PLC Old Collegian Suzanne Kirton (1983) has been appointed as a Judge of the County Court of Victoria, where she will head the Building Cases List in the Commercial Division. 

Judge Kirton has had a rich involvement with PLC since graduating. Her two daughters, Rowena Boone (2013) and Steph Boone (2015), also attended the College.

Over the years, she served on many parent committees including the JSPA, the SSPA and Friends of Rowing, and she was a director of the PLC Foundation. In her time as a barrister, she hosted many PLC students for work experience and is delighted to see them now forging their own careers in the law.

After leaving PLC, Judge Kirton completed her studies at Monash University, working as a solicitor before she was then called to the Bar and practised as a barrister for 18 years, specialising in construction law and property disputes. In 2018, she was appointed as a Senior Member at the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal. Her Honour became Head of the Building and Property List at VCAT in 2021. 

During her time at the Bar, Judge Kirton was a member of Svenson Barristers, led by Old Collegian Anna Svenson (Hall 2004). Judge Kirton was an incredible support to Anna in taking over what was then Gordon & Jackson Barristers Clerks in 2016 and oversaw this transition as the Vice List Chair. Judge Kirton remains an engaged and beloved member of the wider Svenson Barristers’ List alumni community today. 

Judge Kirton begins her next chapter at the County Court with an Associate who is also a PLC Old Collegian, Tracey Huang (2014). 

Her Honour believes strongly that life is about making the most of the talents you have and giving back as much as you can. She is very excited to be able to continue to serve the community in her new role and looks forward to continued professional engagement with many PLC alumni in her Court.

Sally Capp is the first woman to become the Lord Mayor of Melbourne in almost three decades and the first woman to be directly elected to the role.

Sally has had an illustrious career in business and the wider community in roles including as the former executive director of the development lobbying group the Property Council of Victoria.

Sally graduated with honours in economics and law from the University of Melbourne and was previously the Chief of Operations of the Victorian Employers Chamber of Commerce and the former Victorian Agent-General in London from 2009 to 2012 - the first woman to hold the office.

She is also the former CEO of the Committee for Melbourne and was a director of Collingwood Football Club to 2009, the first woman to serve on the board of that club.

Catherine Phillips (Class of 2009) is Co-Captain of St Kilda Football Club and was one of inaugural players in the AFL Women's football league. 

Catherine, who prior to playing for Melbourne FC, had virtually zero AFL experience, was a gold medallist winner in the 2001 World Championships for Ultimate Frisbee. Having first played Ultimate Frisbee in Year 11 at PLC, she honed her craft and has been a six-time representative for Australia and was the team Captain at the US Open title in 2015, where Australia was the first non-North American team to win the title. 

Catherine graduated in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Melbourne and is working full-time in her profession, whilst training and playing in the evening for St Kilda FC.

Professor Liza Lim is regarded as one of Australia's leading and most influential international composers of ultra-modern music for chamber groups, opera and orchestral works. Her lyrical, colourful and dynamic works have been commissioned by groups such as the Los Angeles Philharmonic, BBC and Sydney Symphony Orchestras and she has made operas and large-scale, collaborative installations for all of the major city festivals in Australia.  Her distinctive music draws on cross-cultural influences including Aboriginal and Chinese sources.
 
Liza was a boarder at PLC and through the encouragement of her music teacher Rosalind Macmillan, was composing from an early age. Student ensembles performed her early compositions and she started to win competitions, resulting in an Australia Council grant in her final year of school. This began a lifetime of collaboration with performers, in particular the Elision Ensemble, with whom she has worked closely for 30 years.
 
She is currently Professor of Composition at the University of Sydney’s Conservatorium of Music as well as Visiting Professor at Shanghai Conservatory. From 2008-2017, she was Professor of Composition and Director of the Centre for Research in New Music at the University of Huddersfield, UK where she still holds a visiting position. 
 
 

A country boarder from Bairnsdale, Briony has nineteen years’ experience in conservation, exhibitions and loans management and preventive conservation. 

In London, Briony worked for two years at the Tate Gallery specialising in the conservation of British watercolours and drawings and co-curated Drawing Materials and Techniques: Works on Paper from the Oppé Collection 1750-1850. Returning to Australia, Briony worked at the State Libraries of Victoria and NSW before transferring to the National Gallery of Victoria. 

Since 2007, Briony has worked at the Centre for Cultural Materials Conservation, The University of Melbourne. In this role she has undertaken treatment programs for works on paper, prepared and deliver lectures and practical sessions for the Master of Arts (Cultural Materials Conservation) course at the University of Melbourne. In 2015, Briony restored the PLC pastel portrait of Dame Nellie Melba by Florence Rodway. Last year, she was a recipient of Copland Foundation Grant, in partnership with the National Trust Victoria, to conserve wallpapers from Gulf Station. The Centre for Cultural Materials Conservation accepts fee-for-service clients and the scope of work is always interesting, often rare and of great historic importance. 

Currently, Briony is working on a significant Dutch map from 1663, one of the first to show the outline of Australia. Other highlights include treating the ‘Phar Lap Tonic Book’ owned by Museum Victoria. This booklet contained all the recipes that the trainer prepared for Phar Lap, and what many believe may have unintentionally contributed to the horse’s death as many of the recipes included arsenic.

Fiona holds a Bachelor of Arts (Hons) from Monash University, a Graduate Diploma in Information Management from University of NSW and an MBA from the University of RMIT. 

Fiona's career has been in the information technology industry working in enterprise technology across Australian Aviation, Information and Telecommunication Services, Financial Services, Distribution and Logistics, Education sector, Marketing and Commercial systems and not-for-profits for over 35 years. 

She is currently an independent non-executive director for Metcash, Salmat, TAL (Dai-ichi Life) Australia, Airservices Australia and is a Council Member and Treasurer of Knox Grammar School, Wahroonga.

Balfour has received numerous honours for her work, including the Award for Excellence in Management from the Australian Telecommunications Users Group in 2003, the National Pearcey Medal in 2006. 

She was appointed a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Company Directors in 2009 and a Fellow of Monash University in 2010.

Click here to read Fiona's speech to the PLC OCA Christmas Lunch 2016.

Helen has been working as an artist since graduating from a Bachelor of Fine Art at RMIT in 2002, later returning to study to complete a PhD in Fine Art at Monash University in 2014, which received the Mollie Holman Medal for Doctoral Thesis Excellence. Recently Helen has held solo exhibitions at the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London; at Chapter in Cardiff alongside Megan Cope; as part of the 2016 Glasgow International; and at Château Shatto in Los Angeles.

She has also exhibited work as part of The National at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, and has participated in group exhibitions at the National Gallery of Victoria, Heide Museum of Modern Art, the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, the TarraWarra Museum of Art as well as numerous overseas galleries. Her work is held in many public and private collections including those of the Tate with the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney, the University of Chicago, the Monash University Museum of Art, Queensland Art Gallery, the Art Gallery of New South Wales, the National Gallery of Australia, the National Gallery of Victoria, Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery and the City of Yarra. She is represented by Sutton Gallery in Melbourne, Château Shatto in Los Angeles and Pilar Corrias in London, and is a Lecturer in Fine Art at Monash University.

When she was in Year 11, Cindy Nguyen (2013) attended a National Young Leaders Day conference where she was inspired by a speaker from the Australian Army. The presentation motivated Cindy to expand her leadership skills and challenge herself in a physically, emotionally, and mentally demanding environment and it led, many years later, to her attaining her current position as a commissioned General Service Officer, with the rank of Lieutenant in the Corps of Royal Australian Engineers (RAE) within the Australian Army. Following that conference, Cindy was elected as Rosslyn House Captain and a member of the Student Leadership Team.

These experiences strengthened her resolve to serve not only the girls at PLC, but to lead and serve others in the future, for a bigger and greater purpose, for our nation. On completion of her Bachelor of Science (Physiology Major), degree with Honours at the University of Melbourne, Cindy voluntarily served a two-year Contract Full-Time Service (CFTS) with the Australian Army, as an Army Reservist.

She has now returned home to Melbourne to pursue a Postgraduate Medicine degree to become a doctor (her life-long ambition) while serving as an Army Reservist. This is in line with her ambition to one day be able to serve and deploy as a Medical Doctor in the Army with combat experience.