Information about Rmit University

RMIT University
Motto	Perita manus, mens exculta (a skilled hand, a cultivated mind)
Established	1887
Type	Public
Chancellor	Professor Dennis Gibson, AO,DSc
Vice-Chancellor	Professor Margaret Gardner, AO
Faculty	2,957
Undergraduates	25,683 (2005)
Postgraduates	8,424 (2005)
Location	Melbourne, Vic., Australia
Campus	Urban
Organisations	Member of Australian Technology Network, Global University Alliance (GUA) & Open Universities Australia
Affiliations	ASAIHL
Website	www.rmit.edu.au

RMIT University, (previously The Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology) is a university based in Melbourne, Australia. Its main campus is on the northern edge of the city's central business district, has other campuses in Brunswick and Bundoora, and operates other sites in the CBD and at Point Cook. In regional Victoria, RMIT operates in Hamilton and Lakes Entrance.

RMIT's Vietnam division, "RMIT International University Vietnam" has campuses in the Ho Chi Minh City suburb of Saigon South and in central Hanoi.

In 2006, the Times Higher Education Supplement placed RMIT in the top 200 universities of the world, at rank 146 (down 91 places from 55 in the 2004 Times Higher Education Supplement placings). RMIT is a member of the GU8, and is considered one of Australia's more selective universities^[1]. While focusing on higher education, it is also Victoria's largest vocational education institution.

History

Founded by Francis Ormond, prominent grazier, Freemason and philanthropist, in 1887 as the Working Men's College (encapsulated in its motto: "perita manus mens exculta" translating to "a skilled hand, a cultivated mind"), and renamed the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology in 1960, RMIT University gained formal university status in 1992.

The College proved immediately successful, with over 900 students enrolled by the end of 1887. Students undertook a variety of courses including mechanics, physics, bookkeeping, elocution and arithmetic, as well as certain trades. Its campus was adjacent to the Old Melbourne Gaol on LaTrobe Street, and over the years has taken over the whole block as the Gaol was decommissioned and the university's courses increased in size.

In 1934, the College became known as the "Melbourne Technical College".

The College played a major part in training over 22,000 servicemen for World War II, especially in the areas of Radio Communications, when the current Chemistry Building (Kernot) was used entirely for this purpose.

In 1954 the College was awarded the right of the prefix "Royal", and associated Monarchy of England regalia. It then became known as the "Royal Melbourne Technical College". [1] Six years later in 1960, there was another name change, this time to "Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology". The name "RMIT" was born.



In June 1979 Emily McPherson College amalgamated with RMIT. Its old building is near the 888 monument. It was a female focused college, and at the time of its merger its courses predominantly covered fashion, textiles and cooking.

In 1992, RMIT merged with the northern suburbs Phillip Institute of Technology and became "RMIT University". Phillip brought to the university campuses in Coburg and Bundoora (now RMIT Bundoora West).

1993 saw the opening of "RMIT Business" in the CBD's Tivoli Building, bringing together operations that had been in a variety of city buildings. Also in that year, the recently dissolved Melbourne College of Design's "Department of Visual Merchandising", and "Department of Interior Decoration and Design" joined RMIT.

In 1995 North Melbourne's Melbourne College of Printing and Graphic Arts merged with RMIT, its courses soon being transferred to the main campus. Also in that year, the Bundoora East campus opened, along with an Aerospace site at Fisherman's Bend.

In 1996, the University opened "RMIT Penang" in a joint venture with a Malaysian company. It offered Advanced Diplomas that were the equivalent of the first two years of an RMIT degree course. [2] The third year had to be studied in Melbourne.

RMIT vacated its Coburg campus, and the site was taken over by Coburg High School in 1996. [3]

The Melbourne Institute of Textiles joined RMIT in 1999, together with its Brunswick campus.

In 2005, RMIT opened a campus in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.

On April 4, 2005 RMIT University appointed a new Vice-Chancellor, Professor Margaret Gardner.

Rankings

Research produced by the Melbourne Institute in 2006 ranked Australian universities across seven main discipline areas: Arts & Humanities, Business & Economics, Education, Engineering, Law, Medicine, and Science.

For each discipline, RMIT University was ranked^[2]:

Discipline	R1*	No.	R2*	No.
Arts & Humanities	23	38	31	35
Business & Economics	19	39	18	34
Education	23	35	26	32
Engineering	10	28	15	28
Law**	-	-	-	-
Medicine**	-	-	-	-
Science	19	38	17	31

.* R1 refers to Australian and overseas Academics' rankings in tables 3.1 -3.7 of the report. R2 refers to the Articles and Research rankings in tables 5.1 - 5.7 of the report. No. refers to the number of institutions in the table against which RMIT is compared.

.** RMIT did not in 2006 have a law school or a medical school (though the Department of Accounting and Law has commenced teaching a JD Law course for Graduate students in late 2007).

The following publications ranked universities worldwide. RMIT ranked:

Publications	Ave.	1999	2000	2001	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007
Times Higher Education Supplement[3]							55	82	146
Shanghai Jiao Tong University[4]						u/r1	u/r	u/r	u/r
Newsweek[5]
The Economist
AsiaWeek*
Financial Times MBA rank[6]
Economist Intelligence Unit's MBA rank[7]
Webometrics[8]:									299

¹ u/r = unranked.

.*AsiaWeek is now discontinued.

Campuses

In 2003, 58,078 students studied at RMIT University campuses in Melbourne and regional Victoria, in Vietnam, online, by distance education and at more than 190 partner institutions throughout the world. Prospective students currently have a choice of more than 200 TAFE and higher education programs.

RMIT belongs to the Australian Technology Network (ATN), an alliance of five prominent Australian universities of technology, each located in a different mainland state of Australia. ATN universities claim a history of collaboration and a commitment to partnerships with industry and the community.

Storey Hall, Swanston Street campus. Completed 1994 to the design of Ashton Raggatt MacDougall	Part of Storey Hall, Swanston Street campus	RMIT Building 4, Swanston Street campus. Completed 1904.	RMIT Building 8, Swanston Street campus.
The RMIT Business campus on Bourke Street (Building 108).	Capitol Theatre lecture rooms

Portfolios

RMIT University offers programs of study in twenty-seven schools across three academic portfolios.

Business

• Accounting and Law
• Business Information Technology
• Business TAFE School
• Economics, Finance and Marketing
• Graduate School of Business
• Management

Design and Social Context

• Applied Communication
• Architecture and Design
• Art
• Creative Media
• Design (TAFE)
• Education
• Fashion and Textiles
• Global Studies, Social Science and Planning
• International Centre of Graphic Technology
• Property, Construction and Project Management

Science, Engineering and Technology

• Aerospace, Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering
• Applied Sciences
• Civil, Chemical and Environmental Engineering
• Computer Science and Information Technology
• Electrical and Computer Engineering
• Health Sciences
• Infrastructure, Electrotechnology and Building Services
• Life and Physical Sciences
• Mathematical and Geospatial Sciences
• Medical Sciences

Student life

The RMIT Student Union operates across all campuses, and is active in organising political campaigns, events and providing support for academic and non-sporting or arts based clubs. The Student Union also publishes a monthly magazine, Catalyst and it supports the operations of the RMITV student television station. Postgraduate students are represented by the RMIT Postgraduate Association, a member of the Council of Australian Postgraduate Associations.

Some people believe the atmosphere at RMIT is unique to many other universities in the area, a belief potentially created by its larger concentration of Computer Science and Engineering students. RMIT Union and Student Union both run a large number of activities and clubs, and allow for social events and interaction between students. In addition, the RMIT Cafeteria areas, 'Intermission' in Building 10, and other recreation areas, such as the womyn's and queer rooms, run by the RMIT Student Union further enhance student interaction.

RMIT Student Union, along with many other Australian university student unions, have been under threat by VSU (Voluntary Student Unionism), a recently introduced law which changed requirements for universities, no longer required to collect a compulsory student union fee. The student union argues that this will result in less services for students, and have organised several protests, in association with other student unions.

RMIT has a history of launching successful community broadcasters including radio stations 3RMT FM (which became 3RRR),SYN and RMITV.

Controversies

RMIT has had a somewhat troubled recent financial history, at least partly due to problems associated with the university's student administration system upgrade (it cost the institution tens of millions of dollars). The university, however, has maintained teaching services. The financial woes eventually claimed the then Vice-Chancellor (Professor Ruth Dunkin) and some of the university's board. However these problems seem to have passed as RMIT posted a $24 million operating profit in 2005, a $50.1 million operating profit in 2006^[9], and is currently in the middle of restructuring its property assets which value at over $1 billion.

Future

The city campus will receive a new heart, with many buildings being renovated in the city. Some will be moved to a new HUB on the old site of CUB. The Business School is also being mooted to move to the site behind the Oxford Scholar Hotel on Swanston Street with a new building to be built there.

Notable Alumni

• Jacques Nasser (Former CEO of the Ford Motor Company)
• Justin Madden (Victorian Politician, former AFL Footballer and architect)
• Paul Stoddart (Australian millionaire & former owner of the Minardi Formula One racing team)
• Jason Wood (Australian Politician)
• Dennis Jensen (Australian Politician)
• Bruce Billson (Australian Politician - Federal Minister for Veteran Affairs)
• Neil Comrie (Former Chief Commissioner of Police for Victoria)
• James Hird (AFL Footballer)
• John Safran (Comedian)
• Rebecca Maddern (Journalist & News Reporter)
• Anthony Hudson (AFL Commentator)
• Kenneth Jack (Artist)
• Robert Ingpen (Graphic Designer)
• Leigh Whannell (Actor & Director)
• James Wan (Director)
• Megan Spencer (Journalist & Triple J Announcer)
• Wu Zun (Chinese actor and boyband member)
• Gillian Chung (Chinese actor and Singing group (twins)

References

External links

• RMIT website
• RMIT Alumni website
• RMIT Racing Formula SAE Team
• Artabase Page For RMIT Gallery
• RMIT University Music

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