Chair’s Speech on KCLA Annual Dinner 2025
Event Date:
Event Venue: Vintners Hall, 68 Upper Thames Street, London, EC4V 3BG
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- My lord ladies and gentlemen I’d like to give you a warm welcome to our fourth annual dinner at Vintners’ Hall. I am delighted that our Vice Chancellor and President of King’s, Professor Shitij Kapur and his wife Sharmistha are able to join us today, as well as the Reverend Jim Craig, Chaplain of Guys hospital. It’s great to see that our membership has now grown into a younger and more diverse community of alumni, which is very encouraging.
- Apologies from our Dean, the Revd Dr Ellen Clarke-King, who is visiting a student in hospital tonight. Also, from our honorary secretary Maryam Hussein, who is fasting for Ramadan.I would also like to extend a warm welcome to our speaker, Lord Willetts and Pierrette Hebga Meinrad, who is accompanying him tonight, and is a former Council Member of KCLA as well as working for Lord Willets at the Resolution Foundation. I’m delighted that my family has also joined me tonight.
- We have had a very successful year with the second sport Hall of Fame event being held in May, which Professor Stephen Challacombe kindly organised again in conjunction with King’s Sport. Certificates were presented by our Patron, Dame Katherine Grainger.
- Last September, Charlie Beardmore ran our inaugural festival of sport at Honor Oak Park Sports ground, where we had teams of alumni and students competing against each other in a variety of sports, followed by a really fun dinner in the Robens suite on the 29th floor at Guy Hospital. This was so successful that we’re repeating it again this year, so save the date of the 6th of September and do come and join a team or simply watch. I hope to link these events with the City as there are plans to make London a centre for sport, and with such incredible sports men and women in both of these events, there is huge scope for some collaboration.
- In December, Dr. I Stephanie Boyce, former President of the Law Society, gave our Annual address on Swift Justice. This was a fascinating talk sparking interesting debate. You can catch this now on our YouTube channel.
- When I become Chair last year, one of my ambitions was to create an atmosphere with more collaborative working and build small teams to share the workload. Over the last few months, I have been working hard to attract new volunteers and we have had quite a few step up to take on certain responsibilities, many with overlapping skills, which is a great help. We welcomed Maryam Hussein as our new Honorary Secretary and Camelia Manta, who is here tonight, will take on a variety of duties including a main role helping with events. Yan Liu, who is also here, will help me with social media. I have several more new volunteers who have offered to help with sport, database management, finance, WordPress and comms generally. However, don’t let this put you off, we still have plenty of room for more and I would encourage you to volunteer and join our teams. There is plenty to do.
- In addition, I would like to welcome Professor Jim Lynch who I received some very interesting emails from in the run-up to the dinner and we found that we had a lot in common in the City Livery world. He is a distinguished Emeritus Professor of Life Sciences at the University of Surrey and has written a book on one of my pet subjects, and I’m sure he won’t mind me giving his book a quick plug! It is entitled: What is Life and How Might it be Sustained?
- At alumni events such as this, we often think back to our own student days. Having talked to our Dean and many of our chaplains at graduations, I’m interested to find how much things have changed. When I studied for my AKC, The Associateship of King’s College, it was a case of 9am lectures on a Monday morning and exams on a Saturday, which led to quite a high drop out rate and horrifies current students. Now the AKC is online and open to graduates after they leave and I’m impressed by the numbers of alumni taking this up. It is a thought provoking course which is invaluable.
- On a personal note, I was honoured to be installed as a Freeman of the Worshipful Company of Educators on Wednesday night. As they also do a lot of mentoring and STEM work as a specialist area, it will hugely enhance and complement my voluntary work for both KCLA and King’s.
- I won’t further delay your wait for the delicious food which Searcys is about to serve. So enjoy your evening and keep in touch.
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