Queensland's 'Centre of Philanthropy'
10 December 2001 at 12:12 pm
A new Centre of Philanthropy and Not for Profit Studies has been established within the Faculty of Business at Queensland University of Technology (QUT) in Brisbane, Australia.
The Centre was officially launched by the Governor of Queensland, Major General Arnison, AC on Monday, 26th November 2002. More than 100 people including Mr Michael Myer of the Myer Foundation and Mr John Reid of the Reid Family Trusts, major donors to the Centre, attended the function.
Recurrent funding for three years has been secured from these large Australian philanthropic foundations and QUT has also committed significant funding to the Centre.
Michael Myer spoke at the launch saying there is a need to reinvigorate philanthropy in Australia with some of the new insights provided by “venture philanthropy”.
John Reid told the audience that Australian Universities need to coordinate and cooperate their research and teaching programs to ensure that the scarce resources available for the study of philanthropy and Not for Profit organisations are used to their maximum potential.
From February 2002, Centre staff will offer four postgraduate units as a Graduate Certificate in Business (Philanthropy and Not for Profit Studies) focussed on issues relevant to philanthropy and the Third sector.
It is designed to provide the community sector practitioners and postgraduate students with an advanced education in what organisers say has been a neglected area.
The Centre aims to attract postgraduate research students and well-established researchers who will build on the body of knowledge of the Not for Profit sector in Australia.
The Centre will shortly be announcing the appointment of the inaugural Myer Foundation Principal Research Fellow following an extensive international advertising campaign. This appointment, together with the appointment of an Adjunct Professor in Philanthropy will help to provide research leadership for the growing number of postgraduate research students now working within the Centre.
The Centre will continue and expand on the valuable community service work of the Program on Not for Profit Corporations (PONC) which offers educational advice and consulting services under the leadership of Associate Professor Myles McGregor-Lowndes.
