CantiaQuorum, the Music department’s new ensemble-in-residence, launches on Friday 14 November with Stravinsky’s The Soldier’s Tale and Walton’s Facade – and some very special guests.

The evening concert brings devilish entertainment as the ensemble will unfold Stravinsky’s pin-sharp morality tale; and there’s a special element to the Walton, as the narrators for Facade are drawn from the local and the University community, including the Director of Music at Canterbury Cathedral, David Flood, the Chief Executive of Canterbury City Council, Colin Carmichael, fourth-year Drama student and Music Scholar, Emma Murton, Professor Keith Mander, and our own Music Administrator, Sophie Meikle, whose dulcet Glaswegian tones will lend extra relish to Sitwell’s verse!

Tickets and further details about the concert are available on the Gulbenkian webpages and you can read an interview with Alex Caldon about the formation of CantiaQuorum on this music blog.

Renowned artist and director Dave McKean brings new film Luna to the Gulbenkian on Thursday 13 November at 6.30pm. The screening will be followed by a Q&A with Dave McKean.

Writer, director and illustrator Dave McKean is known for his work on Mirrormask (2005), The Gospel of Us (2012), Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (2004) and Luna (2014).

From the creative mind of artist Dave McKean comes his second feature film, Luna, a fantasy story about reality.

Tickets: Full £8 / Concessions £7/ GulbCard Members £6 / Students £5 / GulbCard Students £4

To book:

• Call 01227 769075
• Website

Complete Library and IT services student satisfaction survey and be entered into prize draw to win an iPad mini.

This is your opportunity to help us improve and develop Library and IT services based on your needs.

• Complete survey for students based in Canterbury, Athens, Brussels, Paris, Rome and Partnership Colleges.
• Complete survey for students based in Medway and Tonbridge.

If you have any queries or would prefer to complete the survey over the phone, please contact us:

• telephone 01227 824999
• email helpdesk@kent.ac.uk

Vice-Chancellor’s Question Time is your chance to put your questions to the Vice-Chancellor on the issues that affect you.

Date: Thursday 20 November
Time: 13.05-14.00
Location: Colyer-Fergusson Hall, Canterbury campus

This live event will be led by Kent Union President, Tammy Naidoo, who will be asking the questions on behalf students directly to the Vice-Chancellor.

The questions Tammy will be asking will come directly from students themselves by tweeting @KentUnion using #askjulia.

Students are free to ask questions on any topic that’s important to them and ask any question they feel needs answering.

All are welcome to take part, come along and see the key questions being answered at Colyer-Fergusson Hall. There is no need to RSVP for this event – just turn up!

To have your questions answered tweet @KentUnion using #askjulia. Get questions in early to make sure they get answered! Alternatively if Twitter isn’t your thing questions can be emailed to askjulia@kent.ac.uk.

You may be aware that the Universities and Colleges Union (UCU) has asked its members to participate in national industrial action from 6 November. The action takes the form of a comprehensive boycott of all assessment and marking activities by those UCU members who choose to participate.

This action is in response to proposed changes to the Universities’ Superannuation Scheme (USS), one of the pension schemes provided by universities for their employees. UCU intends to continue its action from this date until there is a negotiated settlement.

We very much regret the decision taken by UCU but it is unclear how many of our academic colleagues will join the boycott. We are currently investigating the potential impact of this on student progress at Kent and the ways any such impact may be mitigated.

We are at the same time working with Universities UK who are leading negotiations with UCU on behalf of universities. We are encouraging them to fully explore all the options and alternatives to the proposals currently under discussion.

We will be contacting you again with more information when we have it. In the meantime, please attend all timetabled events including teaching, assessments and examinations. Your academic school will contact you should they be aware of any industrial action affecting your modules.

If you have any urgent enquiries, please contact me by email at the address below.

Jon Pink, Academic Registrar
Academic Division, University of Kent
academicdivision@kent.ac.uk

A spectacular fireworks display lit up the skies over our Canterbury and Medway campuses as we kicked off our 50th anniversary year.

Thousands of staff, students, alumni, friends and many original benefactors joined in the celebrations. You can watch a short film of the ceremonies and check out photos from the evenings!

The University and the Government Office for Science are co-hosting a Future of Ageing Seminar at Kent on Thursday 13 November from 6.30-8pm.

The event is part of the Government Office for Science’s major Foresight project: Future of Ageing, which explores the challenges and opportunities of an ageing population.

Professor Dame Julia Goodfellow, Vice-Chancellor of the University, will chair the proceedings with three speakers followed by a question and answer session.

Speakers will be:

• Professor Sarah Harper, Director of the Oxford Institute of Population Ageing and Chair of the Foresight project’s Lead Expert Group
• Peter Dale, Chair of the South East England Forum on Ageing
• Dr Julien Forder, Director of the Personal Social Services Research Unit, University of Kent

The seminar will take place in Keynes Lecture Theatre 1 on the Canterbury campus. Admission is free, but places are limited so if you wish to attend please register in advance via this link: http://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/future-of-ageing-seminar-kent-tickets-14044841499

The seminar is one of a series of similar events around the UK in the coming months and aims to deepen the Foresight project’s understanding of local experiences and perspectives on ageing. The organisers are particularly keen to attract people from the Kent area.

As part of Employability Week Kent Union is inviting students to get involved with various projects and to try volunteering.

Activities will all be geared towards decorating and filling shoeboxes for Smile International to send to disadvantaged children this Christmas.

Additionally Kent Union will be providing an ideas board for the new garden space on campus, as well as running short sessions where you can discuss what you would like to see go into the project.

Find out more on Facebook.

The Templeman Library development was featured in a Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) presentation by the project architects Penoyre and Prasad.

Associate Suzi Winstanley presented ‘ThinkSpace – Perspectives on Architecture’, a practice-led research project examing the new demands on reader space facing the contemporary university library, and proposing and modelling prototype design solutions.

The contemporary university library faces a number of challenges, including changing study patterns, shift away from print towards digital dissemination, and ongoing proliferation of power-hungry digital devices. Traditional library interior design and furnishings do not meet these emerging requirements.

Architects have designed bespoke solutions which can be effective but suffer from high costs, low levels of R&D, and lack of scalability. Consequently, there is a clear creative and commercial opportunity to rethink and redesign interior settings for the contemporary university library as a typology.

The research emerges out of, and runs in parallel to, the Library’s extension and refurbishment scheme.

For more information, contact Julia Crompton.

Is Russian, Arabic, Japanese or Mandarin your first language? If so do you have a free one to two hours each week to help a student learning your language? In return they may be able to help you with your English if you have never studied in the UK before, forming the basis of what we call Language Exchange.

To find out more please see our Moodle page.

If you would like to sign up as a ‘language buddy’ please follow the instructions and create a profile. Once completed you can search for a student learning your language and other students can also find you.

To support Language Exchange we will be hosting a social event on Tuesday 25 November from 17.00-19.00hrs in Keynes Senior Common Room.

If you would like to attend this please see the booking details listed on Moodle (please note, numbers will be restricted and will be on a first come first served basis).

If you have any questions please contact Amy Moses.