University of Otago - Definition

University of Otago
Motto	Sapere aude "Have courage to be wise."
Established	1869
Chancellor	Mr Lindsay Brown
Vice-Chancellor	Dr David Skegg
Location	Dunedin, New Zealand
Students	19,000 total
Homepage	http://www.otago.ac.nz

The University of Otago in Dunedin is New Zealand's oldest university and the world's most southerly. It is the South Island's largest employer and claims to have the world's longest-established annual Capping Show and New Zealand's oldest ballet company.

Founded in 1869, the university opened in July 1871. Its motto is "Sapere aude" ("Dare to be wise"). (The University of New Zealand subsequently adopted the same motto.) The University of Otago Students' Association answers this with its own motto, "Audeamus" ("let us dare").

Between 1874 and 1961 the University of Otago functioned as a College of the University of New Zealand, and issued degrees in its name. However, as a full university in itself, it retained degree-granting powers, but chose not to exercise them. The dissolution of the University of New Zealand saw these degree-granting powers re-activated.

Some of the University's many diverse buildings appear in the following panorama:

The University clocktower viewed from Castle Street.

Distinctions

The University of Otago began teaching medicine in 1875: its medical school remains one of only two in New Zealand.

Many Fellowships add to the diversity of the people associated with "Otago". They include:

• Robert Burns Fellowship (literature)
• Caroline Plummer Fellowship in Community Dance
• Charles Hercus Fellowship
• Claude McCarthy Fellowship
• Foxley Fellowship
• Frances Hodgkins Fellowship (art)
• Henry Lang Fellowship
• Hocken Fellowship
• James Cook Fellowship
• Mozart Fellowship (music)
• THB Symons Fellowship
• William Evans Visiting Fellowship

In 1998, the physics department gained some fame for making the first Bose-Einstein condensate in the Southern Hemisphere.

The 2004 Government investigation into research quality (to serve as a basis for future funding) ranked Otago in fourth place in New Zealand.

Journal "Science" has recommended worldwide study of Otago's Biochemistry database "Transterm", which has genetic code data on 40,000 species.

Colleges and Halls

These residential Colleges and Halls are not as significant in the life of the University when compared with the Colleges and Halls of the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge -- with the exceptions of Selwyn and Knox Colleges which do have resident fellows and operate like Oxbridge colleges (with chapels, for example). As a result some New Zealanders regard them as more prestigious and desirable -- in other words as 'true' "colleges". Selwyn and Knox form separate corporations, apart from the University.

Official list (http://www.otago.ac.nz/about/accommodation/halls.html)

Notable alumni and alumnae

Internal Wikipedia links

• Barbara Anderson
• David Benson-Pope, Cabinet minister
• Dame Silvia Cartwright, Governor-General of New Zealand
• Bill English
• Ian Fraser, broadcaster, head of Television New Zealand
• Julian Grimmond, co-producer of "The Amazing Race", which won two consecutive Primetime Emmys
• Fergus Hume
• Chris Laidlaw
• Michael Laws, politician and broadcaster
• John Edward "Jack" Lovelock
• Sir Kamisese Mara (Knox)
• Simon McCallum, organiser of New Zealand's first Game Developers' Conference
• Arnold Nordmeyer
• Lord Porritt (Selwyn), Governor-General of New Zealand and physician to the Queen.
• Robert Stout
• Peter Tapsell

External links

• Tan Sri Dato' (Dr) Hj Ahmad Azizuddin Bin Hj Zainal Abidin (http://www.otago.ac.nz/alumni/profiles/hj_abidin.html) (Dr Ahmad, former Speaker of the Perak State Legislative Assembly)
• Professor Murray Brennan (http://www.otago.ac.nz/alumni/profiles/murray_brennan.html) of the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York
• Sir Peter Buck (Te Rangi Hiroa) (http://www.otago.ac.nz/alumni/profiles/te_rangi_hiroa.html), former visiting professor at Yale University then Director of the Bishop Museum of Hawaii
• Sir Geoffrey Cox (http://www.otago.ac.nz/alumni/profiles/geoffery_cox.html), co-founder of World Wide Television (today one of the main television news agencies)
• George Griffiths (http://www.otago.ac.nz/alumni/profiles/george_griffiths.html), publisher, journalist, regional historian, and Hocken Fellow 1998
• Alison Holst (nee Payne) (http://www.otago.ac.nz/alumni/profiles/alison_holst.html)
• Dame Judith Mayhew Jonas (http://www.otago.ac.nz/alumni/profiles/judith_mayhew.html), City and Business Adviser to the Mayor of London, sitting in the London cabinet, Board Member of the London Development Agency (chairing its Business Committee, and (inter alia) Chairman of the Board of Governors of Birkbeck College, University of London)
• Professor Datuk Dr Mazlan Othman (http://www.otago.ac.nz/alumni/profiles/mazlan_othman.html), Director-General of Malaysia's National Space Agency

External links

• University of Otago homepage (http://www.otago.ac.nz/)
• General outline of Burns, Hodgkins, and Mozart Fellowships (http://www.forbar.co.nz/downloads/{990E1EB2-7260-4017-B0B8-31FA3F4035E5}.pdf)
• About the Bose-Einstein Condensate (http://www.physics.otago.ac.nz/research/bec/)