It has been a year like no other. The Australian university sector has been among the hardest hit by the COVID-19 crisis but, despite this, we continue to play a vital role in the national response.
UTS Vice-Chancellor Attila Brungs talks about his pride in the alumni community, what 2020 has taught him about being adaptable, and how UTS is shaping the future of learning to help you upskill in a rapidly changing world.
What makes you proud of the alumni community?
The biggest impact the university can have for society in a positive way is through the wonderful work that our alumni do and by talking to alumni I get to hear the incredible things they are doing here and around the globe in making the world a better place. So what makes me very proud to both a member of the UTS community and proud of all of our alumni, is that they have got not only the skills, they not only have got the aspiration but they’ve got, let’s call it the motivation to change things for better. And that’s what we hear time and time again when I talk to the alumni again both here and around the world.
What has 2020 taught you about being adaptable?
One of the things about 2020 is, as well as all the challenges we have had over the past year has been the incredible inspiration that I have drawn from working at a place like UTS. I have been, ah I cannot describe how inspired I have been by my colleagues and students and the broader UTS community during these trying times. I mean within the year, I will give you some examples; we have had academics go and work with governments from day one on helping them do the economic modelling they need to get the state in position, we have used our assets like the data arena to do, to look at the best responses from around the world in different governments model them, model health responses, again to give the government the best information to make the best decisions.
We’ve had groups in say the engineering faculty, design and then rapid prototype and then produce 3D printed masks to help Papua New Guinea medical officers because as I have said we have had some real challenges in Australia but there are nations around us who have faced COVID times in much much worse situations then we have.
What has inspired you about the UTS community this year?
What I have been most inspired about, is just the way people have responded. We always thought, I always thought the university community is special. I’m sure the alumni who are seeing this know that the university community is special from your time here but to see that demonstrated time and time again, when many of the individuals are facing great personal challenges as well is just truly inspiring.
What have you learned in 2020 that you didn’t know last year?
There has been far too many things that I have learnt in 2020, coping with all the challenges both for the university and also to help the government to think through some of the challenges that I can talk about. Look, on the simplistic level I have learnt where the unmute button is and believe me it took much longer to learn where the unmute button is on zoom meetings than most people did but I think I have got that under control now.
What have you learned in 2020 that you didn’t know last year?
We are literally shifting the whole university, not just to support students from school or coming back to do undergraduate degrees but to support people throughout their whole lives and whole careers. That is a profound shift and in fact COVID and 2020 and the challenges we have faced have not only not slowed us down in that goal but have actually sped us up. So we have been using the opportunities presented to us by COVID in terms of the restructuring we have been doing, to completely reshape the university to support people through their whole lifetime. Now that is distinct. There is no other university on the globe at the moment that has made that shift, now we haven’t got there either but that is our aspiration in the next couple of years to really drive this support not just for our current students, not just for future students but for all our past students and graduates to support them all the way through their careers and lives in very different ways then people would ever imagine being linked to a university and that does include things like short courses, micro credentials but it also includes things like networking, it includes things like helping people with things like careers advice, when people are think through big career transitions what support can the university provide both in terms of direction but also in terms of all the critical skills.
Any final message for our alumni and friends?
One of the things I would really like to exhort everybody who is seeing this is, so that you can get some of the excitement that I feel around the great work that our alumni are doing is have a look at our website around the Alumni Awards. The 2020 Alumni Awards, even though we are in a COVID world and we did things very differently, seriously ever single story of every single one of those award winners was just awe inspiring. The work that they have done, the changes they have brought around themselves, the impact they have had on the globe is incredible. So something I would love all of you to do, if you have the time, is just click on the website have a look at the UTS 2020 Alumni Award winners you will see this years Alumni Award winners but also previous years just so you get a sense of what some of your colleagues, you know, some of your fellow alumni’s are doing around the world.