Top 400, looking for new colleagues and Open Day

The latest Shanghai Jiao Tong world ranking of universities was released in the last week.

Excellent news for JCU: our standing improved from 400-500 to 300-400. That is we have been independently assessed to be among the top 400 universities in the world based on research excellence.

That we are there at all is testimony to outstanding work by many over many years – with improving research results in more recent years. Only 15 of Australia’s universities are included in the list, and only two in Queensland. The results are not calculated proportional to the size of the institution, so this outcome is even more impressive given our outputs are being compared with those of much bigger universities, many of which we have outperformed on the measures used by this prestigious league table. My thanks to our current community for the excellent and impactful work that is reflected in the ranking, and also to colleagues from earlier years who played their important role in their time.

The University also had some good news with improvements in the Good Universities Guide (GUG) in a number of areas. While there is still room (and plans) for improvement, it seems that, on average, these data too are moving in the right direction.

You may have seen the advertisement for our 17 new professorial positions in The Australian on 6 August. It was a fresh approach to our advertising, with high impact intent. We have received very good feedback on the ad and it seems that it has certainly attracted attention (including commentary by Stephen Matchett of the The Australian Higher Education Supplement). The ad was designed to elicit strong interest in the available positions – and an understanding in the higher education world that we are serious about pursuing our intent to deliver “A brighter future for life in the tropics, worldwide”. More information on this significant recruitment activity is available at www.jcu.edu.au/tropicalleaders .

Open Day at Cairns campus was a great success yesterday. Estimates vary, but I understand that around 3000 people attended. All faculties reported busy stalls, with prospective students and parents lined up at times. There was a lot of interest in the new Dentistry program. It was terrific to see so many staff on hand to welcome visitors and prospective students – the day had a really good feel about it.

The liveliness of the day was enhanced by the high energy presence of students competing in OPTI-MINDS, a competition for teams of school students. Around 67 teams from 33 schools, from Weipa to Innisfail, had worked very hard for several weeks, preparing their approaches and presentations for the challenge. Congratulations to all division winners who now head to Brisbane for the State finals in October.

Next Sunday (24 August) is Open Day on the Douglas campus at Townsville. I look forward to seeing many colleagues and visitors there on the day. I'm sure it will be a good one too.

Cheers,
Sandra