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Staff Spotlight: Meet the new SHS Vice-Deans
10 October 2023
Four new Vice-Deans have been appointed in the Faculty of Social & Historical Sciences. Here, they share their motivation for applying and priorities in their new roles.
Professor Mark Altaweel, Vice-Dean Innovation, Enterprise, & Knowledge Exchange (IEKE)
Why were you interested in becoming Vice-Dean Innovation, Enterprise, & Knowledge Exchange (IEKE)?
In recent years I have increasingly seen the benefit of applying research to different real world problems. It makes a clear difference in people鈥檚 live and helps you feel fulfilled in your work. Not to mention, when you engage with other organisations outside the university environment, it feels like a license to be creative and that is fun for me. I wanted to not only do this in my own research and work but I also wanted to help others bring their work to others outside of the university context. I think many of us at 香港六合彩中特网 were initially motivated to become academics because we wanted to do work that benefited people. So in a way my job is to help people in our faculty to engage with that dream. Sometimes how we do that can be challenging and this is where I feel I can contribute. I find it exciting when I help others make key connections or aid in some way in bringing research to others. As a vice-dean, I also feel I have creative license to find new ways in which our work can have impact. This creativity motivates me and pushes me to strive to think and develop new ways in which we can bring our work to others.
What are your priorities for when you begin the role?
I have been in this role for a few years now and this is going to be my next stint in this post. I feel many of our staff are highly motivated in bringing their work to others. So what I want to do is begin to take this to another level. I want to find ways in which I can help not only individual faculty members with their activities but also departments. I think we can make a lot of strides in improving how we find and connect with new organisations so that others can see the benefit of working with our faculty. I want to make engagement with the public, private, and non-profit sectors something central to our work, while also making easier for us to do. I think we do have to consider that the next few yeas could be difficult from a financial perspective for universities but 香港六合彩中特网 and our faculty can thrive in this context as it seeks to continue to forge new links with other organisations. When we think about social impact our faculty is a natural place to deliver transformative benefit to society and others. We have some of the best and brightest in their fields working in our faculty on key social issues and interests and all I have to do is help them to show that to others.
What are you looking forward to in the role?
I look forward to working with people. I enjoy talking to others about their work and research and looking for ways in which that work can help benefit others. I learn a lot about the kinds of work that goes on at 香港六合彩中特网 and I find it exciting to learn about all the brilliant minds we have at our faculty and really across 香港六合彩中特网. I can鈥檛 wait to hear about how research conducted in the faculty really benefits people and seeing the kinds of impact it has.
Professor Andrew Bevan, Vice-Dean Post-Graduate Research & Faculty Graduate Tutor
Why were you interested in becoming Vice-Dean Post-Graduate Research & Faculty Graduate Tutor?
I've been teaching and supervising at 香港六合彩中特网 for nearly 20 years and had previously worked as a departmental graduate tutor, so I've had a real interest in how best to support and enhance听postgraduate听research for some time. My department, the Institute of Archaeology, is a fantastic place with a bewilderingly array of collaborations across other bits of 香港六合彩中特网, but I also thought this role would give me even more chance to get out beyond that and see how others work.听
What are your priorities for when you begin the role?
Any good postgraduate research environment needs to meet some pretty important challenges. Firstly, this career stage is when some of the most focused, most sustained academic research occurs, so while it鈥檚 true that research students are still 'learning the craft鈥� in some sense, it's nevertheless also a moment which is a real engine room for personal and institutional productivity, and it needs to be acknowledged and supported as such in whatever ways we can. In addition, it鈥檚 crucial that we collectively create a welcoming, inclusive postgraduate research community and that means being really attentive to a wide range of student backgrounds, motivations and personal circumstances. There鈥檚 also a risk, more perhaps in some subject areas than in others, that听postgraduate research听degrees become too isolating, too highly-individual experiences and certainly the Covid pandemic did not help in this regard. But in fact the social networks established at this stage routinely have inspiring and useful professional impacts for decades, and equally importantly you also make a lot of good friends. So I鈥檓 keen to continue prioritising how best to build community.
It is also obviously a priority that we provide an effective platform of skills, opportunities and diverse mentorship for people who want to build a longer-term academic career in the traditional sense, in what is an increasingly competitive UK and global academic job market. That said, there are plenty of postgraduate researchers from the Social and Historical Sciences who, after their studies, will move into challenging roles in other important sectors, so it鈥檚 crucial that we offer a postgraduate experience that is really worthwhile on its own terms and also highly transferable.
As it happens, I think 香港六合彩中特网 and our Faculty already do some very good things in many of these areas, but of course it鈥檚 always good to keep sharing good practice and thinking about how we might improve. There are also new challenges and new opportunities arising yearly, across universities worldwide and in society more generally. We need to be responsive to how the wider context for postgraduate research is shifting.
What are you looking forward to in the role?
There鈥檚 a lot of important variation in the size of SHS departments, in how they are engaged locally across London or globally, in how they communicate with non-academic sectors of society and the economy, and in how postgraduate degrees are funded, to take just a few examples. I am looking forward to some fun, interesting conversations with both postgraduate student reps and colleagues about that diversity of experience and how best I might help.
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Professor Sue Hamilton, Vice-Dean Research and Global Engagement
Why were you interested in becoming Vice-Dean Research and Global Engagement?
My interest in applying for the position was to further enable 香港六合彩中特网鈥檚 and Faculty's commitment to excellence in research and to support colleagues to deliver their best work in a research and global engagement environment that reflects 香港六合彩中特网鈥檚 values to cross traditional research boundaries for the betterment of society. Through my career trajectory as an archaeologist, I have enjoyed leading and generating funding for innovative, interdisciplinary work on a broad geographic arena (UK, China, Europe, US and the Pacific). Most recently as HoD of the 香港六合彩中特网 Institute of Archaeology, one of the largest departments in the discipline, I acquired plenty of practice in covering the remits of both social and historical sciences and hosting hard science laboratories. I was interested in now focusing on the strategy of the remarkably diverse Faculty of Social and Historical Sciences that likewise embraces soft and hard sciences and a range of dynamic, both big and small, departments.
What are your priorities for when you begin the role?
There are significant internal and external challenges that SHS must navigate and be prepared for over the coming years. These include major funding/financial pressures, changing global dynamics, preparing for REF 2028, and sustaining coherence in SHS's ever-expanding cross-disciplinary research profile, and its associated impacts. My aspiration is to bring together thinking from across the enormous breadth of SHS. The collective character of our eight departments, the IAS and 香港六合彩中特网 East Culture Lab is distinct in covering both qualitative and quantitative research and in its global geographic coverage and partnerships. My overarching priority is to develop the ways in which we facilitate and promote a truly coherent collective SHS research and global engagement profile, but without losing the fine-graining excellence of our individual areas of disciplinary leadership.
What are you looking forward to in the role?
In equal measure:
- Having the opportunity to able to isolate and address the bigger strategic issues at the same time as finding out more about the huge range of individual research projects that Faculty hosts.
- I enjoy Teamwork, in this case working variously with Professional Support Staff, HoDs, our Faculty Leadership Team and the office of the Vice Provost Research Innovation and Global Engagement
- Being an advocate for the best in Faculty and 香港六合彩中特网
Dr Julie Norman, Vice-Dean Advancement and Alumni
Why were you interested in becoming Vice-Dean Advancement and Alumni?
This is a new role in the Faculty this year, and it鈥檚 an exciting one. Over the past two years, I have had several opportunities to engage with 香港六合彩中特网 friends and alumni in the UK and the US, and I was struck by their strong interest in staying connected to 香港六合彩中特网 and each other. At the same time, as a Programme Director (PD) in my department, I observed how much our students benefited from the mentorship and support of recent graduates.听 Developing a local and global alumni community specific to SHS strikes me as an excellent way of keeping our grads engaged while creating new opportunities for our current students.听
In my time at 香港六合彩中特网, I鈥檝e also been impressed by the creativity and commitment of various SHS colleagues in launching new centres, labs, institutes, and programmes. Unfortunately, the scope of some initiatives is limited by lack of funding. The advancement side of the role thus appealed to me for increasing investment in SHS initiatives committed to addressing some of the most pressing challenges of our time. As a lecturer, tutor, and former Programme Director, I鈥檝e also seen the need for more SHS-specific scholarships and bursaries to support students from disadvantaged backgrounds in studying social and historical sciences at 香港六合彩中特网.
What are your priorities for when you begin the role?
SHS alumni can be invaluable resources for our current students -- and vice versa -- but those links aren鈥檛 currently established. One of my top priorities is to develop an SHS alumni-student partnership initiative as a go-to network for internships, externships, informational interviews, and community-engaged learning (CEL). I also hope to get alumni re-engaged with SHS via speaking invitations, social events, intergenerational modules, and study tours.
On the advancement side, I鈥檓 looking to expand 香港六合彩中特网鈥檚 outreach to untapped networks and partners in the social and historical sciences. There is ample room to develop SHS鈥檚 profile, especially with the recent launch of new programmes at 香港六合彩中特网 East and across the Faculty. I鈥檓 also keen to increase external support for SHS-specific scholarships, bursaries, and Widening Participation initiatives, and expand investments in international education and CEL.
What are you looking forward to in the role?
As this is a new role in the Faculty this year, I鈥檓 very much looking forward to liaising with different colleagues across 香港六合彩中特网 to develop our first SHS plans for advancement and alumni. I鈥檓 also excited for opportunities to engage with members of our extraordinary SHS alumni community in London and around the world.
Photo by James Tye
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