Cockeyed Optimist

Inevitably, there came a time when the Director of TEDI (the Tertiary Education Institute), Professor Ernest Roe, had reluctantly to retire.

There was an interregnum, when a series of eminent members of the University took over the directorship for short periods. I was even an acting director myself, for a while. Meanwhile there was a search for a new director, and the post was eventually filled by an academic researcher from the UK, David Warren Piper, whose basic qualifications and experience were in psychology, particularly in organizational psychology.

Unsurprisingly, TEDI took a new direction now, and the emphasis shifted away from staff development, workshops and programs for new academics, with individual assistance to members of faculty on matters of teaching and learning, towards organizational issues. So we at TEDI found ourselves helping academic departments to develop mission statements, sort out their strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats, and reorganize themselves generally. This was the start of the era during which Universities in Australia were beginning to transform themselves into imitations of corporations.

I adapted to this to a certain extent, quite enjoying running retreats for teaching departments and helping them to develop their own mission and goals statements; at that time a former agricultural college was being taken under the wing of our university, so it was pleasant to drive the eighty kilometres or so to their campus and see how the other half lived.

But I gradually became disenchanted with university life, and, in September 1995, ‘took the package’ (accepted voluntary early retirement). This decision was reinforced by the fact that TEDI had been reviewed by an independent panel, who recommended, in effect, that all the innovations brought in by David Warren Piper over the years of his incumbency be reversed. Accordingly, he resigned and returned to the UK.

My leaving the university was helped by the fact that my wife, Katherine, took a four-month sabbatical, during which she visited colleagues, first in Indonesia, while my son Oli and I joined her in Taiwan, subsequently visiting Hong Kong, Scotland, Israel, Austria, Hungary, Sweden, Poland and South Africa. This was a very enjoyable tour, and I might blog about it later.

Before we left, I had made contact with a Brisbane studio who were turning out very attractive CD-ROMs on artistic, musical and poetry subjects. I picked up one such product: “Tryptich: Matisse, Aragon, Prokofiev - Battle Against the Shadows” at an art exhibition at the Queensland Art Gallery, and contacted the producer, Guy Casaril, offering my services. Happily, his studio was just about to embark on the production of an encyclopedia on CD-ROM, and he invited me to contribute.

So, when we got back to Brisbane, I started writing entries for scientific topics. Other authors included Guy himself (he had been a film producer in France) and several other locally-based experts. Sadly, Guy was very ill, with the progressive motor-neurone disease, and he passed away just as the encyclopedia was being completed. A European consortium had the publishing rights, and it was completed under their supervision, but only in a French-lanuage version. So I have a copy of that CD: “L’Encyclopédie: Le Sésame de Savoir” (Havas édition électronique, Arborescence, Paris 1996), and have to struggle with my school French to read it, including my own text; but the graphics are good!

After this, I needed something to do. There was some editing, mainly following up university contacts; I tried multi-level marketing of vitamins and supplements (a disaster - I haven’t got the style for it), and selling a scholarships scheme that we had had our son enrolled in since he was a toddler. Although this was an excellent scheme, and was very helpful when he was at school and also at university (he is just finishing second year of a Science/Law dual degree), I found again that I am no salesman.

And then I signed up with an on-line editing service (BetterEdit) and I have been enjoying working in that field ever since.

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