DEPUTY VICE-CHANCELLOR LEADS UCAS ADMISSIONS PROCESS REVIEW

UCAS this week published one of the most comprehensive reviews of university and college admissions in 50 years, following detailed research in partnership with the higher education sector.

Keele's Deputy Vice-Chancellor and Provost, Rama Thirunamachandran, who chaired UCAS' Admissions Process Review Steering Group, said: "Universities and colleges are committed to fair and transparent admissions and it has been heartening to witness the willing engagement of so many experts and practitioners in helping to develop the proposals."

The document offers a model that would support a longer term move to a post-results system, and also consults on a range of shorter term improvements to the current model. 

Rama will now lead a consultation that will seek the views of senior leaders in higher education, schools and colleges. It also asks the opinions of applicants' representatives and other stakeholders, such as awarding bodies, government departments and their agencies.

The consultation process will remain open until 20 January 2012, with a report of the findings and proposed next steps to be published in March. The earliest proposed date for any significant change to the process would be for applicants entering higher education in 2016.

 KEELE HALL RECEPTION FOR BRUNEIAN STUDENTS

Keele Hall was the venue for a buffet reception for Keele's Bruneian students last night.

The event, which included a presentation by the Deputy Vice-Chancellor and Provost, Rama Thirunamachandran, was attended by a large number of our new and continuing undergraduate and postgraduate students, providing them with the opportunity to meet with each other and key members of academic and administrative staff throughout the University. 

Also in attendance was Mr Delon Hon who, through the company James Hon Marketing & Management Services, has worked closely with a number of our students in order to assist them in their preparations for coming to Keele, and visitors from the Brunei Students Unit in London. 

Keele now has over 100 Bruneian students and has the UK's largest number of Bruneian Government Sponsorship funded students. 

The Deputy Vice-Chancellor is pictured with Mr Hon.

DEALING WITH GRIEF

Dr Linda Machin, Honorary Research Fellow in the Research Institute for Social Sciences (RISS), presented a two day invited symposium at Mount Royal University, Calgary, Canada.  Over one hundred delegates attended from a wide range of health and social care backgrounds. The topic of the symposium was 'Dealing with Grief' and was based on Dr Machin's work in developing a new model of grief, the Range of Response to Loss and a new tool to assess distress and engage therapeutically with clients (the Adult Attitude to Grief scale). Dr Machin was accompanied by Dr Bernadette Bartlam (School of Medicine), who co-facilitated the symposium. Drs Bartlam and Machin are pictured, second and third left,  with members of the organising committee.

MARITIME INSURANCE ASSEMBLAGES IN THE 21ST CENTURY

Dr Luis Lobo-Guerrero (SPIRE, Emerging Securities Unit/RISS) gave a public lecture at the University of Kassel, Germany, last week analysing the strategies developed by the maritime insurance industry in the last decade to secure sea lanes from piracy events. The lecture was followed by a PhD doctoral training workshop drawing on the theoretical underpinnings of his work on insurance as a global security technology and the biopolitics of security.

Earlier last month, Luis gave a presentation at the University of Hamburg discussing the problem of global order in light of current challenges to maritime circulation. He spoke in the context of a conference entitled 'Operations of the Global, Explorations of Dis/Connectivity' and argued for the need to re-problematise ideas of uncertainty in light of shifts in risk-based understandings of security.

KEY MESSAGES FROM HEALTH SYSTEMS WORKSHOP

In February Professor Michael Rigby, Emeritus Professor of Health Information Strategy, contributed to a workshop run jointly by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the US National Science Foundation, on challenges to health systems, and how modern information and communications applications could help create smarter health systems.  Professor Rigby was also appointed co-rapporteur for the event. 

The initial report of key messages has now been posted on the OECD web site, following approval by the organising bodies.  Rigby M, Ronchi E (eds.) OECD-NSF Workshop: Building A Smarter Health And Wellness Future 15-16 February 2011 Summary Of Key Messages is available on http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/19/23/48915787.pdf .

GUEST COMPOSER AT INTERNATIONAL FESTIVAL

Professor Rajmil Fischman, Research Institute of Humanities, was invited as guest composer to the Visiones Sonoras International Electroacoustic Music Festival 2011, in Morelia, Mexico. Visiones Sonoras has become the main event in the field of music and new technologies in the country and is one of the most important festivals in Latin America.

Professor Fischman's participation included the performance of his musical work ¡A Que No Me Quemas! for bass clarinet and digital audio, presented by the London Sinfonietta in its Latin American tour. He also delivered a lecture, entitled Mimetic Space: Sounds that Are Worth a Thousand Images, discussing his recent research on the aesthetics and analysis of composition with recognisable sampled sound sources. He also conducted workshops for composition students together with composer Mario Mary.

In addition to interviews for Radio of the State of Michoacán and Radio of the National Autonomous University of Mexico, Professor Fischman participated in the launch of two issues he edited for the CMMAS publication Sonica Ideas at Mexico's National Book Fair (http://www.sonicideas.org/). These are devoted to the exploratory subject of Music in the Holodec, including contributions by authors worldwide that are intended to inspire a wide debate on the future of music and time-based arts: taking the holodeck (featured in the television series Star Trek) as inspiration and metaphor, the writings discuss possible new musical art forms within virtual realities indistinguishable from the physical world that expand the traditional auditory medium of music to include other senses. The second issue includes Professor Fischman's article Back to The Parlour, which outlines a short and middle term strategy for the development of Structured Interactive Immersive Musical Experiences, including a project which has recently received AHRC funding.

PHILIP LEVERHULME PRIZE FOR OUTSTANDING SCHOLAR

Dr Peter Adey, School of Physical and Geographical Sciences and the Emerging Securities Unit, is one of only two UK Human Geographers to be awarded a Philip Leverhulme Prize this year.

The award was given on the basis of Peter's contribution to cultural and political geography, specifically in the study of security and the advancement of the new mobilities paradigm.

The prizes, with a value of £70,000 each, are awarded to outstanding scholars who have made a substantial and recognised contribution to their particular field of study, recognised at an international level, and where the expectation is that their greatest achievement is yet to come.

Peter will use the prize towards developing a series of research activities around the study of evacuation and its cultures and politics.

He is expecting that this will take him to sites in Japan, the US, New Zealand and Haiti, while developing further collaborative projects with colleagues in Durham, London, Swansea,Philadelphia, and the University of California.

PREMIERE FOR AUDIOVISUAL WORK

'Visitation Adagio', a collaborative audiovisual work by Dr Diego Garro, pictured below, and MRes student Richard T. Nelmes, was premiered at the 'Seeing Sound' Biennial Symposium in Bath Spa. 'Visitation Adagio' explores landscapes and soundscapes as neighbouring territories for a musical voyage of re-discovery.

The work can be previewed here.

HEAD OF CAREERS AND EMPLOYABILITY

Lisa McWilliams has been appointed as Head of Careers and Employability within Student Support and Development Services.

Lisa has worked as a Careers Adviser at Keele for 10 years and brings significant experience and insight to the role.

NEXT WEEK

The Royal String Quartet - Wednesday (Westminster Theatre, 9 November, 19:30 – 22:30).

Short-listed by the Royal Philharmonic Society as one of the three most outstanding chamber groups to appear in the UK in 2006, The Royal String Quartet was established in 1998 and has since gained a reputation as one of the world's most interesting and dynamically developing string quartets of the younger generation.

UK Premiere at Keele Chapel

Keele Concert Band, with the Phoenix Singers, from Leek, will perform the UK premiere of Missa Katharina, composed by Jacob De Haan, as part of a concert in the Keele University Chapel on Saturday, 12 November at 7.30 pm.

For more information see the website here.

FROM THE ARCHIVES

Twenty-three years ago - 
 
The appeal for funding to purchase the statue of Icarus by Mike Talbot, a student of the Henry Doulton School of Sculpture, in the Chancellor's Building Concourse, is nearing target. 4 November 1988.