St Paul's College Boomalakka News - March 2023

Boomalakka

St Paul’s College - March 2023

From the Warden

The 2023 year has begun exceptionally well at St Paul’s. This is our first co-residential undergraduate cohort and both our freshers and returning students have embraced the change with vigour. We also welcomed a large contingent of graduate students such that the College is completely full for the first time since the building of the Ivan Head and McMillan Buildings. St Paul’s now has over 420 undergraduates, graduates and academic members living in our College. Welcome Week was a wonderful time of orientation to College and University with plenty of fun and socialising both at St Paul’s and the intercol community. I am very grateful for the efforts of our staff and student leaders in making the beginning of the year such a wonderful success. It was also a great delight for St Paul’s to welcome the Chancellor of the University to dinner and a drink in the Salisbury in celebration of International Women’s Day.

Over the summer break numerous improvements were made to the facilities including renovating bathrooms and refurbishing the Salisbury Bar. The Salisbury has expanded operations to being open every weekday as a coffee shop from 7am-3pm and Monday – Thursday as a bar 7:30pm10:30/11:30pm. This activation of the space has made a significant impact on College life. We have also commenced building works on our new purpose built performance space (The Waddy Centre), gym expansion and music centre. These facilities depend on the generosity of our community and if you are able to contribute please do so via our website.

I hope you find this edition of our e-news a helpful compendium of the many things that have been taking place at St Paul’s lately.

Ed Loane

Belinda Hutchinson AC, Chancellor of the University with Ed Loane, Warden in the newly refurbished Salisbury Bar after the College’s International Women’s Day Dinner.

Boomalakka — March 2023

It is not surprising that the enthusiasm for celebrating gender equality and embracing diversity has been so strong at the College since the first women enrolled in Graduate House in 2018 and the first women undergrads began only weeks ago. On the eve of IWD the undergraduate community gathered for its IWD Dinner with guest of honour, Belinda Hutchinson AC, Chancellor of the University. During the dinner we had a solo instrumental performance by Isabella Taylor on violin. What a great occasion to have the first-ever solo in the Dining Hall by a female undergraduate Pauline.

Election of Fellows to the College Council 2023

International Women’s Day at Paul’s – 8 March 2023

Congratulations to Rev’d Dr Max Wood and Rev’d James Collins OAM who have been declared by the Returning Officer as Clerical Fellows for six year terms on Council. Both Max and James have served for 8 years as Clerical Fellows and the College community is delighted they will continue to serve.

There is an election for two Lay Fellows as circulated by email to those eligible to vote in this election. Eligible Voters have received an email with candidate details, instructions, and a one-time voting link. The election closes on 24 March.

Academic Seminars

During Semester both Graduate House and Undergraduate communities have the opportunity to experience interesting guest speakers on a Monday night. Graduate House kicked off Sem 1 with two of their own Richard Henchman and Bec Osborne talking about their current research. In Week 3 Dr Kenneth Ooi presented a seminar on his work as an ophthalmologist and cataract surgeon at the Sydney Eye Clinic and a Clinical Senior Lecturer at the Sydney Eye Hospital and UNSW.

Fr James Collins OAM Revd Dr Max Wood

GH Senior Resident Member Jethro Mahon, Dr Ooi, Dean Dr Antone Martinho-Truswell and GH old Pauline Dr Charles Walker (now at RNS)

Intercol Palladian Solo Instrumental

On 7 March Chris Lennox and Isabella Taylor represented St Paul’s in the Solo Instrumental competition, the first one in the Intercol Palladian for 2023. For the first time the College entered a female musician! Isabella, violin, and Chris, clarinet, performed admirably in a tough round held at the Holme Building of the USU. The next competition is on 21 March with Solo Vocal.

Anyone interested in the music of the College will find a growing collection of videos on the website and every Tuesday at 5.15 pm you are welcome to join us for Evensong to hear the College’s fabulous choir and organ.

Please see the list of events coming up at the end of this e-News.

Graduate HouseThe Best Place for Good Medicine

by Katie Allan, Senior Tutor

The 2023 Academic Year began early for our newest medical students. Long before Welcome Week, our newest aspiring doctors began their first semester of medical studies on 30 January. Organised by our Assistant Senior Tutor for Medicine, Meheer Zaveri, and with presentations by 2nd year medics Arnav Shetty and Catherine Trueman, we held a Welcome Evening the night before their first day on the McMillan Building rooftop. Over a casual pizza & drinks, Cat and Arnav, as well as many other of our medical students, gave some helpful tips and tricks for beginning medical school and explained the tutorial and clinical skills programme in Graduate House. It was a friendly and informative afternoon with an excellent group of young people. We look forward to seeing them develop into the knowledgeable and caring doctors we know they will be!

We are lucky to have tutorials for all medical subjects, and many clinical skills, in Years 1 and 2 of the Sydney Medical programme with 10 of our senior medics involved in tutoring our newer students. Our Assistant Senior Tutor and 4th year medical student, Meheer Zaveri, runs the programme in conjunction with the Senior Tutor and our subject tutors. All the best to all our medical students for a great 2023!

Chris Lennox and Isabella Taylor at the Holme Building for the Intercol Palladian Solo Instrumental competition

Academic Success After Academic Success

by Katie Allan, Senior Tutor

Academic Life – A great end to 2022 and a fantastic start to 2023!

Last year’s academic results are in and our Paulines can be proud of their fantastic achievements. Over one third of the College received a HD or D average in 2022, with a strong showing by last years Fresher cohort!

Once again, of our top 10 undergraduate academic performers were Freshers: Mr Ed Taylor (Bachelor of Engineering Honours and Bachelor of Arts), Mr Luka Mattani (Bachelor of Veterinary Biology and Doctor of Veterinary Medicine), Mr Josh Taleb (Bachelor of Engineering Honours (Mechatronic Engineering) and Bachelor of Science), Mr Tylor Wessels (Bachelor of Engineering Honours (Aeronautical Engineering) and Bachelor of Commerce), and Mr Alessandro Petagna (Bachelor of Economics/Bachelor of Advanced Studies). All these men received a high distinction average and have made a truly impressive start to their university careers. Our annual average mark across the College was 70.4%.

Another area in which Paulines excelled is in our tutorial programme. In 2022, over 1100 tutorials were held across the undergraduate and graduate communities—the largest tutorial offering in the College’s history. At the heart of our tutorial programme is peer learning and students encouraging each other. We had 60 young people teaching in our programme last year, including 15 members of Graduate

House, 40 members of our undergraduate community, as well as recent alumni and friends of the College. Our students have reported that, ‘coming straight out of high school, [tutorials] really helped us understand …what was required of us to succeed in university.’ Our tutors have, students reported, shown passion and ‘consistently demonstrate a willingness to help.’ A big thank you to all our tutors at Paul’s for being so, in the words of our students, ‘proactive, compassionate, empathic, and diligent’ and ‘embodying what it means to be a Pauline.’

Academic Life is also off to a fantastic start for 2023. Our incoming freshers are studying a wonderfully diverse range of degrees. We have students studying vet science, computing, teaching, architecture, music, nursing, psychology, pharmacy, commerce as well as a significant number of students, the most in recent years, choosing to take traditional liberal university studies in the Arts and Sciences. On Friday of Welcome Week, after a fun-filled few days, a studious air descended over the Quad and Library as freshers met with seniors in their degree groups to plan their studies for the semester ahead and get to know other students in their cohort. Our tutorial programme is also now in full-swing with over 90 subject tutorials offered across our undergraduate and graduate communities.

The academic life of St Paul’s is looking exciting this year and we are looking forward to seeing our students aim high, do their best, and look after each other. Here to a great 2023!

Open-air tutorial for summer

The Library is more popular than ever!

The Salisbury Refurbished

Over the summer break a big project for the College was a renovation of a tired old Sals. The need to bring the bar up to modern compliance standards necessitated a complete refit of the Salisbury and now the College boasts a 7am–3pm café and 7:30pm–10:30pm bar during the week.

The refurbishment features a styled bar area with refined cabinetry and new benchtops but retains the unique sandstone finish of the walls of the original boiler rooms (the bar area) and the 1860s staff parlour (the café). Outside a new bar and patrons’ area is protected by a modern sail cloth roof juxtaposing the grand heritage walls of the Blacket exterior. The paving throughout has been up-graded and fixed and all aspects of this licenced space now meet all compliances standards. It means the Salisbury can continue to trade as a public bar, and is open as a venue for students most days and nights of the week, including the popular Wednesday nights.

The College caterers, Trippas White Group, have been awarded the liquor licence and TWG train and hire the bar and café staff from the ranks of current students at Paul’s.

So far the café space, which is air conditioned, has been very popular for those residents escaping the heat of some of the upper floors of Paul’s on recent hot days. Students, staff and all our visitors really love the refurbishment as the daytime café provides a restful area for study, socialising and meetings. The Salisbury has always been popular and now has become a favourite because of it subsidised pricing and good coffee. ,

March 2023

Sports Digest

From the Dean of Undergraduates, Harry Croker

The 2023 Rawson Cup campaign is underway at 9 City Road. The College cricketers were hard at work for a number of weeks leading into the opening Rawson tournament. The first opponent; Wesley, Monday 27th Feb. Played on a beautiful sunny day at the College Oval, Wes won the toss and elected to bat. All out for 83. Paul’s went on to win the match 4/84, aided by an outstanding batting display from second year, Jack Matthews. (Matthews 53, Lynch 14, Stuart* 4, Munro* 4, Bowman 0, Donaldson 0).

Round 2 vs St John’s, Thursday 2nd March. Overcast and drizzly. The good guys won the toss, and elected to bat. Again, the College Oval was the venue, but the conditions not as desirable. Nevertheless, a second victory was notched in the cricket campaign, with a poor battler’s rear windshield the only other casualty of the day besides the SJC XI. St Paul’s 7/318 (Bowman 73, Craig* 63, Donaldson 61, Stuart 30, Matthews 17, O’Connor 13, Lynch 10, Bennett* 9, Munro 3). St John’s all out for 180 (Collins 66, Smith 53, Colgan 10, Kelly 8, Fogarty 7, Madigan 7, Southon 6, Lane 5, Woolnough 5, Rizzo* 4, Dunlop 1).

Round 3 vs our old foes. Wednesday 8th March; warm and sunny; the hallowed turf, No. 1 Oval. Despite a large fan base, the men in the gold and gules were unable to get the chocolates against a strong St Andrew’s outfit, who won the toss and elected to bat. St Andrew’s 8/236 (Snyman* 62, McNamara 37, Fredriksson 36, Lynch 27, Hayman*

19, Jones 13, Walker 8, Wines 6, Wright-Smith 5, Hope 1, Hartnell* 0). St Paul’s all out for 124 (Bowman 29, Hodge* 28, Stuart 16, Munro 16, Bennett 6, Donaldson 4, Craig 3, O’Connor 2, Matthews 0, Lynch 0, Brownie 0). A valiant effort no doubt, and as always, our men were gracious in defeat.

Currently the College is placed second overall in Rawson Cup standings on three points, with Drew’s in first place on five points, Wesley third place on one, and John’s fourth on zero.

Our next chance for a victory comes in Week 6 at the swimming.

History has been made this month as the College’s maiden Rosebowl campaign got underway on Monday 13th March against St Andrew’s at Bryden’s Show Court (SUSAC). Our young women have been training very hard for this outing, and they could not have more support from everyone at the College. We know they will do us proud.

The College calendar is ripe with events again this year. The social calendar began with the very popular Wine Cellar Lunch in week 2. Surreal Sounds is the first ‘dance’ of the year and attracts 1500 students from across the college community of the University. SClub is managing these ticketed and all the usual sporting events.

Le Labyrinthe | Tickets | trybooking.com/CGDHL

Date | Friday 31 March 7.30pm @ St Paul’s College Chapel Venture into the labyrinth and discover your own path to enlightenment this Easter.

Join Anna Fraser (soprano), Thomas Wilson (organ) and the women of St Paul’s College Chapel Choir (Jack Stephens, Director of Music) on a sumptuous and spiritual journey, guided by College Chaplain, Rev Antony Weiss, showcasing this beautiful and rarely heard French Baroque vocal work. Michel-Richard de Lalande’s ‘Leçons de Ténèbres’ and Miserere (1730) is beautiful, decorative, introvert sacred

Tarsus Chamber Collective | Just Another Story | Tickets | free, register at events.humanitix.com/just-anotherstory

Date | Sunday 2 April 3pm @ Graduate House Refectory

The Prokofiev quintet was the inspiration that led to creating Tarsus. The Prokofiev quintet was created for a traveling circus troupe of five musicians - this rare instrumentation created a unique dynamic for creativity and compositional possibilities.

Tarsus are very excited and proud to announce our first commissioned work called “Just Another Story” by Olga Hans. Olga is a successful Polish composer who took

Coronation Celebration

Date | Saturday 6 May 5-10pm | More information to be provided soon!

All welcome to St Paul’s College for a celebration of the Coronation of King Charles III. The Chapel Choir will present a concert of favourite Coronation Anthems with an organ, brass and percussion ensemble. After this, attendees will be invited into the Dining Hall for a ‘Royal Formal Dinner’, featuring entertainment from some of your favourite numbers of Victoriana! To conclude the night, chairs and picnic rugs will be present in the Quadrangle for a livestream of

music of great style and grace and will be performed on the College Chapel’s two-manual Flentrop pipe organ.

inspiration in writing this piece for us after hearing members of Tarsus perform the Prokofiev Quintet back in 2020.

the Coronation via an outdoor cinema. The Wine Cellar will be available throughout the evening.

Events Coming up for Alumni and Community

Evensong with the College Choir, organ and more, in the Chapel - every Tuesday at 5.15 pm

RC/RB Swimming - 28 Mar

Choir Concert “Le Labyrinthe” - 31 Mar 7.30pm College Chapel [see details on p. 7 to book tickets]

Tarsus Chamber Collective Recital - 2 April 3pm Graduate House Refectory [see p. 7 to book tickets]

Holy Week and Easter Services - from 3 Apr to Easter Morning

St Paul’s College Union AGM - 18 April 7.30pm in the JCR - all members welcome

Mummers play - 21 Apr, 22 Apr and 23 Apr

Anzac Commemoration Service and refreshments - 25 Apr

RC Rugby - 26 Apr, 3 May and 17 May (final at USyd No. 2 Oval)

Fathers’ Dinner - 28 Apr & 29 Apr

Coronation Concert, Dinner and big screen - 6 May 5- 10 pm [see above for save-the-date]

RB Hockey - 8 May, 10 May, 12 May, 16 May and 19 May

Graduate House Impressario’s Players production of The 39 Steps - 19 & 20 May

RC/RB Rowing - 23 May

College and USyd Open Day - 27 May

The “3s” Fresher Years Reunions weekend of Fri 14, Sat 15 & Sun 16 July - 1963s have booked lunch on Sat 15th, 1940s, 50s and other 60s have booked lunch for Sun 16 July. Where are you 1973?, 1983? 1993? 2013?

Boomalakka e-News is the official news bulletin of the College (including the Union) published about every month and emailed to all our alumni, residents, parents, supporters and friends to keep you informed about the achievements of current and older Paulines and events at the College that are for everyone to enjoy.

If you have news and pictures you think will be of interest please contact me. Thank you for your support for and interest in St Paul’s.

Richard “Rex” Morgan (1978) - Editor t. 02 9550 7472 | e. community@stpauls.edu.au

Please see the College website for more stories and current news items: www.stpauls.edu.au