WORLD FIRST FOR KEELE

Keele has received a BREEAM environmental impact rating of 'excellent' for the Lennard-Jones Multi-User Laboratory extension, completed last year. It is thought that it is the only lab of its kind in the world to achieve such a rating.
 
BREEAM (BRE Environmental Assessment Method) is the leading and most widely used environmental assessment method for buildings. It sets the standard for best practice in sustainable design and is the measure used to describe a building's environmental performance.

The impressive state-of-the-art Lennard-Jones building, which achieved a score of 71.34% in the BREEAM assessment, features the use of green sustainable materials, with low environmental impact; a green ' living wall', providing habitat and biodiversity; roof mounted solar panels, providing hot water to the development, and rainwater recycling, providing water to serve toilet flushing and the living wall.

Professor Pat Bailey, Dean of Natural Sciences, pictured above, said: "This is an impressive new, multi-use facility, built to accommodate the very substantially increased numbers of students studying chemical sciences and pharmacy at Keele. More so, it was built to the highest sustainable standards and we believe it is the first lab of its kind in the world to achieve the BREEAM excellent rating."

BLACK HISTORY MONTH SEMINAR

African Studies at Keele (ASK) held their third seminar last week in celebration of 'Black History Month'. The group heard inspired presentations from high profile figures, including three external visitors who were welcomed to Keele by the Deputy Vice-Chancellor, Rama Thirunamachandran.
 
Speakers included, Ms. Mumtaz Kassam (Deputy High Commissioner for Uganda and Keele Alumni,1979), pictured; Sir Jeffrey James (former British High Commissioner to Kenya, Keele Alumni, 1969); Tolu Ogunlesi, author and journalist from Nigeria (currently studying an MA in Creative Writing at the UEA) and Dr Emma Dawson (Keele).

The seminar was a great success and was attended by approximately thirty guests, including Keele staff and students, and postgraduates from Sussex and Goldsmiths universities. For more information on future ASK events contact Zoë Groves, email: z.r.groves@ihum.keele.ac.uk

CHARITY AWARDS FOR KEELE STUDENTS AND STAFF

The North Staffordshire Medical Institute presented its 2010 medical research grant and student awards at an evening reception last week.
 
Best Performance in Medical School Year 2 Prize was awarded to James Blackburn, and the Year 4 OSCE Examination Prize went to Sandeep Dhanda.

Research grants totalling £17,000 were awarded to two groups, led by members of Keele's Research Institute for Science and Technology in Medicine. Dr Divya Chari's research group received a grant for a laboratory-based project to study side effects of corticosteroid therapy on neural cells using genomic analyses. The work involves collaboration with Professor Clive Hawkins, a Consultant Neurologist at UHNS, and Dr Richard Emes, now at Nottingham University.

Dr Paul Horrocks received his grant for a project he and Professor Steve Allin (School of Chemistry and EPSAM) designed to synthesise and evaluate Buchtienine as a novel antimalarial agent.

Presenting the awards, NSMI Chairman, Mr Duncan Gough, congratulated the students and the two groups on their success and hoped the grants would help in producing key results and publications in the future.

The closing date for the next round of NSMI pump-priming research awards is Friday, 5 November 2010. Details can be obtained from Jacqui Robinson at: office.nsconf@btconnect.com

KEELE STUDENTS PRAISED BY BRITISH COUNCIL

Films produced by eight Keele students at the second Media and Film Summer School at Dongguk University, Seoul, Korea have been praised by the British Council.
 
The students, part-funded for the visit through the Prime Minister's Initiative 2 funding, spent a month in Seoul attending a two-week course on Korean Film, followed by a two-week film production workshop. They also attended a Buddhist retreat and visited the Demilitarized Zone.

Lee Harris, PMI Project Delivery Officer said: "Having previously worked in the Television and Film industry for over 10 years, I was particularly impressed with the style and professionalism of the film titled 'Line 4'."

Professor Marilyn Andrews, Pro Vice-Chancellor, said: "I was amazed at the quality of the student films and thoroughly enjoyed them. Activities such as these are so valuable in the development of our students and to their enjoyment of being a Keele student."

A summary of the films can be seen shortly here.

BUSINESS COUNCIL VISITS KEELE

Research and Enterprise Services and the Applied and Environmental Geophysics Group, from the School of Physical and Geographical Sciences, played host to a meeting of the Business Council for Sustainable Development's Low Carbon Energy Group.
 
Thirty-three members, from companies including E.ON, Converteam, Arup and Lafarge, attended the all-day meeting held in the Keele Management Centre, where they heard presentations from the Department of Energy and Climate Change, the Environmental Sustainability KTN (Knowledge Transfer Network) and guest speaker, Professor Peter Styles, on the ongoing coal bed methane extraction work at Keele and the University's interest in geothermal energy.

Delegates were treated to a visit to the new development site on campus where Nexen have completed the test bore hole for the methane extraction.

KEYNOTE SPEAKER ON WOMEN OFFENDERS

Anne Worrall, Emerita Professor of Criminology was a keynote speaker at a regional conference run by Cheshire Probation Trust. The conference, entitled 'Why prison is not the place for women offenders' was the first large conference ever held inside Styal Women's Prison and attracted about 150 delegates from the criminal justice system.

Professor Worrall, above left, spoke about the contribution of research to policy-making in relation to women offenders. Other keynote speakers included Baroness Jean Corston, whose report on vulnerable women in the criminal justice system has become a blue-print for reform in the treatment of women offenders.

GOLD MEDAL FOR EXCHANGE STUDENT

Exchange student Lyndsay Stecher, who is currently at Keele, has been awarded the Board of Governors Gold Medal for the highest in-course academic achievement in Social Science at her university, the University of Windsor, Ontario in Canada.

Lyndsay, 19, pictured above, is studying International Relations and Development Studies at Windsor, and while at Keele for the academic year is taking modules in Sociology, SPIRE and History.

CHILDREN'S AUTHOR MEETS KEELE STUDENTS

Pauline Fisk, renowned children's author and winner of the Smarties Grand Prix Award (for Midnight Blue) and runner-up for the Whitbread Children's Book Prize, came to speak to Educational  Studies undergraduates this week.

Pauline, pictured above, talked to students taking the Childhood, Policy and Education module about her life as  a writer, her inspiration for particular stories and how she carried out research for her books. In 2008 she trekked in the jungles of Belize, researching the gap year experience for her latest novel, 'In the Trees'.

The visit was organised by Dr Sarah Thomson, Teaching Fellow in Education.

KEELE MEDICS CHARITY SOCIETY

The Keele Medics Charity Society (KMCS) is a newly established student organisation hoping to raise money for regional charities.

Their focus this academic year is on children's foundations and their first major event at the Medical School was in aid of Barnardo's Midlands.

The KMCS committee collected some fantastic lots for auction, largely due to the generosity of local companies and individuals, and raised £1,000.

Organisers say special thanks go to Sarah Lockey, who hosted the event, and Kirsty Hartley, without whom the night would not have been possible.

For more information about KMCS contact: keelemcs@ gmail.com.

FT LETTER ON SOVEREIGN RISK

In a letter published this week by The Financial Times, Professor Costas Milas, Keele Management School, questions the use of government bond yields as reliable indicators of sovereign risk in Eurozone economies.

He makes the case that peripheral economies faced with a high risk of default are currently experiencing borrowing costs that might contradict all publicly available information.

CFM FUND RAISER

CFM raised £260 for the Douglas Macmillan Home at Blurton by supporting the Signal Radio 'bring a pound to work day'.

Star of the day was Dawn Brookes (Domestic Assistant at Barnes Hall) who joined in the fun by coming to work in fancy dress.

The Signal 1 team rolled in to Keele to cheer along the fund-raisers and Dawn was interviewed by Liz Ellis, pictured above, who also met Dawn Jackson and Michelle Harvey at the Darwin Building.

FROM THE ARCHIVES

This week 57 years ago -

21 October 1953

Dr W A Jenkins, Director of Studies at the University College, Keele, has been appointed Vice Chancellor of the University of Dacca, Pakistan.

Dr Jenkins was appointed Registrar at the University College in 1949.