LEARNING ON BALANCE

PRESIDENT AND VICE-CHANCELLOR COLIN STIRLING HAS MOVED FLINDERS UNIVERSITY ON TO A STREAMLINED, RESPONSIVE TRAJECTORY FOR THE 21ST CENTURY.

- STEPHEN CROWE

Whether it was the view outside his window in Manchester or the Perth weather forecast is not really that important, as these things go, but they certainly were an influence, as Colin tells it. He was, he says, in a reflective mood when he was made an offer too good to refuse, so he packed up his family to pursue a career on the other side of the world. It was, in retrospect, the right move, he confirms.

“I got a call one day asking if I was interested in the idea of a job in Perth, and I have to confess that part of the motivation was looking out my window at the Manchester weather and then the weather charts in Perth, and I have to say there was a certain attractiveness to the Australian climate. But, in fairness, the other incentive was I’d got involved in the leadership at Manchester Uni as vice-president, but still doing my regular professor’s job,” he recalls. “I was doing them both and I realised that I ought to make a decision and do one or the other as well as I possibly could. An option came up at Curtin University just as I was thinking those thoughts, and it looked like a really interesting opportunity, so I couldn’t resist.”

Colin and his young family made the move to Perth, where he took on the role of Deputy ViceChancellor Academic at Curtin University in 2011. Then in 2015, they moved again to South Australia when Colin accepted the role of President and Vice-Chancellor of Flinders University in Adelaide.