Fellows Of The College

PROFESSOR EMERITA VIRGINIA SPATE AC

FELLOW OF THE COLLEGE

Professor Emerita Virginia Spate AC (UWC 1956) was a resident student of University Women’s College from 1956 to 1959. An outstanding scholar in Fine Arts, Virginia became a lecturer in Art History at the Central School of Art, London, and Bath Academy of Art in the late 1960’s. When Virginia returned to Australia, she took the position of Permanent Head of the Department of Fine Arts at the University of Sydney (the first woman to be appointed to that position). Virginia also has a number of publications to her credit and she was a Patron of the College’s Building and Development Program.

PROFESSOR PETER DOHERTY AC

FELLOW OF THE COLLEGE

Professor Peter Doherty AC is a distinguished immunologist, researcher, Nobel Laureate, Companion of the Order of Australia, Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science, Fellow of the Royal Society of London, and has won many prestigious international awards for research in medical science. Peter is the namesake and patron of the Doherty Institute in Melbourne, has been Australian of the Year, and is a Living National Treasure of Australia. We feel that Professor Doherty will challenge and stimulate our students and we are indeed privileged to have him accept our invitation to be a Fellow of the College.

DR ALISON HARCOURT AO

FELLOW OF THE COLLEGE

Dr Alison Harcourt AO (UWC 1947) was recognised as the 2019 Victorian Senior Australian of the Year. As a woman in mathematics and statistics in the 1950s, Alison’s pioneering work on integer linear programming raised little interest. This work is now recognised as contributing to efficient computer processing. Alison’s other research, on the poverty line and randomisation of ballot papers, led to a Royal Commission and electoral law changes. The University of Melbourne recently awarded Alison with the degree of Doctor of Science (honoris causa) – the highest honour that the University can bestow on an individual.

Alison was a student at the College, a Resident Tutor, a Council Member, was made a Governor of the College in 1971 and has been an active member of the Scholarships Committee since 2010.

PROFESSOR JOHN LOVERING AO

FELLOW OF THE COLLEGE

Professor John Lovering AO has served with distinction on Council from 1970 to 1979 and again from 2001 to 2009. John and his wife Kerry, presented the College with the wonderful armillary sphere sundial that welcomes people as they arrive at the entrance to the College. John was appointed as a Governor of the College in 1980.

DR PATRICIA EDGAR AM

FELLOW OF THE COLLEGE

Dr Patricia Edgar AM (UWC 1955) was an undergraduate student of the College, a graduate student as well as Treasurer of the Student Club in 1958, a distinguished member of our Council from 2004 to 2008, and a Governor from 2011. We welcome Patricia not only for this past service, but as someone who continues to enrich the College community in a host of ways.

Patricia is an author, television producer, educator and media scholar and was instrumental in forming children’s television codes for the first time under the Whitlam Government in 1975 when she was appointed to the Australian Broadcasting Control Board. Patricia is best known as the founding director of the Australian Children’s Television Foundation and as Producer of the popular children’s television series Round the Twist.

A cancer survivor, Patricia also chaired the Breast Cancer Network of Australia from 1998 to 2008.

CR ARRON WOOD AM

FELLOW OF THE COLLEGE

Arron Wood (UC 1994) is an Australian environmental activist, consultant and Deputy Lord Mayor of the City of Melbourne. A graduate of the University of Melbourne with a degree in Forest Science, Arron is the youngest appointed Governor and Fellow of University College and founded and runs the highly successful Kids Teaching Kids program to educate students about environmental issues. In 2012, Arron Wood was elected to Melbourne City Council. Cr Wood is Chair of the Finance and Governance portfolio.

Arron received The Centenary Medal for outstanding contribution to conservation, awarded by the Governor-General. As a past winner of the United Nations Individual Award for Outstanding Service to the Environment, Arron was also the 2001 Young Australian of the Year for the environment.

Arron is a board member at South East Water and Chair of the Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute. Previously he chaired the Parks and Gardens Advisory Committee and was a member of the Yarra Park Advisory Committee.  He served a term as board member of Sustainability Victoria and two terms on the board of the Port Phillip and Westernport Catchment Management Authority.

DR DI BRESCIANI OAM

FELLOW OF THE COLLEGE

Dr Di Bresciani OAM (UWC 1960) completed a Music Degree at the University of Melbourne and subsequently obtained a Doctor of Philosophy in Music and Psychology undertaken with a Post Graduate Research Scholarship. In the 1980’s her research achieved international recognition, culminating in an invitation to visit the USSR by Dimitri Kabalevsky.

In 1988, Di and her husband Lino (a Governor of the College) founded the Youth Music Foundation of Australia which is affiliated with leading music and arts institutions in Australia, Italy, the US and the UK. In 2003, Di was selected Woman Achiever of the Year by the Australian Brain Foundation. Di is a life member of the Melba Trust Foundation, a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Music Teachers, a senior adjudicator for the Australian Music Examinations Board, a Governor of University College, an honorary Fellow of the Institute of Music Teachers, a Governor of the Florey and Mental Health Research Institute and a Member of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.

Di was awarded Medal of the Order of Australia in 2013 with the citation ‘for contributions to music, the visual arts and the community’. Di enjoys a distinguished career as a pianist, piano teacher and artist, having held several exhibitions of her work.

PROFESSOR MARILYN MONK

VISITING FELLOW OF THE COLLEGE

Professor Marilyn Monk (UWC 1956 – 1959 and College Tutor) is a research scientist in the fields of molecular biology, early embryonic development, epigenetics and cancer. She is Emerita Professor of Molecular Embryology at University College London and previously Honorary Professor at the University of Melbourne and Adjunct Professor at Monash University.

Her research, beginning in the Bacteriology Department at Melbourne University, was concerned with the mechanisms of DNA replication and repair in micro-organisms. On winning a scholarship for study overseas and a British Passenger Line free passage, she moved to London to complete her PhD after which she returned to postdoctoral research in Melbourne Zoology Department. Then she was awarded an ICIANZ scholarship and continued her post doctoral research at the CNRS in Paris, the University of Leicester, and the University of Edinburgh.

She moved to University College London in 1974 with a change of field to early mammalian development and has remained there to this day. Due to this change of field, a hallmark of Marilyn’s bench research is the ‘micronisation’ of molecular techniques to the sensitivity of a single cell in order to bring molecular biology to the very few cells available in early embryonic development. The ability to detect gene mutation, gene modification and gene transcription in single cells has had far-reaching medical significance. Together with Cathy Holding, Marilyn carried out the pioneering experiments which established the feasibility of pre-implantation genetic diagnosis for couples at risk of having a baby with a serious genetic disease.

Her research has led to several paradigm shifts including the discovery of the late origin of the germ line (thus ending August Weismann’s 1892 doctrine of the continuity of the germ line in mammals), some original work showing that the expression of genes is programmed by modifications superimposed on the gene DNA (epigenetics), molecular mechanisms of Lamarckian inheritance, and the phenomenon of deprogramming by global erasure of methylation modifications inherited from the sperm and egg in early development. Deprogramming returns the embryonic cells to the tabula rasa (totipotent stem cell) state, capable of producing all the different cell types of the new individual.  Marilyn hypothesised that deprogramming may also be an initiating event in tumour formation and, subsequently, the development of cancer and has isolated a number of embryo-specific expressed genes also expressed in cancer towards the development of a new type of cancer vaccine.

PROFESSOR SHEILA FITZPATRICK

VISITING FELLOW OF THE COLLEGE

Professor Sheila Fitzpatrick (UWC 1958) is primarily a historian of modern Russia, especially the Stalin period, but has recently added a transnational dimension with her research on displaced persons (DPs) after the Second World War. Sheila received a Mellon Foundation Distinguished Achievement Award in 2002 and the American Historical Association’s Award for Scholarly Distinction in 2012. Sheila is past President of the Association for Slavic, East European and Eurasian Studies (formerly AAASS) and a member of the Australian Academy of the Humanities and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Having worked for most of her career in the United States, she moved back to Australia in 2012. Sheila is currently Honorary Professor at the University of Sydney, as well as Bernadotte E. Schmitt Distinguished Service Professor Emerita of the University of Chicago, and heads an ARC-funded team working on Russian migration to Australia via China after the Second World War.

Sheila’s books, which have been translated into many languages, among others, include:
– The Russian Revolution (1982, 4^th edition 2017)
– Stalin’s Peasants: Resistance and Survival in the Russian Village after Collectivization (1996)
– Everyday Stalinism (2000)
– My Father’s Daughter. Memories of an Australian Childhood (2010 – winner of AHA’s Magarey Medal for Biography 2012)
– A Spy in the Archives (2013)
– On Stalin’s Team. The Years of Living Dangerously in Soviet Politics (2015 – winner of Prime Minister’s Award for Non-Fiction 2016)
– Mischka’s War: A European Odyssey of the 1940s (2017 – short-listed for the Prime Minister’s Award for Non-Fiction 2018)

ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR DAWN GLEESON

TEACHING FELLOW OF THE COLLEGE

The students at University College hold Associate Professor Gleeson in high regard as a caring academic committed to helping them make a smooth transition to University. Her enhancement of the first year learning experience, particularly in Biology and Biomedicine, aligns entirely with the aims of the College.

DR ROS TERRY

FELLOW OF THE COLLEGE

Dr Ros Terry (UWC 1958) graduated with a Bachelor of Science (Hons) in 1961 and Bachelor of Medicine/Bachelor of Surgery in 1973. During her four years at University Women’s College, Ros became Treasurer of the Student Club in 1961, was awarded the Georgina Sweet Scholarship in 1960/61 and won the Ramsay Prize in Microbiology and Epidemiology in 1971. Ros was a member of the College Council from 1998 to 2003 and was made Governor of the College in 1990. During her career in Medicine, Ros spent many years abroad including time in Chicago, USA and Papua New Guinea as well as locally in Tasmania for two years on hydatid research and in the Emergency Department at the Alfred Hospital. Ros was the first female surgical registrar appointed at St Vincent’s Hospital, Sydney. Most recently, Ros was appointed as a Board Member to AMA Victoria.

DR LYNNE BROUGHTON

VISITING FELLOW OF THE COLLEGE

Dr Lynne Broughton (UWC 1964) was a University Women’s College resident from 1964 to 1967. Lynne has maintained an active contribution to the College by becoming a regular donor and honouring us whenever in Melbourne by presenting fascinating seminars, exhibitions and discussions on different aspects of her field of study. These have proved to be enjoyable for the College community and particularly stimulating for our students.

KRAM

VISITING FELLOW OF THE COLLEGE

Kram (UC 1988 – Mr Mark Maher) is the drummer/singer of Australian ARIA award winning band Spiderbait, who have toured globally and sold over 1 million records to date.

Kram has appeared at the 2004 benefit concert for the South-East Asian tsunami, Wave Aid, as a member of super-group The Wrights who performed Stevie Wright’s 3 part classic, “Evie”. Kram also plays in the RecLink Community Cup, a much adored charity football match series that pits musicians against community radio hosts annually, as a member of the Rockdogs.

His debut solo album Mix Tape was released on 13 March 2009. He has also made guest appearances on the television shows “The Project”, “Talkin’ ‘Bout Your Generation” and “Good News Week” on Network Ten as well as “Spicks & Specks” on the ABC.