Welcome to the first quarterly alumni newsletter of 2026.

As always, when reading this edition, we invite you to consider whether you have any news you would like to share with us that you think would be of interest to the wider Hilda’s community. If the answer is yes, please get in touch and let us know what you think should be featured this year.

This quarter’s issue includes:
Young alumni lawn bowls

IWD Luncheon

Geelong Reunion

An alumni profile

And more!

As always, we encourage you to pass the St Hilda’s details onto any friends who you think may not be on our mailing list and encourage them to get in touch with us so that we can update their details. 

From all of us here at St Hilda’s College, we hope you enjoy reading the Q1 newsletter and Happy Easter to those in the community who are celebrating this coming weekend.

The post St Hilda’s Newsletter – Q1 2026 appeared first on St Hilda's College.

We invite you to read our new five year strategy, Shaping Our Future 2026-2031.

This strategic document outlines the College’s vision, values, mission, strategic priorities and goals as we look ahead to the next five years of our journey.

The post Shaping Our Future 2026-2031 appeared first on St Hilda's College.

Welcome to the final quarterly alumni newsletter of 2025.

As always, when reading this edition, we invite you to consider whether you have any news you would like to share with us that you think would be of interest to the wider Hilda’s community. If the answer is yes, please get in touch and let us know what you think should be featured in 2026.

This quarter’s issue includes:
Sneak peak of the history book

Alumni profile and book review

Founders & Benefactors

2026 save the dates

And more!

As always, we encourage you to pass the St Hilda’s details onto any friends who you think may not be on our mailing list and encourage them to get in touch with us so that we can update their details. 

From all of us here at St Hilda’s College, we hope you enjoy reading the Q4 newsletter.

The post St Hilda’s Newsletter – Q4 2025 appeared first on St Hilda's College.

As our students use SWOTVAC to get ready for the final assessments and exams for the academic year, here’s your chance to see what they and the wider St Hilda’s community were up to throughout Quarter 3.

When reading this edition, we invite you to reflect if you have any news you would like to share with us that you think would be of interest to the wider Hilda’s community. If yes, please don’t hesitate to get in touch and let us know what you think should be featured in future issues.

This quarter’s issue includes:
Gold Leaf Dinner
Alumni profiles
Industry showcase event
Current student news
And more!

As always, we encourage you to pass the St Hilda’s details onto any friends who you think may not be on our mailing list and encourage them to get in touch with us so that we can update their details. 

From all of us here at St Hilda’s College, we hope you enjoy reading the Q3 newsletter.

The post St Hilda’s Newsletter – Q3 2025 appeared first on St Hilda's College.

We’d like to introduce you to your new look alumni newsletter, Hilda’s News. 

We want your alumni newsletter to speak more directly to you so if you or someone you know from your time at St Hilda’s has something worth sharing, please get in touch with us and let us know what you think should be in future issues. 

This issue includes:

• An alumni feature
• Tributes to those we have lost in recent months
• An insight from current Principal, James Hardiman about the culture of the modern college
• Upcoming save the dates for reunions and young alumni events
• And more

As always, we encourage you to pass the St Hilda’s details onto any friends who you think may not be on our mailing list and encourage them to get in touch with us so that we can update their details. 

From all of us here at St Hilda’s College, we hope you enjoy reading the Q2 newsletter.

The Community Engagement Team

The post St Hilda’s Newsletter – Q2 2025 appeared first on St Hilda's College.

Saturday 3 May 2025

Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you, James, for welcoming me here today. It’s a great honour to present the Marjorie Smart Oration and I thank St Hilda’s board member Dr Lynne Williams for the opportunity.

I acknowledge the traditional owners of the land we meet on today, the Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung people of the Kulin Nations, and pay my respects to their Elders past and present. I extend that respect to all First Nations peoples here today.

I also acknowledge that I am the descendant of settlers. My grandmother, my mother and I were born on Ngarrindjeri Country on the banks of the Murray River at Mannum in South Australia and that is where the ashes of my mother are now scattered.
I was fascinated to read the brief bio of Marjorie Smart which James provided to me in preparation for this oration. While my career does not compare with Marjorie’s, there are some parallel themes in our early lives. We both had parents of faith, who valued community service and education. That modelling had a deep impact on the trajectory of our lives.

Unlike Marjorie, my family wasn’t wealthy, educated or connected. I suspect like some of you, I was a ‘first in family’ and a country kid (or at least a regional kid).

I was taught about service to others at my parents’ knee – literally. That there were others who didn’t have what we had: a loving, stable family; food in the fridge; a car with petrol. Some of my earliest memories are of my parents’ generosity. My mum would take food to an Aboriginal family who lived nearby. She explained to me that not every child came back from school to a home cooked meal, because their mum and dad weren’t able to provide that for them. Another early memory is of my dad, driving the community bus from our small town to Adelaide so that other people could go to the market or visit the library. He did that every couple of weeks, year in, year out. Those formative memories laid down a pattern of serving others that has stayed with me.

Like Marjorie, my parents also valued education, and my love of learning comes from them. They didn’t have the opportunity of university, or even 6 years of high school, but they were avid life-long learners. They nurtured my curiosity. They made many sacrifices so that I and my siblings could get the education that they couldn’t. So, from an early age a good life entwined service to others and continued learning about the world around me. I think it is something that Marjorie would agree with.

Despite this love of learning, starting university was daunting. It took me a while to find my place and my people. I didn’t have the incredible college experience that you have here at St Hilda’s. My early months at university were overwhelming, although I did love being immersed in books and ideas. It took me two attempts at Law School to finish my first law degree – 7 years between when I started at Melbourne University and finishing my degree at UNSW (picking up an honours Arts degree in between). I found the study of law uncomfortable at first – although now, in a twist I would never have predicted, I have 3 law degrees!

So, with that background, I wanted to share some thoughts with you about the place we find ourselves today and, in response, encourage you to pursue service as you shape your futures, and that of the society of which you are a part.

Although it took a while, I eventually qualified as a lawyer, and my entire professional life has been spent, in one way or another, in the law. I do this as an inheritor and servant of a collective endeavour that dates to Magna Carta in 1215, from which flows the basic rights and freedoms of the common law. More recently, this has come to be referred to as “the rule of law”, which underpins our society today.

Let me unpack that a bit.

Legal scholar Prof Martin Krygier says the purpose of the role of law is to limit the possibility of exercising arbitrarily power. It does this by demanding – among other things – that no one is above the law (from the Magna Carta), that you – your personal body – cannot be subject to the arbitrary power of the state (habeus corpus – you should ‘have your body’), that people can defend themselves against legal charges, that laws much be known and knowable (transparency), that citizens should chose who makes the laws which govern them, and that the transfer of power from one government to another be done peacefully. These are just some of elements of the rule of law.

In Australia, these principles operate – for the most part – every day in unremarkable ways. If you are arrested, the police must – and will – bring you before a magistrate within a matter of hours to explain why your liberty has been curtailed, and the magistrate will decide whether you should be detained. You will then hear the case against you and mount a defence, all in open court, and a decision will be made by an independent judge.

And of course, we are having this conversation today, on election day. We are fortunate in Australia to have a strong democratic culture and high degrees of trust in our election outcomes. As Dr Judith Brett reminds us in her book, From Secret Ballot to Democracy Sausage, from the beginning, Australia has pioneered methods to encourage everyone to vote – with the shameful exception of our First Nations peoples – the silent ballot, voting on the weekend, an independent electoral commission that runs elections and sets electorate boundaries and of course, compulsory voting. If today sees a change in government, or if it doesn’t, the transition will occur smoothly and peacefully, with a concession speech by the loser and the bureaucracy moving seamlessly to work with the new government.

So – let’s return to service.

My career in the law has been a varied and fascinating one. And entirely unpredictable to my 20-year-old self.

My first introduction to law and lawyers was in my gap year, when I worked as a junior receptionist at a large law firm. It was an eye-opening experience, and I made life-long friends and had a glimpse of the way that the law could shape society. After (finally) graduating as a lawyer, I worked in a large law firm – an environment which I initially found alienating. But over time, I came to value the collegiality and intellectual stimulation of legal practice. Importantly, I also found ways to incorporate my values of public service and social justice into the fabric of the firm. I did pro bono work and eventually managed the pro bono work of the office. I led the firm’s thinking in corporate social responsibility, setting up a charitable foundation and a volunteering programme.

This experience set me up for my next move – as General Counsel at World Vision Australia. Another incredible learning opportunity, and another set of close colleagues. I also realised that leadership was more important to me and more my “happy place”, rather than legal practice. With the management and leadership skills I learned at WVA, I took my first CEO job at Justice Connect. JC.

Now, in my role as the regulator of the Victorian legal profession, my purpose is to promote public trust and confidence in lawyers, by ensuring they are ethical and professional in their dealings with clients. This includes complaint handling, investigation and prosecution of misconduct, licensing of lawyers and overseeing their management of trust accounts. This is all crucial to the rule of law – the public must be confident that their lawyers will do the right thing.

In my role I also support the rule of law by funding access to justice, helping to ensure that legal help is available to everyone, even if they can’t afford to pay, and is accessible in a way that they can understand.

As I look back over my career as a lawyer, I can see that I am a part of the collective effort of a society to maintain the rule of law, and where service to others is valued because we are free and equal under law. Whatever career you choose, by serving others you build on the same collective project.

Understanding this – and its importance – is vital to responding to the challenges we face as a society. These are challenges that you will be grappling with as you finish your studies and enter into the workforce and to adulthood.

I am a Gen Xer – I can recite most of Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, and U2 is unashamedly the soundtrack of my life. I made mix tapes on cassette off the radio for my first boyfriend, and I waited by the fixed line phone for him to call.

I also lived through what we saw as the triumph of the rule of law and democracy over the tyranny of totalitarianism. Communism fell and democracy flourished, even briefly in parts of the Middle East during the Arab Spring. Political philosopher, Francis Fukuyama infamously declared that we had seen “the end of history” – meaning that the historical human struggle to find the optimal means of structuring society had been decided in favour of Western liberal democracy.

But now, we are at a moment where, around the world, we see democratic institutions, including the rule of law, under challenge and strain.

In Australia over the last several decades, including post-pandemic, trust in our institutions has begun to shift. Royal commissions into the banking system, Robodebt, abuse of people living with disability, and institutional child sexual abuse showed that too many institutions were not living up to their mandates to protect and serve. And the trauma of the pandemic has left a mark. Intolerance and anger seem to be rising, testing the integrity of our institutions. This is now a global phenomenon, amplified by the super-spreading capabilities of algorithms, artificial intelligence, and social media.
And of course, in the beacon of democracy, the United States, we have this fortnight seen judges arrested for their interpretation of the law and the rulings they make in their courtrooms.

In the US, Republican pollster Frank Lutz recently predicted a ‘dealignment’ from traditional political, intellectual and economic allegiances. Luntz said he was finding unprecedented hostility in his focus groups with conservative voters because, in his words:

And it is all happening at a time when, according to the World Justice Report’s rule of law index, limits on government power declined in 59% of countries last year. Given what is at stake, how should we respond to what feels like an existential test?

This is a big question to ponder over lunch! Many people are discussing it and some of the answers are obvious and important – to do more to help people understand and celebrate the importance of our civic inheritance of a stable, functional democracy and the triumph of both our multi-cultural society and our extraordinary First Nations peoples. To rein in the worst excesses of our digital lives and make sure that the potential of AI is used for the public good, not the enrichment of a tiny minority. To reaffirm and defend the principles of the rule of law, that no power should be uncurtailed and that might is not right. These are all important and necessary.

But I want to close by returning to where I started – to Marjorie and to me, to all of you, and to the concept of service.

I think there is another reason that the challenges to the rule of law that I’ve outlined are unhealthy for us as a country. Anger and cynicism, selfishness and the pursuit of power and wealth for its own sake nurture an inward focus. One of the powerful things about service to others is that, by definition, we look outwards. It shifts the focus away from us. It rebalances us and helps us see where we fit in the world. It also delivers that great joy of engaging with people and the community.

As we wrestle with massive issues like climate change and global instability, it’s even more important that we focus on issues outside our patch.

Some of you may be studying law – I hope that you will think about the role that you can play in upholding the rule of law and pursuing access to justice. For those of you who are pursuing other careers, I encourage you to do this in a way that puts service and integrity front and centre.

In closing I want to leave you with an intriguing finding from our friends in the sciences. I recently heard about neuroscience research that shows when someone tells a story and you listen, their neural synapses and yours are firing in the same parts of the brain and the story you hear becomes part of your own story. The researchers concluded that we are biologically wired to respond to stories. Think about that – simply by being curious, by listening to the stories of others, and sharing our stories in return, we can come closer together. I’ve talked about some big topics this afternoon, but perhaps thinking about generosity and open heartedness to people around us can give us some different tools, different neural pathways to try and solve these big problems.

Thank you.

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It’s been a busy start to the year and we have plenty to share in the world of St Hilda’s. The Q1 2025 newsletter includes overview of key events that have taken place, including:

• Welcome Saturday
• International Women’s Day
• The Communitas Society Inaugural Luncheon

Plus, we have alumni news, student club news and more. And, you can access the 2024 Chronicle through this quarter’s newsletter as well!

As always, we encourage you to pass the St Hilda’s details onto any friends who you think may not be on our mailing list and encourage them to get in touch with us so that we can update their details. 

From all of us here at St Hilda’s College, we hope you enjoy reading the Q1 newsletter.

The Community Engagement Team

The post St Hilda’s Newsletter – Q1 2025 appeared first on St Hilda's College.

By Clementine Dernelley

For International Women’s Day, I had the pleasure of attending St Hilda’s luncheon. This was for past and present students, as well as notable figures, to get together and talk about the importance of empowering the women in their life and highlighting the inequality we face, in hopes to reduce the effects this has. At St Hilda’s College, we have more female-identifying than male-ientifying students so it is even more important to empower them, especially whilst entering higher education and the workforce. International Women’s Day aims to recognise the achievements of women throughout the world, whilst noting how far we have to go, and that we aren’t an equal society – yet.

As a guest speaker, we had the pleasure of listening to Dr Danielle McMullen. Dr McMullen is not just inspiring due to her incredible work in her field, but also because of how hard she has worked to be where she is today, and how she is using her education to empower others. She is the president of the Australian Medical Association (AMA), and was the AMA NSW president during COVID; the AMA representative on the Strengthening Medicare Taskforce, being the leading voice in General Practice Reform; an incredible GP, with a clinical interest in women’s health, family planning and mental health; the director of the Australian Digital Health Agency, AND the Non-Executive Director of the Doctors Health Services Board. With this plethora of experience, she knows a lot about the disparity that women face in medical and educational sectors, and uses her power to share this knowledge and highlight some of the issues that need to be fixed.

Something that spoke to the soul of the women in the room is the disparity that women face when being educated through the lack of opportunities that they are given compared to men. It wasn’t only this unfortunately common reality that Dr McMullen brought light to. She also spoke on the issue that is women losing opportunities in their education due to not being able to attend days because of period-related issues. Given there aren’t programs to help women, they are forced to just miss out on things. Being a taboo subject, periods – and the issues around them – are not really spoken about, causing there to be a lack of women who seek help. These issues also extend to the workforce, where women will inevitably miss out on days due to period-related issues, therefore missing out on opportunities – continuing the inequality of opportunities as well as furthering the pay gap.

Extending this point that Dr McMullen was educating us about, she informed us on the disparity that women face in healthcare, in Australia and globally. Talking to everyone afterwards, I found that the majority of people, including women, in the room were shocked by the things that Dr McMullen was saying, particularly in relation to pregnancy and sexual health.

Most had no idea how dire the situation was. Currently, the Australian mortality rate is 4.8 deaths of women in births per 100,000, compared to other countries, including parts of Africa, where it can be over 1,000 per 100,000. With the work that is currently being done by parliament to backtrack the abortion laws that were approved in 2019, it is feared that this figure will rise in Australia. There is also an ongoing lack of knowledge around pregnancy and safe sex, due to restrictions given to GPs, causing those areas to be more unsafe, adding to why these things need to be taught.

However, despite this seemingly grave situation, there is also positive work being done. According to Dr McMullen, there is work in parliament and across the world to fix the inequality in access to healthcare between men and women. There is also work being done to allow women in medical training to get better access to paid maternity leave as well as women getting access to better maternity leave in medical sectors generally, and getting paid leave when going through menopause. The IUD and implanon medicare rebate has been heightened too! 

Not only is there work being done to reduce the disparity across Australia and on the panels Dr McMullen works on, there is also positive work being done throughout college that was highlighted. This includes, but is not limited to, the access to sex education that is being delivered for all students as well as the Co-President model and having incredible people such as Dr McMullen come in to educate us.

I, and most women there, were not aware of these issues, and were not fully aware of the inequalities that we face in our day to day life as it is normal for us. This kind of inadvertent disregard to these topics due to the lack of education causes a continuation of inequality, hence why it is so important to be educated and raise awareness for such topics. International Women’s Day at Hilda’s was not just about celebrating the successes of the women in our community, but making sure they continue to enjoy an environment that is built for them to thrive. 

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Wrapping up a very successful 60th Anniversary year, you can read about all things Quarter 4 related by clicking on the image below to read our Q4 newsletter. 

As always, we encourage you to pass the St Hilda’s details onto any friends who you think may not be on our mailing list and encourage them to get in touch with us so that we can update their details. 

From all of us here at St Hilda’s College, we hope you enjoy reading the Q4 newsletter.

The Community Engagement Team

The post St Hilda’s Newsletter – Q4 2024 appeared first on St Hilda's College.

Pascalle Bailey

The post Creating Communitas – Celebrating the Art of St Hilda’s College appeared first on St Hilda's College.