Australian Administrative Staff College, 1956-1970

Component identifier:

Series 40

Content Summary:

Modelled on the Administrative Staff College at Henley in England, the Administrative Staff College was incorporated in 1955 with the support of 60 companies 'to give an opportunity to senior executives in public and private enterprise to review the major problems of administration in coordinated discussion...' Copland was approached while in Canada by the Chairman of the College Council, Sir Essington Lewis, to be its founding Principal. He studied overseas administrative training courses during 1956, and between October 1956 and March 1960 established the College at Mt. Eliza near Melbourne. A study method based on syndicates was introduced in which participants lived-in for a fixed term or session.

The work of the College between 1956 and 1960 is well documented by records in the Copland Papers, and this material forms the basis of Series 40. It includes syndicate reports, correspondence about College matters with people such as Sir Alexander Fleck, Professor R.N. Spann and W.S. Lowe, correspondence conducted by Copland's secretary Joan Morrish, and publications such as Copland's Administrative staff training: a new frontier in education (Staff paper no. 1; F.W. Cheshire, 1957). A set of addresses delivered by the Principal, 1958-60 with attached College distribution slips and some of his lectures to Syndicate 7 are also in Series 40.

The remainder covers 1960-1970 and documents the contact Copland maintained with the College through the Victorian and New South Wales Branches of the Australian Administrative Staff College Association. This section also has his correspondence with two subsequent Principals, Sir Ragnar Garrett and Maurice Brown and Collegemen, such as, C.S. Booth and Harold Harvey. It also includes some roneoed newsletters and circulars distributed to 'old boys' of the College, some post 1960 syndicate lectures, and a 1970 College Handbook.

A brief history of the College's origins are outlined in Copland's 'The Australian Administrative Staff College' in Personnel Practice Bulletin, xii (No. 6) June 1957. See also 'The freshest field' by Maurice Brown (Economic Record, vol. 36, no. 73, 1960: 169-72).

Immediate source of acquisition:

Lady Copland presented the personal papers of Sir Douglas Copland to the National Library in September 1973. Additions to the collection were received from the Copland Family between 1977 and 1981.

Names:

Copland, D.B. (Douglas Berry), 1894-1971

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