Principal Renouf's 2022 Valete speech

Welcome

Good evening, Chairman Greg Mills, distinguished guests and council members, Residential Fellows, BRA President Bas Braham, staff and residents, and welcome to Valete.

I acknowledge and celebrate the First Australians on whose traditional lands we meet, and whose cultures are among the oldest continuing cultures in human history. I pay my respects to elders, past, present and emerging and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island people present this evening.

Reflecting on the year

Our annual Valete dinner is an opportunity to reflect on the year past and I am already enjoying some of the highlights, thank you Abby and Nathan.

Firstly, thank you to our staff team who worked so hard this year through our COVID outbreak and beyond to provide support for this community; everyone went above and beyond to ensure the College is a safe and vibrant place to live.

Thank you in particular also to Margaret, Ivana and Rachelle for organising tonight’s fabulous event.

Thanking leadership teams

I’d like to recognise the enormous work our leadership team have done over the course of the year. Could our RAs, BRA, GSEAs, Academic Network Coordinators, IT Crowd, bar staff, App media managers, Cultural Change Working Group, along with everyone who has participated in a Committee this year, be it Diversity, Charities, BurgSAG, O Week, Bush Week, Burg Ball, Mx Burg, please stand up? They have put in a huge amount of work. Congratulations!

I’d also like our Inward Bound team and everyone involved in IB to stand. I would like to acknowledge the hard work you have put in for an incredibly important interhall event that has history dating back 60 years.

I acknowledge the disappointment felt when the event was postponed. We are excited that IB is going ahead this weekend. You have put so much effort in and we would like to acknowledge this.

I encourage residents to attend send-off this Saturday evening and get up early on Sunday to attend end point and cheer home the teams. There will be a reception at end point and a dedicated area to study.

I would now like to say a few words about our dedicated BRA President Bas Braham.

It has been nothing short of an honour to work with Bas. From the first day of your Presidency, you have demonstrated unwavering dedication to our community; resilience, strength and intelligence. As President of BRA and as a member of the College’s Board, you have always been a considered and measured voice for our community and a strong bystander for the wider residential community at the ANU. Congratulations, Bas, and thank you.

Valete is an opportunity for our community to celebrate the year gone and to farewell members of our community who are leaving. Although our valedictorians may not call Burgmann College home next year, they remain an integral part of our community as they become alumni.

We hope you will come back in the future for alumni events, or perhaps sharing your expertise through the Burgmann Alumni Mentoring Program (BAM). Please be sure to join our Alumni App*—a professional networking tool for Burgies.

As I reflect on another year gone, I think about all the ways residents have contributed to the community; how we’ve seen you grow; and we’ve gotten to learn a bit more about you all. It makes me appreciate why Burgmann exists.

My husband Brodie has a tattoo in Latin which reads, Esse quam videri. It means, To be, rather than to seem. He has it as a constant reminder of the work that is necessary to do in life, of continually striving to be true to who you are; not beholden to the expectations of others, or attracted to the veneer you can portray to others.

It strikes me that this motto, To be, rather than to seem, is relevant to our community. When you live 24 hours a day with others, it’s not possible to keep up a front, to be fake.

There’s no Instagram filter for 8am weekday breakfast in the Dining Hall.

As our moles will no doubt tell you, pretending to be someone you’re not, for any extended amount of time, can be exhausting. Unless of course, you’re Leonard McGullen, whose presence in our community persists on in unexpected and delightful ways.

What I mean though is that newcomers to the College, armed with their ATAR-pride and CV-list of achievements, quickly find that actually, while you should absolutely be proud of these things; ultimately, it’s not what you’ve done, or the image you project to the world that means the most.

It takes courage to be vulnerable, to let people see the parts of you that are fallible. That the whole of you is actually complex and a work in progress. And importantly, to feel the relief when you realise, people accept this about you.

I commend you for choosing to spend some of your most formative years in this community—doing the work to realise the best and worst parts of yourself; reconciling this with being a complete human being, an honest version of yourself, with a greater understanding of who you are, becoming the best person you can be.

I hope your time at Burgmann has helped you be, rather than to seem.

To our residents who are leaving us at the end of the year, farewell and good luck. Please don’t be a stranger—come back for a meal if you’re undernourished or join the staff for the quiz and morning tea—you are always welcome in the Burgmann Community.

Thank you.

*Editor's note: The Burgmann Alumni app has since been retired.