Dear staff,
I’m looking forward to visiting our Gatton campus today, where we will host the first 2 of 23 UQ graduation ceremonies that will be held over the next 10 days.
From tomorrow, the graduation ceremonies will move to the UQ Centre. It will be good to see all the activity around the campuses as the 2022 graduating cohort gather to celebrate with family and friends.
Speaking of celebrations, it has been wonderful to see such strong attendance at the final two ‘UQ Thanks You’ events – at St Lucia last Friday and Gatton on Tuesday. As the photos attest, these were terrific celebrations. Thanks to everyone who came along.
Also on Tuesday, it was great to participate in the Sashing Ceremony for the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students who will be graduating this month. It’s really pleasing to see the growing number of Indigenous students graduating from UQ and to have the opportunity to hear about their achievements and plans for the future. I look forward to this tradition continuing to go from strength to strength in the years ahead.
Translational Science Hub announced
Earlier this week, I joined the Premier and the Deputy Premier for the announcement that Queensland will host a globally significant mRNA vaccine research facility, to be known as the Translational Science Hub.
The creation of this new $280 million vaccine hub is the result of a partnership between the Queensland Government, UQ, Griffith University, and the French-based healthcare company, Sanofi. The Hub will link our local researchers with scientists at Sanofi’s mRNA Centres of Excellence in France and the United States.
The Hub, which will open in early 2023, will utilise laboratories and infrastructure across UQ, Griffith University, and the Translational Research Institute.
Pulse Survey results
The results from the annual staff survey are now available on the Pulse Survey web page. As I outlined at last month’s All Staff Forum, we achieved an impressive 74 per cent completion rate. I would like to thank staff for participating and providing us with helpful feedback on a range of workplace and team topics.
As next steps, senior executives will be sharing the results for their area with their teams and developing local response plans to address feedback particular to their area. The University Senior Executive Team will also be looking at whole of UQ initiatives to address some of the recurring areas of concern.
Update on back pay due to some casual staff
In June, I updated staff on our progress in finalising the back pay that was due to some current and former casual academic staff. This back pay was due to an error, which was raised by the NTEU in November 2021, in the hourly salary increases that were entered into the University’s payroll system. This occurred from March 2018 and has been corrected since January 2022.
I can advise that the back pay due to all current casual academic staff has been paid. We have a dedicated team who continue to make every effort to contact former casual academic staff to complete this process.
While most individual payments are less than $100, we expect the total amount paid will be around $882,971.98, which includes interest, superannuation and lost earnings on superannuation.
I want to again apologise that this error occurred and reassure staff that we are committed to ensuring that all UQ staff are paid fairly and appropriately.
And, finally, I’d like to congratulate a couple of colleagues whose great work has been recognised with the presentation of two significant international awards.
Emeritus Professor Ian Frazer AC was recently named as a recipient of the Prince Mahidol Award 2022 in the field of Public Health. And Professor Ove Hoegh-Guldberg, who is a coordinating lead author for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), recently received the good news that he and his IPCC colleagues were the recipients of the 2022 Gulbenkian Prize for Humanity.
I hope you enjoy the rest of the week.
With best wishes
Debbie
