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

proposed the establishment of a Board of Scrutiny as a means of ensuring thecontinued accountability of the Council to the Regent House.The role of the Board of Scrutiny is to examine the way in which the Universityis run, and to comment on this to the University’s governing body, the RegentHouse. Each year the Board is required to look at the University’s accounts, theAllocations Report, and the Council’s Annual Report, and it may then investigateany matters that arise from these documents. In doing so, the Board is empoweredto consult any official document and to make enquiries of any officer.The Board has no executive power. Instead, it acts as a review body, to lookretrospectively at what has happened in the University over the previous year.The Board is composed, in essence, of interested amateurs. It comprises eightelected members of the Regent House, together with the two Proctors and thetwo Pro-Proctors. The elected members serve for four years, with half beingelected every two years (in the Easter Term of odd years). In each biennial election,one of the elected members must be under 35 years of age. Senior administrativeofficers of the University are excluded from membership of the Board. Themembers of the Board then elect a new Chairman each year, and also a Secretary(who may serve for longer than a single year).The Board is empowered to report to the University, meaning that it canpublish Reports in the University Reporter. The Board has chosen to publish anannual report. This report is put down for discussion in the traditional fashion inthe Senate House. The University Council then considers the Board’s Report,together with any remarks made at the Discussion, and in due course publishesa response in the Reporter.How to get a place at Downing in 1946by AnonIn August 1946, the War Office suddenly announced it would consider sendingus Regular Officers in the Royal Engineers to Cambridge again – if we could findour own places. I telephoned the Headmaster of my school who arranged for meto meet the tutors at two colleges. They were both very friendly but had no spareplaces and advised me to try again the following year. So that was it: I had triedand failed to get a place. Not having been to Cambridge before I decided to lookat some of the famous buildings. But the centre was crowded with people34