Sharing Knowledge, Building Communities: 2005 Asia-Pacific Conference, Manly, Sydney, 13-16 January 2005

The International College of Tourism and Hotel Management provided the perfect venue for the 2005 Golden Key Asia Pacific Conference. The organisers of this years conference wanted the event to be a spectacularly different experience for our members - so the decision was made to forego the traditional 5-star hotel elegance for the picturesque hillside setting of a Hogwarts-style castle overlooking Manly Beach.

The conference format was also revamped to devote one full day each to chapter development and personal/professional development activities. The resulting featurepacked program ensured the most successful AP conference to date, with 220 delegates from throughout Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia and South Africa, as well as guests from the UK and Golden Key CEO Alex Perwich in attendance.

The University of Sydney Chapter can be extremely proud of its involvement in this year's conference. Not only did we have a total of 14 delegates in attendance, including 6 general members, but our President was appointed the representative of all student members in the Asia Pacific, our chapter received the Golden Key-SIFE award for the best education-focussed initiative for the 2004 Indigenous Health Forum, and our chapter contributed two out of three primary non-staff members of the 2005 Asia Pacific Conference Steering Committee.

Within the AP Conference newsletter, we have included articles written by a representative sample of conference delegates from around the country. Our request to these delegates was that they wrote about the session that, alone, made their conference attendance worthwhile - the variety of responses clearly demonstrates that this year's conference was not only well balanced, but also offered something different of value to a diverse range of delegates.

The grand finale of the conference was a stylish banquet, followed by an evening of revelry at Ceruti's in Manly. Our gratitude must go to the APHQ staff, without whose efforts this magnificent and unforgettable event would not have been possible, and to all who have provided these articles to inform those who were unable to attend and to encourage participation in the next AP Conference.

For more info please visit: AP Conference newsletter (pdf) and photos.