Dunoon's Oxford scholar

Gina Murray is hoping her daughter Alexandra will come home again one day, but she said "there's not a lot of demand for Doctors of Neuroscience in Dunoon."

Twenty-six-year-old Alexandra Murray recently graduated as a Doctor of Philosophy in the field of cognitive neuroscience from Oxford University.

Her mum, who had proofread her thesis "The Capacity and Precision of Visual Short Term Memory", made the trip over to England to see all the pomp and ceremony of the Oxford graduation (which was conducted predominantly in Latin).

"I'm just so proud," Gina said. "I want the whole world to know... She has worked so hard to achieve what she has and I am amazed at the dedication, diligence and determination she has shown on her way to achieving such a high award."

Alexandra attended Dunoon Public School and Trinity Catholic College before going to Sydney University where she achieved her Bachelor of Psychology with First Class Honours. At the age of 21 she was short-listed for a Rhodes scholarship and then gained a Commonwealth scholarship to go to Oxford.

"We don't really have a big community of people (around Lismore) who have travelled for higher degrees and I'd just like to encourage local school leavers who are thinking of going to university that I've done it and you can too," Alexandra said.

"Lismore is classed as a rural area so you may be eligible for scholarships... That really helped me. I don't know if I could have done what I've done (without the financial assistance). Give it a go."

Alexandra is currently working at a university teaching hospital in Hamburg, Germany, and hopes to return to Australia in the next few years.