The honour recognises Brenda’s exceptional contribution to the University and her longstanding commitment to health, medical research and tertiary education.

It was conferred at the Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology graduation ceremony on Monday 10 August, where Brenda addressed the University’s newest graduates.

University of Melbourne Interim Vice-Chancellor Professor Glyn Davis AC said Brenda’s life’s work had taken her “from the heart of Australian finance to the frontiers of medical research”.

“She has built, in the Aikenhead Centre for Medical Discovery, something that will outlast us all,” Professor Davis said.

Brenda began her career in business and finance, becoming a member of the Australian Stock Exchange and serving on the boards of major Australian companies. She built a reputation for rigour, sound judgement and determination, qualities she would later bring to an entirely different challenge.

“What distinguishes her is what she did next; turning her instinct and discipline to the cause of human health,” Professor Davis said.

Her connection with health and medical innovation spans decades. As a member of the Australian Advisory Board on Technology and Healthcare Competitiveness, she helped shape national thinking about the role of innovation in healthcare. From 2003 to 2009, she served as a National Board Director of the Sisters of Charity Health Service.

But it is ACMD that most clearly reflects Brenda’s vision.

She has chaired the ACMD Board since 2016, guiding the Centre from an ambitious idea to a purpose-built home for clinicians, engineers, scientists and students within St Vincent’s Hospital Melbourne.

Her conviction was simple but powerful: bring the people who understand patients’ needs together with those who can design and build solutions and give them the environment and support to turn promising ideas into better care.

Today, teams from St Vincent’s and ACMD’s university and research partners work side by side, focused on closing the distance between medical discovery and the patients who stand to benefit.

Professor Davis acknowledged Brenda’s central role in securing the funding that made ACMD possible and in steering its development from concept to institution.

“Her true achievement is the belief central to its foundations, that the distance between a discovery and a patient is the distance that matters most, and that Australia can close it,” he said.

“The ACMD is among the great translational achievements of Australian medicine, and it stands as her legacy.

“Ms Shanahan came to us, many years ago, as a student of commerce. She returns to us as a builder of institutions, a benefactor of medical discovery and a friend of this University in the fullest sense.

“In conferring the title of Fellow, we honour not only what Brenda Shanahan has achieved, but what will follow from it; in laboratories she has funded, in careers she has enabled, and in the lives of Australians, in years to come, who will be healthier because of what she chose to build.”

Dean of the Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology Professor Thas Nirmalathas also recognised Brenda’s remarkable generosity, including through the Brenda Shanahan Charitable Foundation, of which she is Founder and Trustee.

“Ms Shanahan has made an enormous contribution, giving to and governing institutions across medicine and the arts, as Chair of St Vincent’s Medical Research Institute, benefactor of St Vincent’s Health and the University of Melbourne, Treasurer and Director of Kimberley Foundation Australia, and former Chair of the St Vincent’s Institute Foundation,” Professor Nirmalathas said.

In 2021, the Foundation endowed the Shanahan Chair in Frontier Medical Solutions at the University of Melbourne. The Chair is held by Professor Andrea O’Connor, whose work is dedicated to translating biomedical engineering research into better health outcomes.

For everyone at ACMD, Brenda’s Fellowship is a fitting recognition of her leadership, generosity and determination and of a vision that will continue to shape Australian healthcare for generations.

Vice-Chancellor, distinguished guests, fellow members of the University, proud families and friends and above all our graduates.

Congratulations. It is a great honour to join you all in celebrating this special moment in your lives.

It is also special to be in the Royal Exhibition Building which hosted the opening of Australia’s first Federal Parliament, just over 125 years ago. It is fitting that we are celebrating your graduation where history was created and acknowledge that the country has faced many challenges since then, but grown into a confident and forward-looking nation, bound by fairness and equality.

You are now part of the diverse communities that will shape and strengthen our nation. You have achieved a range of high-quality qualifications, allowing you to make an ongoing contribution to your chosen professions or vocations and importantly to your particular communities. And it is your opportunity for contribution that I want to highlight today.

I can still remember being in your shoes, graduating from the University of Melbourne, and wondering what might come of my life. Looking back, I realise life doesn’t unfold based on a grand plan that you set and follow. If I told my story that way it wouldn’t be true.

Instead, it is my reflection now, that some simple habits have guided my journey and enabled both joy and contribution that I couldn’t imagine when I graduated. So, what are they?

Firstly, remain curious and open to all challenges and opportunities.

You do not know where that next offer will lead you. I almost always said “yes”!

It has seen a young commerce graduate working in finance, travel through the worlds of stockbroking, healthcare and medical research with many side roads along the way.…. maybe my mother’s role in healthcare was a Northstar in that journey, I was always very proud of her contribution to the community.

Secondly, remain optimistic and back your beliefs about a better future.

Twenty years ago, a small group began talking about the problem of being a nation of outstanding researchers without the same outcome in innovation and translation. We could see this in healthcare and medical research. We wondered what would happen if instead of everybody working in silos, we bring clinicians, engineers, scientists, universities, industry and government together… not just as neighbours, but as true collaborators? The truth is we believed in this, but we did not know how to make it happen.

That concept eventually became the Aikenhead Centre for Medical Discovery, which is across the street from where we are this evening, on the exciting Fitzroy innovation precinct centred around St Vincent’s Hospital.

What is the lesson I offer here…. Worthy ideas do not start with solutions but a belief that a problem is worth solving, and it is this belief that builds the collective, and wins the efforts of others necessary to find solutions that create a better future. The biggest breakthroughs happen when we remove the invisible walls between disciplines, institutions and ways of thinking. Breakthroughs rarely happen in isolation. We can do more together than we can do alone.

Thirdly, remain generous and giving to others.

At various stages, I have mentored, advised, and given support and encouragement to people and organisations. I like doing this. What I recognise now is how valuable that has been to my life journey and contribution. Generosity is the fuel for trust, partnership and collaborative work. It will reward your career and expand your capacity for contribution.

So today we are here celebrating the graduation of some of the most dedicated and determined of our young people, including many who have come from around the world to this most impressive institution – the University of Melbourne.

The next chapter of life in Australia and around the world will be shaped by you and cohorts like you. I urge you to be curious and open, back your beliefs for a better world, and be generous in your time and care for others… with the love and support of all that are here with you today. Thank you.