Ann Zubrick

I was a graduate student in psychology at the University of Michigan and in my mid twenties when I was assigned to teach a course on Adult Development and Ageing. I knew about adult development, but not much about ageing! It was an excellent learning opportunity, as teaching a subject so often is. Since then I've taught many similar courses and the ageing aspect has become my favourite part.

The career I had for some twenty five years was focused on speech pathology, primarily as a university professor and clinician training students in professional speech pathology practice. I've taught in a wonderful variety of places: Curtin University, University of Michigan, University of Hong Kong, University of Notre Dame Australia and been a visiting professor at universities in China, Malaysia, Singapore and New Zealand.

My time is divided now in a number of directions - or perhaps I should say 'balanced' across a number of interests.

Currently I sit on five boards-Council on the Ageing (WA), the Brightwater Care Group, Centre of Excellence in Alzheimers Research and Care, ASeTTS (a wonderful organisation that supports refugees), and The Friends' School in Hobart. Serving on these boards provides me with insights into a range of contemporary medical, educational and social challenges.

I've also returned to study-as a distance student-and will complete a Masters Degree in Ageing and Pastoral Studies at the end of 2010. Last year I wrote a course called Facing and fulfilling the later years . The ten sessions are designed to get people thinking and talking honestly about different aspects of getting older and old. My current goal is to run the program with several different groups in the community and to build upon and refine it further.

Music is important to me too. I'm an alto member of two large oratorio choirs, and have had the opportunity of travelling interstate and overseas to sing in some of the most wonderful venues-most recently in the Sydney Opera House.

There is a problem in all this, however. When the box on a form asks 'occupation', I find myself puzzling about what to write. In the past I would confidently have chosen either educator, psychologist, speech pathologist and even consultant. Now none of these quite fits.

Although I don't have an occupational label that fits me at this stage of my life, I commit to things that matter to me and that I trust make a difference to others.

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