Macquarie University News

					July 2001

Professor of Actuarial Studies at Macquarie University, John Pollard, has been awarded the Silver Medal by the Institute of Actuaries of Australia (IAAust) in recognition of a long record of outstanding actuarial work in the service of the profession, business, government and community, which has brought credit to the profession. The Silver Medal has only twice previously been awarded.

Professor John Pollard

“There's no more deserving Australian actuary than John Pollard” said Tony Coleman, President of the IAAust, when presenting the award at the IAAust's recent biennial Convention at Sanctuary Cove on the Gold Coast.

“The quality of John's academic and research papers, his leadership of the Macquarie University actuarial department and contribution to actuarial education nationally and internationally, make his efforts truly outstanding” Coleman said.

Pollard has been the Head of the Department of Actuarial Studies since 1977 and has taught over 500 of Australia's 1,140 actuaries, and an even greater proportion of Associate and Student members of the IAAust.

His influence in the education of actuaries stretches globally - he is the author of seven books, of which three have been translated into other languages and one into Braille.

A leader in seminal research, Pollard has had more than 80 research papers published in refereed journals. His joint authorship in 1979 of a mortality model continues to stimulate research internationally. In 1982 John proposed a method for analysing changes in the expectation of life in terms of the changes in the underlying causes of death, which was later adopted by the World Health Organisation in its analyses of international cause of death data.

John Pollard certainly provides a challenge to the usual stereotype of an actuary. A consummate traveller, having visited more than 60 countries, Pollard and his wife, Carys, drove from London to Bombay in 1968 and then across Europe, Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India. Remarkably he used the same 1964 Morris Mini to drive the 27,000 km back to England in 1999, via Malaysia, Thailand, Laos, China and Tibet, Mongolia, Siberia, Russia, Belarus, Poland and Western Europe.