The Director

The director of Austral Books, Professor Reginald St Leon, was educated at the University of Sydney and the University of Heidelberg, Germany, and became Head of the Department of Germanic Studies in the University of Sydney. He is now an Honorary Associate of that university. He was one of the pioneers in the field of Early Childhood Second Language Acquisition and his work has been publicized all over the world. In 1983 he founded the fully multi–lingual International Grammar School, Sydney (IGS), believed to be the only school of its kind in the world. IGS takes in children aged two and a half years and educates them in English, Chinese or Japanese and one other European language (French, German, Italian or Spanish) through to university entrance, so that they enter university substantially tri –lingual.

After graduating from the University of Sydney with First Class Honours Prof St Leon did a truncated journalistic cadetship on the Richmond River Express, the smallest daily newspaper in Australasia, under the editorship of Harry Rayner, later press secretary to Malcolm Fraser and co–founder the Canberra Press Club. He then worked as a journalist for ABC Radio News, finally as its Industrial Roundsman, before returning to academe. He has published works of academic scholarship and many educational children´s stories.