A ministry update!

After a delightful time shopping and eating delicious new things at the Queen Victoria market early yesterday morning, Mike picked up Ash and Jared and I and drove us out to LaTrobe University to meet with the Christian Union team there. Ash will be writing a little bit about that meeting and another meeting with a national staff member with Christian Union working with graduate students. Suffice to say, the eyebrows wagged in our favor and we had a couple of really productive, positive meetings yesterday.

Today I hopped on the bus to Monash to meet Ash and Mike there for the undergraduate Student Life (Campus Crusade in Australia) weekly meeting, which was delightful. Then I wandered upstairs to the Monash Postgraduate Association, an office which serves the Post-grads (Graduate students) at Monash with seminars, socials, support, and advocacy. Here they have 4 full-time staff devoted to helping graduate students to cope with grad school problems and find community. Jenny, executive officer of MPA, sat down with me and happily answered all my questions about how the MPA works. Basically, the university funds the MPA to increase the completion rate (graduation rate) of post-grads by providing advice and support. In the case of conflict with supervisors (advisors) or problems with intellectual property rights, the MPA can act as an independent advocate for the graduate student, explaining their options and even going with them to help sort things out. I'm not sure if there's really anything like it in the 'states.

Ash joined us later and we continued a great discussion about the perils of graduate school and the role that a group like ours, devoted to meeting the physical, emotional, and spiritual needs of graduate students could play. The MPA provides a lot of inspiration for our work in the future at Penn State and in Melbourne. The mission of the MPA to support graduate students is very much like ours in PSCG. Their website even uses the slogan "Don't go it alone" - which we've discussed using in the past. Perhaps they would like our Top 10 reasons to get involved with PSCG, including "Your advisor is not your God" and "The late-night library raves are getting old."

P.S. It has come to my attention that our Slideshow gadget up on the right-hand side seems to be broken, hopefully temporarily. In the meantime, click here to visit our gallery

First day of Australia

We arrived in Melbourne this morning, travel-weary and bereft of Tuesday. Mike Shepski, the state director for Student Life (Campus Crusade in Australia) and a Penn State grad, collected us from the airport and took us to his home so we could shower off the stench of 16.5 hours on a plane, nourish ourselves with coffee, and email our loved ones, thus regaining much of our humanity lost on the long journey from LA.

We squeezed back into the car to head to Melbourne University campus. As far as I can tell, Melbourne University is a cross between Hogwart's, Harvard, and Penn State. Later, we headed over to Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT) to hang out with the Crusade undergrad summer project team doing an outreach in front of the RMIT 'caf' (Cafeteria). Blood sugar levels dangerously near zero, we walked across the street to Melbourne Central, a train station/mall. There we were fortified by delicious Malay cuisine before moving on to our next meeting at University House to meet with Malcom and Sandy who are involved with post-grad (grad student) ministry at Melbourne. University House is a private club for faculty and staff at the university with a fine sitting room where we sipped tea and hot chocolate and felt much like Britons.

(Parenthetically: Ash and I have just determined that we have been awake or engaging in what passes as sleep on a plane for the past 48 hours. Our insanity has begun to thicken and solidify like pudding. If this entry doesn't seem very coherent, that is why.)

Malcom and Sandy were delightful and we really enjoyed meeting with them while the rain began pouring down in earnest outside. Dodging the rain, we met up with our hosts James and Jane, at the train station. As the day closed we found ourselves running on fumes, and used our train ride to learn how to use Aussie phrases like "No Worries" inappropriately to random strangers. Now our kind hosts have fed us and tried their darndest to keep us awake with conversation. However, motor skills and language are beginning to fail me and I must go to bed, even though it's only 8:24pm. Look forward to more interesting/less erratic updates tomorrow.