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Professor Albury retires after distinguished career

October 29, 2004

Randall Albury.jpgProfessor Randall Albury is retiring as the University of New England’s Pro Vice-Chancellor (Academic) after six years at UNE and more than 30 years in Australian higher education.

Professor Albury, who came to UNE at the beginning of November 1998 to serve as Dean of the Faculty of Arts, moved into the Pro Vice-Chancellor role in January 2002. Reflecting on his retirement at the end of October, he said he had “really valued the opportunity to make a contribution to UNE” in both these roles.

He came to UNE from the University of New South Wales where he had spent 25 years: 12 of them as Professor of the History and Philosophy of Science, and the last four as Associate Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences.

“By the end of 1998 I was looking for a change from the urban congestion of Sydney and for some new, higher-level responsibilities,” he explained. “When the position of Dean of the Faculty of Arts was offered at UNE, it was a natural choice for me to accept.” He found a Faculty struggling with a financial deficit, and the task of creating a sense of collegial identity in the Faculty’s six Schools that had recently been formed from 17 independent Departments. “By the time I left we had addressed these issues and embarked on a number of new academic initiatives, while also making some inroads into the problem of disciplines with unviably small enrolments,” he said. “So I hope that, overall, I assisted in strengthening the Faculty.”

He said the biggest single challenge he had faced during his years as Pro Vice-Chancellor had been his management of the process for UNE’s audit by the Australian Universities Quality Agency (AUQA). This is continuing right up to the day he retires. “UNE has been invited to contribute to AUQA’s Good Practice Database, and the deadline for our submission is 1 November,” he said. “So dispatching that document will be my final act as PVC.”

Professor Albury, who is retiring for family reasons, hopes to find some time for his academic interests. He was invited to deliver the keynote address for a history of medicine symposium at this year’s conference of the Australian Historical Association, and he has continued his involvement in professional societies for the history of science and the history of medicine. “I had hoped to be able to publish at least one refereed article a year while I was at UNE,” he said, “and I came pretty close to that target. So with any luck I can stay active in research.”

He will become an Adjunct Professor in two UNE Schools when he retires: the School of Classics, History and Religion, and the School of English, Communication and Theatre. In addition, he has just been awarded the title of Emeritus Professor by the University of New South Wales, in recognition of his previous service at that institution. “I expect to be staying in Armidale for the foreseeable future,” he said, “so my primary affiliation will be with UNE, but it will be good to have a formal link with UNSW when I visit Sydney.”

Posted by Jim Scanlan at October 29, 2004 01:28 PM