Jamie Beddard graduated from Kent in 1991 with a Sociology Degree. Now he is coming back 30 years later as the writer of Delicate, a dance-circus production that come to Gulbenkian on Fri 2 Dec.

Jamie explained to us just how this happened:

“I recently returned to Canterbury and Whitstable for the first time in 30 odd years in search of some old haunts and friends, I was delighted to find both. So now I cannot believe I am back so soon, and Delicate is being presented at The Gulbenkian. I have not been back on campus since completing my Sociology degree in 1991. My college, Rutherford, was only one of four, and I used to roam the campus on my rusting tricycle. Whilst I did not excel at sociology or studying I grew up, became independent and met many lifelong friends. I only have fond memories of my time at Kent and it was instrumental on the journey I am still on today.

After leaving Kent I became a hopeless Youth Worker in Kilburn, before the BBC came knocking. They were making a film which required disabled actors and somehow got hold of my name. Acting had never been on my radar, and my main interest was visiting the iconic BBC building at White City.

To my utter astonishment I was offered the role in the film ‘Skalligrigg’ and a new career suddenly beckoned. Cut to 30 years later I’m returning with the play Delicate (Writer, Co-director). By complete chance the last gig of the tour that started in the Arctic Circle is ending at the Gulbenkian. For me personally there is a beautiful synergy about this.”

You can see Delicate by Extraordinary Bodies at Gulbenkian on Fri 2 Dec, 19.30.  More information can be found on the events website.

 Find out more about Jamie.

The Centre for the Study of Higher Education (CSHE) congratulates the following colleagues who have successful gained Senior Fellowship or Fellowship of AdvanceHE (formerly the Higher Education Academy) through the Route to Recognition for Experienced Staff (RRES).

Senior Fellowship

• Caroline Challans – International Programmes
• Marian Duggan – School of Social Policy, Sociology and Social Research
• Samantha Evans –  Kent Business School
• Epameinondas Katsikas – Kent Business School
• Bridget Ng’andu – School of Social Policy, Sociology and Social Research
• Zita Stone – Kent Business School
• Kirsti Taylor – Global and Lifelong Learning
• Johanne Thompson – Kent Law School

Fellowship

• Nidal Acac – Council for At-Risk Academics (Cara) / University of Kent PhD student
• Luisa Dumbleton – International Programmes
• Ahmed Halil – Council for At-Risk Academics (Cara)
• Sameena Hoda – International Programmes

AdvanceHE Fellowship or Senior Fellowship status confers national recognition for holders’ expertise and commitment to professionalism in teaching and learning, and demonstrates that their practice is aligned to the UK Professional Standards Framework (UKPSF).

The Council for At-Risk Academics (Cara) provides urgent assistance to academics who are in immediate danger, forced into exile, or who choose to continue working in their home country despite serious risk. The Centre for the Study of Higher Education is pleased to work with Cara to assist displaced Syrian academics in gaining Fellowship recognition through AdvanceHE.

University of Kent staff members who are interested in applying for the RRES should complete the expression of interest form on the CSHE website.

Gulbenkian’s Christmas Season 2022 is a scrumptiously festive selection box of treats! From merry music gigs, festive family events to comedy nights full of Christmas cheer, Gulbenkian has Christmas all wrapped up this December!

Schedule:

Home Alone (PG)  Sun 4 Dec, 15.00

Under The Frozen Moon  Tue 6 – Wed 21 Dec, Times Vary

Funny Rabbit Comedy Club: NJambi McGrath & Keith Farnan Fri 9 Dec, 20.00

Christmas Cornucopia  Sat 10 Dec, 19.30

Harriet Kemsley: Honeysuckle Island  Sat 10 Dec 20.00

The Muppet Christmas Carol (U) Sat 10 Dec, 15.00

ROH: The Nutcracker (U) Thu 8, 7.15pm & Sun 11 Dec, 14.00

Frozen Sing-Along (PG)  Sun 11 Dec, 10.30

Elf (PG) Tue 13 Dec, 19.00

The Polar Express (U)  Sat 17 Dec, 10.30

Relaxed Screening: The Grinch (2018) (U)  Sat 17 Dec, 15.00

Arthur Christmas (U)  Sun 18 Dec, 10.30

It’s a Wonderful Life (U)  Sun 18 Dec, 16.00

Join us throughout December (Tuesday 6 – Wednesday 21) for our magically festive theatre show Under The Frozen Moon. Award-winning Half a String presents a winter show perfect for ages 3 and above. In this heart-warming tale, a young girl sets out on a quest to confront the dragon under the ice who has hoarded all of the fires and lights for himself. With lively poetry, transforming sets, atmospheric live music and exciting puppetry; Under the Frozen Moon brings to life a beautiful world of ice and adventure.

We’re decking the halls and singing merrily on high with incredibly merry music gigs this December including the University Chorus and Orchestra’s Christmas Cornucopia as part of the ten-year anniversary of Colyer-Fergusson on Saturday 10 December.  Folk in the Barn bring us The Albion Christmas Band, who are back with more Christmas music, humorous stories and spine-tingling ballads on Saturday 17 December. Plus, the University of Kent Big Band returns with its annual festive cracker of a Christmas gig, Christmas Swing-Along! featuring season classics and big band swing on Wednesday 14 December.

There’ll be hohohos aplenty at our Funny Rabbit Comedy Club on Friday 9 December, featuring NJambi McGrath & Keith Farnan. We also have Canterbury’s own Harriet Kemsley with her new stand up show Honeysuckle Island on Saturday 10 December.

Snuggle up in our cinema and be enchanted by our incredible screenings this December. Cheer on pint-sized hero, Kevin as he runs rings around two would-be burglars in this Christmas caper full of pranks and booby-traps galore as Home Alone kicks off our Christmas season on Friday 4 December. Be wrapped up in the world of old Hollywood as we screen the evergreen classic It’s a Wonderful Life on Sunday 18 December.

Rediscover the childlike wonder of the season with Christmas family film favourites including Aardman Animations’ Arthur Christmas on Sunday 18 December, the joyous and anarchic take on the icon Charles Dickens’ tale The Muppet Christmas Carol on Saturday 10 December, and The Polar Express stops by our screen on Saturday 17 December. Let yourself go once again with Disney’s Frozen Sing-Along which skates onto our screen on Sunday 11 December.

Christmas just wouldn’t be Christmas without the inspiring and opulent Royal Opera House’s The Nutcracker. Experience one of the most enduring and enchanting versions of the age-old tale The Nutcracker. Follow a young girl’s journey as an enchanted present leads her on a wonderful Christmas adventure in this beautiful classical ballet, danced to Tchaikovsky’s magnificent score. It will be screened live at Gulbenkian Arts Centre on Thursday 8 December and Sunday 11 December.

This year the University Carol Service takes place on Monday 12 December in Canterbury Cathedral at 7.30pm (please note that the start time is 30 mins earlier than in recent years).

The event will feature the University Chamber Choir and Kent Gospel Choir. There will be plenty of well known Christmas carols for everyone to sing and you will hear traditional readings which will be read by staff and students representing various roles and groups from across the University.

Admission is by free ticket only, and staff may request up to 4 tickets.

Please email Revd Dr Stephen Laird s.c.e.laird@kent.ac.uk with your ticket requests as soon as possible and by 4 December at the latest.

Please note that you will be given the option of accessing e-tickets; or of receiving printed tickets via internal mail. This year’s appeal is for Porchlight, Canterbury’s homelessness charity.

What is Disability History Month?

Disability History Month is a yearly nationwide celebration from 18 November to 18 December, which was started to shine a spotlight on historical and current achievements and issues to do with disability. UKDHM is the national organisation which strives to celebrate the lives of disabled people; challenge disablism or stigma around disability; and achieve equality.

UKDHM ascribes to the social model of disability, an idea first proposed by Kent alumnus and professor Mike Oliver, in the 1980s. This is the now widely accepted idea that much of the difficulty of being disabled is due to societal failure to adapt for disabled people. At Kent we actively work to seek to acknowledge and remove those barriers to create a more inclusive and accessible environment for everyone.

DHM at Kent

The University of Kent and Kent Union are proud to collaborate to amplify the voices of disabled people within our community to educate everyone on the issues people with visible and invisible disabilities continue to face, so we can further de-stigmatise and work together for a more inclusive and equal society.

The full programme is available on the Disability History Month webpage and all events are open to students and staff, and free to attend.

Some key highlights include: a discussion with a debut novelist, Kent Alumnus and disability activist Chloe Timms; a creative workshop where you can try Finger Casting and foil embossing, the inspirational speaker and paralympic skier Millie Knight, Disability Workshop at Medway which discusses and explains the campus provisions, and a fun interactive workshop to look at Accessibility and Ideas for Inclusion to improve your work and study.

Our Stories: Tuesday 6 December

• 17.00- 18.00: Exhibition viewing in Marlowe Building Foyer, refreshments available
• 18.00 18.30: Film shorts screening in Marlowe Lecture Theatre 1

As part of Disability History Month 2022, we’ve been in the Templeman Library archives researching the history and progress of disability provision and communication from the first cohort of students and staff at the University of Kent in 1965, to the present day. Check out the timeline online, or head over to the Marlowe foyer from 24 November to see it hanging as a physical display.

We’ve also created a collection of short films featuring students, staff and alumni on their experiences of disability, all captioned and signed in British Sign Language, which will be screened at 6pm on Tuesday 6 December in Marlowe Lecture Theatre 1. Book your free place on Eventbrite to join current and former students and staff for free refreshments to view the exhibition from 5pm, and stay for the film screening.

#InclusiveKent

We hope you enjoy the programme and that you use it as a starting point for deeper thought and conversations with your friends and colleagues. Follow #DHMKent22 and #InclusiveKent on social media for the latest updates and check out further articles on Disability and Inclusion.

In 2020 the University of Kent, Université de Lille, KU Leuven and Ghent University established the Interregional Internationalisation Initiative, the 3i University Network. The main goal of the network is to bring together universities, regional governments and the private sector/civil society to work on challenges common to Flanders, Kent and the Hauts-de-France. By virtue of their proximity, the three regions share challenges in a number of areas, including, but not limited to

• Marine and maritime questions (blue energy, preservation of the coastal environment…)
• Climate and energy (net zero, sustainability, energy security etc)
• Nutrition and health  (sustainable, healthy alternative food sources,  …)
• Communities and well-being (migration and refugee studies, vulnerability and inclusion of ageing populations and people with disabilities,…).

In order to enhance cooperation between the 3i-partners, the members of the 3i University Network have decided to put out a call for proposals for collaborative projects. This call aims to support academic staff of the four partners who want to set up or increase their cross-border collaborations with the specific goal of submitting joint project applications for larger grants.

Maximum funding available per project: €10.000 for one project per thematic cluster of the 3i University Network.
Total budget available for this call is 40.000€.

Find out more about this call here:

Joint call for projects

Application file

Congratulations to Steven Allain, from the School of Anthology and Conservation, who won an award at this year’s NBN Awards for Wildlife Recording 2022. Steven won the 2022 NBN Award for Wildlife Recording – Terrestrial.

The winners and runners-up of the NBN Awards for Wildlife Recording 2022 were announced at the Natural History Museum, in London, on Wednesday 9 November 2022.

These national Awards recognise and celebrate the outstanding contributions adults and young people are making to wildlife recording and data sharing, which is helping to improve our understanding of the UK’s biodiversity.

Steven has worked hard to both generate and verify records of amphibians and reptiles in Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire, and Norfolk since 2016 and in the last two years in Kent.

All of the records that Steven generates are shared with the local Amphibian and Reptile Groups. He is Chairman of the Cambridgeshire & Peterborough Amphibian and Reptile Group, and also the Norfolk Amphibian and Reptile Group as well as being Volunteer Officer for the Bedfordshire Reptile and Amphibian Group.

Steven is often consulted by Animal and Plant Health Agency regarding the presence of non-native amphibian and reptile species in the UK, and his passion and enthusiasm for amphibians and reptiles, and his unique ways of engaging people helped him to also win the 2022 Anglia Ruskin University Sustainability Champion Award.

Steven Allain says: “The main thing that excites me about recording amphibians and reptiles, is that they are historically under-recorded. This means that it is fairly easy to discover new populations of even the most widespread species that no one knew were present in an area. For me, it is all about putting dots on maps, and trying to cover as large a geographical area as possible, to help maintain up-to-date distribution maps of our herpetofauna.”

Come join us at our Menopause café on Wednesday 23 November! Head over to the Oasis Lounge, Rochester Building from 13.00 – 15.00 where you can gather to eat cake, drink tea and discuss the menopause – there’s no need to book!

At the Menopause café

At a menopause café there is no agenda – you won’t learn facts about the menopause, and there is no intention of leading café participants to any conclusion, product or course of action. The café simply gives space to anyone wanting to chat about the menopause in a confidential, respectful space. We will have lots of treats, teas and coffees available, and a few facilitators hopping between tables to keep conversation flowing.

We are running this menopause café in partnership with Menopause Café, which is a not-for-profit organisation that supports the set-up of the café with some guidelines, and also run their own #flushfest. More info can be found on their website.

How it started

The Menopause Café came about in 2017, in Perth, Australia, created by Rachel Weiss who was inspired to get more people talking about the menopause after watching the BBC programme ‘Menopause and Me’.

She modelled the Menopause Café on the Death Café, which aimed to ‘increase awareness of death with a view to helping people make the most of their (finite) lives’.

The menopause café has only one purpose: to gather people, often strangers, in one place to drink tea, eat cake and discuss the menopause.

Castles are Elsewhere is an exhibition that commemorates the life of Roger Cardinal (1940-2019), whose fascination with the extraordinary led him on a wondrous odyssey upon which he encountered creativity in the most unexpected places.

Roger is probably best known for his seminal book titled Outsider Art, published in 1972 – the first of its kind in the UK which this year celebrates its 50th anniversary. It was followed a few years later in 1979, with the ground-breaking Outsiders exhibition at The Hayward Gallery.

Through the treasures in his private art collection, his books, his letters, and a selection of his fascinating diaries, this exhibition will give an insight into Roger’s life, and we hope fitting
memoriam to a man who encouraged us all to look at art and life differently, to see that ‘castles
are elsewhere’.

The exhibition which was curated Jennifer Gilbert & Vivienne Roberts, will be accompanied by a publication where luminaires of the Outsider Art world have been invited.

When:

Wednesday 23 November. 17.30 – 19.30
Opening hours: Wednesday – Sunday (27 November), 10.00 – 17.00
This venue is wheelchair accessible and it’s FREE admission.

Where:

Foyle Rooms, Turner Contemporary, Rendezvous, Margate, CT9 1HG

“Who are the Outsiders? They possess no qualifications as artists. They seem to work on their own, for themselves, for the fun of it. They know nothing of the trends and snobberies of the cultural centre. All prefer the rule of the imagination to the strictures of officialdom. Instinctive and independent, the appear to tackle the business of making art as if it had never existed before they came along. What they make has a primal freshness: it is the product of an authentic impulse to create and is free of conscious artifice.” – Roger Cardinal, 1979

Eastern Arc will be hosting a one day workshop on 10 January 2023 for those working on practice research. It will be led by practitioners from the three EARC universities (UEA, Essex and Kent), and will be a chance to explore the issues and opportunities facing all those whose work involves a significant practice element.

The event is free and open to all. However, it is primarily intended for colleagues at the Eastern Arc universities. Those at other universities, research institutes and organisations are welcome to apply and, if there is capacity, their place will be confirmed by 17 December at the latest.

The draft programme is available on the Eastern Arc webpage. The location will be a short walk from Chelmsford mainline station, the midpoint of the EARC Consortium, and the venue will be confirmed shortly.

To take part, please complete this short form. If you have any queries, email Phil Ward, Director of EARC.