A vision for higher education delivered in the regions for the regions

It was the 1920s. A period in Australia’s history when only the wealthy or highly gifted could dream of a university education delivered from the sandstone towers of capital city universities. The newly elected member for the Northern Tablelands, David Drummond, had an alternative vision. A vision for higher education delivered in the regions for the regions. It was a vision ridiculed by the powers that be, with NSW Parliament sceptical of Drummond's plans to establish 'another Cambridge or Oxford on a sheep station’.

Ignoring the prevailing view, Drummond and the community of northern NSW, with the support of local grazier Thomas Forster, began raising money for ‘a University College for all Australia’. By March 1937 the fund-raising campaign had met only half the target of £10,000 required to found a university, all of which was required by the December of the same year. However, through the determined support of New England citizens who shared Drummond's vision, the £10,000 target was reached by the final day of the appeal.

With the money raised, the forerunner of the University, the New England University College, came into existence on New Year's Day, 1938. UNE gained independent university status in 1954 with Dr Robert Madgwick as Vice Chancellor, fulfilling the long-term dream of the community for a university that would ‘provide educational and research support for rural people both locally and nationally’ and Madgwick’s vision of ensuring that ‘all who were capable of it would have access to higher education’.

Out of the shared vision of Drummond, Forster and Madgwick came perhaps one of the greatest innovations in higher education of the time – the delivery of quality distance education for which we remain nationally and internationally renowned.

Today, the spirit, resilience and tenacity of our founders and the local community that supported them and a commitment to opportunity for all Australians through innovative and flexible delivery remain core to our DNA. They are what founded us and what will shape our future.