Plans & Prospects 2022

PLANS & PROSPECTS 2022
DECARBONISATION MILESTONES • STUDENT ACHIEVEMENTS • HOW EPIDEMICS END
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Summer 2022
Contents
12
14
16
20
22
Collaborative advantage
Mary Adeyemo, DPhil Law
A journey of curiosity
Ayaka Shinozaki, DPhil MRI Physics
How epidemics end
Professor Erica Charters
For the love of truth
Tom Brennan, Geoffrey Garton Creative Arts Fellow
To be useful
Shaharzad Akbar, MPhil 2011
College news: 4-7
Student Awards: 8-9
Student profiles: 12-15
Alumni lecture: 16-19
Zero Carbon project: 10-11
Development report: 26-27
Financial report: 28-29
Alumni relations & development
Communications
Huw David
Development
Director
huw.david@wolfson.ox.ac.uk
Jessica Dunham
Senior Development
Officer
jessica.dunham@wolfson.ox.ac.uk
Femke Gow
Head of
Communications
femke.gow@wolfson.ox.ac.uk
Judith Palmer
Communications
Assistant
judith.palmer@wolfson.ox.ac.uk
All information is believed to be correct at the time of publication (July 2022). Every effort has been made
to verify details and no responsibility is taken for any errors or omissions, or any loss arising therefrom.
Unless otherwise stated all images © Wolfson College, University of Oxford. Every effort has been made
to locate the copyright owners of images included in this record and to meet their requirements. The
publishers apologise for any omissions, which they will be pleased to rectify at the earliest opportunity.
Compiled by Femke Gow, Judith Palmer, and Huw David. Infographics and layout on pp. 10-11 produced
by B&M Design & Advertising. Cover photo by John Cairns. Many thanks to all our members who have
contributed to our publications.
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Published by Wolfson College
Copyright 2022 Wolfson College
Wolfson College, Linton Road
Oxford OX2 6UD
Telephone: +44 (0)1865 274 100
digicomms@wolfson.ox.ac.uk
www.wolfson.ox.ac.uk

Credit: John Cairns
Welcome
Sir Tim Hitchens
President
Moments of crisis produce moments of truth. Events in Ukraine have led us to ask ourselves: what is important in
our lives? The more idyllic and peaceful a place – and Wolfson College definitely falls into this category – the more we
need to think of those living in shattered nations. Across Oxford, and around Europe, people have proved themselves
very generous and open.
Some ask why Europe appears to prioritise other European countries over those elsewhere who have suffered just
as much. Earlier this year we welcomed back to Britain Shaharzad Akbar, a Wolfson alumna and the first Afghan
woman to graduate from Oxford. Welcomed her back in the most difficult of circumstances, secreted across borders
and via Turkey, and back here as a refugee, with her family, having until August last year been Chair of Afghanistan’s
Independent Human Rights Commission. We are delighted that she will become a Visiting Fellow based at Wolfson
this autumn, and we hope she will in due course be able to return home.
And Ukraine now dominates our thinking in summer 2022. The sculpture exhibition in our grounds – terracotta
pots hanging from our trees representing the sound of the word “art” in different languages – was an intriguing idea
when it was first put up; but the fact that the artist was born in Ukraine, trained in Moscow, and has now chosen his
allegiance to Ukraine in this war, gives it added poignancy. Our academics who study and speak Russian and Ukrainian,
skilled specialists, are now widely in demand, explaining what is happening and why it matters. Two (Julie Curtis and
Jan Fellerer) spoke eloquently at the College in May as part of our Giving Day in support of at-risk academics, whether
from Kyiv, Moscow, or Kabul. We’re delighted to have raised over £90,000 during those two days – thank you all
– and we are delighted to have a Ukrainian academic, Katya Kovalchuk, joining us for two years in the autumn too,
thanks to that generosity. We are privileged to have as an alumnus Karim Khan, Chief Prosecutor at the International
Criminal Court, and central to our collective attempt to hold Russian aggression to account.
All this reminds us that human nature can be generous as well as savage; and that though we can sometimes feel
helpless, we should never be stunned into inaction.
During my visit to the US in April – my first overseas trip for over two years – I was able to meet alumni and friends
who have been so important in allowing this remarkable College to continue to transform itself. We have received
great support in particular for our zero-carbon project, which has advanced faster and with more effect than I
could possibly have imagined. In June we switched off our old gas boilers, turned on the air source heat pumps, and
became all-electric on the main estate. We will be commemorating our zero carbon achievements in September in
the presence of the Vice Chancellor. One anonymous alumnus gave us $3million, the largest dollar gift we have ever
received; our friends at the Wolfson Foundation have committed £500,000 for the same aim.
My warm thanks to all of you who have continued to support Wolfson this year. The capacity of humans to behave
atrociously towards others, and towards our planet, continues to shock. I hope we can continue to show an equal and
opposite force, for generosity, responsibility and compassion.
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College News
Above: Prof Nikita Sud and Prof Erica Charters
Full professorships for Nikita Sud and Erica Charters
Each year, Oxford recognises the
distinction of Associate Professors’
research by conferring full Professorships.
We are delighted that Professor Sud and
Professor Charters heard the good news.
Nikita Sud is now Professor of the
Politics of Development. Nikita’s
research and teaching is centred on the
politics of development; the neo-liberal
transformation of postcolonial states
and governance; and the political
Newly Elected Honorary Fellows
George Monbiot
Following a strong partnership with
Wolfson’s Earth Emergency Cluster,
the College has elected the writer and
enviromental activist George Monbiot to
an Honorary Fellowship. George spoke
at the EEC’s first event of the academic
year in Michaelmas term, discussing
the societal challenges around climate
change.
Speaking of his appointment, George
said: “I’m thrilled and honoured to
be appointed an Honorary Fellow at
Wolfson College. Already, I’ve met some
fascinating people there, and begun
what promises to be a very interesting
collaboration.”
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sociology, economy, and ecology of
contemporary India.
Erica Charters is now Professor
of the Global History of Medicine.
Her current research examines the
history of war, disease, and bodies,
particularly in the British and French
empires. In the context of COVID-19,
Professor Charters is coordinating
a multidisciplinary project on ‘How
Epidemics End.’
Sir Chris Whitty
During the COVID pandemic, Sir Chris
became a household name delivering
daily briefings to the nation as the UK’s
Chief Medical Officer. As a graduate
student he read for a BM BCh in Clinical
Medicine (1988) at Wolfson and was
Chair of General Meeting (1990-91).
He gave the College’s annual Haldane
Lecture in February on the role of
science in emergencies.
Speaking of his election, Sir Chris said:
“I am very honoured to be elected to
this fellowship. I have huge respect for
the mission of Wolfson, and its ability
to train outstanding people in multiple
sciences for public benefit.”
New Fellowship Arrivals
in 2021/22
Tom Brennan
Geoffrey Garton Creative Arts Fellow
An award-winning theatre director,
playwright, and actor, Tom joined
Wolfson in October 2021. His company,
The Wardrobe Ensemble, is an associate
company of Complicite, Shoreditch
Town Hall and Bristol Old Vic.
> See full interview on p. 20
Chihab El Kachab
Governing Body Fellow
A social anthropologist specializing in
visual and media anthropology, with a
focus on Egyptian media production.
Chihab currently focuses on historical
and ethnographic methods to examine
everyday bureaucratic practices at the
Ministry of Culture (MOC) in Egypt.
Konstantinas Kamnides
Governing Body Fellow
Associate Professor of Engineering
Science (Biomedical Imaging) at the
Department of Engineering Science. His
research primarily focuses on machinelearning
and deep neural networks for
medical image analysis.
Rachael Wood
Governing Body Fellow
A Lecturer in Classical Archaeology at
Corpus Christi College and formerly
a researcher with the British Museum
and Oxford University research project
‘Empires of Faith’, Rachel’s interest area
is in the art and archaeology of pre-
Islamic Iran. Her current topic is the art
and religion of the Sasanian empire.
Spirit Wolf Gin Launched
Wolfson’s very own BarCo worked
closely with Charlgrove Distillery in
Oxford to produce a unique rose and
saffron gin for the College called Spirit
Wolf.
A tasting session was held as well as a
competition to design the name and
logo, with the winning logo designed by
Common Room member Malina Graf.
Wolfson College is the first Oxford
College to have a gin created, but others
are now following suit.

College News
Cara Fellows announced
Wolfson wins ‘Best
Postgraduate Idea’ at the
All-Innovate Trinity final
All-Innovate is Oxford’s inter-collegiate
competition, run by the Oxford Foundry
to help turn student entrepreneurial
ideas into business propositions.
Students across all courses put forward
their innovative ideas, and go through
shortlisting for the chance to win
£10,000.
Above: Dr Katya Kovalchuk and Shaharzad Akbar
Following the generosity of alumni and
friends to our first ever Giving Day,
the college has awarded two new Cara
Fellowships for refugee academics:
Katya Kovalchuk
Ukranian Byzantine historian Katya
Kovalchuk will be joining Wolfson as
a visiting scholar for two years. Her
research will focus on ‘Memory of
Religious Foundations in Byzantine
Literary Sources’.
Shaharzad Akbar
Shaharzad Akbar, a Wolfson alumna,
is the first Afghan woman to graduate
from Oxford. After leaving us, she
returned to Afghanistan and eventually
became the Chair of the Afghanistan
Independent Human Rights Commission.
Following the events of last August, she
and her family fled to Turkey, and are
now based back in the UK.
Shaharzad accepted our offer to join us
with her family, fully funded, for the next
two years. She plans to speak to us here
next term, and to continue her work on
rebuilding a global Afghan Human Rights
NGO here in Oxford.
> For more on Shaharzad, turn to
p. 22 for full interview
Following almost 100 applications
from 33 participating colleges, Team
Bedqueue, representing Wolfson, made
it through shortlisting, bootcamp and
final judging to be chosen as ‘Best
Postgraduate Idea’ 2021.
Co-founded by MBA students Kevin
Eguiluz, Ekaterina Kuznetsova, Azhra
Syed, and Cocoa Gao, Bedqueue predicts
a patient’s length of stay in the hospital
with accuracy and precision.
“We’re thrilled to have the Foundry’s
support of our idea and validation of
our work so far. Inefficiencies in health
systems have real implications for
patients’ health outcomes, and having the
Foundry supporting us will help us get to
our vision faster.”
Wolfson welcomes new staff
Judith Palmer
Communications Assistant
Judith brings ten years of publishing
experience to help curate and manage
both print and digital communications.
John Gardiner
Student Support & Engagement Officer
Working with the the Academic Office,
John manages the Welfare Officers and
liaises with peer supporter volunteers.
Claudia Reiter
Head of Catering and Events
Claudia joins us with extensive hospitality
industry experience, including 16 years
under the mentorship of Raymond Blanc.
Karen Konopka
Bursar’s PA
Karen has joined Wolfson after a long
administrative career in the private
sector, to assist Bursar Richard Morin.
Nick Safta
Housekeeping Manager
Nick joined Wolfson in 2022 to manage
and oversee the College’s housekeeping
operations.
Adrian Gardner
College Accountant
Adrian joins the college from Oxford
University central finance where he was
the interim Divisional Financial Controller.
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Wolfson Bob Sim Uruguay
Initiative launched
In April 2022, Wolfson formally launched
the Wolfson Bob Sim Uruguay Initiative.
The programme supports interaction and
exchange between Wolfson students,
postdocs and fellows in biochemistry,
immunology and other biological
or biomedical sciences, and their
counterparts in Uruguay. The initiative
is named in honour of Professor Robert
‘Bob’ Sim (DPhil Biochemistry, 1973) and
is made possible by the generous support
of his family.
The initiative offers grants for recipients
to travel from Oxford to Uruguay to
meet with and discuss their research with
their Uruguayan counterparts, and/or to
give seminar or conference papers. It also
offers grants for recipients from Uruguay
to visit Wolfson as Visiting Scholars.
The Wolfson Bob Sim Uruguay initiative
strengthens Wolfson’s connections with
South America and with Uruguay in
particular, where immunologists have
developed a global reputation for their
work investigating parasitic infections and
echinococcus.
A symposium in April brought expert
immunologists from across the world
to Oxford to launch the initiative. His
Excellency Mr Cesar Eneas Rodriguez
Zavalla, Uruguayan Ambassador to the
Court of St James’s, was guest of honour
at a dinner in College on 9 April.
Above: Professor Lucie Cluver and Dr Jamie Lachman
Wolfson Winners at 0 2 RB Excellence in Impact Awards
The 0 2 RB Excellence in Impact Awards,
supported by the University of Oxford’s
ESRC Impact Acceleration Account,
recognise and reward social scientists
whose research has achieved excellent
economic and social impact.
Wolfson’s own Dr Jamie Lachman and
Professor Lucie Cluver (Department of
Social Policy & Intervention, University
of Oxford), have received the award
Professor Matthew Weait, who
completed his DPhil at Wolfson in 1988,
has joined Oxford as Director of the
Continuing Education Department and
Fellow of Harris Manchester College.
Matthew moved from the University of
Hertfordshire, where he was Deputy
Vice-Chancellor and Professor of Law
and Society.
for their scale-up of evidence-based
COVID-19 Playful Parenting resources
for more than 196 million people around
the world since March 2020. They
have been translated into more than
100 languages and local dialects. Their
resources have been used by UNICEF,
WHO and the Centre for Disease
Control and have helped to reduce
violence against children and to improve
child wellbeing during the pandemic.
Wolfson alumnus named Oxford’s new Director of
Continuing Education
Matthew’s research is in the field of
law and public health, in particular the
impact of criminal law and criminal
justice processes on people living with
HIV and AIDS. He publishes widely, and
supervises research students in this area
Above: Professor Matthew Weait
and has provided expert consultancy
to the National AIDS Trust, British HIV
Association, European AIDS Treatment
Group, UNAIDS, and WHO (Europe).
New Rachel Conrad Scholarship announced
Alumni news
For a full list of alumni news and
publications, head to:
www.wolfson.ox.ac.uk/alumni-news
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Wolfson College is pleased to announce
the creation of the Rachel Conrad
Scholarship for the study of Clinical
Depression, which will be awarded for the
first time in the 2022-23 academic year.
This endowed scholarship has been
made possible thanks to a generous
legacy from Reuben Conrad CBE in
memory of his late wife, Rachel. Reuben
Conrad passed away in 2020 at the
age of 103, and was a distinguished
psychologist and pioneer in
Deaf education.

College News
Wolfson alumnus receives Science and
Sustainability Award
Wolfson alumnus Hesham Sallam has
received the Science and Sustainability
Award at the Study UK Alumni Awards
2022.
Hesham is an Egyptian palaeontologist,
who received his DPhil from Wolfson
Below: Dr Hesham Sallam
College in 2010. He is the founder of
the Mansoura University Vertebrate
Palaeontology Center (MUVP-C),
the first vertebrate palaeontology
programme in the Middle East. He
led the discovery and description of
Mansourasaurus shahinae, a species of
sauropod dinosaur from Egypt, which
has improved understanding of the
prehistory of Africa during the late
Cretaceous period.
His work has helped popularise
palaeontology in Egypt. Hesham is now
an associate professor at the School
of Sciences and Engineering, American
University in Cairo and the Department
of Geology, Mansoura University, Egypt.
The award ceremony took place
on Tuesday, 22 February at the
Ambassador’s residence in Cairo,
with HMA Gareth Bayley, British
Ambassador to Egypt, and Elizabeth
White, Director of the British Council,
hosting the event.
Frances Gardner becomes
Fellow of The Academy
of Social Sciences
Oxford University’s Social Science
Division announced that eight of its
academics have received the award
of Fellow by The Academy of Social
Sciences, including Wolfson’s own
Professor Frances Gardner.
The eight new fellows include
economics experts as well as
researchers in law, international
development, geography, and social
policy and intervention.
Frances Gardner is Professor of Child
and Family Psychology and a Governing
Body Fellow at Wolfson. Her work
focuses on the development and testing
of parenting interventions for reducing
child behavioural problems, and
violence against children in high, as well
as low- and middle-income countries,
with projects in the UK, USA, Eastern
Europe, South Africa, Tanzania,
Thailand, and the Philippines.
Wolfson bids farewell to longserving staff
Barry Coote
Ellie Clifton
Clare Norton
Our industrious Home Bursar and fount
of Wolfson knowledge, Barry retired
after 17 years of extraordinary service.
Never seen without her furry shadow
Snap, Ellie will be a sorely missed
member of the College garden team.
Since 2017, Clare’s work as Development
Officer has been instrumental, including
the success of Wolfson’s first Giving Day.
Get in touch!
We love hearing about your
professional and academic milestones.
If you’ve got news, please send it our
way, so we can share it.
Email us at:
digicomms@wolfson.ox.ac.uk
Sebastian Stefanov
Head of Events and Catering throughout
the pandemic, Sebastian returned to
Bulgaria earlier this year.
Sandie Lowe
Managing the Bursar’s office, Sandie
provided key secretarial and administrative
support, as well as a welcoming smile.
And tag us on social media.
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Student Awards
Each year, Wolfson students reap the rewards of their hard work and enthusiasm, with recognition at both College and
University level through various awards and grants. Here’s a round up to celebrate the energy and talent of our community.
Mary Adeyemo
Vice-Chancellor’s Diversity Award winner
> See p. 12 for full interview
“Always remember that the world
depends on you to survive and thrive;
ensure to always do your part.”
Ultimate Frisbee Team
Wolfson Annual Sports Trophy
“It’s been a really positive season with so
much growth for the club and we’re all
really thrilled to be recognised!”
Timothy Muller
Wolfson High Profile Support Grant
£200 to sing at St John’s Choral Festival, Island of Cumbrae
“The award facilitated my travel and
heavily subsidised my accomodation,
enabling what was in many ways a trip
of a lifetime.”
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College News
Olivia Farrar
Wolfson High Profile Support Grant
Oxford University Women’s Boat Club
“Rowing has showed me some of the
shapes I can fit into alone, but it has
also tabbed me within a larger puzzle.
For that, I’m honored.”
Ayaka Shinozaki
Wolfson High Profile Support Grant
Oxford University Polo Club
> See p. 14 for full interview
“Spring-boarding from this opportunity,
I hope to go from strength to strength
and to contribute to diverse athlete
representation at the national level.”
Miriam Stricker
Wolfson High Profile Support Grant,
Half Blue Rugby Fives
“I hope we can encourage Wolfson
students to try out some of the many
sports played in Oxford.”
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WOLFSON’S ZERO CARBON JOURNEY
The last year has been transformative
for Wolfson’s Zero Carbon project, our
groundbreaking initiative to eliminate
carbon emissions from our estate. In
summer 2021, we secured a highly
competitive government grant from the
Department for Business, Energy and
Industrial Strategy (BEIS), specifically
allocated to decarbonize the public
sector. With reward came challenge,
and a tight timeline to use the £5m
funds by March 2022; a notably short
period for an unprecedented project,
and one unique among Oxford’s
colleges.
Our Grade II listed main estate designed
by Powell & Moya, which opened
in 1974, is a symbol of a time when
environmental impact wasn’t a priority.
Max Fordham Engineers and Original
Field Architects soon discovered
through in-depth surveys that we had
our work cut out.
With admirable patience and hard work
from all those involved – students, staff,
alumni, fellows, donors, and contractors
– Wolfson met the challenge head on.
Fast-forward a year and we are now
powered by a new electricity substation
and state of the art air-source heat
pumps. The 50 year-old gas boilers
have been switched off. Our student
rooms have well-insulated, triple
glazed windows with radiator valves
that regulate temperature. So do the
common rooms, and the library soon
too.
Wolfson hasn’t seen a transformation
quite like this in all its years, and
this is just the beginning. The work
to decarbonize doesn’t stop with
engineering, and we’ll keep adapting for
as long as it takes.
MAJOR MILESTONES
1 new electricity
substation
1,000+
individually cut
bespoke pieces
of glass
1,564 new
radiator valves
9 district plate
heat exchangers
cut down to 2
main plate heat
exchangers
600m+ of new
pipework laid in
service ducts and
trenches
WHAT’S NEXT?
Electric charging
points for cars
New electric
minibus
Installation of
photovoltaic panels

BEFORE AND AFTER
July 2021
Original Field Architects and
Max Fordham Engineering
scoped the project, with a few
press visits along the way.
August 2021
Kicking off the project, we
started work in Block B,
working through windows,
radiators and insulation.
Sept – Feb 2021
As winter progressed, so did
the work. We moved through
Blocks B-H, working to an
ambitious March deadline.
March 2022
By this point, we’d replaced
over 1,000 windows and
radiator valves, and started
tweaking to perfection.
May 2022
We reached a milestone when
we shut off power to switch
the heating and hot water
system from gas to electricity.
August 2022
We’ll start up again in August, working through A
Block, E Block and B Block penthouses.
June – July 2022
A quieter summer means time to complete
other building work around College.

Collaborative advantage
Mary Adeyemo is the recent winner of a Vice-Chancellor’s Diversity Award, founder of her own business and all-round force of
motivation. If you’re lucky enough to catch her around College, your day is sure to get a little brighter.
DPhil Law, 2021-2024
Above: Mary Adeyemo
When asked to think of three pivotal
moments in her life, Mary Adeyemo
talks through her most challenging times
with admirable grace.
Mary sees power in adversity, a suitable
fit for someone reading for a DPhil in
Law with a focus on medical negligence.
She hails proudly from a Christian
Nigerian family and grew up with a
“perfect view of how life should be.
Like you’re going to be blessed if you do
everything according to the bible.” Until
all that changed.
Her life took a different course when
her older brother, the first-born son in
their family, fell into convulsive fits one
night and later died due to preventable
medical errors.
“Even when it happened, I still had
the confidence to say this is a joke,”
remembers Mary. “We fall sick and get
well. It never occurred to me that it
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could be the last time he would ever
stand on his feet. That changed the
definition of life for me. He was a whiz
in math, he was a chatterbox. You can
wake up today, so active and powerful,
and tomorrow you’re gone.”
As the second oldest, Mary had to step
into her brother’s shoes, a responsibility
she didn’t feel prepared for. “I’m the
second-born, the first girl in my family.
Responsibility goes to the firstborn in an
African setting. I started thinking for my
juniors too. That changed the trajectory
of my life, my thinking.”
Mary’s academic journey in law started
at Nigeria’s Afe Babalola University,
where she completed her first-class
undergraduate degree as best graduating
law student in 2017. She was called
to the Nigerian Bar (the largest bar in
Africa) in 2018 and was working as legal
practitioner in Lagos when she decided
to apply for a Rhodes Scholarship in
2020 with hopes of attending Oxford.
Like so many other prospective students,
Mary first thought, “There’s no point in
wasting my time,” while everyone around
her said, “Just apply!” So she submitted
her application, 10 minutes before the
deadline, and was one of the top ten
finalists for West Africa in 2020.
When Mary’s application process for
the Rhodes Scholarship ended there,
she began to think Oxford just wasn’t
for her. But it wasn’t long until her
defiant perspective kicked in and she
remembered that things don’t just
happen, even if you do everything right.
“I suddenly just told myself, even if it
takes ten years, I’ll keep applying.”
She was soon accepted for a place at
Oxford and received a full scholarship
from the founder of her undergraduate
university to finance her entire DPhil.
“People always think I’m making these
stories up because I’m sympathetic and

Student profile
make them feel good. But I always say,
‘No trust me. I’ve been there. I can show
you my rejection emails.’”
But for every mountain you climb,
there’s another in the distance. Oxford’s
distinctive environment can be a
challenge in itself, so Mary leant on the
concept of collaborative advantage to
lift spirits. “It’s very much like a pressure
cooker once you’re in here. You arrive
with all the expectation you put on
yourself, thinking ‘How did I make it
into this room?’ But once you start
speaking to each other, those walls break
down a little bit. And the pressure’s still
there, but it’s a little easier knowing
everybody feels the same. Many feel
it’s a competition, but it’s not. You’re
collaborating for the future.”
Whatever stage we’re going through
in life, Mary reminds us that it’s just a
matter of time. No matter how difficult
today is, it will end and tomorrow will
come. With her motivational mindset,
“Many feel it’s a competition, but
it’s not. You’re collaborating for
the future.”
Mary won the Vice-Chancellor’s
diversity award for her work enhancing
opportunities for school students from
under-privileged backgrounds. She also
founded a project, CareerCarrierz,
which supports students in Nigeria with
resources to study, empowering them
to explore tech opportunities at a young
age.
But for now, she’s soaking up the
summer in Oxford, our small English
city (albeit an international one) with a
slightly quieter lifestyle than she’s used
to back home. “When I first got here,
I was like ‘Where is the music? Where
is everyone? What’s going on?’ But I’m
slowly beginning to appreciate the long
walks and moments of peace. The next
thing for me is to concentrate on my
DPhil and be open-minded to absorb as
much as possible, like a foam sponge.”
Mary, it’s a privilege to have you here.
Below (L-R): Ike Chioke, National Secretary for West Africa, Rhodes Scholarship. Mary Adeyemo. Interview judge.
13

A journey of curiosity
From Japan to the United States, Cambridge and now Oxford, DPhil student Ayaka
Shinozaki has travelled far and wide to follow her curious mind.
Above: Ayaka Shinozaki
DPhil MRI Physics, 2021-2025
Ayaka Shinozaki is now finishing her first
year at Wolfson, where she is working
on imaging metabolic diseases using
hyperpolarized MRI, but her route to
Oxford has been anything but standard.
Growing up in Japan, Ayaka was very
aware of the ideals that her home
country held highest. “In Japan, what’s
most prioritized is academic work at the
sacrifice of everything else” she explains.
But what do you do if those ideals don’t
fit with your dreams? “That works well
in Japan but it didn’t work well with
my personality. My curiosity was really,
really strong. I wanted to do academics,
I wanted to do sports, I wanted to do
music, art, everything. I really wanted to
pursue the liberal arts.”
So at the young age of 14, Ayaka’s
curiosity got the better of her and
she left her home and family behind
to travel to the United States for
boarding school. “[I wanted] to find
somewhere that [would] allow me to
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do rigorous academic work, and on
top of that rigorous sports and music
and everything that I was curious about
just in one package.” Making such a
huge move had its difficulties but Ayaka
puts her ability to thrive down to the
friends she made and the community
she surrounded herself with. “[Moving]
away from my family for the first time
with the culture shock of going from
Japan to the US was quite drastic”
she recalls. “I’m so grateful for all the
amazing friends that I made because they
really made the experience everything.
My friends were absolute gems. When
I needed help, they were there to talk
to me. I had mentors and a really good
support system. ”
Following her graduation from high
school, Ayaka stayed for her bachelor’s
degree, but after studying in the USA
for eight years, she then made another
big move to the UK for her Masters at
Cambridge, where she worked at an AI
start up as a software engineer. Once
again her curiosity and ambition got
the better of her and soon it was time
to move on. “Having worked in the AI
start-up for three years, I noticed the
glass ceiling to become a CTO. Most
people at that level have PhDs or have
been in the industry for more than ten
years.”
Following her new-found passion for
medical devices (particularly MRI), Ayaka
moved to Oxford to read for her DPhil
and work on a project she felt strongly
about. “I had worked on hyperpolarized
helium in the lung during my
undergraduate degree. Then this project
that I found, when I was looking for my
DPhil, is in hyperpolarized carbon-13.”
She elaborates, “We’re looking at brains,
kidneys, livers, and different organs that
relate to the metabolism. I was drawn
to the project but also I’m so glad that I
ended up in the lab that I’m in because
the people are amazing there.”

Above: Ayaka working with an MRI scanner
“I wanted to do academics, I
wanted to do sports, I wanted to
do music, art, everything.”
As someone who thrives in a supportive
team, Ayaka has embedded herself in
Wolfson life. As well as winning awards
on the university polo team (see p. 9),
she’s also a cox in Wolfson’s esteemed
Boat Club, which has become a valuable
part of her time here. “I love being a
cox because there’s a lot of multitasking,
including being motivational.”
How does this help keep her on track
with intensive studies? “Sometimes, like
Below: Wolfson College Boat Club, Women’s 2nd VIII
this morning, it was carnage. So many
boats were out there, near crashes and
everything. But there’s some sort of
calmness in the chaos. When I’m trying
to focus, I have a goal. I want to have
a good outing. I want to make sure my
rowers are getting a good practice in.
That resets me from a busy day doing
my PhD.”
When she’s not out on the river, or in
the lab, Ayaka can also be found striking
up conversations at college guest nights.
“Some of my favourite events are the
guest nights and the speakers that come
to Wolfson, whether they’re alumni or
they have a connection with the college.
“I get to branch out from my own
lab. I’ve met people from completely
different backgrounds. Last week, I met
a junior fellow who’s in architecture. I
don’t know anything about architecture
and we just had a nice conversation
about the architecture at Wolfson.” She
continues, “Me coming in as a scientist,
as a physicist looking at the architecture
and thinking, ‘Oh my God. Wow. This is
what I think, when I think of brutalism.’
But I found out there was a lot more to
it than that.”
It’s not just discussion of architecture
that engaged Ayaka’s curiosity at
Wolfson. “I love that it’s a graduate
college because people have had multiple
different life stories that miraculously
converge here right now, today, this
year.”
So what does life hold for her after
Wolfson? “I’d love to pursue medical
devices. I do want to keep my
entrepreneurship side of my life alive and
going. I guess I’ll take any opportunities
that come my way.”
15

How epidemics end
Early March 2022 saw us emerge from two years of persistent social restrictions
because of the COVID-19 pandemic, which gradually took on the more contained
shape of an epidemic. Who better to lead us through such a pivotal moment than
Professor Erica Charters, who delivered this year’s Wolfson London Lecture at
Lincoln’s Inn in March, on how epidemics end.
Erica Charters
Professor of the Global History of
Medicine, Erica Charters examines
the history of war and disease,
particularly in the British and French
empires. More specifically, her work
focuses on manpower during the
eighteenth century, examining the
history of bodies as well as the
history of methods used to measure
and enhance bodies, labour and
population as a whole, including the
history of statistics.
In the context of COVID-19,
Professor Charters is coordinating
an ongoing multidisciplinary project
which, amongst other things, maps
out the stages through which
epidemics move gradually closer
towards an end point.
16
For those who research the relationship
between disease and societies, it is both
eerie and fascinating to live through
a pandemic. After years of analysing
the ways that humans and pathogens
interact, and teaching the history of
public health, it was startling to have my
expertise suddenly framed as relevant,
with students paying close attention
to standard introductory lectures on
understanding epidemics.
As is the case for many scholars,
research is a comfort during times
of crisis. With archives closed and so
much in a state of uncertainty, in late
2020 I began a project to examine how
epidemics end, spurred by colleagues
and friends who had started to ask
me this question. The project brings
together over thirty researchers who
are experts on epidemics – but on a
variety of different epidemics that took
place in different parts of the world
and in different eras. These researchers
also come from a variety of disciplines:
anthropologists, archaeologists,
biologists, epidemiologists, historians,
political scientists, mathematical
modellers, among others. All draw
on years of research to explain how
epidemics end, whether cholera in
twentieth-century China or plague in
Renaissance Italy.
The project has also been an
experiment in conducting research
during a pandemic. Supported by
online workshops and recorded video
interviews, many of the contributors
have never met in person. The
COVID-19 pandemic has shaped
research ambitions and aims, both
intellectually and logistically. Throughout
2021, contributors in India, South Africa
and elsewhere had to reschedule or
postpone activities due to the ebbs and
flows of disease, lockdowns, and the
accompanying social and political unrest.
The project’s progress thus tracked
the contours of the pandemic’s global
trajectory in fits and starts.
The project’s findings, summarized in
a wide-ranging journal issue of 18 case
studies, two conceptual articles, and 14
video interviews, highlight the protracted
and fractured nature of an epidemic’s
end. Rather than a quick and decisive
conclusion, the end of an epidemic is an
uneven and contested process. Indeed, it
is more accurate to describe epidemics
as having multiple endings. As the
project’s summary article observes:
“When we ask how an epidemic ends,
we wish to know when this disease
will stop disrupting our lives and allow
a return to normalcy. This necessarily
encompasses a range of endings, often
overlapping, but usually different and
sometimes even conflicting: the end of
disease (the medical end), the end of the
crisis and regulations (the political end),
and the return to normalcy (the social
end).”
The medical, political, and social endings
are related, but they are distinct, and
often at odds with one another.
For most epidemics, the end arrives not
through the disappearance of disease,
but instead through a decline in disease

Alumni lecture
Credit: Eradicate Malaria by Spraying, ca. 1960. Courtesy of the US National Library of Medicine, History of Medicine Division. Copyright owner not known.
17

“Epidemics are not
a series of discrete
biological events
that simply pass into
history. They are also
moral crises.”
rates until the medical crisis has passed; a
point often defined as when rates reach
‘normal’ or ‘locally acceptable’ levels. Yet
this necessarily raises the issue of what
is an acceptable or manageable level in
a given locality. Who has the authority
to decide this, and what evidence is
used to establish this? As a result, the
end process is when different forms of
authority negotiate and compete with
one another, often debating fundamental
social, economic, and political priorities
as much as medical data.
Influenza A, for example, is a disease
that has long circulated among human
populations in unpredictable waves that
regularly reach epidemic heights, and
then subside to endemic or manageable
levels. The 2009 H1N1 (swine flu)
pandemic was declared to be in its
‘post-pandemic period’ by the World
18
Health Organization when case rates
conformed to seasonal patterns of
influenza. Likewise, the seventeenthcentury
London merchant John Graunt
(1620–1674) gauged the end of plague
outbreaks not according to when plague
cases entirely disappeared, but instead
when London death rates returned to
something approaching normal levels.
For many, official declarations are
therefore less meaningful than the
resumption of social and economic
practices. Although officials traditionally
marked the end of an epidemic with
the re-opening of city gates and festivals
of thanksgiving (civic or religious),
historical records show that these official
acts often came after the community
had returned to normal patterns
of socializing, living, and working.
For example, when the Danish king
proclaimed an end to the 1710–14 Baltic
plague epidemic, declaring therefore that
bedding should be destroyed for sanitary
reasons, many common people resisted.
For them, the official declaration was an
expensive and arbitrary intrusion into
lives that had already resumed.
Just as different civic authorities gauge
the end points of epidemics differently,
so do different scholarly disciplines, each
measuring different data. Epidemiologists
often rely on case numbers, with
the decline of an outbreak becoming
apparent only in retrospect. By contrast,
bioarchaeologists measure social and
ecological factors that shape population
immunity to explain long-term patterns
of the decline of disease across societies.
Political analysts measure parameters
of political fractures and erosion of
trust in policy makers, noting how

Alumni & fellows
Credit: Malaria eradication : the world united against malaria : 10 paisa postage / Pakistan. Wellcome Collection. Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
the spread of disease is linked to the
breakdown of infrastructure such as
the provision of clean water, basic
healthcare, and trust in authorities –
problems which can cause and prolong
outbreaks. Anthropologists, by contrast,
examine the experience of illness among
communities, measuring the strain that
disease – and interventionist medical
measures – inflict on cultures. An
epidemic can therefore only fully end
when society reunites, which involves
the negotiation and acknowledgement
of the disparate ways in which disease
has affected different groups, and also of
the profoundly divisive nature of public
health interventions.
Most fundamentally, the end process
demonstrates that although epidemics
are triggered as biological events, they
are also profoundly social and political
phenomena. Tracking pathogens and
analysing virulence can only partly
explain the unfolding of epidemics and
the uneven dynamics of their ending.
For example, HIV/AIDS has been
transformed into a manageable chronic
condition due to medical innovations,
and is thus no longer an epidemic for
those in the Global North. Yet, for many
in the world who live with political and
economic instability and cannot access
sustained health and social care, the
epidemic of HIV/AIDS has not ended.
Epidemics therefore end at different
times for different groups, even within
one society. And political, economic,
and social contexts fundamentally
shape the proximity of these endings.
Indeed, medical treatments easily
available in some parts of the world
can delay endings in other regions,
pushing diseases such as HIV/AIDS out
of the spotlight, making its end even
more elusive for those in the so-called
Global South. In places such as Kenya,
COVID-19 therefore interacts with
ongoing outbreaks of ebola, cholera,
HIV/AIDS, and tuberculosis.
The contested end process of an
epidemic is a reminder that epidemics
are not a series of discrete biological
events that simply pass into history.
They are also moral crises, testing the
limits of social cohesion and trust.
The end process is a period of moral
reckoning, with discussions of ‘lessons
learned’ and the crafting of narratives
of heroes and villains. In this process,
societies look backwards and forwards
as the past epidemic is re-interpreted
as a morality tale to help prevent future
catastrophes, restoring faith in human
agency to face the power of nature.
19

For the love of truth
Above: Tom Brennan
Playwright and theatre director Tom Brennan joined Wolfson as our latest Geoffrey Garton Creative Arts Fellow at the start of
Michaelmas 2021. Named after Geoffrey Garton, Wolfson’s Bursar between 1977 and 1987, the fellowship celebrates visual arts,
music, performing arts and creative writing. As such, Tom has been holding writing workshops, performing play readings and talking
through the highs and lows of running his own production company, with much more to come as he continues his fellowship
through to 2024. For now, find out a bit more about Tom’s take on theatre and what it’s been like to burst onto the Oxford scene.
Geoffrey Garton Creative Arts Fellow, 2021-2024
Theatre has been running through
Tom’s bones since he was a young boy
growing up in Bristol in the 1990s. His
dad bought a camcorder (a big deal
in those days), and would record his
family in anything from interviews to
plays. “There’s a record of these family
films of us growing up, which began as
documentaries and slowly grew in scale.”
Tom learnt a lot from those early days,
much of which might encourage our
budding academics. “When you’re
starting out, your craft isn’t very good.
20
It’s really heart-breaking because you
make lots of bad things that don’t match
your brilliant taste. You have to just
keep throwing stuff out there until you
develop the craft to make the thing that
matches your taste.”
Two reproductions of James Bond and
Lawrence of Arabia later (the latter was
called Lauren of Australia and even had
its own movie poster), and Tom was
well on his way to a career in theatre.
He soon found himself wrapped up in
the all-encompassing Bristol Old Vic
Young Company as a young teenager,
where he was given space to take the
reins on every aspect of theatre. “It
felt like running away to the circus. The
leaders spoke to us like we were adults,
for better or for worse. The intensity
of that felt thrilling. We made a home
there.”
Through makeshift childhood films and a
do-or-die introduction to theatre work,
Tom developed a knack for “thinking of
something and just making it happen.”
From a cold, scrappy wardrobe-cum-

Alumni & fellows
studio in the Old Vic emerged the
acclaimed group that is now The
Wardrobe Ensemble - Tom’s nonhierarchical,
empowering production
house. “Everyone has a clear voice
and it’s really just about giving yourself
permission to let it out a lot of the time.
Our work is built on that.” That freedom
of expression is a wonderful reflection
of what we all hold dear at Wolfson.
Before long, Tom directed his first play
for the ensemble, which they went
on to perform at Edinburgh Fringe, a
festival which, at the time, was “the
place to go if you were unsupported and
unproduced.”
Just like academics, playwrights often
start off writing about things they think
they should be writing about, rather
than areas where they can have the
deepest impact based on who they are
and what they know. One of Tom’s
earliest plays was about the 2010
Chilean mining crisis, when 33 miners
were trapped underground for 69 days.
As a group of young adults far from
the reality of that situation, they soon
decided to create something that felt a
little closer to home. “Once we weren’t
trying to prove ourselves anymore, it
just felt like a free conversation.”
Tom’s unusual path led him to Wolfson,
where he’s in equal parts thrilled and
surprised to find himself. “I never had
any guide in terms of what I should
do to push myself, and the Oxford
thing was always a source of envy for
me. Being here at Wolfson feels like
validation for me as an individual, outside
of the ensemble. I am the company,
but I’m also not the company, so that’s
very rare for me to encounter. It’s a real
thrill and has given me a great deal of
freedom.”
At a time where it’s all too easy to get
blindsided by the cultural and political
biases of our media feeds, Tom sees
the same thing happening in theatre. “A
lot of what I’m seeing in my industry is
self-congratulatory theatre, which feels
very smug and pleased with itself, so
everyone in the theatre can all agree
with the thing that’s happening.”
In the same breath, theatre can be the
perfect tool to cut through that, if used
sharply. “A friend of mine recently said,
‘I want my sense of good to be mocked
by an interrogated sense of truth.’ If you
want to talk about something difficult,
humour feels like a really good way of
doing that. Through laughter, just like
through tears, we can open people up a
little bit more.”
Just like academia, theatre captures a
moment in history that reflects the state
of its field and the mindset of its author.
They are both sharp tools that can
burst biased bubbles, and they are both
bubbles in their own rights when their
creators get too comfortable.
Thoughtfully as ever, Tom sums up his
world like this: “Theatre isn’t the pearl in
the oyster. It’s the piece of sand. It wakes
me up and refreshes my senses. It makes
me think about something differently
instead of confirming something I always
knew was true.”
Controversy challenges our thinking;
hopefully a familiar notion for any
academic deep in the cutting edge
thoughts of their field.
“I want my sense of good to be mocked
by an interrogated sense of truth.”
21

Credit: Maryam Farzami
To be useful
Wolfson alumna Shaharzad Akbar was
the first woman from Afghanistan to
study at Oxford. As she returns to the
College in 2022, she looks for clarity on
how to move forward after 2021 saw
the Taliban take over her home country,
which has always been the compass of
her work.
MPhil Development Studies, 2011
Shaharzad was the first Afghan woman
to study at Oxford University. She
completed her MPhil in Development
Studies as a Weidenfeld-Hoffmann
Scholar, after graduating from Smith
College in Massachusetts with a BA
in Anthropology. Shaharzad has since
worked across public and private
sector organisations with a variety of
missions, all with one thing in common –
Afghanistan. Rather than striving toward
a particular career goal, she says, “I just
tried to go wherever I thought I could
be useful. For me, the main issue was
22
doing something for human rights, and in
particular women’s rights, in Afghanistan.
It’s really gender inequality that’s at the
heart of our conflict.”
Born in Jawzjan, Afghanistan in the late
1980s, Shaharzad grew up in conflict
as the Taliban emerged in her home
country in the early 1990s. Her family
was displaced and travelled from one
country to another for safety. She
lived as a refugee in Pakistan in the late
1990s and returned to Afghanistan in
early 2002. “We suffered poverty but
my parents always made sure we had
books and some form of education.”
As they moved around, her father
home-schooled Shaharzad, her siblings
and other children on the basics of
world history, religions and philosophy.
“This wasn’t just about learning facts
but deepening our perspective on
how connected we are as a human
community, what links we have, and
how long there has been a struggle for
dignity.”
For Shaharzad, getting into Oxford was

Alumni & fellows
“When I went back to
Afghanistan after graduating,
I was much more confident.
I’d been in an environment of
the highest possible level of
intellectual debate.”
an unimaginable seal of approval. “As
a girl who grew up in a country that is
least kind to its women, with the fewest
opportunities, it just seemed impossible
that I could make it.” To achieve the
impact she sought for Afghanistan,
Shaharzad wanted to learn about the
development stories of other countries,
so she could apply these to her efforts
in Afghanistan. “Oxford was at the top
of my list, but it made a huge difference
that I got a full Weidenfeld scholarship. I
was the main contributor to my family’s
economy, so there was no way that I
could have paid for my education or
even my plane tickets.”
But it was about much more than
money. “It gave me exposure to leaders
on important issues whom I could learn
from, to graduate students from around
the world in a variety of disciplines. It
allowed me to look at an issue from
different perspectives in a way that’s
not possible in other institutions. So
when I went back to Afghanistan after
graduating, I was much more confident.
I’d been in an environment of the highest
possible level of intellectual debate.”
Shaharzad attended Wolfson under the
presidency of Hermione Lee, who was a
huge catalyst in helping the young activist
find her voice, along with her supervisor
Dr Proochista Ariana. “I felt I needed to
speak in some imaginary Oxford voice to
be heard in my writing. What did it mean
that I was supposed to be brilliant and
then was struggling to pass my exams?”
Through reaching out for support from
those she looked up to, Shaharzad was
able to regain ownership of her research.
And she remembers Wolfson’s former
president fondly. “I basically worshipped
Hermione. She was an incredible
example of female leadership. She was
accessible and thoughtful, open to my
ideas and such an incredible writer. I
looked at her and thought ‘I want to
carry these qualities when I lead’. She
created an environment where you felt
comfortable going to her for guidance
and showing your weak side and
vulnerability.”
Shaharzad went on to work in both
private and public sector roles: reporting
for the BBC, co-founding her own
human rights consultancy, working as a
senior advisor to the Afghan President,
and for the National Security Council
of Afghanistan as a deputy to the senior
national security advisor. Then her latest
23

Akbar family portrait with Shaharzad second from right on the top row.
full-time role in Afghanistan was as chair
of the Afghanistan Independent Human
Rights Commission (AIHRC), before
stepping down in January 2022.
Having worked in various leadership
positions, working in AIHRC was
Shaharzad’s most challenging post to
date. A new mother at the time to
her two month old son, Shaharzad
worked in a team of nine with diverse
backgrounds, all appointed together.
“All decisions about the stance of the
commission had to be taken collectively,
and I was the youngest. I was also the
chair, and a woman in a patriarchal
society. It was hugely challenging to
establish my authority with colleagues,
create consensus and get people to move
together in a fragmented space, while
24
there was conflict every day.
“We were all equally inexperienced
in running the commission as an
organisation. We came in following a
founding chairperson for the commission,
so there was a lot of scrutiny. People had
been used to the same leadership for
18 years. There were a lot of questions
about our ability to lead the commission
during a very challenging time for
Afghanistan. We needed more clarity
around everyone’s roles, and that is
something that we tried to do. We tried
to make it more effective.”
Following the US withdrawal from
Afghanistan in August 2021 and the
Taliban’s takeover, Shaharzad stepped
down from her role at AIHRC because
the institution was no longer operating
from inside the country. “It just
didn’t have the same meaning for me
anymore. With that role, I learned how
to responsibly step up, and when to
responsibly step down.”
Working in such high pressure roles on
deeply personal causes requires a great
deal of stamina. “It’s a very intangible
kind of worth,” says Shaharzad.
“There are active attempts to silence
you, belittle you and shame you, and
sometimes just waking up another day
to stand up for the things that you
believe in just seems like the hardest
thing ever.”
And that’s where resilience comes in.
“You just have to be persistent. And
really stubborn in terms of hope.”

Alumni profile
Stallworthy
Poetry Prize
The annual competition was set up
in memory of the late Professor Jon
Stallworthy (1935-2014), poet and
Fellow of Wolfson College, and is open
to any student currently enrolled in
postgraduate studies at the University of
Oxford. The funding for the prize was
provided by generous donations from
Jon Stallworthy’s many friends
and admirers.
The prize is awarded for the best poem
in English verse not exceeding 40 lines in
length, in 2022 on the subject of ‘Sleepcycles’.
The value of the prize is £1,000,
and entrants are permitted to submit
up to three poems. The judges for
this year’s award included the Oxford
Professor of Poetry, Alice Oswald.
The award ceremony took place online
on 18 January 2022 where the winning
poem, A Quick Lie by Alexander Peplow,
was announced along with two runners
up and three highly commended entries.
At the event, Wolfson President Sir Tim
Hitchens noted, “All the poems bring
something fresh and new to us and our
imaginations; every year, I see something
I had never seen before.”
A Quick Lie
So, every fifty, sometimes forty, years
they come along and dig another body up
and put a box down in its place.
A black cloud dips its heads around the hole
then leaves, and shovelfuls, fill it up again.
The ground is left, a little higher than it was.
And here I sit, beneath this tree,
on the glummer side of the church,
at the back wall, with all my teeth,
and smiling, all that I can do
to sightlessly observe decay of memory
within the living of the dead.
The sexton heaves up mostly dust
or breaks a bone too large to fit within his bag
of people to be tidied out of sight
like useful screws and scavenged soaps.
It leaves a pristine pit to hold
a year or two of an eternal rest
before they tumble, shattered, cell
to narrow cell, and spoil their neat repose
unseen, within the sliding of the earth
and of its creatures. I, and only I,
lead-lined, am still where I was put
so quickly, in the middle of the night.
Somewhere, there is another pit
where cheek- and ankle-bone are clacked
and voices mutter how they never knew of this
then slip into the mouldiness
of time and of the earth, and flowers
that are admired in the spring.
Credit: John Cairns
About the winner:
Alexander Peplow is a second-year History DPhil student, working on how
obedience to claims of sovereignty was conceptualised in the Holy Roman
Empire and Papacy in this period – in short, why people did what they were
told. Aside from the subject of his doctorate, he is involved in the Teaching
the Codex project on palaeographic practices. More generally, he is interested
in the history of the medieval Empire, and twelfth- and thirteenth-century
intellectual history, especially in the presence of Stoicism during that period.
25

A year in Development
and Alumni Relations
Development Director Huw David reflects on a year of returning to in-person alumni events, our first Giving Day, new scholarships
and, throughout it all, the generosity of Wolfsonians past and present.
As the academic year draws to a close,
it is once again a pleasure to salute
Wolfson’s alumni and friends, whose
generosity, commitment and enthusiasm
are vital in helping the College thrive.
Like the rest of the College, we spent
much of the year in the Development
Office thinking about carbon emissions
– and, specifically, Wolfson’s groundbreaking
Zero Carbon project. As work
has progressed replacing windows,
installing new insulation, and replacing
our 50 year-old gas boilers with air
source heat-pumps, Wolfsonians’
generosity has been instrumental in
allowing the project to move at such a
rapid pace.
A gift of $3m for Zero Carbon from
an anonymous alumnus represented
the largest dollar denominated gift
the College has ever received, while
a commitment of £500,000 from the
Wolfson Foundation is enabling the
second phase of the project, beginning
this summer. Other alumni and friends
have contributed in ways large and small,
monetarily and through their expertise
and advice.
After nearly two years of intermittent
lockdowns and social distancing, it was a
pleasure to meet so many Wolfsonians
again in person. We began with a
reception in the Buttery in September
2021 and then returned to the Oxford
& Cambridge Club in Pall Mall for the
annual London Christmas Drinks.
Alumni who braved both a tube strike
and torrential rain were treated to a
fascinating London Lecture at Lincoln’s
Inn on 1 March, at which Professor Erica
Charters described ‘How Pandemics
End’, a project which features on
the centre pages of this magazine.
Towards the end of April, we hosted
Wolfson’s most generous benefactors
26
at the Iffley Dinner, an event preceded
by the unveiling of the College’s new
Benefactors’ Board. It records the
names of all those who have given more
than £10,000 to Wolfson across its
nearly sixty year history, a roll-call of
phenomenal philanthropy.
Moved by the crisis in Ukraine, in May
we held Wolfson’s first ever Giving
Day to raise money to accommodate a
refugee scholar and his or her family, and
for wider student support. The appeal
raised a tremendous £93,000 over
two days of activity in College, ranging
from talks from fellows Jan Fellerer and
Julie Curtis on Ukrainian language and
literature and former ambassador Simon
Smith on the geo-political background
to the conflict, to a row-a-thon in the
front quad (where the crews covered a
phenomenal 301km in total,) to a bake
sale in the café. We are now working
with the Council for At-Risk Academics
(CARA), established in the 1930s to
offer academics fleeing persecution
around the world refuge at British
universities, to identify the recipient of
the refugee scholarship.
Wolfson’s alumni and friends continued
to make possible outstanding academic
research across the many fields studied
here. We are deeply grateful to the
Eutopia Foundation for its generosity
towards research in theoretical physics
and to Simon Harrison for his steadfast
support for scholarships in physics
and quantum computing and the Boat
Club. In April we launched the Bob
Sim Uruguay Initiative, a partnership
with South American counterparts in
immunology, established thanks to the
generosity of the late Professor Sim’s
family. In the arts and humanities, the
Dorset Foundation has again provided
invaluable assistance to the Oxford
Centre for Life-Writing and this year
we will welcome the first holder of
the newly established Lorne Thyssen
Scholarship in Imperial History. Thank
you to everyone who has supported
Wolfson in so many different ways.
It is always a pleasure to welcome alumni
back to Wolfson, to hear about your
time at the College and the impact it has
had on your lives, and to express our
gratitude for your generous support. We
look forward to seeing you again soon.
Huw David
Development Director
Would you consider supporting
Wolfson’s students by establishing
a bursary or scholarship?
Please contact Dr Huw David,
Fellow and Development Director,
to discuss how your support
can help Wolfson’s students and
postdocs prosper.
E: huw.david@wolfson.ox.ac.uk

Development
Credit: John Cairns
Wolfson 1966 Fund
Supporting expertise, today and tomorrow
From climate change to global
pandemics, never has the world needed
expertise more than now. Since
Wolfson’s foundation in 1966, our
students and post-doctoral fellows have
made ground-breaking discoveries and
brought fresh light to bear on some of
the world’s most intractable challenges.
As Oxford’s most international and
family-friendly college, Wolfson is a
special place in which to study, learn
and live. But we want to do more to
help our students and postdoctoral
fellows. The support of our alumni and
friends is essential in doing this.
Last year we launched the Wolfson
1966 Fund, a dedicated fund to provide
direct support for our students and
post-docs through scholarships,
research and travel awards, and hardship
bursaries. This year donations to the
fund also enabled the College to offer
vital support to imperilled refugee
academics and their families, following
our Giving Day in May.
To support the Wolfson 1966 Fund
and Wolfson’s outstanding community
of students and postdocs, please visit
www.wolfson.ox.ac.uk/wolfson-1966-
fund
Arrivals and departures Syme Society Newsletter
In September 2021, we welcomed
Judith Palmer as Communications
Assistant. Judith lives in College
with her family and runs
Wolfson’s family society. In May
2022, we bade farewell to Clare
Norton and thanked her for her
outstanding work over five years
as Development Officer. We wish
her all the best in her new role at
Overcoming MS.
The Syme Society was established
to commemorate one of Wolfson’s
most distinguished fellows and
benefactors, Sir Ronald Syme.
Those who pledge a bequest to
Wolfson in their will and notify
the College are invited to join the
society, and to a summer lunch at
Wolfson. This gives us an opportunity
to thank those who have
remembered Wolfson in their will.
Wolfson’s termly e-newsletter,
The Wolfsonian, offers alumni and
friends regular updates on College
news and events. If you’re not yet
on the mailing list but would like
to be, please contact the Alumni &
Development Office at
alumni.office@wolfson.ox.ac.uk.
We’ll be happy to forward you the
latest edition and sign you up so
you don’t miss the next one.
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Financial Report
“Out of the frying pan and into the fire” - Wolfson’s Bursar Richard Morin talks us through the current financial moment, as no
sooner had we felt relief sailing intact through COVID-19’s choppy waters than we headed into the perfect storm of war in Europe,
a post-Brexit tightening of labour markets, and spiralling inflation.
As we move forward and begin to
live and operate with COVID-19, we
should all be relieved that the financial
catastrophe that was possible did not
materialise. Thank goodness for the
excellent work of our Finance and
Investment Committees, which had
made so many sensible and cautious
decisions prior to the pandemic. Whilst
there was a huge downturn in the size of
our endowment when COVID-19 first
hit, this recovered well, and, whilst our
various income streams were severely
interrupted, especially the conference
and events income that we had come to
rely on so much, they are now returning
to healthy levels.
Over the last few years, we had
returned to making a small surplus.
However, there is now every chance that
the current ‘storm’ will cause us once
again to slip into an operating deficit.
The coming together at one time of
so many challenges will be a real test,
and this is likely to mean that we will
no longer be able to be as bullish as
we would have liked in investing in our
academic activities and further estate
improvements; we will, instead, once
again, need to remain prudent, and limit
activities and costs where we can. We
cannot be confident, for example, that
our investment values will not reduce
over the coming years to levels that will
impact on the operating income that our
endowment generates for the College.
This will all depend on how assets are
revalued in the new inflationary era.
At the time of writing, the endowment
was worth less than it was 12 months
before, while the income required to
run the College grows rapidly under
inflationary pressures.
In the year to 31 March our investment
managers achieved a total return of
around 7%, which would have been
reasonable and a real return in previous
years, but with inflation now running at
around 10%, you will appreciate that 7%
is a negative return in real terms and will
not be sufficient to enable the College
to keep pace with its growing operating
costs. Looking back, it is clear that
we’ve had some good years in terms of
investment returns, and it will be much
harder going forward. Our investment
managers are, of course, looking carefully
at their asset classes, and growing
investments in more defensive sectors
which may provide some protection,
but it simply won’t be possible to be
fully protected from the challenges we
face. As we put our operating budgets
together for the coming year, we need
to prioritise more carefully than ever.
Meanwhile, we are continuing with the
ground-breaking decarbonisation works,
to which we were fully committed
before the current crisis. These will see
the whole of the main estate, including
all of the Powell & Moya original
buildings, become fully decarbonised.
We are now running all of our hot
water and heating to our main buildings
without fossil fuels and through 100%
renewable electricity. We have been able
to close down the massive fifty-year-old
gas boilers, which were using so much
fossil fuel inefficiently and pumping so
much carbon into the air for so long.
Works continue on the main site,
with roofs to be insulated and more
windows to be replaced, in order to
minimise the renewable energy that we
draw from the grid, and by the end of
March next year we will have reached
a point where we will have completed
“Out of the
frying pan and
into the fire”
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Credit: John Cairns

Credit: John Cairns
all of the projects that we are currently
committed to (and which we can afford
at this time). Whilst there will be more
to be done (further flat roofs to be
insulated, a large storage battery to be
put in place, for example), we will not
be able to afford to do those at the
moment: we will return to them when
funds allow.
As part of our decarbonisation, you
will see as you come into College that
we have installed four electric vehicle
charging points near the main entrance,
and we hope that this marks the start of
a general transition to electric travel. We
plan to replace our diesel minibus with
an electric one, but as yet we have been
unable to find a suitable model – we will
continue to work on this and as new
models become available we will make
the transition.
It has been a hard couple of years for
the community putting up with the
many building works associated with
decarbonisation, and I am very grateful
to all of those who have shown such
patience and resilience during this
time. The catastrophe of not tackling
the climate crisis clearly outweighs the
short-term inconvenience, and I hope
that those here at Wolfson during these
projects will look back with pride for the
contribution that they have made.
Other building projects around College
include a new Marble Hall lift, which
will prevent the frequent breakdowns
that we used to experience. And the
problem of water leaking through the
substructure underneath the Family
Terraces has now been resolved with a
complete resurfacing project, including
the installation of tiles to match those
originally in place when the College was
built (a requirement of our listed building
status). This project has been ongoing
for several years and was an essential
requirement to stop significant damage
to the substructure of the Powell &
Moya buildings. It is a huge relief to have
it concluded.
We continue to work on the design
for a new accommodation block of 49
rooms to sit in the south car park and
surrounded by Wolfson’s lovely gardens
and views. Now that the design is almost
complete, we will be continuing to
assess financing options (although the
option of raising finance in the private
markets may now be much harder
and we will have to think carefully as
to whether this is something that the
College can pursue at this time). We
are also completing the design for the
Sports and Wellbeing Centre, which we
hope to build at some stage in the future
should we find funding support.
There have been several changes of
key personnel. Our industrious Home
Bursar, Barry Coote, retired from the
College after 17 years of extraordinary
service and we applaud him particularly
for his outstanding dedication and hard
work over the last few years during the
COVID-19 crisis. Our Estates & Health
& Safety Manager, Chris Licence, will
be stepping up as the Acting Home
Bursar for the time being. We have been
pleased to welcome to the College a
new Head of Catering & Events, Claudia
Reiter, who comes with extensive
hospitality industry experience, including
16 years under the mentorship of
Raymond Blanc. She will be taking us
forward on our culinary journey along
with our brilliant new Head Chef,
Michael Godfrey, an award winning
international executive chef – the food
in Wolfson has never been so good, so
do please come into College and enjoy
it whenever you can! We have also
recently said farewell to Kathryn Pocock,
our brilliant College Accountant, who
has helped us navigate the challenges of
the last few years so well, as she returns
to the world of senior auditing, and we
have welcomed Adrian Gardner, who
joins us as the new College Accountant.
29

@wolfsoncollegeoxford
Join us on social media for events, news and inspiration
70 retweets
We’re delighted to announce England’s Chief
Medical Officer @CMO_England Sir Chris
Whitty as Wolfson’s newest Honorary Fellow.
#HonoraryFellow #NextSlidePlease
146
Cosy armchairs & stacked bookshelves
#librariesofOxford #WinterReading
6.1K views
Earth Emergency Cluster hosted British writer,
environmental and political activist George Monbiot.
30
Credit: Jason Tong

Make a gift
Scan the QR code with your
phone camera to make a
donation to the College online
Supporting Wolfson
The generosity of alumni and friends has a great impact on the lives and experiences of
our students, post-docs and the whole College community. Gifts allow Wolfson to offer
scholarships to defray the costs of study and bursaries for those who encounter unexpected
financial hardship, support our beautiful gardens and our sports teams and facilities, and
much more.
Online giving
Our recommended method – if you
are resident anywhere except the
USA, please donate online at www.
development.ox.ac.uk/wolfsoncollege.
You can set up regular giving
there, or make a single gift with a credit
or debit card.
In the USA, you can donate tax
efficiently through Americans for
Oxford (AFO), the university’s 501 (c)
(3) charitable organisation, at www.
oxfordna.org/donate.
Giving by post
You can download a donation form at
www.wolfson.ox.ac.uk/make-gift
and donate by cheque, by post to the
Wolfson Alumni & Development Office,
Wolfson College, Linton Road, Oxford,
OX2 6UD.
Tax efficient ways of giving
Depending on where you live, there are
several ways you can increase the value
of your gift to Wolfson.
UK residents
You can increase the value of your
donation by 25% by including Gift Aid,
courtesy of HM Revenue & Customs.
Higher and additional rate taxpayers
are eligible for a further deduction from
their taxes.
USA residents
Gifts to Wolfson in the United States
can be made through AFO. Gifts to AFO
qualify for an income tax deduction to
the full extent allowed by law.
Gifts can be made online at: www.
oxfordna.org/donate or by cheque
sent to Americans for Oxford, Inc., 500
Fifth Avenue, 32nd Floor, New York, NY
10110. Please include clear instructions
that your gift is for Wolfson College,
including postal address (Linton Road,
Oxford, OX2 6UD).
Canadian residents
The University of Oxford is recognised
by the Canadian Revenue Agency
as a prescribed institution under
Section 3503 of the Canadian Income
Tax Regulations. On receipt of your
donation, we will ensure that you
are sent a receipt for Canadian tax
purposes.
German and Swiss residents
Residents of Switzerland and Germany
can make tax-efficient donations via the
German Friends of Oxford University
and Swiss Friends of Oxford University
(SFOU) respectively.
Please email the Alumni &
Development Office at alumni.
office@wolfson.ox.ac.uk for more
details.
Wolfson is a registered charity, no. 1141446
31

Upcoming events
Saturday 17th September 2022
Wolfson Alumni Lecture & Drinks Reception
Thursday 13th October 2022
Annual Wolfson Art Tour with Sir Tim Hitchens
Monday 18th October
President’s Seminar - with the Mind and Brain Cluster
Thursday 20th October 2022
Shaharzad Akbar on “Afghanistan: What Human Rights?”
Thursday 3rd November 2022
Syme Lecture - Professor Katharine Dunbabin, on Roman art and mosaics
Thursday 3rd November 2022
Old Wolves Talk and Lunch - Dr Susan Walker
Thursday 17th November 2022
Oxford Lieder Concert in the Leonard Wolfson Auditorium
Thursday 24th November 2022
Sarfraz Pakistan Lecture - Cyril Almeida on Pakistan and its military
Tuesday 29th November 2022
Wolfson Alumni Drinks in London, Oxford and Cambridge Club
All events in College unless otherwise specified.
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