Have you ever wanted to volunteer at the Graduations but not sure what it would be like?

If you are interested in volunteering at our students’ special day in July, then please come to the Graduation Launches to find out more about the volunteering roles, how graduations work and meet the team.

Canterbury Launch 7 March in Darwin Conference Suite from 12.00 -13.00 and Medway Launch 8 March in the Oasis Lounge from 10.00 -11.00.

We have now launched Salary Finance to help support you through the cost-of-living crisis.

Salary Finance is our new financial wellbeing benefit provider that offers:

• Simple savings: Savings account with Yorkshire Building Society where contributions are transferred directly from salary to an instant access savings account, with 2.75% gross Annual Equivalent Rate (AER). You choose how much you want to save and there are no fees or hidden costs.
• Help to Save: With this government-backed scheme, anyone receiving Working Tax Credit, Universal Credit or Child Tax Credit could earn bonus payments on their savings. You could earn up to £1,200 in tax-free bonuses from the Government over four years. That works out at an extra 50p for every £1 you save.
• Money insights: Visit the Learn platform and access simple and accessible educational resources to help you navigate and understand your finances. There’s support for all employees including webinars, videos, guides and tools to help make money simple.
• Loans repaid through salary: Salary Finance also offers loans at affordable rates with a higher acceptance than banks. A lower-rate loan could help to pay off more expensive debt or pay less interest if you need to borrow money for a car, home improvement or unexpected expense. Representative Rate 9.9% APR (fixed). For loans under £5,000, Salary Finance offers a price promise – if you get a better rate they’ll match it.

To find out more about Salary Finance, visit the FAQs page and head to the Salary Finance webpage see the options available.

Don’t forget about our cost of living support webpage and the Emergency Support Fund, where you can get up to £500 from the University to help with a short-term, emergency cash flow problem.

Important: This is an option, not a recommendation. University of Kent does not benefit from offering this service and all your communications will be with Salary Finance. Loan applications will be assessed to ensure the loan is appropriate and affordable for you. “Learn” content is for guidance and educational purposes only and is generic in nature. Salary Finance does not offer regulated financial advice. Please seek independent financial advice.

As part of Kent Giving Week, we are creating a cookbook jam-packed with recipes, all for under £5 per serving. We have had some fantastic contributions from the likes of Joe Wicks, local chefs, staff and students.

Priced at £5, pre-orders for The Thrifty Cook are starting soon, you will also be available to buy during Kent Giving Week. There’s also the option to donate one to our students. All proceeds will help to provide nutritious meals to students facing financial hardship at this time.

To get a taster for what’s to come, check out Philip Pothen’s Easy Cauliflower and Spinach Dal with Coconut recipe:

Number of Servings: 4
Cost per serving: £3.50

Ingredients

250g red lentils
2 tbsp vegetable or sunflower oil
1 onion, chopped
2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
2cms ginger, grated
2-3 green chillies, chopped
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground coriander
1/2 tsp tumeric
1 tsp salt
2 ripe tomatoes, chopped
250ml coconut milk
1 medium cauliflower, cut into florets
200g baby spinach leaves
Coriander leaves, chopped (optional)

Method

1. Heat the oil in a large saucepan over a medium heat. When the oil is hot, add the onion and cook for ten minutes or so until the onion starts to soften. Add the garlic, ginger and chillies stirring for two minutes.
2. Add the cumin, coriander, tumeric and a teaspoon of salt, stirring continuously for one minute. Add the chopped tomatoes, and then add the red lentils stirring until all lentils have been coated in the spiced mixture.
3. Add 500ml of water and the coconut milk and bring to the boil. When boiling, turn down the heat and simmer, stirring occasionally until the lentils begin to become a soft mush. This should take about 25 minutes. Season with salt, to taste.
4. Add the cauliflower florets and stir occasionally.
5. After eight minutes or so, add the spinach leaves. After two more minutes, take the saucepan off the heat. if using coriander leaves, add them and stir.
6. Serve with a portion of rice or naan bread.

CEMS, NATS and the UKC Women’s Network have joined forces this year to celebrate International Women’s Day with a panel discussion on ‘Women in STEM: How far have we come? What obstacles still need to be overcome?’

By Prof. John H. Strange and Prof. Bob Newport

Professor Gerald Rickayzen died on 7^th February 2023 at the age of 93 after a long and distinguished career as a theoretical physicist, teacher and academic administrator. An outline of his extensive contribution to Physics and the University of Kent is provided below; we offer first, however, brief personal reflections from two of his former colleagues.

John Strange, Professor of Physics and a former Head of the Physics Laboratory (- the original manifestation of Physics at the University) recalls the day on which he met Gerald:

“I first met Gerald during the summer of 1964 on a hike in Ithaca [New York State, USA] organised by the Physics Department of Cornell University where he was a visiting academic and I was a post-doctoral research fellow. Gerald had a two year old son, Ben, on his shoulders and was accompanied by his wife Gill and their three other children, Alan, Sonia and Asher. Throughout his life he was a devoted family man. Gerald and I met again in the post room of Cornell Physics Department a few days later and were amused to find that we had both applied to join the academic staff of the new University of Kent.

“Whilst at the University of Kent, he lived in Blean and was known among friends and colleagues for the social activities in his large garden that included admiring the Rickayzen flock of sheep that kept his extensive lawn in trim. His family were keen amateur musicians. Gill, with Gerald’s support, organised ‘Monday Music’ which provided lessons and other musical activities for all ages. Gerald played the cello and Gill the viola and they hosted musical evenings with others to form string quartets, playing chamber music together. Gerald was a member of the University symphony orchestra for many years.”

Another former colleague, Professor Bob Newport, writes fondly of Gerald:

“I knew Gerald as a man to look up to: a man of honesty and integrity, with a gentle spirit, a mind as sharp and perceptive as any I’ve encountered and with a strength of character and conviction surpassed by no-one. Having said that, my first exchange with Gerald was a distinctly unsettling one – he chaired the large interview panel arrayed before me on the happy day I was offered a junior lectureship in John Strange’s department; Gerald, in his role as Deputy Vice Chancellor, was standing in for the VC. That was in 1985. For more than a decade thereafter I learned from his example and revelled in the lively and wide-ranging coffee-time conversations we were a part of within the original Physics Laboratory (now the Marlowe Building). He was a genuinely inspiring academic leader and his voice was one of the few I relied upon during the tumultuous days of 1997 when the Physics Laboratory and its sister Chemical Laboratory were greatly reduced in size and merged into the School of Physical Sciences. (I had been appointed the School’s first head of department.) We lost touch after his move back to London, but that distance doesn’t lessen the sadness I felt at the news of his death.”

Additional material from John Strange:

Gerald Rickayzen joined UKC, the University of Kent at Canterbury, in the summer of 1965 as Reader in Theoretical Physics from Liverpool University bringing with him a research fellow, Dr W.A.B. (Alan) Evans who later joined the physics staff as lecturer. (Sadly, Alan also died recently.)

Gerald was responsible for teaching the core course on waves to the first and subsequent intakes of science students. Teaching was important to him and he contributed to various courses throughout his career, at all stages from the introductory to advanced postgraduate theoretical physics. He was an extremely clear and sympathetic teacher. From his arrival in Canterbury he was involved with education at all levels and in the mid 1960’s he was a leading light in the local branch of CASE, the Campaign for the Advancement of State Education.

He already had a distinguished research career when he arrived at Kent, having worked on the theory of superconductivity with Bardeen (the B of BCS theory that explained this phenomenon of superconductivity) and was the author of an advanced textbook on the theory of superconductivity. He also published a postgraduate-level textbook on Green’s Functions and Condensed Matter in 1980. His research interests at Kent were focussed on many-body problems, superconductivity, superfluidity and the theory of colloids. In later years he collaborated with David Hayes and colleagues Jack Powles and Alan Evans on computer simulation, molecular dynamics and the theory of liquids. He worked with a number of research students and post-doctoral research assistants throughout his career.

It was shortly after his arrival at Kent that he was promoted to a personal chair in theoretical physics, which he held until retirement, and was awarded a Research Professor position 1994 -96 on retirement. Thereafter he was Emeritus Professor of Theoretical Physics and continued to be active in research, in collaboration with Jack Powles. In 1974 he had followed Jack Powles as Director of the Physics Laboratory but relinquished that in 1976 to become Dean of the Faculty of Science until 1980 when he was appointed Pro Vice-Chancellor. From 1984 to 1990 Gerald was the Deputy Vice-Chancellor. His contribution to the work of the University of Kent, to science and more generally to Canterbury was immense and we can gratefully celebrate a long and successful life of one of the University’s first members.

We are pleased to announce that we are working on launching an International college at our Canterbury campus in September this year.  

The college will be a joint venture between the University and a private provider. This will offer foundation and pre-Masters programmes for international students, with the aim of significantly increasing recruitment. The market has changed considerably in recent years and many other universities are already successfully operating in this way.  

There are still a number of permissions that need to be agreed both internally and externally before the college can be launched. However, we are working hard to deliver a first cohort for September 2023.  

There is a great deal of work underway to support this and the important next step is agreeing the programmes that will be taught at the college to ensure they meet our academic and quality standards, whilst making sure students will successfully progress to our mainstream programmes. We will be discussing these measures with colleagues across the University and we look forward to continuing these discussions.  

In the meantime, if you have any questions, please contact Simone Davies, Director of MORA.  

Our children’s holiday camps for 5-12 year olds  are coming back for 2023! Filled with daily multi-sports and activities, DBS-checked camp staff, and qualified coaching, your child will love our EasterZone holiday camp! EasterZone runs from Tuesday 11 to Friday 14 April 2023.

“Both my children loved it all. They loved the staff, said they were fun and kind to them, and they enjoyed every activity they did (including the drawing!). Really varied and great fun. Thank you.”

Children’s Holiday Camp survey feedback, 2022

Qualified coaching

Our daily timetables include various sports and activities for your child to get involved in. With traditional sports such as football, hockey, and rugby alongside new sports like endball and goalball, there’s loads to keep children entertained, regardless of their age.

We’ve also introduced some fun activities like Drums Alive and Street Dance, and we’ll close out the camp on Friday 14 April with a School Sports Day for the whole camp! You can see the full PDF camp timetable on our website.

EasterZone 2023 prices

Spaces can be booked either for individual days or the full four days. Spaces are limited so book your space early.

University of Kent staff

We’re offering University of Kent staff a 15% discount on the below rates. Please contact sportsdevelopment@kent.ac.uk to receive the discount code.

Members of the public

• One day £35 per child
• One week (four days) £120 per child

Late pick-up (15.00 to 17.00)

Our late pick-up option includes fun and engaging activities tailored to the location, such as table tennis, table football, new-age kurling, bowls, speed stacks, twister, board games, and creative drawing.

• £12 per child per day

Booking and payment

This year we’ve made the process for booking much simpler, through our new Holiday Camp booking system; LTA ClubSpark. You will need to create an account with the Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) first before you can book EasterZone.

Once you’ve created your account and you’re ready to book, visit the EasterZone booking page.

You will need to complete the process for each child you wish to book on to EasterZone (you only need to create the LTA account once though). Within your booking confirmation email, there will be a link to an additional details form. This contains very important information, so please make sure you complete this for each child you book on EasterZone. We will get in contact if we require additional information.

If you have any questions about our children’s holiday camps, please email sportsdevelopment@kent.ac.uk or call 01227 816391. Alternatively, please contact us if you would like to be added to our mailing list for future camps.