Prosh (University of Western Australia)

Prosh refers to both a calendar fundraising event and the satirical annual newspaper written by students at the University of Western Australia to raise funds for nominated charities.

Annual event

The annual tradition is the collaboration of a team of voluntary students who write, design and edit a spoof newspaper designed to poke fun at current events and political agendas. Content varies, but often contains elements of potty humour or black humour interspersed throughout sometimes surprisingly witty social and political stories. A moderate anti-establishment jilt features in many of the articles, but while the paper strives to cause commotion (as seen in the Prosh motto "Never Apologise, Never Explain!") it remains a purely humorous and satirical publication.

Every April the paper is distributed to the public of Perth's metropolitan area by students dressed in costume in exchange for a "gold coin" donation, that is, a donation of one or two dollars. However, most collectors are willing to accept any sort of small change or cash donation. The day is also marked by a procession through the streets of Perth. The event now involves many carefully designed floats, practical jokes and stunts which are played on the public by participating students.

Those who work in Perth's CBD generally regard the event with good humour or tolerance, although chance shoppers and tourists are often caught off-guard at the appearance of bizarrely dressed young men and women demanding money - typically assertively if good-naturedly. However the Perth City Council sometimes bans traditional UWA Prosh activities in the city [ The West Australian, 3 April 1985, p.4,]

History

In 1931, a small group of students compiled a small, satirical newspaper called the "SRUSS SRUSS Times" of humorous but possibly offensive content, as part of graduation-time shenanigans. Later in that week, the Perth newspaper The Sunday Times berated the creators of this newspaper, calling it trash and filth, and the creators were subsequently penalised, in the form of a fine payable to the local children's charity. Evidently, this punishment wasn't effective, as the tradition of publishing a satirical humour of 'ill taste' continues to this day, 76 years later, however in a much larger and slightly more organised fashion.

Over the decades of the prosh procession through the city of Perth, various floats and vehicles of dubious form and function passed through the centre of the city prior to the Hay street and Murray Street malls existence. This made both the prosh procession participants, and in turn the spectators excellent targets for interaction with flour, water and beer from the balcony of the hotels then open for trade. City council employees involved in cleaning up were often seen immediately after the last float.

Currently, PROSH (which is now one of the oldest UWA traditions) is kept alive by volunteers writing, editing and distributing the newspaper annually in April - all in the name of fundraising. Each year a new group of charities are chosen as the recipients of all money raised by Prosh. In recent years, over 65 000 papers are sold on the day, with proceeds often breaking the $100 000 barrier.

Prosh Day

In recognition of the day, morning classes are cancelled on campus. Students arrive at the university very early on the morning and collect their donation tins, then are released onto the streets of Perth to sell the newspaper. This continues until just before midday, where they once again meet up in Perth for the procession of floats through the CBD. After this finishes, students once again take to the streets to sell the paper, returning late in the afternoon to debrief and relax at the after-event on campus.

In 2001, Prosh fundraising broke records to that year [ "Prosh breaks another record".(Prosh for 2001 has raised more than $80 000 for charity)."University of Western Australia news", 7 May 2001, p.4 ]

In 2007, Prosh took place on April 4 and over $108000 was raised for charities.

In 2008, Prosh took place on April 9 and made roughly $120000 for charity, breaking all previous records.

Infamous Highlights

* In 1994 the production of Prosh was almost stopped by the actions of a security guard late on the final layout weekend. The supposedly "slightly inebriated" team (and their esky) were evicted from the Prosh office on the Guild Village's third floor. However, the team was able to set up camp south of the river at Murdoch University due to a few fortuitous links to its students. Production continued at a hectic pace and the public was once again subjected to the hijinks of Prosh.

* The residential colleges across the road from the main campus have also contributed to the much-loved stunts and pranks in days gone by. Motor cars have met a watery grave in the iconic Reflection Pond and many prank phone calls have been made - such as a call to the local police informing them that the Main Roads workers at the intersection were actually students disrupting the traffic, followed by a subsequent call to Main Roads about students imitating police officers at the same intersection. 2008 saw an adventurous climber place a traffic cone atop the large pine tree in front of St George's College.

* In 2000, the engineers of UWA built and submerged a scale model of a UFO. Numerous calls to radio and TV stations and the much-publicised retrieval of the UFO from near the Narrows Bridge created the kind of PROSH publicity that the students revel in.

* In 2004 a naked student fire extinguished a car because the person refused to buy a paper. "I'm doing this for the kids" he was heard saying while the car received fire extinguishing.

* In 2007, two members of the Solid Gold club were led away by police at the Perth Cultural Centre after streaking in a skit in which they danced to the song "In the Navy". The most memorable moment for the crowd was when one of these naked students chased one of the hosts of Prosh, the Nova 93.7 radio station host Nathan, who attempted to avoid the student by darting through the crowd. Both were later given jobs by Nova 93.7

References

External links

* [http://www.prosh.guild.uwa.edu.au/2004/ The official 2004 Prosh homepage]
* [http://www.prosh.guild.uwa.edu.au/2005/ The official 2005 Prosh homepage]
* [http://www.prosh.guild.uwa.edu.au/2006/ The official 2006 Prosh homepage]
* [http://www.prosh.guild.uwa.edu.au/2007/ The official 2007 Prosh homepage]
* [http://www.guild.uwa.edu.au/ The UWA Student Guild homepage]

ee also

*Prosh (University of Adelaide)
*Melbourne University Prosh Week
*Rag (student society)