Top Graduates of Macquarie University

Adam Hills

Adam Hills is an Australian comedian and television presenter familiar to both Australian and British audiences. He is most famous in Australia for hosting the music trivia show Spicks and Specks and in Britain for hosting The Last Leg as well as several appearances on Mock the Week.  Hills started his career as a stand-up comedian aged 19 in 1989 and has gone on to produce ten solo international shows. He has appeared at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, the Melbourne International Comedy Festival and the Montreal Just for Laughs festival: Appearances which have earned him three consecutive Perrier Award nominations for his Edinburgh shows in 2001, 2002 and 2003.

Originally from Sydney, Hills was born without a right foot and wears a prosthesis, which he refers to throughout his act in a humorous way. Hills graduated in 1991 with a Bachelor of Arts in Communications from Macquarie University.

Mike Aynsley

Mike Aynsley is an expert in the banking and financial sector with 30 years experience in the UK & Europe, Australasian and Asia Pacific markets. Aynsley was recently employed by Irish government in the European financial crisis as CEO of Irish Bank Resolution Corporation Limited. Aynsley successfully sold the bank’s US assets for €10 billion and reduced its asset portfolios from €115 billion in 2008 to around €14 billion by the end of last year. Mike Aynsley holds an MBA degree from the Macquarie University Graduate School of Management.

Peter Overton 

Peter Overton is an Australian television journalist and news presenter. He grew up as a friend of actress Nicole Kidman in the Longueville suburb of Sydney. Overton’s early education was at Lane Cove Public School and North Sydney Boys High School. He later graduated with a Bachelor of Economics with a minor in Communications from Macquarie University. Overton then started his career with the Nine Network as a news reporter before graduating to weekend sports presenter on the national news network.

Ian Thorpe

Ian Thorpe is an Australian swimmer, nicknamed the Thorpedo, who specialises in freestyle, but has also competes in backstroke and the individual medley.  He is a five-time Olympic gold medallist. When Australia hosted the Sydney Olympics in 2000, Thorpe won three gold and two silver medals making him the most successful athlete at the games. 

In 2001, he became the first person to win six gold medals in one World Championship. 

During his swimming career, Thorpe studied psychology and linguistics at Macquarie University

Brains and Beauty at Macquarie University

Laura Dundovic, known to most as Miss Universe Australia, has graduated from Macquarie University with a degree in Psychology. The model, who was born in Sydney, Australia but who is of Croatian descent, announced the news on her Instagram account accompanied by a photo of herself wearing her graduation cap and gown. Having started her degree at Macquarie University several years ago, Miss Dundovic deferred the end of the course so that she could have more time to pursue her career in modelling.

Her career has gone from strength to strength since she started modelling several years ago. Her Miss Universe Australia title was achieved in 2008 and she then went on to place in the top ten of the Miss Universe pageant in the same year. Miss Dundovic was the first Australian face of international shoe label, Steve Madden. She has also worked as the official ambassador for the Autumn and Spring racing carnivals at the Sydney Turf Club. In the same year that she won her Miss Universe Australia crown, Miss Dundovic also opened the Sydney Fashion Festival for Charlie Brown. Following this ceremony she was subsequently signed to be the face of the brand. She is also an official ambassador for Myer, Australia’s largest department store.

Before her graduation, Miss Dundovic worked as a television host for a dating show called Dating in the Dark. The show, in which three men and three women were placed into a light-tight house in the Netherlands to get to know each other in the complete darkness, aired on Foxtel through 2010 and 2011. Several media publications have run stories on Miss Dundovic, especially in reference to her on-again, off-again relationship with her boyfriend, James Kerley. Mr Kerley also works as a television host and also frequently as a radio presenter on Nova FM. Mr Kerley is also a published author and the pair live together in an apartment on Sydneys lower north shore. With her most recent accomplishment of graduating from Macquarie University, Miss Dundovic is now taking some time to relax and continue with her work commitments as her modelling portfolio continues to grow.