Making the move from Adelaide to Sydney enabled the UNSW Grounds Manager to follow his true passion, and he hasn’t looked back in his life or career.
Growing up in Adelaide in the 1960s, Mark Clark’s working life started on production lines in General Motors, Holden and Levi Strauss factories. He also worked as a sheet metal worker.
“My father was Scottish and came out at a time when many Irish, Scottish and English people were settling in Adelaide,” he said.
“It was a real working-class place to grow up – just like Jimmy Barnes describes in his book Working Class Boy. It was hard and rough at times, but I’m very grateful and proud of where I came from.”
After completing an apprenticeship in gardening and green-keeping, Mark studied for an Associate Diploma in Applied Sciences of Horticulture at Charles Sturt University in Wagga Wagga. He gained experience working in local councils and eventually decided to listen to his manager’s advice who said ‘You need to leave here if you want to go places in horticulture’.
A small fish in a big pond
More than 30 years ago, Mark made the life-changing decision to move to Sydney to explore opportunities.
“I didn’t have a job lined up but I had a friend in Glebe, so I knew I could come and stay with the intention of finding work.
“Luckily a job came up at UNSW for a horticulturist. At that time, we had all in-house staff, including large teams of gardeners and landscapers with a large grounds depot where the current Tyree Building stands.”
As the campus grew and more space was needed, the grounds management model changed to employing contractor staff and only a couple of UNSW gardeners. Thanks to Mark’s experience and extended studies, he became the UNSW Grounds Manager, a role he has held for more than 15 years.
Mark on the tools on the UNSW Kensington campus.
Health and safety aspects
A more serious side of Mark’s job is health and safety. He said dealing with trees is an unknown quantity, unlike managing a building, they are living organisms. The campus’s many large trees require regular maintenance.
“We have a tree maintenance contract, which involves a crew coming to campus every Saturday. We also bring them in one day per week to work on our external properties.”
Storms can weaken trees and branches, and regular building works can lead to damage, including loss of limbs and disruption of roots. As the Grounds Manager, Mark needs to respond quickly and safely.
“I’ll call out contractors, work with the security team to cordon off an affected area and sometimes organise an aerial tree assessment by an arborist. There are lots of processes on campus around health and safety.”
Grounds manager or event manager?
Mark thinks it’s a privilege to work at UNSW. He loves what he does and likens his work to preparing for a large-scale event on a daily basis.
“People arrive, they need to eat, be entertained, find a comfortable place to sit and use our campus services. From 6am we prepare the campus, ready for the day, and the next day we do it all over again,” he said.
Mark works with many different teams at the University, including being involved with campus improvement projects and new buildings. He’s consulted on landscape plans and provides recommendations on suitable plant and tree species. He collaborates with the Sustainability Team to achieve campus goals.
With so many beautiful spaces on campus, it’s hard for Mark to pick his favourite, but one he regularly visits is the Morven Brown Lawn with the jacaranda tree and pond.
“I love the feeling of the space, with the height of the buildings not overpowering the size of the courtyard. It has perfect balance and symmetry.”
The day the black cockatoos came to town
One of the highlights of Mark’s career at UNSW was seven years in the making.
“I arranged to plant rows of the Australian native Banksia serrata along the University Mall between the Anita B. Lawrence Centre and Robert Webster buildings, with the intention of attracting flocks of yellow-tailed black cockatoos,” he said.
“These native birds often flew from the south over UNSW on their travels to Centennial Park and I was confident we could attract them to our campus.”
Seven years later Mark’s efforts were rewarded. The black cockatoos arrived and perched in the trees, cracking open banksia cones, as he watched in awe.
What is something that might surprise your colleagues?
I was a first division amateur soccer player in my early 20s.
Do you have a favourite quote?
“And the winner is Sydney”. Those words when Sydney was awarded the Olympic Games cemented my life-changing decision to leave Adelaide for the big smoke. It was at a time when I was wanting to advance my career and this inspired me to make the move.
What’s one thing that makes you happy?
Slowing down and observing life while showing awareness of my surroundings – whether it’s in the bush or traveling overseas. I enjoy understanding my small significance in the world and appreciate that as an Australian I can experience these things.
What day in your life would you like to relive?
The day I arrived at Machu Pichu at sunrise after hiking through the Andes for three days in 1993.
What’s the best thing you’ve watched in the last year?
The movie How to Make Gravy. I’m a huge Paul Kelly fan and this is a great adaptation of turning his lyrics into a movie.
Know someone with a good story? Email us at: insideunsw@unsw.edu.au
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