The University of Western Australia
BY SPENCER LIU
Oct 2013
Dental students saw the new McGeachie-Tennant food kiosk built in what seemed like no time at all, with the official opening on August 7. The enclosed kiosk replaced the mobile cart, allowing Kim and her staff to offer more options to the staff, students and patients at OHCWA.
In a historic first, UWA Guild President Cameron Barnes and a few of his colleagues met with UWA students. This meeting allowed students to raise pertinent concerns and initiate productive communication. The 2014 UWA Guild Elections are imminent, with candidates running for various positions, each hoping to bring about change. We wish them all thebest!
There have been several events, including Red Party 2013 with other allied health students from different WA universities to raise funds for Oxfam Australia’s Integrated HIV and AIDS Program, South Africa. There may not be many pictures fromthe NOBOTE Pub Crawl, but for all you know, it was that fun. Even though the semester is quickly coming to a close, there are still a couple more events, like the annual Quiz Night and Dental Dinner.
Currently many of our fifth year dental students are out on placements in various parts of Western Australia and around the world! In WA we are spread from Albany in the south up to Bunbury and even all the way up to the Kimberley. These placements have been a fantastic experience for many of our final year students and hopefully will provide a wealth of knowledge and many memorable experiences.
The graduation ceremony for last year’s crop of budding dentists was held recently, and if you’re reading this as a new UWA dental grad, congratulations and all the best for the future. Hopefully you can retain your passion for dentistry and not let your enthusiasm decay!
Keep smiling everybody, and don’t forget to floss :)
Jenny Hanna
University of Western Australia
UWA has had a great start to 2013! This is the first year we’ve had an intake of DMD students into the post graduate course so it’s been great for us to have ‘freshers’ around again and hopefully everyone is settling into the craziness of dentistry well without too many teething issues!
We kicked off the social side of things with ‘Fresher Welcome’ on the dental school lawn on March 8th. UDLs were piled high and our traditional boat racing was as intense as ever. We’ve also had a very successful cake stall to raise funds for our student society. There is plenty more to come, with the annual ‘No-Bote,’ Nogga, Quiz Night, Dental Dinner, G.V. Black’s birthday and Sports Day to look forward to. Brace yourself!
2012 has been an insanely busy year for dental students this side of the Nullabor desert. UWA didn’t have any first year dents this year and so ‘Fresherless Welcome’ was held on the lawn outside our dental school at the start of the year, possibly the ‘closest we would get to nature all year.’ (Sad, but probably true.) The UDLs were piled high, the boat racing was intense, no one has any idea who won, and no one can really remember too much else about the night. Success, yes?

............................................................................ North Nogga was a huge triumph this year- an ............................................................................ ‘Amazing Race’ style event where teams of dental ............................................................................ students (or should I say Mario brothers, ............................................................................ Power Rangers and elite athletes) competed in ............................................................................ challenges around Perth, including seeing who could ............................................................................ take the best alginate impression, who could make ............................................................................ the best plasticine tooth (or phallus?), and who could ............................................................................ win fluffy bunnies (Tim Stevens, your mouth is ............................................................................ ginormous!). Rubberdamsel was awarded to yours ............................................................................ truly, and Amalgaman (or should I say, Amalga- ............................................................................ maniac) went to Marc Nalder.
............................................................................ UWA had a solid turn out at this year’s Sydney Convention in July. No arrests this year (winning!) but we all caught the flu (AKA ‘Conventionitis’) and then proceeded to return home and infect everyone at dental school who didn’t even go. We’re all super keen for Radelaide 2013, which for many convention diehards will be our fifth and final convention. *sniff*
The students and clinical tutors got together to celebrate G.V. Black's
birthday on Friday August 3 (not quite his actual birth date, but close
enough!) at the local pub. There was lots of dancing, free drink tokens
and a seriously impressive cake (thanks to our cooking extraordinaire
Clare Chantler)! Our dentistry father would have been prouder than
a proud amalgam. Lol. (Lame, I know).
The inaugural UDSS Sports Day saw all years come together on
September 1 for basketball, volleyball and soccer. I think fourth years
were victorious (was difficult to tell, just so much talent all round). It
was a nice reminder to all participants just how fat and unfit we’ve
become studying dentistry.
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Our annual Quiz Night was held at the Tav on September 14 and had an Olympic Games theme, where teams dressed in countries of their choice. Hats off to the team ‘Bogan Australia’ for their impressive (and surprising!) win. Angus Dinnison, Ryan ‘Mo’ Moldrich and Jeffrey Yong were the smallest team and also the drunkest by far, but managed to come from behind and steal victory from Russia and Hawaii.
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There’s also been the annual pubcrawl ‘Nobote,’ affectionately named because we’re not well behaved enough to be trusted with an actual boat. The nautical theme ensured lots of naughtiness and a very drunken time was had by all. Our social year is far from over though with the Dental Dinner on November 23 at the Hyatt Regency. Exciting!
But it’s not all about drinking and strutting it up in WA. We’ve been on some Primary School Visits to teach local kids about oral hygiene, and also helped out at a Mums n Bubs expo giving free dental exams to children. Everyone is currently busy preparing for exams, or in the case of fourth year students, recovering from a horrific week of examinations in which 5 exams testing four years’ worth of knowledge were squeezed into 7 days. FML.
I would like to specially mention a few standout UWA dental students of 2012...Congratulations to Luke Rodman, our current student society president, who has just been elected as a UWA Guild Councilor for2013! And also to Siamak Saberi, for massively improving dental student welfare at UWA over the past 5 years. Siamak is a bit of a hero at our dental school and we wish him all the best for when he graduates at the end of this year.
Also congrats to all those UWA dental students who ran the Chevron City to Surf this year. Nice to see that you’re getting some fresh air outside dental school. And props to Hayden Brooke for winning Footy Tipping. You probably cheated.
Keep smiling everyone!
