AMA VICDOC Autumn 2024 - Magazine - Page 54
D R ROSA L I N D T E R RY
THE FIRST GIRL IN HER FAMILY
TO GO TO UNIVERSITY
ENCOURAGEMENT TO ATTEND
MEDICAL SCHOOL
Raised in Melbourne and Geelong,
Ros's enjoyed school, particularly math.
Despite her father's scepticism about
higher education for women, Ros’s mother
arranged for Ros to sit a scholarship for
MLC without his knowledge. Having
left school at age 14 to become a
dressmaker, despite being dux, her mother
was determined to ensure Ros had the
academic opportunities she had been
denied. When Ros subsequently won the
scholarship, her father capitulated only
on the basis that, “This is worth a lot of
money, so we had better not waste it.”
Ros subsequently won scholarships
throughout her secondary schooling and
successfully completed her matriculation
at MLC. In her final year, however, her
father remained stubbornly unsupportive
of her university aspirations. “Nobody in
the family has been to university and a
girl is not going to be the first.” he stated.
Despite her father’s reluctance, he finally
allowed her to undertake a three-year
science degree in 1957, when Ros won a
Commonwealth scholarship to attend the
University of Melbourne. While studying,
she won a fees scholarship, allowing her to
live at the University’s Women's College.
This period marked a significant shift in
her life, eliminating the exhausting threehour commute from home; and allowing
her to blend work and study seamlessly,
working in the Microbiology Department
at the University while also completing
a Master of Science majoring
in Microbiology.
Ros then moved to the United States
for three years, accompanying her first
husband while he studied a higher degree
in theology. In Chicago Ros worked as a
biochemist and in Madison Wisconsin
in the veterinary laboratory headquarters.
While in Chicago her supervisor noted
Ros’s potential for a career in medicine.
She encouraged Ros to pursue this in
America; believing in Ros’ potential
so strongly that she personally flew to
Washington in the hope she might be
able to organise a visa extension for Ros
to study medicine in the United States,
but without success.
Back in Australia, Ros received similar
encouragement while working in the
veterinary laboratories in Launceston
Tasmania. Her new supervisors
emboldened Ros to pursue medicine –
but if Ros were going to become a doctor,
there would be no straightforward way to
do it. With no medical school in Tasmania,
she returned to Melbourne. And with
second Commonwealth scholarships
disallowed and her marriage having
ended; she had to do this on her own.
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