Bulletin

Issue: August 2005

News

Largest group of INU scholarship winners heads overseas

La Trobe University has awarded the highest number ever of its International Network of Universities (INU) - Vice-Chancellor's Targeted Travelling Scholarships.

Most of this year's winners with
Vice-Chancellor Osborne, centre rear.

Twenty-eight scholarships were recently presented to high achieving undergraduate students to spend one semester at an INU university of their choice. Subjects completed by the students overseas are credited to their courses

Congratulating the winners, La Trobe University Vice-Chancellor, Professor Michael Osborne, said students improved their employment prospects by studying part of their courses in universities in other countries.

'It is increasingly important for students to add an international dimension to their studies because more and more employers are looking for people with international experience and the capacity to work in the world at large. So the employment situation is much enhanced for those who have some experience in the global arena.'

Professor Osborne is President of the INU, a consortium of quality universities in Australia, Asia, Europe and America, and one of the architects of the scholarship scheme designed to encourage more Australian undergraduate students to expand their horizons by doing at least a semester of their degree in another country.

The largest group, of eight students, is going to James Madison University, USA. Six each are going to the University of Leicester, UK, and Malm– University in Sweden, while others are destined for Hiroshima University, Japan, and Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Hungary.

For the first time this year, the INU exchange program includes J–nk–ping University, in Sweden, where three students - two in nursing and one in prosthetics and orthotics - are attending the School of Health Sciences, one of the largest schools for health care in Sweden known for its high academic quality and long experience of education and research.

Students from every faculty of the University are represented among the scholarship winners. Their overseas courses range from the applied, behavioural and medical sciences, to tourism, sport and leisure management, as well as arts, business, computing, and electronic engineering.

Four students from the Bendigo Campus, and one each from the Shepparton and Albury-Wodonga campuses, are among this year's scholarship winners, as well as several Melbourne (Bundoora) Campus students who come from regional areas.