Monthly Luncheon

"O.K. I hope we're not too long, because I've got things to do too, Darren, but we've got to see how we can help you to keep up with your work." This was a deliberately gentle start from the teacher who was a bundle of contradictory emotions as he tackled this interview, standing at the blackboard and trying to look relaxed and to sound pastoral. His heart was pumping with a strange mixture of surprise, fear and compassion. Surprise, because Darren had actually remained; fear, because he had seen Darren explode before compassion, because he was aware of some of the problems that Darren brought in to the school with him. "I've gotta get home ... and you're not allowed to keep me." “I’ll keep you as long as we need. Just settle down and finish your work and then we can talk about what happens next. You know I’ve talked to your mum and you know she wants to you have some success at school. Just sit down and finish copying that map and then you can go. It’ll only take a couple of minutes if you get stuck into it.” “I’m not doing that now. I’ve gotta meet me friends and they’re waiting for me.” The teacher had faced lots of these typical moves from wayward students who could not countenance staying back, particularly on a Friday afternoon. He persevered, aware that his body was becoming more tense by the moment and that his voice was becoming softer in inverse proportion to his anger. Again, with a crestfallen look on his face and a “more in sorrow than anger voice” the teacher asked, “Just finish off the map and then you can go.” If only he could understand what was going on in that youngster, whose eyes were narrowing, whose normally pasty colouring was rapidly turning a bright shade of red and whose pursed lips looked ready to snap open and bite. Again, the soft response. Somehow this seemed to aggravate the situation and Darren turned to his desk, snatched up his folders – he never brought a bag to school – and looked as if he was going to flee.

“Darren, getting angry’s not going to help. If you go now, you won’t be allowed back next week and then your mother will be upset. Let’s work out why you’re messing round so much and ruining your chances.” “It’s none of your business. I’ll do what I like and you’re not going to stop me.” There was a long pause while the combatants glared at one another, both victims and yet both strangely powerful. In the teacher's mind, the last few months flashed by in a minisecond. Darren was one of the most frightened and angry students he had ever encountered, with a desperate need to keep adults at a distance and to play up to his peer group. Earlier in the year the school had arranged for him to attend a special small school where some gifted staff had built a relationship with him and helped him gain some self-respect on the way back to normality. The teacher had visited the home, had a profitable discussion with Darren's mother and older brother and his return last month had been accompanied by some real hope for a better term than last year. Now this ... and a sinking feeling of deja vu and another failure. Who was winning? By now, they had been in the classroom for ten minutes, so the teacher had succeeded in keeping Darren against his will. What sort of success was that? Darren was still frustrated and he had still not finished the assigned task - filling in a few cities on a map of India. Once more the request was made, quietly and persistently. "Come on, Darren, just finish off that map and then you'll be free to go." What happened next remained embedded in the teacher's memory for life. He often wondered whether he had provoked the outburst by the very deliberately quiet manner in which he had addressed his combatant. With a sudden lunge, Darren leapt to the blackboard and slammed his clenched fist against it with all the accumulated anger he had been nursing. The sound echoed around the silent corridors along which he strode towards freedom from the oppression of the afternoon.

A winner?

The names in the story have been changed. We are very proud to have such a disparate and varied membership. Graduate Union Members are all over Australia and the world. This month we present to you the latest Melbourne gems that should be explored, whether you are temporarily passing through the world's most livable city, or you reside here.

Winter Night Market

Queen Victoria Market, Corner Queen and Therry Street. 7th June, 14th June, 21st June, 2017

Queen Victoria Night Markets are back on Wednesdays and will be starting in June. Explore the wonder of one of Melbourne’s greatest markets against the backdrop of a starry Melbourne night sky.

Aboriginal Heritage Walk

Birdwood Avenue, Royal Botanic Gardens Melbourne, Birdwood Avenue.

With an Indigenous Australian guide, you can explore the Royal Botanic Gardens through the history of its Traditional Owners. The tour includes a traditional smoking ceremony, a guided walk through important areas of the gardens, discussions about the traditional uses for food, tools and medicine. The tour is a fantastic way to learn more about Indigenous heritage. Learn more at https://

www.rbg.vic.gov.au/ whats-on/aboriginalheritage-walk

DENFAIR 2017 Design Exhibition

Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre, 1 Convention Centre Place, South Wharf. 10th June 2017

Denfair is the leading destination for contemporary design in Australia. As the only design event dedicated to tailoring authentic design to design professionals, DENFAIR will open its doors to the public for one day only on 10 June. 12,000 square metres of pure design with over 300 curated design brands on display, you can lose yourself in the world of design that Australia has to offer.

If you have any recommendations for places or events of interest for our Members and Residents, email publications@graduatehouse.com.au

Run Melbourne Presented by lululemon

Federation Square, Melbourne, Corner Swanston Street and Flinders Street. 30th July 2017

Join Sole Motive and run Melbourne again in 2017 to celebrate 10 years of Run Melbourne. Be part of the 170,000 plus who have helped participated in Run Melbourne since 2008, raising over $12 million for more than 400 charities. With distances of five and ten kilometres or the Half-Marathon, there is an option available for everyone. Run for a charity close to your heart, take on a new challenge, or aim for a personal best.

Ridding the ocean of hazardous plastics

Dutch foundation The Ocean Cleanup has raised USD $21.7 million to initiate large-scale trials of its cleanup technology in the Pacific Ocean later this year. The technology, which has been developed over the last four years, is a passive plastic capturing device which uses ocean currents to catch and concentrate the plastic. This reduces the theoretical cleanup time of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch from milennia to years. Representing the most important milestone on the road to the full-scale cleanup for the world's oceans, Founder and chief executive of The Ocean Cleanup said that due to the support of the project's funders, they are closer to returning the first batch of plastic to shore. "Our mission is to rid the world's oceans of plastic, and this support is a major leap forward towards achieving this goal," he said. An international study showed that in 2010, 8 billion tonnes of plastic entered the ocean and indicated that 192 nations produced a total of 275 million tonnes of plastic waste. As plastics are hard to break down, some items, such as a dense monofilament fishing line could last for up to 600 years. Although a plastic bag could last for up to a month, a lot of negative environmental impact could have occurred before then. Other microplastic fragments can come from plastic packaging such as cups, bottles and bags, as well as fragments of fishing gear. Marine animals face the most critical consequences of waste in the oceans, research showing that around 5,000 and 15,000 sea turtles are entangled in items like discarded fishing gear. Around 90 percent of seabirds ingest plastic causing gut blockages or perforation of the intestines. The newest technology of The Ocean Cleanup was significantly funded by San Francisco based philanthropists Marc and Lynne Benioff and an anonymous donor. "With Boyan's innovative leadership, I believe The Ocean Cleanup will have an incredibly positive impact on the future of our oceans," said Mr Benioff. The Ocean Cleanup aims to launch its first experimental cleanup system in the Pacific waters by late 2017. Learn more about The Ocean Cleanup at www.theoceancleanup.com

The creative benefits of walking

From an early age Rousseau developed a passion for walking; finding delight especially from the journeys guided by chance: peripatetic randomness, or what he calls, “the pleasures of going one knows not where.” Such walks allowed his mind to wander as he penned in his Reveries of the Solitary Walker, where we are introduced to 10 ‘walks’ from Rousseau’s autobiographical musings toward the end of his life. Through his walks, Rousseau delved deep into selfreflection and self-analysis, rejoicing in his freedom to “converse with [his] soul.” “There is something about walking that animates and activates my ideas; I can hardly think when I am still; my body must move if mind is to do the same,” wrote Rousseau. Fast forward to 2014 where French Philosopher Frederic Gros released his book A Philosophy of Walking and he also speaks of the mind-freeing quality of walking. “A long walk,” writes Gros, “allows us to commune with the sublime,” he penned. He notes the flaneur, coming from French meaning to stroll or to lounge, the casual saunter, roaming the many pathways of a city, observing, musing, pondering, and contemplative walking. This type is similar to that of Rousseau’s walking: a propellant for mind-freeing, “you’re doing nothing when you walk, nothing but walking,” writes Gros, “but having nothing to do but walk makes it possible to recover the pure sensation of being, to rediscover the simply joy of existing … It is at this point where our mind is free.” When we walk, the mind walks also – it roams its own grey cellular paths to find ends that were known but not consciously realised: the good idea, the creative potential wedged inside the deep recesses of our mental workspace. Walk yourself, and you walk your mind along some new creative pathways. There is scientific validity to this as well. For example, in a study by Oppezzo and Schwartz, it was found that walking improved divergent thinking – the more creative form of thinking, the thought process used to generate ideas by exploring many different possible solutions, as opposed to convergent thinking, like finding the single answer for a mathematical equation. The researchers found that walking had a large effect on creativity, and their participants benefited creatively from walking compared to sitting. Whether walking to sitting, vice versa, walking indoors, outdoors on a predetermined path, or on a treadmill indoors, the participants who walked produced more creative responses to their creativity tests. In all of the tests 81 per cent, 88 per cent, and 100 per cent of participants were more creative walking than sitting. And 100 per cent of those who walked outside generated at least one novel highquality response compared with 50 per cent of those seated inside. It was merely the physical act of walking which saw this increase in creativity, as the authors noted, “walking has a very specific benefit — the improvement of creativity … When there is a premium on generating new ideas in the workday, it should be beneficial to incorporate walks.” In fact, in the 1960s psychologist Jerome L Singer conducted research which demonstrated that letting our minds wander is relatively crucial for a satisfying mental life. “Having to reread a line of text three times because our attention has drifted away matters very little if that attention shift has allowed us to access a key insight, a precious memory or make sense of a troubling event,” he discussed in a recent review. Engaging in mundane tasks, mild exercise, or acts that require little cognitive effort are a kind of idea generator in their own rights. It is here we begin to think the ‘unthought’ — the thoughts what we didn’t realise we had because we were otherwise mentally engaged. Don’t be afraid of truly switching off because it’s not disengaging with the world, it’s reengaging with another world altogether, go for a walk and think about it.

Organising our function at Graduate House was a quick and easy process. Rosie is flexible and accommodating in working with me through the process. The morning and afternoon tea was good. Staff was exceptionally helpful. Our presenters had several requests on the day and they were all met with speed and ease. Thank you very much to Rosie and team. Lee Goodson, UoM Commercial Ltd

Phone: 03 9347 3428 The Graduate Union Email: admingh@graduatehouse.com.au 220 Leicester Street Carlton Website: www.graduatehouse.com.au VIC, Australia, 3053

Phone: 03 9347 3428 The Graduate Union Funding for Futures DONATION The GraduaTe union of The universiTy of Melbourne inc. Email: admingh@graduatehouse.com.au Website: www.graduatehouse.com.auOrganising our function was seamless and efficient as always. The function rooms were perfect, the food, both in terms of quality and quantity was excellent as always and the staff were very helpful before and after our event. We are very grateful that we had Donation Form 2014 220 Leicester Street Carlton VIC, Australia, 3053 a few servers circulating with platters due to the limited space. Penny Beeston, Geography Teachers Association of Victoria

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Organising our function was very easy and stress free. The food is good. We loved the scones for morning tea. The staff were extremely helpful as usual. Nothing is too much trouble and they are all friendly, helpful and professional. Just the best!!! Cindy Tschernitz, School Library Association of Victoria Best soup I have had for years! Member, Dr George Luk OAM

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Donation Form From its establishment in 1911, Members have lived, learned and met together to continue the experience of ‘the meeting of the minds’ beyond From its establishment in 1911, Members have lived, learned and met together to continue the experience of ‘the meeting of the minds’ beyond university as they entered the workforce, had families, became leaders, volunteered across the world and retired. university as they entered the workforce, had families, became leaders, volunteered across the world and retired. These Members built the organisation through great generosity in the These Members built the organisation through great generosity in the form of donations of funds and buildings, bequests and sponsorship, form of donations of funds and buildings, bequests and sponsorship, together with volunteer and pro bono work. We seek always to honour together with volunteer and pro bono work. We seek always to honour this legacy and to foster a culture of active and contributing membership. this legacy and to foster a culture of active and contributing membership. Please give to our unique association of graduates. Please give to our unique association of graduates.

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Remembrance Day Poppies

In our March Newsletter we invited members and friends to join us in making 500 crocheted poppies by November. The project is ongoing and while we do not have the tally yet, we have prepared yarns for our craft-minded members to collect from reception.

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