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Monash University () is a public research university based in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Named for prominent World War I general Sir John Monash, it was founded in 1958 and is the second oldest university in the state. The university has a number of campuses, four of which are in Victoria ( Clayton, Caulfield, Peninsula, and Parkville), and one in Malaysia. Monash also has a research and teaching centre in Prato, Italy, a graduate research school in Mumbai, India and graduate schools in Suzhou, China and Tangerang, Indonesia. Monash University courses are also delivered at other locations, including South Africa.

Monash is home to major research facilities, including the Monash Law School, the Australian Synchrotron, the Monash Science Technology Research and Innovation Precinct (STRIP), the Australian Stem Cell Centre, Victorian College of Pharmacy, and 100 research centres and 17 co-operative research centres. In 2019, its total revenue was over $2.72 billion (AUD), with external research income around $462 million. In 2019, Monash enrolled over 55,000 undergraduate and over 25,000 graduate students. It has more applicants than any other university in the state of Victoria.

Monash is a member of Australia's Group of Eight research universities, a member of the ASAIHL, and is the only Australian member of the M8 Alliance of Academic Health Centers, Universities and National Academies. Monash is one of the Australian universities to be ranked in the École des Mines de Paris (Mines ParisTech) ranking on the basis of the number of alumni listed among CEOs in the 500 largest worldwide companies.

History

Early history: 1950s

Established by an Act of Parliament in 1958, the original campus was in the suburb of Clayton where the university was granted an expansive site of 100 hectares of open land. The 100 hectares of land consisted of farmland and included the former Talbot Epileptic Colony. The Tudor-style farmhouse built by the O'Shea family became the original Vice-Chancellor's House - now University House.

From its first intake of 357 students at Clayton on 13 March 1961, the university grew rapidly in size and student numbers so that by 1967, it had enrolled more than 21,000 students since its establishment. In its early years, it offered undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in engineering, medicine, science, arts, economics, politics, education, and law. It was a major provider for international student places under the Colombo Plan, which saw the first Asian students enter the Australian education system.

In its early years of teaching, research and administration, Monash did not have entrenched traditional practices, and as such, Monash was able to adopt modern approaches without significant resistance. A modern administrative structure was set up; Australia's first research centres and scholarships devoted to Indigenous Australians were established.

The university was named after the prominent Australian general Sir John Monash. This was the first time in Australia that a university had been named after a person, rather than a city or state.

1970s onwards

From the mid-1960s to the early 1970s, Monash became the centre of student radicalism in Australia. It was the site of many mass student demonstrations, particularly concerning Australia's role in Vietnam War and conscription. By the late 1960s, several student organisations, some of which were influenced by or supporters of communism, turned their focus to Vietnam, with numerous blockades and sit-ins. In one extraordinary event that came to be known as the Monash Siege, students forced then Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser to hide in a basement at the Alexander Theatre, in a major protest over the Whitlam dismissal.

In the late 1970s and 1980s, some of Monash's most publicised research came through its pioneering of in-vitro fertilisation (IVF). Led by Carl Wood and Alan Trounson, the Monash IVF Program achieved the world's first clinical IVF pregnancy in 1973. In 1980, they delivered the first IVF baby in Australia. This eventually became a massive source of revenue for the university at a time when university funding in Australia was beginning to slow down.

In the late 1980s, the Dawkins Reforms changed the landscape of higher education in Australia. Under the leadership of Vice-Chancellor Mal Logan, Monash transformed dramatically. In 1988, Monash University had only one campus in Clayton, with around 15,000 students. Just over a decade later, it had 8 campuses (including 2 overseas), a European research and teaching centre, and more than 50,000 students, making it the largest and most internationalised Australian university.

Expansion in the 1990s

Expansion of the university began in 1990 with a series of mergers between Monash, the Chisholm Institute of Technology, and the Gippsland Institute of Advanced Education. In 1991 a merger with the Victorian College of Pharmacy created a new faculty of the university. This continued in 1994, with the establishment of the Berwick campus.

In 1998, the university opened the Malaysia campus, its first overseas campus and the first foreign university in Malaysia. In 2001, Monash South Africa opened its doors in Johannesburg, making Monash the first foreign university in South Africa. The same year, the university secured an 18th-century Tuscan palace to open a research and teaching centre in Prato, Italy.

At the same time, Australian universities faced unprecedented demand for international student places, which Monash met on a larger scale than most. Today, around 30% of its students are from outside Australia. Monash students come from over 100 countries, and speak over 90 different languages. The increase in international students, combined with the university's expansion, meant that Monash's income greatly increased throughout the 1990s, and it is now one of Australia's top 200 exporters.

2000 onwards

In recent years, the university has been prominent in medical research. A highlight of this came in 2000, when Alan Trounson led the team of scientists which announced to the world that nerve stem cells could be derived from embryonic stem cells, a discovery which led to a dramatic increase in interest in the potential of stem cells. It has also led to Monash being ranked in the top 20 universities in the world for biomedicine.

On 21 October 2002 Huan Yun "Allen" Xiang, shot two people dead and injured five others on the Clayton campus. Since December 2011, Monash has had a global alliance with the University of Warwick in the United Kingdom.

In 2014, the university ceded its Gippsland campus to Federation University. On 15 July 2016, Monash confirmed that Federation University Australia would take over the operations of the Berwick campus prior to the end of 2018.

In 2019, the university sold its Monash South Africa campus to Advtech. Students who were on schedule to complete their degree on time would still receive a degree from Monash University after the sale. The reason for the sale was reported low profitability and enrollment numbers. Prior to the sale, Monash University had sidelined the South African campus on its official websites and did not refer to it as a 'campus' unlike Monash Malaysia.

Monash announced its second Southeast Asian expansion in Indonesia as it officially obtained its operational license from the Ministry of Education and Culture on 1 December 2020. The university plans to open its campus doors in October 2021, located in BSD City, Tangerang, Banten. Unlike Monash Malaysia, Monash Indonesia will focus on graduate studies.

Campuses

Australia

Clayton

The Clayton campus covers an area over 1.1 km² and is the largest of the Monash campuses. Clayton is the flagship campus for Monash, demanding higher ATAR (Australian Tertiary Admission Rank) scores than all the other campuses, with the exception of Parkville. Clayton is home to the faculties of Arts, Business & Economics, Education, Engineering, IT, Law, Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences, Pharmaceutical Science and Science. The Clayton campus has its own suburb and postcode (3800).

Various major scientific research facilities are located on or adjacent to the campus. Chief among these are the Australian Synchrotron and CSIRO.

The campus is also home to numerous restaurants and retail outlets, as well as student bars Sir John's (located in the Campus Centre) and the Notting Hill Hotel (located down the street, founded in 1891), both of which are hubs of social life on the campus.

The campus is also home to a number of halls of residence, colleges and other on-campus accommodation that house several thousand students. Six halls of residence are located at the Clayton campus in Clayton, Victoria

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