Last Tuesday night, 6 March, we held a celebration of our highest achieving academic Residents from 2017. We also welcomed  Her Excellency Menna Rawlings who is the British High Commissioner to Australia. Her Excellency gave our Residents an account of her experiences working in diplomacy over the last 20 years.

Residents who achieved an average GPA of 6 or higher throughout 2017 were presented with an academic achievement medal by our Head of College Steve Foley:

Academic Awards – GPA of 6+

6.0

• Harry Chisolm
• Ellery Dunn
• Pierce Leahy
• Teague Moloney
• James Staats
• Bryce Veitch
• Justin Weier

6.025

• Kyle Raabe

6.075

• Angus Tully

6.125

• Peter (Wai) Au
• Vibhu Goel
• William Lambre

6.167

• Matt Martyr

6.250

• Reshabh Agarwal
• William Chen
• Alex Goodsell
• Riley Hughes

6.292

• Liam Mallinson

6.375

• Archie Borradale
• Luke Jessup

6.458

• Clint Caldicott

6.5

• Tim Harris
• Alexis Tang

6.625

• Joshua Curti
• Kelbie Davidson

6.708

• Hayden D’Addona

6.75

• Yu Shen Chia
• Srihakra Motamarri

6.875

• Tom Baxter
• Lachlan Henderson
• Dominic McMahon
• Daniel Nunns

7.0

• Patrick Lynch
• Rohan Olufson

Faculty Academic Awards

Residents who scored the highest GPA in their faculty were presented with a shield and some money from Professor Aidan Byrne, Acting Vice Chancellor for the dinner:

• BEL Lachlan Henderson             GPA: 6.875
• EAIT Rohan Olufson                    GPA: 7.0
• HABS Joshua Curti                      GPA: 6.625
• HASS Liam Mallinson                 GPA: 6.292
• Medicine Riley Hughes                GPA: 6.250
• Science Patrick Lynch                  GPA: 7.0

College Awards

Several College prizes were awarded to those residents who got the highest overall GPAs.

The JH Baxter Prize is awarded to the most successful academic Resident in first year. In 2017 we were lucky enough to have three Residents who all scored a GPA of 6.875 and were in their first year:

• Tom Baxter
• Lachlan Henderson
• Dominic McMahon

The McKenna Prize is awarded to the most successful academic Resident among all the other years. In 2017 we were lucky enough to have two Residents who had perfect 7.0 GPAs:

• Patrick Lynch
• Rohan Olufson

They were awarded shields and some money by our special guest Her Excellency Menna Rawlings.

The final award of the night went to Daniel O’Sullivan. He won the Blessed Edmund Rice prize which is awarded to a Leonian who gives of his time and his self, often in a service setting.

After dinner guest speaker

After dinner Her Excellency Menna Rawlings CMG, British High Commisioner to Australia talked about her extensive experience in a wide range of diplomatic service roles.

She was mostly recently a member of the Foreign and Commonwealth Management Board as HR Director. This followed postings to Washington DC, Ghana, Israel, Kenya and Brussels. In London, she has served as Private Secretary to the Permanent Under Secretary as well as in Press Office and the Africa and EU Directorates.

Her Excellency argued that feminism is actually a win for both men and women. This, no doubt, stimulated much debate around the blocks after dinner!