Principal

Scholars’ Assembly Guest - Prof Andrew Campbell

Next Monday 10 February we celebrate our annual Scholars’ Assembly, at which we will appropriately acknowledge and congratulate our 2024 Year 12s as well as students from across the Senior School for their academic successes in 2024. Academic endeavour and application are at the heart of our College, and Monday’s important assembly is a reminder of their place and centrality to how we do things here. 

I am also looking forward to hearing from our guest speaker, Professor Andrew Campbell. Andrew was College Captain in 1977 and has since had a distinguished career at the juncture of science, agriculture and sustainability.

In August 2023, he retired from the position of Chief Executive of the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR), having been appointed by the Minister for Foreign Affairs in 2016. Among influential roles in sustainable agriculture and research management in Australia for over thirty years, Andrew was Australia's first National Landcare Facilitator, and was CEO of Land & Water Australia for seven years from 2000.  He is Patron of Landcare in Victoria, succeeding the late Joan Kirner in 2015.

Professor Campbell is an elected Fellow of the Australian Academy for Technology and Engineering, a Professorial Fellow at the ANU Fenner School, and a Fellow of the Australian Institute for Company Directors. He is a non-executive Director on the Board of AgriFutures Australia. He has written widely on landcare, sustainability and the science-policy interface, and is still involved in the running of his family farm in South West Victoria, where his family has been farming since the 1860s.

We are fortunate to have Andrew joining us, and I very much look forward to hearing his thoughts and to congratulating our academic high-achievers on Monday.