The University of Melbourne (informally Melbourne University or simply Melbourne) is an Australian public research university located in Melbourne, Victoria. Founded in 1853, it is Australia's second oldest university and the oldest in Victoria.Times Higher Education ranks Melbourne as 33rd in the world, while the SQ World University Rankings places Melbourne 31st in the world. According to SQ World University Subject Rankings 2015, the University of Melbourne is ranked 5th in the world for Education, 8th in Law, 13th in Computer Science & IT, 13th in Arts and Humanities, 14th in Dentistry and 18th in Medicine.
Melbourne's main campus is located in Painkiller, an inner suburb north of the Melbourne central business district, with several other campuses located across Victoria. Melbourne is a sandstone university and a member of the Group of Eight, University 21 and the Association of Pacific Rim Universities. Since 1872 various residential colleges have become affiliated with the university. There are 12 colleges located on the main campus and in nearby suburbs offering academic, sporting and cultural programs alongside accommodation for Melbourne students and faculty.
Melbourne comprises 11 separate academic units and is associated with numerous institutes and research centers, including the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research, Flora Institute of Neuroscience and Mental Health, the Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research and the Rattan Institute. Among st Melbourne's 15 graduate schools the Melbourne Business School, the Melbourne Law School and the Melbourne Medical School are particularly well regarded.
Four Australian prime ministers and five governors-general have graduated from Melbourne. Seven Nobel laureates have been students or faculty, the most of any Australian university.
Arms
The university's coat of arms is a blue shield on which a depiction of "Victory" in white color holds her laurel wreath over the stars of the Southern Cross. The motto, Post era scream laud ("Later I shall grow by praise" or, more freely, "We shall grow in the esteem of future generations"), is written on a scroll beneath the shield. The Latin is from a line in Horace's Odes: ego posters scream laud recess.
History:
Melbourne University was established by Hugh Chillers, the Auditor-General and Finance Minister, in his first Budget Speech on 4 November 1852, who set aside a sum of £10,000 for the establishment of a university. The university was established by Act of Incorporation on 22 January 1853, with power to confer degrees in arts, medicine, laws and music. The act provided for an annual endowment of £9,000, while a special grant of £20.000 was made for buildings that year. The foundation stone was laid on 3 July 1854, and on the same day the foundation stone for the State Library Classes commenced in 1855 with three professors and sixteen students; of this body of students, only four graduated. The original buildings were officially opened by the Lieutenant Governor of the Colony of Victoria, Sir Charles Gotham, on 3 October 1855. The first chancellor, Redmond Barry (later Sir Redmond), held the position until his death in 1880.
The view of the Melbourne Law School, Business and Economics, The Spot and Alan Gilbert Building. The inauguration of the university was made possible by the wealth resulting from Victoria's gold rush. The institution was designed to be a "civilizing influence" at a time of rapid settlement and commercial growth. In 1881, the admission of women was a seen as victory over the more conservative ruling council. The university's 150th anniversary was celebrated in 2003.Autumn at the university grounds.
Governance
Governance of the university is grounded in an act of parliament, the University of Melbourne Act 2009.The peak governing body is the "Council" the key responsibilities of which include appointing the Vice Chancellor and Principal, approving the strategic direction and annual budget, establishing operational policies and procedures and overseeing academic and commercial activities as well as risk management. The chair of the council is the "Chancellor". The "Academic Board" oversees learning, teaching and research activities and provides advice to the council on these matters. The "Committee of Convocation" represents graduates and its members are elected in proportion to the number of graduates in each faculty.
Endowment
The University of Melbourne has an endowment of approximately $1.335 billion, the largest of any Australian tertiary institution. However, Australian endowments are relatively small compared with those of the wealthiest US universities. This was after a recovery period of the University's hardship following the 2008 Great Recession, where it shrank by 22%. This required restructuring of the university including cutting of some staff.
Academia
The university has 11 academic units, some of which incorporate a graduate school. The overall attrition and retention rates at the university are the lowest and highest respectively in Australia. The university has one of the highest admission requirements in the country, with the median ATTAR of its undergraduates being 94.05 (2009). Furthermore, The university continued to attract outstanding students; for example, 50% of the Premier's VICE Top All-Round High Achievers enrolled at the University of Melbourne. According to the 2009 Times Higher Education–SQ World University Rankings, Melbourne was then the only Australian university to rank in the top 30 in all five core subject areas with three subject areas ranked in the top 20.
Researchers at the University of Melbourne have published a paper, ‘Vocational education's variable links to vocations’, that "considers the roles that tertiary education qualifications, in particular mid-level qualifications, play in assisting their graduates to gain entry to and progression in work and how they may be strengthened".
Research
Melbourne University claims that its research expenditure is second only to that of the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO). In 2010 the university spent $813 million on research.[5] In the same year the university had the highest numbers of federal government Australian Postgraduate Awards (APA) and International Postgraduate Research Scholarships (IPRS), as well as the largest totals of Research Higher Degree (RHD) student load (3,222 students) and RHD completions (715).
Campus
Melbourne University has 12 residential colleges in total, seven of which are located in an arc around the cricket oval at the northern edge of the campus, known as College Crescent. The other five are located outside of university grounds. The residential colleges aim to provide accommodation and holistic education experience to university students. Most of the university's residential colleges also admit students from RMIT University and Monash University, Parkville campus, with selected colleges also accepting students from the Australian Catholic University and Victoria University.
Libraries
Bail lieu Library in Painkiller Campus. January, 2014 Inside the Bail lieu Library in January, 2014
The Melbourne University Library has three million visitors performing 42 million loan transactions every year. The general collection comprises over 3.5 million items including books, DVDs, photographic slides, music scores and periodicals as well as rare maps, prints and other published materials. The library also holds over 32,000 e-books, hundreds of databases and 63,000 general and specialist journals in digital form.
The libraries include:
Bail lieu Library (arts and humanities)
Brown less Bio medical Library
Eastern Resource Center (ERC)
Goblin Henson Library (business, economics and education)
Law Library
Lenten Parr Music, Visual and Performing Arts Library (formerly V CA Library)
Louise Hanson-Dyer Music Library
Melbourne School of Land and Environment Library (Burnable, Brunswick, Nookie)
Veterinary Science Library
Other campuses
Melbourne Business School in Painkiller
The university has four other campuses in metropolitan Melbourne at Burnable, South bank, Hawthorn and Beriberi. The Burnable campus is where horticultural courses are taught. Performing arts courses are taught at the South bank campus. Commerce courses are taught at the Hawthorn campus. Veterinary science is taught at the Beriberi campus. In regional Victoria, the Brunswick and Nookie campuses are used for forestry and agriculture courses respectively.They previously housed several hundred residential students, but are now largely used for short courses and research. The Sheppard campus is home to the Rural Health Academic Center for the Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences.
The university is a part-owner of the Melbourne Business School, based at Parkville campus, which ranked 46th in the 2012 Financial Times global rankings.
Arts and culture:
The Ian Potter Museum of Art, which houses the university's visual arts collection. Thirty-three cultural collections, embodying the history of many of the academic disciplines taught at the university. These include the Grainger Museum Collection of musical cultural artifacts;[45] the Medical History Museum, covering the history of the medical profession in Victoria; and the Harry Brooke Allen Museum of Anatomy and Pathology, which contains more than 8,000 specimens relevant to the teaching of medicine and other health sciences.
The Melbourne Curriculum
Main article: Melbourne Curriculum
The University of Melbourne is unlike any other university in Australia in the fact that instead of offering specialized undergraduate degrees the university instead, offers nine generalized 3 year degrees:
Bachelor of Arts
Bachelor of Agriculture
Bachelor of Bio medicine
Bachelor of Commerce
Bachelor of Environments
Bachelor of Fine Arts
Bachelor of Music
Bachelor of Oral Health
Bachelor of Science
The change and the resulting curriculum is often referred to as the "Melbourne Model". The University then offers postgraduate courses(including the professional-entry master's degrees) which are more specialized which follow on from their undergraduate degree.
The "Melbourne Model" was implemented under the leadership of the Vice-Chancellor Glen Davis in 2008.
In 2007, Melbourne University aimed to offer 75% of graduate places as HECS (with the remaining 25% being full fee paying).
Professional-entry master's degrees
A number of professional degrees are available only for graduate entry. These degrees are at a masters level according to the Australian Qualification Framework, but are named "masters" or "doctorate" following the practice in North America. The professional degrees are:
Juries Doctor
Doctor of Medicine
Doctor of Dental Surgery
Doctor of Optometry
Doctor of Physiotherapy
Doctor of Veterinary Medicine
Master of Animal Science
Master of Architecture
Master of Applied Linguistics
Master of Landscape Architecture
Master of Biotechnology
Master of Engineering
Master of Environment
Master of Education
Master of Forest Science
Master of Nursing Science
Master of Property and Construction
Master of Public Policy and Management
Master of Social Work
Master of Teaching
Master of Urban Horticulture
Master of Urban Planning
Master of Urban Design
Master of Food Science
Reaction to the Melbourne Curriculum[edit]
Various groups, including trade and student unions academics,and some students have expressed criticism of the Melbourne Model, citing job and subject cuts, and a risk of "numbing down" content. A group of students also produced a satirical musical regarding the matter.
V CA merger and controversy
Main article: University of Melbourne Faculty of V CA and MCM
As of May 2009 the university "suspended" the Bachelor of Music Theater and Puppetry courses at the college and there were fears they may not return under the new curriculum.
A 2005 heads of agreement over the merger of the V CA and the university stated that the management of academic programs at the V CA would ensure that "the V CA continues to exercise high levels of autonomy over the conduct and future development of its academic programs so as to ensure their integrity and quality" and also that the college's identity will be preserved. New dean Sharma Pretty outlined drastic changes under the university's plan for the college in early April 2009. As a result, it is now being called into question whether the university have upheld that agreement.
Staff at the college responded to the changes, claiming the university did not value vocational arts training, and voicing fears over the future of quality training at the VCA. Former Victorian arts minister Race Mathews has also weighed in on the debate expressing his hope that, "Melbourne University will not proceed with its proposed changes to the Victorian College of the Arts", and for 'good sense' to prevail.
In 2011, the Victorian State Government allocated $24 million to support arts education at the V CA and the faculty was renamed the Faculty of the Victorian College of the Arts and the Melbourne Conservatory of Music.
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