COVID-19 has significantly affected workflow across the University, with some areas experiencing an easing of work and others an increased demand.

In response to this, a Co-ordination Centre has been established in Human Resources, with the aim of matching areas where “work is down” with those where “work is up”.

“Our aim is two-fold,” explains Nicole Gower, Vice-President, People and Services. “Firstly, to ensure that we keep our workforce engaged and utilised as best as possible; and secondly, to support those areas where workload is high and there are significant demands.”

One area heavily impacted by recent government mandated restrictions is Campus Life, with the closure of the Sport and Aquatic Centre and the reduction of services across food and beverage outlets. However, through the Co-ordination Centre, some of these staff have now been successfully redeployed to busier areas of the University.

“The 30 staff who are being reassigned include lifeguards, swim instructors, swim coaches, personal trainers, chefs and food and beverage attendants,” says Pete Boyle, Head of U@MQ.

“They will move into the Student Connect area to help facilitate phone-based communication with students.”

One such employee is Chris McKibbins, Supervisor of Programs and Community at the Health Club, who has joined the Student Connect team this week to help with their call campaign reaching out to students to ensure they are managing the shift to online learning.

“The supervisors and equivalent positions at the Sport and Aquatic Centre had been in a state of nervousness – we could see the writing on the wall,” Chris says.  “With the Government closing gyms and leisure facilities, the period of not knowing became tense, although morale has still been good.”

A father of two young kids, Chris is thankful for the community connectivity within the University, allowing him to pivot and keep working, as well as the precious time he’s been able to spend with his family due to the government restrictions.

“We are lucky to have this opportunity to be redeployed as small businesses and other equivalent roles outside the University are at the mercy of a lockdown period,” he says. “Being redeployed allows for some semblance of normal life to continue in this very unusual time.

“I have been so lucky this last month or so having not missed a meal, play or bath time for my kids. I won’t take anything for granted with my kids and a short break to spend with them will be treasured. Moving forward we will all have to adapt as there is a chance this changes our social interactions for a long time to come.”

Student Connect, Associate Director, David Indge, says he’s taking on around 80 staff from across the University to be trained to help support students with the move to online learning through the calling campaign.

“Supporting student success is still our primary focus but with the transition to online learning, we need to also transition our student services and support to online,” explains David.

“These staff are going to be using their fantastic interpersonal and communication skills to connect with students, whether that’s on the phone or online. And, as many of these staff are students themselves, they’ll no doubt share personal experiences that help them form a genuine and authentic relationship.”

The process for the Co-ordination Centre is simple. These are intended to be short term arrangements and hence, there is no formal change to roles or transfer of budgets. If you have staff with capacity to help, please contact your HR Client Team, who will coordinate with other members of the HR team to match those staff with areas where support is needed. Similarly, if you are experiencing peaks in workflow, also let your HR Client team member know.

Jump onto an internet search engine, type in any scientific topic, and in the flash of a computer screen literally millions of results appear.

But what in all that information is fact and what is fake? How can scientists make their voices heard, particularly when it comes to ‘hot-button’ issues such as vaccination and climate change?

The interdisciplinary Science, misinformation and alternative facts workshop provides a forum for researchers and science communicators to discuss the representation of scientific evidence in the public domain.

Experts in psychology, cognitive science, linguistics, and education will join application domain experts in vaccination, climate science, education, and health behaviours to discuss the challenges and potential solutions for closing the gaps between what the evidence says and what the public believes.

Coordinated by the Macquarie Research Enrichment Program and co-sponsored by the Faculty of Human Sciences, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences and the ARC Centre of Excellence in Cognition and its Disorders, sessions will include:

• Communicating psychological science in the ‘post-truth’ world
• Challenges in science communication and translation
• Science communicators’ panel
• The science of science communication
• Outreach and interdisciplinary research

Further information:

• Program
• Workshop presenters and panellists
• Directions

Details:
Date: Thursday 1 June
Time: 10.30 – 4.30
Location: The Australian Hearing Hub, Level 1 Lecture Theatre, 16 University Avenue

Registration is free. Macquarie staff and students should register online.

How has the research landscape changed over the course of your time at Macquarie?
When I arrived at Macquarie in 1987, the University was not at all noted for research; now it is, I’m glad to say. Within my field, interdisciplinary collaboration is now vastly more common than it was, thanks to the internet: I have published papers with people I have never met, which could not have happened in 1987.

I’ve also found that Macquarie is now especially good at supporting female scientists. Within my centre – the ARC Centre of Excellence in Cognition and its Disorders – about 50 per cent of the scientists are women, and that is true at every level of seniority up to and including Professor.

What have been the most significant developments in cognitive science over the course of your career?
The most powerful development has been the use of brain imaging to study cognitive processes. I’m a sceptic re whether this is a good thing or not.

What has been your greatest professional accomplishment as a researcher at Macquarie?
No question about this – the establishment of the Macquarie Centre for Cognitive Science (MACCS) in 2000, set up by my obtaining a nine-year grant from the Australian Research Council.

In 2010 the ARC announced a round of its Centres of Excellence scheme. By then I had retired, but participated as a Chief Investigator in our successful application for a much larger centre. The ARC Centre is funded to 2017 and has been shortlisted by the ARC for consideration for funding from 2017 to 2023.

How do you maintain a passion for your research after having worked in your field for so many years?
I dabble. Some of these things didn’t turn out to be so interesting, and so I abandoned them. Others turned out to be fascinating and challenging with many unanswered questions so I stuck with them – I’ve kept working on reading for 40 years and on delusional belief for 20.

With the benefit of hindsight, what is your best advice for someone who is just starting their research career?

• Don’t choose a research question on the sole ground that it is trendy (such topics typically don’t stay trendy).
• Don’t chose a research topic on the sole ground that it is very easy to work on (such topics won’t be any fun to work on).
• Don’t choose a research topic on the sole ground that it will have real-world applications. Penicillin, X-rays, superconductivity are all are crucial for medical applications these days, but none were originally studied for that reason. Curiosity-driven research is what always precedes the discovery of such applications.
• Do try to be wrong. If there’s no way of showing that your theory is wrong, then there’s also no way of showing that it is right.
• Do find a research position where what research you do is up to you. But make sure it isn’t in a place where you will be intellectually isolated.
• Do dabble.

What are your plans for the next five years?
In five years’ time I will be 82. In this period I hope to learn some new and interesting things about what causes delusional beliefs, about what the mental processes are that underlie skilled reading ability, and about how children’s difficulties in learning to read can be more effectively treated.  I also hope to begin doing research in some field that I currently know nothing about.

‘Science Meets Parliament 2016’ Science & Technology Australia President, Emeritus Professor Jim Piper and delegates Dr Lee Spitler from the Department of Physics and Astronomy, and Dr Alfonso Garcia-Bennett from the Department of Chemistry and Biomolecular Sciences met with Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull in his office at Parliament House earlier this month.

The 16th annual Science meets Parliament brought 200 working scientists to Canberra for a two-day program of professional development and networking aimed at helping them better communicate their science to the media, policymakers and parliamentarians.

Last Tuesday March 8 saw the Macquarie staff and student community come together in a wonderful show of support for International Women’s Day. The event saw inspiring speakers joined by student musicians and sport scholars in a vibrant collection of performances.

27 diverse student societies were also present, and more than $1400 was raised to support the work of the UN Women International Committee Australia to end violence against women and girls in the Pacific region.

As of today, visitors to mgsm.edu.au will encounter a brand new website for the Macquarie Graduate School of Management. A key component of the Shared Identity project, the new site aligns MGSM with the University’s new identity while still maintaining a distinct brand look for the leading business school. Other major improvements include responsive mobile-friendly design and a new site structure that better meets audience needs.

[Left] The newly refurbished Department of Linguistics. [Right] Unveiling of the ‘We Are Ubuntu’ artwork by the Head of the Department of Linguistics, Associate Professor Jan-Louis Kruger (pictured right), and Macquarie University Visual Voices Art Group artist, Olegario Gonzalez.

The long awaited refurbishment of The Linguistics Department C5A building has been completed, in the record time of five months, by the company Inaphase. The new interior has proven to be a hit among staff, showcasing crisp modern features in neutral tones, complemented with splashes of turquoise and copper.

To celebrate, the Department of Linguistics held an opening last Friday afternoon in the elegant space, during which they unveiled the newly installed artwork created by members of the Macquarie University Visual Voices Art Group. The group was established in August 2014 by speech pathologist Christine Sheard in the Macquarie University Speech and Hearing Clinic. The group encourages people with some physical paralysis and language communication difficulties (aphasia) following stroke, to use art as a medium to practise friendship, social participation, renewed self-identity and autonomy.

The unveiled piece pictured is called ‘We are Ubuntu’ from three artists from the group, John Giliberti, Olegario Gonzalez, Alasdair MacLennan and their artistic facilitators Viviene Mewing, Romny Vandoros and Karlene Wilcox; who named the piece after the African term ‘ubuntu’ which means “l am what I am because of who we are”. The artwork rejoices in the fact that communication can occur in more ways than just via speech and that its ultimate success resides also in the attitudes and engagement of people in all our social contexts.

Congratulations to the Macquarie University Catering team on receiving the New South Wales Banquet and Catering Award at the Meetings and Events Australia (MEA) industry awards for the second consecutive year.

The Award recognises organisations that provide catering services for business events either as a stand-alone catering business or as a banquet department providing food and beverage services for conferences and events.

This adds to the long list of awards the team have received throughout the years for their outstanding effort.  Learn more about their achievements.

Late last month more than 800 mathematics teachers from across New South Wales, including many from regional and remote areas came to campus to take part in the Higher School Certificate (HSC) Mathematics Review day.

Run by the Mathematic Department in partnership with the Mathematical Association of New South Wales, and with the assistance of the Board of Studies, Teaching and Educational Standards New South Wales, the day included a number of sessions reviewing each of the mathematics papers from the 2015 HSC. It was an opportunity to highlight areas of concern and provide information and insight to help classroom teachers better prepare their students.

Anne discusses how the human brain makes sense of the squiggly lines we call writing, how far the bounds of neuroplasticity really go, and how the brain damage interviewer Ben Mckelvey suffered as a result of a stroke may be similar to the effects of dyslexia on children.

Missed others in our podcast series? Meet Professor Jeanette Kennett, last week’s featured interview, and hear from others in our series.

Despite the fact that one in six Australians have a hearing impairment, hearing health has been largely overlooked by the government in comparison with other health issues that have been addressed with prominent campaigns, for example to help people to quit smoking.

“Most Australians are completely unaware of the hearing damage they may be experiencing in everyday life, let alone the importance of getting their hearing checked regularly,” said David.

David argues a campaign is needed  to combat the idea our hearing is a second-class sense, particularly as hearing impairment results in a wide range of adverse health, social, and financial impacts. He says Australians need to be made aware of the causes of hearing-loss, how to prevent it, and the importance of getting regular hearing checkups. GPs, on the other hand, need to encourage their patients to get hearing tests regularly.

David says the message is more important now than ever in order to stop more Australians from damaging their hearing.

“Hearing loss has a profound impact on the lives, employment, and finances of many Australians. When you add in the costs to relationships, performance at work, and impacts to health, there is an urgent need for more Australians to know about the risks, and have their hearing checked more often.”

Don’t miss an interview with David on Sky News tomorrow night, Tuesday 8 March from around 8.20pm.

More information

• Read more about the World Hearing Day campaign.
• Explore the latest research from the Australian Hearing Hub.
• Learn more about Professor David McAlpine.  Below, listen to more about the important role hearing plays in our communication and social interaction, how we can better protect our ears from harm with ‘noise diets’, and how a young Protestant boy from Belfast discovered his love for all things academic.