Queen Mary, University of London | ||||||||||||
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Motto | Coniunctis Viribus With United Powers |
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Established | 1123 (Medical College of St Bartholomew's Hospital) 1785 (London Hospital Medical College) 1843 (Medical College of St Bartholomew's Hospital) 1882 (Westfield College) 1885 (Queen Mary College) 1989 (merger of Queen Mary & Westfield) 1995 (medical schools merge with QMW) |
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Type | Public | |||||||||||
Endowment | £32 million[1] | |||||||||||
Chancellor | HRH The Princess Royal (University of London) | |||||||||||
Principal | Professor Simon Gaskell | |||||||||||
Students | 16,919[2] | |||||||||||
Location | London, United Kingdom | |||||||||||
Campus | Urban | |||||||||||
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Affiliations | 1994 Group Association of Commonwealth Universities Universities UK University of London |
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Website | www.qmul.ac.uk | |||||||||||
Queen Mary, University of London (informally Queen Mary, QMUL or QM) is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom and a constituent college of the federal University of London. With roots dating back to 1785, Queen Mary was formed by the merger of four historic colleges, and since joining the University of London in 1915 has grown to become one of its largest colleges.
Queen Mary's main campus is located in the Mile End area of the East End of London, with other campuses in Holborn, Smithfield and Whitechapel. It has around 16,000 full-time students and 3,000 staff[3] and had a total income of £290 million in 2009/10, of which £68.5 million was from research grants and contracts, the highest research income of any UK university which is not a member of the Russell Group.[4] Queen Mary is organised into three faculties – the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, the Faculty of Science and Engineering and the Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry – within which there are 21 academic departments and institutes.
In the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise, Queen Mary was ranked 11th by the The Guardian and 13th by Times Higher Education out of the 132 UK higher education institutions assessed. In the 2010 Times Higher Education World University Rankings Queen Mary is ranked 35th in Europe and 120th in the world.[5] Queen Mary's degree courses in English, Drama, History, Politics, Law, Linguistics and those based at Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry are particularly strong, ranking in the top 10 of national academic league tables. In the 2011 Guardian University Guide, the Queen Mary School of Law is ranked 3rd in the UK.[6] There are five Nobel Laureates amongst Queen Mary's alumni and current and former staff.[7]
Queen Mary is a member of the 1994 Group, the Association of Commonwealth Universities and Universities UK.
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Queen Mary's origins lie in the mergers, over the years, of four older colleges: Queen Mary College, Westfield College, St Bartholomew's Hospital Medical College and the London Hospital Medical College. In 1989 Queen Mary merged with Westfield College to form Queen Mary & Westfield College. Although teaching began at the London Hospital Medical College in 1785, it did not become part of Queen Mary until 1995. In that same year the two medical schools merged together to form the School of Medicine and Dentistry at Queen Mary & Westfield College, but Barts and The London has, to some extent, retained its own identity. In 2000, the college adopted its present title of Queen Mary, University of London, but the official legal title remains Queen Mary and Westfield College.[1]
Queen Mary College was founded in the mid Victorian era when growing awareness of conditions in London's East End led to drives to provide facilities for local inhabitants, popularised in the 1882 novel All Sorts of Conditions of Men – An Impossible Story by Walter Besant, which told of how a rich and clever couple from Mayfair went to the East End to build a "Palace of Delight, with concert halls, reading rooms, picture galleries, art and designing schools."[8] Although not directly responsible for the conception of the People's Palace, the novel did much to popularise it.
The trustees of the Beaumont Trust, administering funds left by Barber Beaumont, purchased the site of the former Bancroft's School from the Drapers' Company. On 20 May 1885 the Drapers' Court of Assistants resolved to grant £20,000 "for the provision of the technical schools of the People's Palace."[9] The foundation stone was laid on 28 June 1886 and on 14 May 1887 Queen Victoria opened the palace's Queen's Hall as well as laying the foundation stone for the technical schools in the palace's east wing.
The technical schools were opened on 5 October 1888, with the entire palace completed by 1892. When opening them, the Master of the Drapers' Company declared their aims to be "to improve the scientific and technical knowledge of apprentices and workmen engaged in industrial life". However others saw the technical schools as one day becoming a technical university for the East End.[10] The conflicting demands of pleasure and education were identified by the Assistant Charity Commissioner as early as 1891 and for the next forty years this was to dog the People's Palace. In 1892 the Drapers' Company provided £7,000 a year for ten years to guarantee the educational side income.
The classes reached a peak of 8000 tickets in 1892–1893 but fell to less than half for the following year, due to competition from the London School Board, despite the Palace's classes being more advanced. With the level of teaching growing, in 1895 John Hatton, Director of Evening Classes (1892–1896; later Director of Studies 1896–1908 and Principal 1908–1933) proposed introducing a course of study leading to the Bachelor of Science degree of the University of London. By the turn of the century the first degrees were awarded and Hatton, along with several other Professors, were recognised as Teachers of the University of London. In 1906 an application for Parliamentary funds "for the aid of Educational Institutions engaged in work of a University nature", led to the College being told it was "of the highest importance that there should be a School of the University in the faculties of Arts, Science and Engineering within easy reach of the very large population of the East End of London." The educational part of the People's Palace was admitted on an initial three year trial basis as a School of the University of London on 15 May 1907 as East London College.
The first aeronautical engineering department in the UK was established at the College in 1909, boasting a ground-breaking wind tunnel.[11] Professor A. P. Thurston, a former student at the College gaining a first class degree in Mechanical and Electrical Engineering in 1906, was encouraged and financially supported by P. Y. Alexander, a wealthy aeronautical enthusiast and acquaintance, and J. L. Hatton, the then Principal, to start regular courses of lectures in aeronautics.[12][13] Thurston gradually brought in more and more skilled aeronautical engineers, and with the newly built laboratory, started giving lectures in aeronautics ("Flying machines", "Balloons, airships and kites", "The mechanical principles of flight")[14] and started extensive research on fundamental matters such as the characteristics of wing sections and propellers, structural and material characteristics, and the forces on struts, leading to use in military aircraft for the First World War.[13][15]
In 1910 the College's status in the University of London was extended for a further five years, with unlimited membership achieved in May 1915. During this period the organisation of the governors of the People's Palace was rearranged, creating the separate People's Palace Committee and East London College Committee, both under the Palace Governors, as a sign of the growing separation of the two concepts within a single complex.[16]
During the First World War the College admitted students from the London Hospital Medical College who were preparing for the preliminary medical examination, the first step in a long process that would eventually bring the two institutions together. After the war, the College grew, albeit constrained by the rest of the People's Palace to the west and a burial ground immediately to the east. In 1920 it obtained both the Palace's Rotunda (now the Octagon) and rooms under the winter gardens at the west of the palace, which became chemical laboratories. The College's status was also unique, being the only School of the University of London that was subject to both the Charity Commissioners and the Board of Education. In April 1929 the College Council decided it would take the steps towards applying to the Privy Council for a Royal Charter, but on the advice of the Drapers' Company first devised a scheme for development and expansion, which recommended amongst other things to reamalgamate the People's Palace and the College, with guaranteed provision of the Queen's Hall for recreational purposes, offering at least freedom of governance if not in space.[17]
In the early hours of 25 February 1931 a fire destroyed the Queen's Hall, though both the College and the winter gardens escaped. In the coming days discussions on reconstruction led to the proposal that the entire site be transferred to the College which would then apply for a Charter alone. The Drapers' Company obtained St Helen's Terrace, a row of six houses neighbouring the site, and in July 1931 it was agreed to give these over to the People's Palace for a new site adjacent to the old, which would now become entirely the domain of the College. Separation was now achieved. The Charter was now pursued, but the Academic Board asked for a name change, feeling that "east London" carried unfortunate associations that would hinder the College and its graduates. With the initial proposed name, "Queen's College", having already been taken by another institution and "Victoria College" felt to be unoriginal, "Queen Mary College" was settled on. The Charter of Incorporation was presented on 12 December 1934 by Queen Mary herself.[18]
During the Second World War the College was evacuated to Cambridge, where it shared with King's College. Meanwhile the Mile End site was requisitioned for war work and was for a time used as the Municipal Offices of Stepney Borough Council. After the war the College returned to London, facing many of the same problems but with prospects for westward expansion.[19]
The East End had suffered considerable bomb damage (although the College itself had incurred little) and consequently several areas of land near to the College site now became vacant. The former church of St Benets' to the immediate east of the College was now defunct and was demolished in 1950, with the space used to build a new block for physics, but most of the acquisitions in the immediate post war years were to the west of the college. Even the new People's Palace was no longer able to meet its needs and it was acquired by the College along with several pieces of land that together formed a significant continuous stretch along the Mile End Road. New buildings for engineering, biology and chemistry were built on the new sites, whilst the arts took over the space vacated in the original building, now renamed the Queens' Building (to reflect the support and patronage of both Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother).
Limited accommodation resulted in the acquisition of further land in South Woodford (now directly connected to Mile End tube station by means of the Central Line's eastward extension), upon which tower blocks were established. Consequently, student numbers continued to expand. The College also obtained the Co-operative Wholesale Society's clothing factory on the Mile End Road which was converted into a building for the Faculty of Laws (and some other teaching), despite being physically separated from what was now a campus to the west.[20]
From the mid-1960s until the mid-1980s the College was in a period of uncertainty and flux. Much planning was dominated by the "BLQ scheme" which proposed to link Queen Mary College with the London Hospital Medical College and St Bartholomew's Hospital Medical College with a joint facility in Mile End, but the land was not yet available. Over the period land that came onto the market was purchased with the intention to consolidate as soon as possible. The Queen Mary College Act 1973 was passed "to authorise the disposal of the Nuevo burial ground in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets and to authorise the use for other purposes thereof..." and gave the authority to disinter and reinter most of the graves to Dytchleys. A further link with both The London and St. Bartholomew's was made in 1974 when an anonymous donor provided for the establishment of a further hall of residence in Woodford, to be divided equally between Queen Mary College students and the two medical colleges.[21]
At the start of the 1980s changing demographics and finances caused much concern through the university sector and led to a reorganisation of the University of London. At Queen Mary some subjects, such as Russian and Classics were discontinued, whilst the College became one of five in the University with a concentration of laboratory sciences, including the transfer of science departments from Westfield College, Chelsea College, Queen Elizabeth College and Bedford College.[22]
From the mid 1980s onwards the College began expanding across the newly acquired land to the east, taking the campus to the Regent's Canal. A part of the burial ground remains to this day but the rest of the area has been absorbed by the College's expansion. The long planned Pre Clinical Medicine building for the BLQ Scheme finally materialised in the late 1980s, further strengthening the ties between the three colleges.[23]
In 1989 Queen Mary merged with Westfield College to form Queen Mary & Westfield College (often abbreviated to QMW). Over subsequent years, activities were concentrated on the Queen Mary site, with the Westfield site eventually sold.
In 1990, the London Hospital was renamed to the Royal London Hospital, after markings its 250th year, and a reorganisation of medical education within the University of London resulted in most of the freestanding medical schools being merged with existing large colleges to form multi-faculty institutions. In 1995 the London Hospital Medical College and St Bartholomew's Hospital Medical College merged together and into Queen Mary & Westfield College to form the entity now named Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry.[13]
In 2000 the college changed its name for general public use to Queen Mary, University of London; however, the College's charter has not been reissued and its legal name remains Queen Mary & Westfield College. The VISTA telescope is a is a 4-metre class wide-field telescope at the Paranal Observatory in Chile that was conceived and developed by Queen Mary University, costing approximately £36m.[24]
The Westfield Student Village opened in 2004 on the Mile End Campus, bringing over 2,000 rooms to students and a huge array of facilities, restaurants, and cafes.[13][25]
The Blizard Building, home to the Medical School’s Institute of Cell and Molecular Science opened at the Whitechapel campus in 2005. The award-winning building was designed by Will Alsop, and is named after William Blizard, an English surgeon and founder of the London Hospital Medical College in 1785.[26][27]
The year 2006 saw the refurbishment of The Octagon, the original library of the People's Palace dating back to 1888.[28]
In 2007 parts of the School of Law – postgraduate facilities and the Centre for Commercial Law Studies – moved to premises in Lincoln's Inn Fields in central London. The Women at Queen Mary Exhibition was staged in the Octagon, marking 125 years of Westfield College and 120 years of Queen Mary College.[13]
In September 2009, the world's first science education centre located within a working research laboratory at the Blizard Institute of Cell and Molecular Science, hoping to inspire children with school tours and interactive games and puzzles.[29]
Queen Mary became one of the few Universities to implement a requirement of the A* grade at A-Level after its introduction in 2010 on some of their most popular courses, such as Engineering, Law, and Medicine.[30][31]
Following on from the 2010 UK student protests, Queen Mary have set fees of £9,000 per year for September 2012 entry, but also offer extensive bursaries and scholarships.[32]
The main Mile End campus contains the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, the Faculty of Science and Engineering, the Queen's building/People's Palace/Octagon, the main college library, the student union, Draper's bar and club, several restaurants, many halls of residences, and a very popular gym. The educational and research sites of the Arts Research Centre, Computer Science, the large Engineering building, Fogg Building, Francis Bancroft Building, G. O. Jones Building, Joseph Priestley Building, Lock-keeper’s Graduate Centre, and the Mathematical Science Building, are all located within the Mile End campus.[33][34]
The Whitechapel campus encompasses Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry, the Whitechapel Medical Library, the award winning Blizard Institute of Cell and Molecular Science housing the largest open plan laboratories in Europe, and the Royal London Hospital.
The West Smithfield campus of Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry, the West Smithfield Medical Library, the Wolfson Institute of Preventive Medicine, the John Vane Science Centre, the Heart Centre and St Bartholomew's Hospital are based in Smithfield.[35]
The Centre for Commercial Law Studies and LLM teaching and postgraduate law research activities are based in Lincoln's Inn Fields in Holborn.[35]
From 1964 until 1982 QMC maintained a nuclear reactor, the first to be built for a UK university. Initially sited beneath Mile End Road, it was moved to the new QMC Nucleonics Laboratory in Marshgate Lane, Stratford in 1967, upgraded in 1968, and decommissioned in 1982, with the site licence surrendered in November 1983.[36][37] The Marshgate Lane site became part of the Olympic Park from 2006; in response to safety concerns about the former purpose of the site, a Greenpeace spokesman was quoted as saying "In our view there's nothing to worry about."[38]
On 26 April 2005, Harold Pinter, who was to win the Nobel Prize in Literature later that year, gave a public reading and was interviewed by his official authorised biographer, Michael Billington, in the studio named for Pinter and located as part of the Faculty of Arts (School of English and Drama) in the Mile End campus,[39][40] to celebrate its refurbishment.[41]
Queen Mary has around 3,000 staff, who teach and research across a wide range of subjects in the Humanities, Social Sciences and Laws, Medicine and Dentistry and Science and Engineering. Almost 17,000 students study at the 21 academic schools and institutes, with just over 30 percent coming from overseas and represent 130 different countries.[34] Queen Mary awarded over £2 million in studentships to prospective postgraduate students for the 2011/12 academic year.[35][42] A staff survey in 2011 found that Queen Mary staff were highly motivated, proud to work at Queen Mary, felt that Queen Mary is a good place to work, and could see constant improvements over 12 months.[43]
Faculty[44] | Number of staff | Number of undergraduate students | Number of postgraduate students | Annual turnover |
Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences | 400 | 4,000 | 2,300 | £43 million |
Faculty of Science and Engineering | 600 | 3,000 | 800 | £53 million |
Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry | 1,000 | 2,300 | 1,000 | £110 million |
The three faculties are split further into independent schools, institutes, and research centres:[45]
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In 2009/10, Queen Mary received a total of £68.5 million in research grants and contracts, the highest research income of any UK university which is not a member of the Russell Group.[4] In the UK Research Assessment Exercise results published in December 2008, Queen Mary was placed 11th according to an analysis by The Guardian newspaper[46] and 13th according to The Times Higher Education Supplement,[47] out of the 132 institutions submitted for the exercise. The Times Higher commented "the biggest star among the research-intensive institutions was Queen Mary, University of London, which went from 48th in 2001 to 13th in the 2008 Times Higher Education table, up 35 places."[48]
The 2008 Research Assessment Exercise classified research on a scale from 1 to 4, with 3 meaning "internationally excellent" and 4 meaning "world-leading". The areas in which Queen Mary excels are (technically, these are the areas where at least three quarters of the research output was judged as internationally excellent or world-leading):[49]
The raw data from the Research Assessment Exercise does not rank or otherwise compare universities. Other parties interpret the raw data and compile university rankings. Queen Mary placed in the first five in UK, according to The Guardian rankings, in the following subjects:
ARWU[59] (2011/12, national) |
20–29 | |
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ARWU[59] (2011/12, world) |
201–300 | |
QS[60] (2011/12, national) |
26 | |
QS[60] (2011/12, world) |
172 | |
THE[61] (2011/12, national) |
16 | |
THE[61] (2011/12, world) |
120 | |
Complete/The Independent[62] (2012, national) |
36 | |
The Guardian[63] (2012, national) |
36 | |
The Sunday Times[64] (2012, national) |
23 | |
The Times[65] (2012, national) |
37 |
Internationally, Queen Mary was ranked 172nd in the 2011 QS World University Rankings,.[66] In 2010 it moved up 17 places to 147th from its position of 164th in the 2009 THE-QS World University Rankings (in 2010 Times Higher Education World University Rankings and QS World University Rankings parted ways to produce separate rankings—with the new 2010 Times Higher Education World University Rankings, Queen Mary now is ranked 120th in the World[67]). The Shanghai Jiao Tong University's 2009 Academic Ranking of World Universities placed it in the 59 – 79 band in Europe and 152 – 200 globally, putting it level with University of Warwick, Durham University and St. Andrews.[68] The 2007 CHE-ExcellenceRanking, examining the academic performance of graduate programs in natural sciences, placed Queen Mary in the European top group for biology and physics.[69] In addition, The Guardian Newspaper's League Tables placed Queen Mary 12th in the UK in 2005; it was placed 42nd by The Times; and 28th in 2006. Queen Mary has also been ranked the sixth best UK university for student employability[70] – with the second highest UK graduate starting salary.[71] The NUS-supported National Student Survey of 2011 ranked Materials at Queen Mary 1st in the UK, with Aerospace Engineering ranked 2nd and Mechanical Engineering 5th, with the entire School of Engineering and Materials Sciences ranked 1st in London. Overall, Queen Mary achieved student satisfaction of 88% to rank equal 2nd in London with UCL, and ahead of King’s College London, LSE and Imperial College.[72]
As members of a college of the University of London, students at Queen Mary have access to Senate House Library, shared by other colleges such as Kings College London and University College London and are permitted to use the facilities at the University of London Union, located a 15 minute tube ride away in the academic melting pot of Bloomsbury. Requests by students to carry out research at other College's libraries, such as the Maughan Library and the collections at SOAS, are also welcomed by member institutions.
Queen Mary offers a joint degree programme with Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications, one of China's top engineering universities. This was the first of its kind to be approved by the PRC Ministry of Education: it is taught 50% by each institution; in English; in Beijing; by staff who fly out from Queen Mary to teach its part of the programme; and the students receive two degrees, one from each university. The programmes are in Telecommunications and Management and Ecommerce Engineering and Law. Almost 2,000 students are studying on these programmes in 2009 and the first cohort graduated in the Summer of 2008.[73] The joint programmes have been praised by the UK Quality Assurance Agency; the PRC Ministry of Education; and the UK Institution of Engineering and Technology.[74]
Queen Mary collaborates with Royal Holloway, University of London to help run programmes at a college of the University of London in Paris, France, known as the University of London Institute in Paris (ULIP), enabling undergraduate and graduate students to study University of London ratified French Studies degrees in France.[75]
The Queen Mary Students' Union (QMSU) unites the various clubs and societies of Queen Mary, University of London. The students' union is split between two sites, the Blomeley Centre and the original students' union site (recently refurbished).
The union mascot is a leopard called Mary. In 1984, a cartoon of the female leopard was printed on RAG T-shirts, and it was possible to gain an impression of nipples, causing the feminist group to demand that they be destroyed. A number of T-shirts were then purchased and the offending cartoon nipples removed.
The elected representatives within the Union are made up of a President and four vice-Presidents. The current SU president is Sophie Richardson.
President: Responsible for the running of the Union and also the main figure head of the organisation.
Vice President Association: Also known as the Barts and the London SU President, responsible for the running of the Association and are specifically there to make sure that the needs of the Medical and Dental Students are addressed and met.
Vice President Education, Welfare and Representation: Responsible for the course reps, elections systems, campaigning on student issues and most importantly making sure that College has appropriate services to meet the welfare needs of students.
Vice President Student Activities: Responsible for the running of clubs and societies, RAG and Provide volunteering, INTERSOC (Inter Society Football) and coming up with innovative activities in which students can participate.
Vice President Media & Publication: Responsible for the Website, Cub Magazine and Surveys and Research.
QMSU and BLSA sports clubs compete every year in the Merger Cup where many of the sports teams within both SUs compete against each other. Queen Mary claimed the cup back in 2010 but lost it again in the following year to BLSA (2011). Sporting fixtures include: Badminton, Basketball, Football, Hockey, Netball, Rugby, Squash, Tennis and Rowing.
Many QMUL students are accommodated in the college's own halls of residence or other accommodation; QMUL students are also eligible to apply for places in the University of London intercollegiate halls of residence, such as Connaught Hall.
Most students in college or university accommodation are first-year undergraduates or international students. The majority of second and third-year students and postgraduates find their own accommodation in the private sector.[76]
The College's Westfield Student Village, situated in the north-east corner of the Mile End Campus, has en-suite, self-catering housing for 1,195 students, staff and academic visitors in six contemporary buildings. A shop, laundrette, café bar, 200-seat restaurant and central reception (staffed 24 hours a day), and a communal area situated adjacent to the Regents canal, form part of the Village development. Rooms are arranged in flats and maisonettes housing between four to 11 students.
To date, there have been five Nobel laureates who were either students or academics at Queen Mary.[7]
Name | Prize | Year Awarded | Rationale |
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Sir Ronald Ross | Physiology or Medicine |
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For discovering the life-cycle of the malarial parasite Plasmodium |
Edgar Adrian | Physiology or Medicine |
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For his work on the function of neurons |
Sir John Vane | Physiology or Medicine |
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For his work on prostaglandins |
Professor Joseph Rotblat | Peace |
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For his lifelong devotion to nuclear abolition |
Professor Sir Peter Mansfield | Physiology or Medicine |
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For his pioneering work on Magnetic Resonance Imaging as a diagnostic technique |
To date, Queen Mary has had a total of 22 Principals (11 of Westfield College, eight of Queen Mary College, and three since the merger of Queen Mary, Westfield, and Barts).[13]
Name | Held Office |
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Constance Louise Maynard |
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Agnes de Selincourt |
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Anne W Richardson |
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Bertha Surtees Phillpotts |
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Eleanor Lodge |
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Dorothy Chapman |
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Mary Stocks |
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Kathleen Chesney |
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Pamela Matthews |
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Dr Bryan Thwaites |
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Professor John Varey |
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Name | Held Office |
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John Leigh Smeatham Hatton |
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Sir Frederick Barton Maurice |
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Professor Benjamin Ifor Evans |
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Sir Thomas Percival Creed |
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Sir Harry Melville |
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Sir James Woodham Mentor |
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Professor Ian Butterworth |
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Professor Graham Zellick |
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Name | Held Office |
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Professor Sir Adrian Smith |
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Professor Philip Ogden |
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Professor Simon Gaskell |
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