Obiter dicta by Professor Gavin Brown AO

Larrikin dreamer

18 July 1996

It has always seemed to me that vice-chancellors are in danger of taking themselves too seriously. We run large business enterprises and are often encouraged to pronounce on important educational issues. We learn to speak in measured tomes and with great caution.

Universities, however, are here to explore new ideas, to nudge society along and to challenge the conventions of fashionable thought. I subscribe to the thesis that the CEO of such an organisation should budget a little time for dreaming on the sidelines - master and fool combined - and allow for some whimsy, some speculation and especially some fun.

Such fine sentiments should lead to amusing and informative columns but after two weeks in a Sydney which welcomed me with a heavy dose of flu’, it seems foolhardy to put the theory to the test. It is at times like these that I envy those rare people who enjoy moving house, revelling in impromptu camping in a strange habitat, and savouring a version of the slow motion Christmas in which one progressively recreates personal life from a random ensemble of cardboard packing cases.

“How do you find the University of Sydney?”, “What is your analysis of the external funding situation?” and “What do you intend to do?” are the typical questions. I am happy to offer some thoughts on the first, believe it is fundamentally unsound to dwell on the second and will no doubt continue to drop hints concerning the third!

I am very encouraged by the obvious willingness and enthusiasm of all kinds of staff to play a creative role in the next phase of the University’s development, and there are many supporters in the wider community who have already shown me a similar depth of commitment. We should not underestimate the existing high achievements - indeed we must do more to make them known - and yet we need to plan effectively and quickly to reposition what is already a changed institution. Sydney is one of a small number of Australian universities with the capacity, and obligation, to undertake research and teaching of international standard across a full range of disciplines. We rely upon the government to provide a regulatory environment in which such goals are possible - but as dear Brutus was once reminded, the challenge of attainment is very much in our own hands.

With that in mind we should not allow our thoughts to become dominated by speculation over funding cuts and squeezes. Of course, we must operate conservatively in advance of the August Budget. Even so we are already exploring how to ensure that innovation and progress will be essential features of our future planning and we are continuing to make selected forward commitments founded on the belief that the Prime Minister, in turn, will honour his commitments to us.

Coming back after several years to Sydney the city, a crow transmuted to a swan, I have rediscovered its feeling of vibrancy - and cheek! The University of Sydney should surely reflect the spirit of its city. While eschewing our highest academic aspirations and setting in train management improvements to lift our performance, let’s be careful to leave some room for a larrikin streak.