: Mapping Landscapes and Memories, (Scribe). Mark McKenna (University of Sydney), From the Edge: Australia’s Lost Histories, (MUP). John Murphy (University of Melbourne), Evatt: A life, (New South Publishing). Elizabeth Tynan (James Cook University) Atomic Thunder: The Maralinga Story (New South Publishing)