211075 Downing Record 07 - Downing College - University of ...

14Fellowship and students in residence. Dave White, our Fellow in Engineering waspromoted to a senior lectureship after having been in post for only 2 years. He iscurrently on research leave in Australia. Ian Roberts, our Professorial Fellow inlinguistics was elected a Fellow of the British Academy. Dr David Pratt, our CollegeTeaching Officer Fellow in history, published a major book, ‘The Political Thoughtof King Alfred the Great’ and which we celebrated at a launch party in the College.As the academic year began, we admitted several new Fellows: Bill O’Neill as Fellowin Engineering, who was promptly promoted to Reader in the University; AmyGoymour as the first Hopkins Parry Fellow in Law; Simone Lacqua as Research Fellowin History and who submitted her PhD thesis in June; Adriana Pesci as Fellow inMathematics. These were all outstanding recruitments to the Fellowship. I am alsodelighted to report that on October 1st 2007, we will admit Amy Milton as ResearchFellow in Natural Sciences, Brigitte Steger as Fellow in Oriental Studies and FrancoBasso as Fellow in Classics. Our Bye-Fellowship community has continued to grow(details may be found on the Downing Website). Many of our Bye-Fellows arepostdoctoral researchers who otherwise would not necessarily be closely associatedwith a Cambridge College. They are actively engaged with Downing, many of themundertaking very important teaching roles. We were again fortunate to have anoutstanding Thomas Jefferson Fellow from the University of Virginia, ProfessorRichard Wilson. Richard specializes in the history of architecture and gave anexcellent seminar on the relationship between the architecture of Downing andthat at Charlottesville, as well as the supposed influence on Thomas Jefferson ofDowning’s architect, Wilkins. Richard’s wife Ellie, a Professor of Education was alsoenergetically and actively engaged in the College, especially the music society.We have been very fortunate to elect and admit four Wilkins Fellows during theyear: Professor Ralph Lewin, Mr Tim Cadbury, Dr Janet Owens and Mr RichardWilliams. Tim and Richard have generously supported the restoration of the Hall;Ralph has generously supported research in plant sciences over many years, as wellas our endowment, while Janet’s generosity supports our teaching Fellow in English,greatly enhancing the fund established previously by her husband, R.J. Owens.The recently introduced termly Graduate Seminars, at each of which 3 currentgraduate students give talks on their research, have continued to be a great success.Our graduate community has become more and more actively involved in Collegelife, although this remains a challenge because of their diversity and wide dispersalwithin and outside and outside Cambridge in their various research environments.A series of excellent Presidents of the MCR and their active committees haveworked closely with the Fellowship to enhance the environment, both academicand social, for all graduate students. A key aim is to provide better facilities forthem, especially additional accommodation on the domus to match the Singerbuilding that was built at the turn of this century.