WORK SET TO START ON NEW £2.9MILLION NURSERY

Keele's commitment to offering first rate child care services was marked this week when the Mayor of Newcastle, Councillor Trevor Hambleton, dug the first turf to mark the start of work on a new £2.9million purpose designed nursery, to be built opposite the current facility.

Rachel Cairns, Deputy Director of Human Resources, welcomed senior colleagues, parents and children to a special ceremony on site. Rachel described Keele's strong tradition of providing childcare since 1960's, offering staff, students and members of the community a safe and caring learning environment for their children. 

The new nursery will accommodate up to 128 children from three months to school age. It has been designed in keeping with the University's environmental sustainability objectives and offers an innovative layout, providing a secure and fun environment and optimising access to the outdoors, including an all-weather "outdoor classroom". Completion date is September 2012, in time for the next academic year.

Ciaran Allinson, pictured above, gives the Mayor a helping hand. Looking on are Wendy Foster, Childcare Manager, The Mayoress of Newcastle, The Vice-Chancellor, Professor Nick Foskett, Rachel Cairns and children from the nursery.

LIFT-OFF FOR GREY MATTERS

Keele University Sustainability Hub welcomed more than 50 delegates to its first Grey Matters event this week to launch a new membership project. The all-day event included an interactive talk on Sustainable Living by local, frugal-living expert Paulette Harrison, a talk on Grow Your Own, by Marcus Chilton-Jones, Curator at the Dorothy Clive Garden, and a talk on Green Technologies for the Home, by Dr Joanna Wright and Dr Sharon George, lecturers within the School of Physical and Geographical Sciences.

Delegates discussed and debated key issues throughout the day which resulted in a series of Sustainability Top Tips, produced by attendees that will feature on the Keele University Sustainability Hub web pages and in an exhibit in the building.

The project, funded by the Keele Key Fund, focuses on inter-generational activity and knowledge exchange and will feature social, practical and learning events around the theme of sustainability.The interdisciplinary project is based at Keele's new Sustainability Hub and brings together expertise from across the University.

The project is managed by the Active Ageing team, within the Institute of Life Course Studies, and members of the School of Physical and Geographical Sciences, within the Faculty of Natural Sciences. Following the success of the event delegates are to be invited back to Keele for a social event, which is being planned for later in December and a second conference day in February. For more information contact Domonique Birks: d.birks@ilcs.keele.ac.uk

NO MORE HEROES ANYMORE

Professor Joe Andrew, School of Humanities, travelled to the USA to present a paper, '"No more heroes anymore": Pechorin's narrative quest, and minor characters in Lermontov's A Hero of Our Time through the prism of plot typologies' to the 43rd Annual National Convention of The Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies (ASEES), in Washington, DC.

The ASEES Annual Convention is the most important cyclical event in the Russian / Slavic calendar. About 2,000 leading scholars from North America and from around the world attended the event, presenting research papers in all fields covered by ASEES. It is a vital meeting-ground to hear the latest research and maintain key research networks.

Professor Andrew's presentation addressed key elements of Lermontov's foundational novel in the light of recent theoretical developments in the field of narratology. This paper reflects one of his main research threads, the relationship between narrative and gender, which he applies to the study of both literature and film.

TWO PRIZE WINNERS IN OSWESTRY SPINAL STUDIES RESEARCH GROUP

Two researchers in the Spinal Studies Research Group based in the ARC/TORCH Building in RJAH Orthopaedic Hospital, Oswestry have won prizes for their presentations.

Sarah Turner (pictured far right) who is a 3rd year PhD Student with Keele, won a prize at the annual meeting of the charity, DISCs, in London, for her presentation, 'Cellular response to glucose and serum concentrations'. 

Dr Sharon Owen (above left) and co-authors, Steve Eisenstein and Professor Sally Roberts, from Keele/Oswestry, Bruce Caterson, Cardiff and Peter Roughley, from Canada, won a prize at the Society for Back Pain Research meeting in Cambridge. Sharon's work was entitled 'Proteoglycan populations in human intervertebral disc – small is beautiful?'  

Sally Roberts (group lead, centre) said: "Although many others within our group are now working on cell therapy and articular cartilage, it is really good to know that some of the team are still producing and presenting work of a prize-winning standard in the field of the intervertebral disc."

WORKSHOP ON GEOTHERMAL ENERGY

Professor Peter Styles, School of Physical and Geographical Sciences, was an invited speaker at a Workshop On Geothermal Energy (Icelandic - British Co-operation) hosted by the Icelandic Ambassador, Mr Benedikt Jonsson, and the UK Ambassador to Iceland, Mr Ian Whitting, at The Embassy of Iceland in London.

An introductory overview of the geothermal energy sector in Iceland was given by Mr Guðni Jóhannesson, Director General of the National Energy Authority, Iceland. Professor Styles and Professor Paul Younger, University of Newcastle, gave talks on the Geothermal potential of the UK and the implications for universities in the Midlands, the North-West and the North-East.

This was followed by presentations from Icelandic companies on geothermal energy, drilling, binary plants and direct use of engineering

The Icelandic President,  Mr Ólafur Ragnar Grímsson, attended the talks and hosted a lunch at which he spoke about the importance of Geothermal Energy to Iceland and his vision for transferring the technology especially to developing countries in collaboration with the UK.

MEETING OF SENATE – 30 NOVEMBER

The second meeting of Senate for the 2011-12 academic year will be taking place on Wednesday 30 November. Key items for discussion at this meeting will be the Research Excellence Framework Strategy and Code of Practice and also the University Learning and Teaching Strategy.

Senate are also being asked to recommend the new constitution of the KPA to Council for approval and will receive the standing reports from the Vice-Chancellor, KUSU, KPA and Senate's sub-Committees, Research Committee and University Learning and Teaching Committee.

The papers are available for campus users to view online here.

Members of staff who are not on Senate are also reminded that they can contact elected colleagues, should they wish for their views and comments on the papers to be shared at the meeting. A list of Senate membership can be found here.

REALLY RUBBISH WEEK

Pupils from local schools performed a "Stomp"-type piece, some developed their own "Really Rubbish" instruments back at school - and might even form a "Rubbish" band - while another group will be doing an assembly to highlight the issues they learned about and one of the schools will be developing lesson plans based on what they did during a Really Rubbish Lesson in Sustainability at Keele.

The local pupils took part in the event at Keele University Sustainability Hub and activities focused on issues of waste and litter and their impact on the environment, including making Really Rubbish music, jellyfish, a world map and even a Dalek.

More than 40 pupils from Sandon Business and Enterprise College, St Josephs College, Haywood Engineering College and St. Thomas More Catholic College took part in the day.

For more information contact keelehub@natsci.keele.ac.uk

WP SHORTLISTED FOR NATIONAL AWARD
 
A programme created by Keele to encourage university applications and raise aspirations and attainment in science was among those shortlisted for a 2011 Times Higher Education Award for 'Widening Participation Initiative of the Year'.

The THE Awards, which celebrate excellence and achievement within UK higher education institutions, were presented last night.

The University's STEM Mentors scheme was developed in response to the need to raise aspiration and attainment in STEM subjects.

During the past two years, the project has grown significantly and we now have over 29 trained STEM Mentors who work on the scheme. They are all current university students who are studying Science subjects as part of their degree programme who deliver workshops on campus and also in schools/colleges.The award went to Newcastle University for its 'Realising Opportunities Partnership'.

SUCCESS FOR KEELE/STAFFS COLLABORATION

Dr Alannah Tomkins, Research Institute for the Humanities, and Dr Mark Webster, Staffordshire University, have been awarded nearly £30K by the Arts and Humanities Research Council for their collaborative project 'Medical Histories: stories about health, illness and medicine in North Staffordshire'. 

Their work will bring together creative writers, Staffordshire residents, industrial representatives, primary care trusts and charities to explore aspects of the local history of medicine, via a series of creative-writing workshops.  The first workshop will be held in March 2012.

Each workshop will be run by a local writer living and working in North Staffordshire, with experience of publishing or performing regionally, nationally or internationally, supported by at least one academic from Staffordshire University and at least one from Keele.  The writings will form part of a touring exhibition to be shown at venues around North Staffordshire, but participants will be able to stay involved after the events by checking the project website, uploading creative writing, and contributing to the 'medical histories' blog.

The aim of the project is to generate momentum in advance of applying to fund a 'writer in residence' at one of the partner organisations.

ADJUNCT FACULTY POSITION FOR SAMI

The Department of Geography at McGill University, Montreal, Canada has approved and offered an Adjunct Faculty position to Sami Ullah, Lecturer in Environmental Sciences.

This decision was made by McGill in response to the active research involvement of Sami with colleagues at McGill University in the areas of global climate change and greenhouse gas fluxes from soils.

The adjunct position would allow Sami to actively seek support from Canadian sources for collaborative research projects in Canada and to strengthen academic links of Keele with McGill University.

Sami participated and showcased soils, and soils related research undertaken at Keele, at the inception meeting of the Midlands Chapter of the British Society of Soil Science held at Nottingham University this week. The event was attended by soil scientists from eight universities in the region and representatives of the British Geological Survey, ADAS and other environmental consultancies. Keele offered to host the next meeting of the Midlands Chapter at the Keele Hub for Sustainability next year.

NEXT WEEK

CONCERTS AT KEELE - Humphrey Lyttelton Band - Wednesday, 30 November, 19:30 in the Westminster Theatre, Chancellor's Building.

An exhibition of life drawing and artwork by Medical Students will be opened in the Keele Medical School Atrium by Cheshire artist Ann Roach on Wednesday evening. Drawings will be available for sale and all proceeds will go to charity.

The exhibition will run until 8 December.

FROM THE ARCHIVES

Nineteen years ago -

Dr David Harrison (Vice-Chancellor of the University from 1979 to 1984) was among four recipients of honorary degrees at the winter degree ceremony held on 28 November 1992 in the University Chapel.

He received the degree of Doctor of the University.