Vice-Chancellor and President Martin Bean CBE said RMIT was excited to welcome someone of Eastman’s calibre and experience.
“Mish has diverse experience in leading through complexity, across both tertiary education and health environments,” he said.
“She has strong expertise in identifying and creating new models of education and training in collaboration with industry, enhancing tertiary pathways, and understanding how to create educational and employment success for learners.”
Eastman said she was excited to lead the next era of VE at RMIT.
“RMIT has a strong and proud history of learning through doing, and applying that to the contemporary world of work to ensure VE graduates are the next generation of skilled, knowledgeable, adaptable and productive employees, employers, business creators and community leaders,” she said.
“It is our job to provide the right balance of practice, challenge, support, learning and assessment so VE graduates can shape and embrace this future world of work.
“We must remain focussed on creating outstanding graduate outcomes in partnership with industry, government and community.”
Eastman began her career as a nurse before moving into education and leadership roles with TAFE Tasmania and the Tasmanian Polytechnic.
Most recently, she was Executive Director Pathways and Vocational Education (PAVE) at Swinburne University of Technology, providing strategic and operational leadership over teaching and learning programs.
Eastman, whose first day at RMIT is today (Monday 18 November), said her leadership style was “credible, authentic, collaborative and motivated”.
“A range of leaders and mentors have been critical to my professional growth as a leader and challenged, supported, encouraged and pushed me when needed,” she said.
“They’ve all had the common thread of humanity, social conscious, and public purpose.
“As a result, I’d describe myself as passionate and compassionate. I’m a big picture thinker who likes working in fast-paced environments and am focused on impact and outcomes.”
Eastman also shared her views on two of the big topics facing Australian society, aged care and gender equality.
She said she was a strong believer that “you can’t be what you can’t see” so creating opportunities for women and men to have diverse and visible leadership role models was critical.
“What we measure and track creates momentum so we need to bring to life the data about gender equality and inequality, myth bust and implement tangible targets and new ways of working to create lasting, scalable social change. This will lead to more effective, innovative and healthier organisations,” she said.
Society and communities were also facing big questions about how ageing was valued, how intergenerational living, learning and community environments were created and how to attract young people to work in aged care, she said.
“Importantly at a student and resident level, it is about delivering on a promise of students who are connected, with practical exposure and applied work experiences from day one, who value and understand the clients they will be working with and can apply theory into practice with compassion, care and joy for the every day.”
Story: Amelia Harris
