Modern Greek Studies at UNSW

In 1989 UNSW began teaching the first Modern Greek course on a part-time basis. The drive was initiated by HELSOC under the enlightened leadership of Paul Nicolaou. Due to the limited resources and the inability to sustain the course indefinitely, Paul approached Costa Vertzayias (founder and first president of HELSOC), who was, at the time, President of the Federation of Hellenic Associations (also known by its Greek acronym as OFSE).

After a number of community consultations it was resolved to approach the University to request the establishment of Greek Studies on a permanent basis. The then Vice-Chancellor, Professor John Niland (who is generally acknowledged to have led the University through its golden age) agreed to establish Modern Greek on a permanent basis. To do so it would require the Greek Community to raise $250,000 and this would be matched by UNSW.

Costa then approached the major Greek community organisations. The Hellenic Club offered to commence the fund raising drive with $10,000. Accordingly, in late 1994 the Hellenic Club settled the sum of $10,000 and founded the Foundation for Hellenic Studies (UNSW) with the trustees being Eleni Amvrazi (the Greek lecturer at the time), Emanuel John Comino (representing AHEPA), Harry Danalis (representing the Greek Orthodox Community of NSW), Angelo George Hatsatouris (representing the Archdiocese), Stan Kondilios (then President of HELSOC), Joan Messaris (from the O Kosmos Newspaper), Paul Nicolaou (representing HELSOC and UNSW), and Constantine Dion Vertzayias (President of OFSE).

Over $280,000 was raised within 12 months and the University contributed $250,000 to establish the Modern Greek Fund. The fundraising was an extraordinary achievement with an unprecedented universal response across the community and involved pensioners donating from their savings, associations and the Archdiocese circulating a special plate one Sunday. It demonstrated what could be achieved when there is unity of purpose. In fact, it was so successful that a similar campaign was launched shortly thereafter for Macquarie Universitywith the same result.

The FHS Trust Deed was structured in a manner that involved the peak Greek community organisations (the Inter-Communities Council of the Archdiocese, the Greek Orthodox Community of NSW, AHEPA, OFSE) having the power to appoint trustees. This was expanded to include the Cyprus Community. At all times the HELSOC president is an ex officio member of the Board of Trustees. Costa Vertzayias was elected the Chair of the Foundation, a position which he holds to the present day. Angelo Hatsatouris, Harry Danalis and Paul Nicolaou have also continued as trustees from their initial appointment. In addition, long serving trustees have included the late Jack Passaris and Michael Christodoulou. Recently, the FHS has been joined by Harry Mavrolefteros, a former HELSOC president and his initiative and drive will take the FHS into a new direction.

In 2009 the GFC shook the FHS when the University resolved to shut down Modern Greek, along with other language courses. The FHS then launched a major community drive to prevent the closure which involved a media and political blitz and HELSOC demonstrating on the Library lawn. An intense struggle followed for more than a year. At the end a compromise settlement was reached whereby the Modern Greek course was reduced to a minor. The community mobilisation and the fact that the corpus of our Modern Greek Fund was intact prevented the closure of Modern Greek Studies.

In the past decade the FHS was also heavily involved in establishing the Greek Australian Archive at the State Library. In one fundraising dinner approximately $90,000 was raised.

Our next major crisis came in 2023 and we are still navigating through it. As a result of the magnificent fundraising achievement in 1995-1996 we had been able to maintain Greek Studies without calling upon the Community's support for almost 30 years. However, the historic low interest rates had a disastrous impact on invested funds in the UNSW Foundation depleting the original corpus. This was compounded by changes in University policies and increased costs which made further severe inroads in the capital fund.

The trustees now call upon the Community for support. The positive news is that we have a good relationship with the University, satisfactory student numbers and our Greek mythology course is one of the most popular courses attracting students overwhelmingly of non-Greek heritage.