Make way for vibrant Victoria graduates
12 May 2008
Make way for thousands of vibrant Victoria graduates
More than 1960 new graduates of Victoria University will procession through inner-city Wellington over three days of graduation ceremonies from Wednesday this week.
A blend of 700-year-old tradition, pageantry and spontaneous celebration, the ceremonies mark an education milestone and a cause for celebration for Victoria students and thousands of family members and friends who join them at the Michael Fowler Centre and in the streets for the graduation procession.
The new graduates will become members of the University's alumni community, as have the 1000 other students who have graduated in absentia so far this year—with their doctorates, degrees, diplomas and certificates conferred upon them by the University Council.
Highlights of the ceremonies include the graduation of 20 PhD students, and on Friday 16 May Victoria University will confer two honorary doctorates on political journalist Colin James and distinguished linguist Professor Bernard Spolsky.
The traditional street procession of graduands and staff will depart from the Government Buildings Historic Reserve on Wednesday and Thursday at noon, parading along Lambton Quay and Willis and Mercer Streets to finish in Civic Square where Mayor Kerry Prendergast will welcome them.
If the parade is cancelled, notification will be given on Newstalk ZB from 11am on the morning of the parade.
Ceremony details:
Wednesday 14 May
Noon
graduation parade
Ceremony 1: 1.30pm Faculties of:
Architecture & Design; Science
Ceremony 2: 6.00pm
Faculty of Education
Thursday 15 May
Noon graduation
parade
Ceremony 3: 1.30pm Faculties of: Commerce &
Administration; Law
Ceremony 4 6.00pm Faculty of
Commerce & Administration
Friday 16 May
Ceremony 5
1.30pm Faculties of: Humanities & Social Sciences;
Toihuarewa
Ceremony 6 6.00pm Faculty
of Humanities & Social Sciences; NZ School of Music
A selection of topical PhD research abstracts are as follows:
Ecstasy (MDMA) addiction
Evangelene Daniela: The use of illegal psychostimulants—such as methamphetamine, cocaine, and MDMA—has increased in New Zealand and globally over the past two decades. Evangelene Daniela aimed to determine if MDMA shared similar behavioural and neurochemical properties as other psychostimulants. Her results indicated that MDMA produced similar behavioural characteristics as other psychostimulants. This information is a novel contribution to scientific literature, as the behavioural effects of MDMA have not previously been characterised. The data produced by this lab was one of the first in the world to demonstrate that MDMA may have an abuse potential.
The minds of young male
offenders
Shirley Grace: Shirley Grace studied young
men’s understanding of the sexual and general violence
they had committed. Her findings contradicted dominant
explanations of youth violence, which can position offenders
as ‘abnormal’. Participants in Shirley’s study
embraced the rationality of ‘manliness’, in which being
violent was a means to ‘get it right as a man’.
Paradoxically, their sexual violence was viewed as also
being irrational instead of manly. Therefore, participants
were unable to explain why they were sexually violent.
Shirley suggested that in developing theories about youth
violence, attention must be given to how notions of manhood
influence the development of violence.
Improving the
abundance of a seafood delicacy
Phil James: Good quality
sea-urchin roe is a seafood delicacy. However, in New
Zealand, many sea urchins are uneconomic to harvest because
they have very low roe content. Roe is the reproductive
organ of sea-urchins and the only edible part of the animal.
Phil James identified optimal holding systems and
environmental conditions for improving the quantity and
quality of sea-urchin roe. He suggested seawater temperature
and water movement were the most critical factors. His
results will assist the development of a sea-urchin roe
enhancement industry, make better use of wild sea-urchin
resources and help meet increasing worldwide demand for
high-quality sea-urchin roe.
Immune protection against
TB:
Kylie Quinn: Tuberculosis (TB) kills 1.8 million
people every year, and the current vaccine against it is
only partially effective. Kylie Quinn’s hypothesis was
that Tregs (T regulatory cells) could suppress the immune
system’s response induced by vaccination, decreasing the
vaccine’s efficacy. To explore this, Kylie inactivated
Tregs prior to vaccination against TB. She found that
protection against TB was not enhanced by this inactivation,
despite increases in the type of immune response that dogma
suggests should be protective. Kylie proposed a new model
for immune protection against TB, which will assist the
development of an effective TB vaccine.
ENDS