University of Otago

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.

The university was founded in 1869, and opened in July 1871. Its motto is "Sapere aude" ("Dare to be wise"). This motto was copied by the University of New Zealand. The University of Otago Students' Association answers this with its own motto, "Audeamus" ("we dare").

Until 1961 the University of Otago was affiliated with 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-instated.

Some of its many diverse buildings appear in the following panorama:

The University clocktower viewed from Castle Street.

It began teaching medicine in 1875, and is one of the two medical schools in New Zealand.

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

• Robert Burns Fellowship
• Caroline Plummer Fellowship in Community Dance
• Charles Hercus Fellowship
• Claude McCarthy Fellowship
• Foxley Fellowship
• Frances Hodgkins Fellowship
• Henry Lang Fellowship
• Hocken Fellowship
• James Cook Fellowship
• Mozart Fellowship
• 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 be used for future funding) put Otago in fourth place in New Zealand.

Colleges and halls

These Colleges and halls are not as significant in the academic life of the University compared with colleges of the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge with the exceptions of Selwyn and Knox Colleges which do have resident fellows and operate as if they were Oxbridge colleges (eg with chapels etc) and as a result are regarded as the most prestigious and most popular among New Zealanders--in other words they are true "colleges". Selwyn and Knox are incorporated as separate corporations from the University.

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

Notable alumni and alumnae

Internal AskFactMaster.Com links

• Barbara Anderson
• Dame Silvia Cartwright, Governor-General of New Zealand
• Bill English
• Ian Fraser, broadcaster, head of Television New Zealand
• Fergus Hume
• Chris Laidlaw
• Michael Laws, politician and broadcaster
• John Edward "Jack" Lovelock
• Kamisese Mara
• Arnold Nordmeyer
• 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/)
• [http://www.forbar.co.nz/downloads/{990E1EB2-7260-4017-B0B8-31FA3F4035E5}.pdf General outline of Burns, Hodgkins, and Mozart Fellowships]
• About the Bose-Einstein Condensate (http://www.physics.otago.ac.nz/research/bec/)

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