About the University

Recognising students’ social commitment

Each year Oxford rewards its top athletes with Blues and its most talented musicians with instrumental scholarships. This year, for the first time, students who have worked to bring about positive change in the community, whether at home or abroad, have also been recognised. The Vice-Chancellor’s Civic Awards were granted to six students who demonstrated outstanding social or environmental commitment.

Professor Andrew Hamilton presented the inaugural awards at a lunch at Rhodes House, which formed part of the Encaenia celebrations on 23 June. ‘As a world-leading institution, Oxford should expect to make a major impact on the world beyond its main achievements in teaching and research’, he said. ‘Recognising students who show a commitment to improving the quality of life for others will help to promote active citizenship in the local community and the wider world.’

The award scheme was proposed by and developed in partnership with the Oxford Hub, a student-led charity founded by Oxford students in 2007 in order to promote and support social action, philanthropy and volunteering. Oxford Hub facilitates student involvement in charities, social enterprises and in the local community – and ensures that this work is effective and sustainable.’

It was particularly keen to work with the University to find a way to acknowledge students’ achievements in this important area.

The award winners received leadership training and mentoring from Oxford alumni with experience in relevant fields.

Adam Grodecki

Founder and chairman,
Student Hubs

Adam GrodeckiAdam Grodecki founded Student Hubs, a student-led charity working to promote and support social action, philanthropy and volunteering in universities, while studying for a theology degree at St Peter’s College.

Adam first became aware that there were problems with the way the charity ‘scene’ in Oxford operated while leading a UNICEF (United Nations Children’s Fund) group during his first year. ‘There was a lack of student engagement with social and environmental issues, and students were unaware of opportunities available to them for making a difference’, he says. ‘The work taking place was also highly disparate, and not as effective or sustainable as it could be.’

He realised these problems resulted from a lack of support for social action at Oxford, and so in 2007 he and fellow students Adam O'Boyle (St John's), Rachel Stephenson (St John's) and John Mellor (Balliol) co-founded Oxford Hub with funding from the Oxfordshire Community Foundation, the Garfield Weston Foundation and Barclays Capital. Their vision was for the University to have ‘a flourishing community of socially aware and socially active students who make a positive difference at home or abroad during their time at university and in their future careers’. They also wanted to equip tomorrow’s social, political, financial and commercial leaders with the knowledge, passion and skills they will need to tackle the major social and environmental challenges of the future.

Three years later, Oxford Hub has expanded to become a national network called Student Hubs – with hubs in Bristol, Cambridge and Southampton as well as in Sydney, and more than 14,000 members. The charity has the support of some of the UK’s leading graduate recruiters, including Barclays Capital, Man Group plc and Clifford Chance. Its community volunteering programme has launched 20 student-led projects and sent 800 student volunteers into the local community; and it has set up a scheme which has placed more than 50 students in four- to eight-week work placements in local charities and social enterprises. It also runs the UK’s leading student conferences on international development, climate change and social entrepreneurship – which have been attended by more than 3,000 students.

The students’ work is making an impact. One of Oxford Hub’s first community projects was Students Together to Improve Reading. Students help out in primary schools to support the reading development of some of Oxford’s most underprivileged children, giving them the encouragement to read that they often lack in their home environment. A recent evaluation revealed that literacy rates had improved by 10 per cent over the previous year in one of the target schools.

‘We’ve now reached a sort of critical mass’, Adam says, ‘where we have loads of incredible people working on all sorts of amazing projects, and new opportunities seem to present themselves every day. It seems like the culture change we’re aiming at is starting to manifest itself – although of course there is a long way to go yet!’

Adam, who recently completed his theology degree, is currently working full-time as chairman of Student Hubs, getting the organisation ready to roll out further across the UK. He leads the charity’s strategic planning, business development and fundraising and continues to be dedicated to its success. ‘I passionately believe that Oxford should not only produce world-class brains, but also world-class citizens’, he says.

Suzie Sheehy

Co-founder, Accelerate!

Suzie SheehyWhat exactly does a particle physicist do? Why do they need huge machines like the Hadron Collider at CERN in Switzerland to investigate particles too tiny to see? And how do you accelerate something to 99.999999 per cent of the speed of light? These are just some of the questions answered by the Accelerate! programme, co-founded by postgraduate physics student, Suzie Sheehy.

Suzie moved to Oxford from Melbourne in 2007 to study for a doctorate in particle physics at Lady Margaret Hall. Her research focused on designing a new type of particle accelerator for cancer treatment. She already had experience of inspiring young people to get involved in science, having worked at Scienceworks, a hands-on science museum in Melbourne, and on an outreach programme, the International Physics and Laser Show, which brought ‘physics and fun’ to around 50,000 Australian schoolchildren. She conceived the idea of creating a free interactive show about particle physics over coffee with Dr Emmanuel Tsesmelis of CERN (the European Organisation for Particle Physics). The pair then enlisted the help of Professor Brian Foster, Suzanne's head of department, and applied to the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) for a Small Award for Public Engagement. In July 2008, they received an award of £8,000 spread over two years and the first Accelerate! show was run in December 2008. 

The 45-minute show, run by postgraduate physics students from Oxford with support from CERN and the STFC, includes levitating superconductors, exploding hydrogen balloons, giant beach balls ‘riding’ an audience ‘Mexican wave’ to demonstrate acceleration of particles, a plasma ball which lights up a fluorescent tube as if by magic, and a Van de Graaf generator which makes your hair stand on end.

Over the past two years, the volunteers have presented the show to more than 5,000 people throughout the UK, including school children and members of the public. They also took the show to the Big Bang Fair 2010 and the British Science Festival 2010. Alongside the show, they run sessions for teachers and provide teaching aids to help them weave the content into their curriculum.

‘I believe science communication and outreach are important for two reasons’, Suzie says. ‘First, it allows the public, who in most cases are funding the research, to understand, on their own terms, the research being done and its implications; and second, it inspires the next generation of students and helps create a scientifically literate society that is able to understand and face the challenges of the future.’

In September 2010 Suzie submitted her DPhil thesis and in November she will take up a three-year fellowship from the Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1851. She will be investigating the use of high power proton accelerators to create accelerator driven reactors for safe, emission free power. However, she is determined that her outreach and communication work will continue alongside her work in particle physics.

‘The Vice Chancellor’s award was important to me, as it was an official recognition of all the years of hard work I’ve put into outreach and science communication’, Suzie says. ‘It is also important because it indicates that the University is serious about outreach. It is very encouraging to know that Oxford recognises the value of outreach and encourages its students and staff to pursue these activities.

'In the nineteenth century, Oxford students set up Oxford House in East London, which accommodated students while they helped out full-time in the local community – so it could be said that student volunteering in this country has it roots in Oxford’, explained Richard Jarman, Head of Government and Community Relations within the University. ‘In addition, “Raise and Give” (RAG), now a feature of many UK student universities, was created by Oxford students. The Vice-Chancellor's Civic Awards formally recognises the contribution our students are making to society locally, nationally and internationally.  The Awards are a small token of how much the University appreciates our student body's community activity of every kind.’

 

The other students who received awards were:

 

Niel Bowerman While: in the second year of his physics degree at Linacre College, Neil founded Climate Justice Project, a national student-led campaign focused on reducing carbon emissions, and later co-founded Climatico, an independent network of climate change experts. Bowerman, who is now studying for a doctorate in atmospheric, oceanic and planetary physics, has given speeches on climate change at institutions such as the World Bank and the European Parliament, and Climatico was recently named one of the most influential websites on climate policy by Social Media Labs.

 

Rachel Dedman: An undergraduate studying History of Art at St John’s Collge, Rachel was President of the University charity committee RAG (Raise and Give) in 2009–10. In this role, she restructured and relaunched the society, organised the first ever University-wide charity ball, represented Oxford at the National RAG Conference and raised more than £50,000 for charities, including Helen and Douglas House, a local children’s hospice, and Shelter, the homeless charity. ‘I am thrilled that the University has recognised the hard work put into fundraising and volunteering by so many students’, she says.

 

Xin Hui Chan: A postgraduate medical student at Lincoln College, Xin Hui came to Oxford from Singapore. Her volunteer work while studying took her to Kenya, Morocco, Bosnia and Georgia. As president of Medsin, the Oxford branch of the International Federation of Medical Student Associations, she helped Oxford win the bid to host the Medsin National Global Health Conference. To promote understanding between different cultures, she also co-wrote the first ever OUSU International Students’ Handbook and organised the inaugural Oxford International Festival.

 

Johanna Carys Roberts: A philosophy, politics and economics (PPE) student at University College, Johanna contributed to her college’s access scheme, Univ Ambassadors. She initiated and led student-run Univ roadshows, as well as a PPE taster day for sixthformers at comprehensive schools in Hackney. Johanna is also the founder and co-ordinator of Maths Plus, a volunteer-led initiative through which university students spend one hour a week with underperforming school students, preparing them to take GCSE Maths.

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