News Archive

As you read this, two young students should have been celebrating their first few days at UWA.

But Ben Pocock and Richard Mayne instead became unwitting and unwilling victims of political turmoil when flight MH17 was shot down a few days ago.

We join with the international community to rage against such senseless waste of lives but it is hard not to feel impotent in the face of such tragedy. What we can do is to open our hearts to the students from Leeds and Loughborough universities, from where Richard and Ben were travelling.

Some students from those institutions are already here, taking part in study abroad programs and living in residential colleges at the edge of the campus. They need our support as they come to terms with their shock and sadness.

We remember too Nick Norris, a graduate from Arts and Education and a successful Perth businessman, who was accompanying his three grandchildren on the flight home from the Netherlands.

This flight from the Netherlands is one that many of our staff and students will have taken in the past, bringing them home from memorable holidays and inspiring conferences.

Those simple letters and numbers, MH17, have been burned into our psyches. And the tragedy has cast a pall over the whole world.

But we can use our sadness in a positive way: to help us reflect on the value of life and how lightly we often treat it; to appreciate the opportunities that life throws to us, and the fact that we have been lucky enough to make the most of them.

We must take the opportunities that Ben and Richard and Nick can no longer take, and live life to the fullest, embracing everything it has to offer.

It is a sad way to start a new semester, but I hope we can all learn and grow from this tragedy and put our precious lives into making it a fruitful, successful and thought-provoking one.

Paul Johnson
Vice-Chancellor

The Employee Assistance Program offers free counselling to UWA staff and immediate family.  To arrange an appointment contact one of the following providers.

PPC Worldwide

Level 16, 251 Adelaide Terrace, Perth
Tel 1300 361 008 (24 hours)

UWA Counselling & Psychological Service

2nd Floor, South Wing, Guild Office
Tel +61 8 6488 2423 (office hours)