Read about alumnus Tom Bunting, who graduated from Macquarie earlier this year, and is about to embark upon a year long journey to Oxford University.
Words by Josh Fry
We caught up recently with Tom Bunting, who graduated from Macquarie earlier this year with a Bachelor of Applied Finance and with his Bachelor of Science (Psychology) last year.
Tom had an interesting start to his university studies, commencing a Bachelor of Psychology (Hons) at the University of Sydney. After a year of rats and stats, he decided he wanted to pursue his passion for Finance and Psychology by doing both degrees at the same time.
“Back then this wasn’t possible at Sydney Uni, so to combine the two disciplines meant I had to look at other options. And luckily, I discovered Macquarie University’s fantastic concurrent degree program… so of course, I transferred,” said Tom.
The Lifecycles team at Macquarie helped him put together a solid study plan to study both a Bachelor of Science (Psychology) and Bachelor of Applied Finance, and the rest as they say, is history.
Tom currently works as an analyst at Responsible Investment Association Australasia. The company provides the world’s first and largest responsible investment certification program. In his role, he helps some of Australia’s leading asset managers structure their approaches to responsible investment and impact on social and environmental outcomes. “Yes, you can do good and do well,” quips Tom.
In March, Tom was ecstatic to receive confirmation that he had been accepted into his dream degree, and in October will begin a year-long journey at Oxford University where he will study a Master of Science in Environmental Change and Management. The degree will provide him with a deep green background in earth sciences and the impacts of environmental change, from local to global scales. The course also looks at systemic responses to environmental change from both the private and public sectors through a broad stakeholder lens that considers economic, legal, cultural and ethical factors.
His passion for pursing this study stemmed from two places. He noticed that expertise in environmental stewardship is sorely lacking in much of financial services sector, and so studying this master’s degree will help position himself as a key knowledge broker at the nexus of finance, sustainability, and governance.
Secondly, he wants to learn from and hopefully work with the creator of Doughnut Economics herself, Kate Raworth, who teaches on this course at Oxford. “Her ideas are gold, and I long to appropriate the principles of Doughnut Economics to finance – Doughnut Finance?” jokes Tom, though keep an eye out for this term in the coming years!
Tom has been giving back to Macquarie through working closely with one of our course directors, Prashan Karunaratne, to enhance student contribution to the Sustainable Development Goals. Prashan runs the capstone which asks final year Commerce students to come up with a venture that contributes to one of the seventeen Sustainable Development Goals.
In the recent Times Higher Education (THE) Impact rankings, Macquarie University came in number 82 from more than 1,100 universities across the globe … “so it will be exciting to see how much further Macquarie can climb with our work on this,” said Tom.
We asked Tom the following four questions to share with students thinking about studying at Macquarie.
What’s your favourite / most memorable memory of your time as a Macquarie student?
Perhaps not a time and place, but the friendly people and sense of community at Macquarie. Spots like UBar (in its many forms…) and cafes dotted throughout the campus were great ways to meet people and find out a little more about what others were studying. I was also lucky to live on campus at Robert Menzies College which meant I always had friends close by! Cross-pollination and diversity – that’s Macquarie.
What advice he would give to students thinking about their career path?
Be clear on the issues that you care about and what you want out of your job and employer. I think what keeps us connected to our work is an emotional stake in what we are doing. Once you know your ‘why’, the ‘how’ and ‘where’ and ‘what’ will naturally follow on the back of a clear vision and commitment to a cause.
Passion is the strongest form of intelligence, and those who follow their heart are often the most successful.
What were your top three favourite subjects:
Financial Modelling really helped me understand the mathematics of finance and how to manipulate formulas for each unique situation (every day is different in the real world)!
Behavioural Economics was honestly some of the most fun I had while studying. Not only did it allow me to combine my interests and study economics with psychology, but the unit itself had some great banter and interesting people from varied backgrounds – Would recommend!
Psychological Science: Putting Theory into Practice made me re-think how I was going to use my knowledge of finance after studying. Drawing from ideas like Psychological Literacy and examples like Martin Luther King showed me that “what we do with what we know is far more important than how much we know or how intelligent we are.”
What lecturers inspired or challenged your thinking?
There were so many great lecturers, however the three that really made a huge impact were Wayne Warburton, Wylie Bradford and Kevin Brooks. They all challenged my thinking and stretched me to think deeply about the applicability of what we learn to the real world. Most importantly, they made education fun and naturally fed my curiosity into each of their quirky academic worlds!