In Principio v17 no3 (2006)

& Celebrating the Blessing and Opening of the Fremantle Hotel building Sister Anna Fewer, Sister Angela Basile, Sister Clare Sciesinski, Sister Alexandra Smolinski, Sr Mary Kiely, Sister Leonie O'Brien rsm. The formal recognition which we have received from all these are competitive, and that we are positioned, as far as possible, to attract National and State accrediting bodies is very important to the the best quality students into our courses. The latter does not refer simply standing and quality of our courses. to tertiary entrance ranking and the like. It is a much broader concept. • We have entered into major agreements with a wide range of professional training bodies and other universities relating to our courses and the qualifications we will offer our students. For example, in Sydney, St Vincent's and the Mater Hospital, one of the best in Australia, has entered into formal agreements with us in relation to the training of nurses and doctors. The St John of God Health Care System has extended its partnership relationship with us in Western Australia to its country hospitals in Victoria. The University of Technology Sydney has entered into a forma l arrangement with us for the biomedical science training of our medical students, comparable to that to the agreement which we already have with Curtin University in Western Australia. We have entered into a partnership with The University of Western Australia, which covers the clinical training of medical students in Western Australia. • Another significant advance for the University in 2006 was the decision by the Minister for Education, Science and Training, the Hon Julie Bishop, to allocate 210 Commencing Commonwealth Support Places in our courses in Teaching, Nursing, and Medicine on the Fremantle and Sydney campuses. This is a major contribution by Commonwealth to the viability and development of Notre Dame in both Western and eastern Australia. We are very grateful that the Commonwealth has seen fit to make such a substantial investment in us. Challenges for 2007 and beyond The challenges for 2007 and beyond are substantial. All universities, of course, face these sorts of problems. We are no exception. However, the rate of development of Notre Dame, and the particular pressures associated with developing a new campus so far from the established ones in Fremantle and Broome, give added sharpness to the questions we must answer in order to progress. The prime challenge we face, of course, in an extremely competitive higher education market, is to maintain and, indeed, improve our quality and our attractiveness to prospective students. We must ensure that we We want to continue to attract to Notre Dame students, who are academically able, highly motivated, committed to making a major contribution for the good in the world into which they will graduate - sympathetic to, and supportive of, the Objects of Notre Dame as a Catholic university. This is a challenge! We also have subst antial financial challenges facing us. The most significant of these is to undertake the capital development of the University, especially in Sydney, which is so necessary for us to be able to grow and achieve a critical mass in both quality and overall student numbers. Raising the money for the acquisition of land and buildings is our number one financial challenge. We are hoping to meet this partly by attracting major benefactors to the University, people who will identify with our Objects, and get behind us financia lly, so that we can expand and build ourselves as a unique high quality Australian Catholic university. Especially important in this regard will be the community in Sydney. As the only significant provider of higher education in the vast Kimberley region we have the challenge of developing our Broome Campus to a further stage. We want to make it a centre for Indigenous research, a place that serves the burgeoning population of the Kimberley Region, and brings Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people together in a spirit of reconciliation. On behalf of the University's Board, I would like to offer my heartfelt thanks to our many supporters and benefactors this year, who have made it a memorable period for us. I would also like to thank especially our staff, who are such selfless and deeply committed contributors to the idea of Notre Dame and its mission in Australia. I am very aware of how fortunate we are to have such remarkable team. I wish all of our subscribers a very happy Christmas.