2021 BULLETIN
CONTENTS PRINCIPAL’S FOREWORD
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SCHOLAR HIGHLIGHTS
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THE NEW 2021 THATCHER SCHOLARS
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REPORTS FROM THE DIRECTORS
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THE THATCHER DEVELOPMENT AWARDS
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CARBON TAX: A POPULAR SOLUTION TO A GLOBAL PROBLEM?
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DEVELOPING NEW TOOLS IN THE 16 FIGHT AGAINST CANCER THE WEAPONISATION OF HEALTHCARE IN SYRIA
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THATCHER DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMME: EVERY DROP MATTERS
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Martin Fellermeyer in his lab at the Weatherall Institute of Molecular Medicine. Photo: John Cairns
Picture credits John Cairns: Pages 3, 9, 16-17 Jack Evans: Pages 4-7, 13, 15 Benjamin Freeborn: Page 10 All Things Mental Health: Page 11 Anna Yakovleva: Page 12 Anas Alkharboutli (picture-alliance/ dpa/AP Images): Page 18
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Oxford Ideas Festival: Pages 20-21
Trust Director: Jessica Mannix Thatcher Scholarship Programme Director: Dr Claire Cockcroft Editor: Jack Evans Design: Jack Evans Contact: jessica.mannix@some.ox.ac.uk
“ TA C K L I N G THE ISSUES T H AT M AT T E R ” The Rt Hon. Baroness Royall of Blaisdon Principal, Somerville College Chair of Trustees
The last year has been one that has brought to the fore the realities and the challenges that we face individually, domestically and globally, in areas ranging from health to the environment, and from geopolitical crises to migration. The pandemic has shown us how vulnerable we all are to new and existing viruses, how fragile our health systems are when faced with surges of patients, and how vital scientific research is to finding and forging the path through these challenging times. I am enormously proud of the contribution that Oxford has made to saving hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of lives through the research and development of the vaccine and therapies. The COP26 conference in November, at which several of my colleagues at the University spoke, brought into focus our responsibilities to our environment, and the actions required to protect our world for future generations. The geopolitical landscape is facing difficult times with international cooperation and understanding being tested by nationalism and populism around the world, as well as the ongoing conflicts that arose more than a decade ago through the Arab Spring. It is into these challenging arenas that our Thatcher scholars and alumni have stepped. I am so proud of them as they walk along the path well-trodden by Somervillians: to make change where it is needed in our world. You will be able to read in this latest edition of the Bulletin about the research being carried out by some of our graduate students, including research into the economics of climate change (pg. 14); how the human immune system works in fighting against cancer (pg. 16); and the weaponisation of healthcare in the Syrian Civil War (pg. 18). Our Thatcher Scholars are tackling the issues that matter and will make a difference. Our Development Programme is also taking on crucial questions for our future, such as water security (pg. 20). There are now twelve Thatcher alumni who are beginning to make our vision a reality: that in time our scholars would be found in the courtrooms, boardrooms, newsrooms, hospitals, NGOs, schools, universities, and governments around the world. They are working as policy interns with the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee; and as research analysts in water management. They are studying for PhDs in conservation, and taking pupillage for the bar. They are getting stuck in as military medics, management consultants, and equity researchers, and they are combining their academic skills with business innovation. I hope that you, like me, are filled with hope in these dark times that our future is in more than capable hands, and that the Thatcher Scholarship Programme is achieving its ambitions: to give the most academically excellent and deserving students the opportunity of a Somerville education that they may go into the world and make change where it is needed.
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THE NEW 2021 T H AT C H E R S C H O L A R S Sarafina Otis, Medicine Margaret Thatcher Scholar BA Medicine After moving to the UK during secondary school, I attended a state comprehensive - but the lack of resources, along with my family not having much knowledge of the higher education system, meant that much of my support during the university application process came from access and outreach initiatives. I am now so glad to be studying Medicine at Oxford, where excellent teaching of the basic science will lay down a framework for my later clinical studies. As a medical student, one of my main ambitions is to directly contribute to the health management of the patients I will meet as a future clinician. With the support of my scholarship, I also hope to get involved in public health initiatives even prior to practising medicine, as well as exploring my academic interests in global health and oncology through research projects and programmes. During my time at Oxford so far, I have loved volunteering as a Somerville ambassador at outreach events; it feels great to help demystify higher education for other students and to support them in their application journey. I also volunteer with the social enterprise Generation Medics, which helps to widen access into healthcare for people from underrepresented backgrounds with the aim of diversifying future healthcare staff. Outside of my academic and outreach interests, I also enjoy playing netball to relax and remain active. Alternatively, you can also find me in the kitchen attempting to bake! I am thankful to have been chosen as a Thatcher Scholar, as it will allow me to explore my academic interests and make an impact through my future work; I hope to make the most of this amazing opportunity. Isaac Tay Lee Kuan Yew – Thatcher Scholar BA Philosophy, Politics and Economics I’m Isaac, a fresher hailing from the sunny shores of Singapore. Reading PPE seemed like the natural choice for me to make, given my love of all three subjects. While studying economics A level, I nurtured my love of politics by volunteering at weekly MP surgeries. I became interested in philosophy through Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations, whose exhortations to focus on the self inspired me throughout my military service and subsequent internship at the Ministry of Social and Family Development supporting rough sleepers and homeless individuals. I look forward to this new interdisciplinary academic journey of discourse, questioning, and (lots and lots!) of writing. As well as my passion for my studies, I also have a deep conviction to support marginalised or underprivileged communities. As well as the aforementioned internship, I spearheaded and chaired two Community Service projects in Singapore: one of which supported pregnant teenagers and teenage mothers, while the other benefited at-risk youth. I also volunteered regularly to teach underprivileged children. In 2019, I was part of a humanitarian trip to Nepal, where we provided aid to communities that were devastated by the 2015 earthquake and are still feeling aftershocks today.
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In my free time, I enjoy playing a variety of sports, especially climbing, and spending time with my friends. I look forward to the prospect of joining many college societies during my time here, especially since Somerville is such an open and inclusive college. I am eternally grateful for the generous Lee Kuan Yew – Thatcher Scholarship, which has provided me a life-changing opportunity. I am honoured to be the inaugural Lee Kuan Yew - Thatcher Scholar, and I will strive to be a force for good in a world that needs it now more than ever.
Hannah Andrews Michael Bishop Foundation Thatcher Scholar BA Experimental Psychology I grew up in Brighton, where I attended my local state comprehensive school. While I was curious about all subjects, from maths to politics, my particular interest in psychology arose when I was working as a personal assistant to a young boy with cerebral palsy and associated learning difficulties, which sparked in me a desire to help others and to understand how the human brain functions. I went on to complete an online short course in psychology and gain a position working as a mental health support worker in a high dependency rehabilitation unit for people with complex mental illnesses, before starting my degree at Somerville College. I am particularly interested in neuropsychology, developmental psychology, and individual differences, and I hope to pursue a research or clinical career. Alongside my studies, I am secretary and treasurer of Oxford Student Action for Refugees (STAR). You can also find me drinking chai in a local café, reading fiction, playing board games, or keeping up my regular yoga practice. Caitlin Kelly Ann and Giles Currie Thatcher Scholar BA English Language and Literature I was born and raised in Norwich. Coming from a first generation student state school background, and following a break in my A level studies due to chronic illness, there were times when any university, let alone Oxford, felt intangible. I was surprised to feel immediately at home when I visited Somerville on an open day in July 2019, and the thought of studying here joined the realm of the possible. Crucially, the college’s history as a pioneering women’s college presented an opportunity to reclaim the education my mother was denied when she was pressured into leaving school at 16. So far, I have found the course endlessly fascinating and rewarding; literature captures and interrogates all aspects of existence. As a student in the era of fake news and the climate crisis, the preservation and enrichment of our heritage and environment is at the forefront of my mind in choosing a future career, which I hope will be in curatorship or environmental law. I am incredibly grateful to Ann and Giles Currie for supporting my scholarship and am greatly inspired by Ann’s work at the Museums Association and the National Maritime Museum. It is an honour to be awarded this scholarship and to be chosen to be part of a project which mirrors my own deeply held meritocratic principles. Matthew Leech-Gerrard Oxford Thatcher Scholar MSt History I grew up in Barnsley, South Yorkshire, and I became the first generation of my family to attend university when I began a BA in History at Corpus Christi College, Oxford, in 2018. Studying Tudor history at school instilled in me the spark of a love for early modern history which has been fully ignited at university. I have been extremely fortunate to study with a range of amazing scholars, and I have become especially interested in the important relationship between abstract ideas and the complex, often charged, political and religious contexts in which they were developed and expressed. My undergraduate thesis, which focused on historical thought in Restoration religious and political culture, was awarded the Bushell Prize by Corpus Christi College. I am looking forward to continuing my research of the political and religious culture of the seventeenth century in the coming year. Away from my studies, I am a devoted supporter of Liverpool Football Club, as well as a keen enthusiast of music, films, and (unsurprisingly) books. I am also passionate about improving educational access and broadening outreach. I have worked for Humans of Oxford, as well as serving as Corpus Christi College JCR’s Access and Admissions Officer.
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Esraa Sha’Ban Oxford Qatar Thatcher Scholar MSc Clinical & Therapeutic Neuroscience I graduated as a pharmacist in Jordan. During my bachelor’s degree, I was keen to understand the human brain. After reading Robert Winston’s book “The human mind”, I realised that the brain is the sole cause of our world. This means that changes in the brain are changes to your world. Some, like “hemineglect syndrome” patients, live with half of their world; it can take it all away under the name “Alzheimer’s”. My Thatcher scholarship gives me the opportunity to progress with a Master’s degree at Oxford, which feels like a wonderful reward for the two years I have spent preparing and working towards this goal. I’m particularly interested in research around treating neurological disorders using the Deep Brain Stimulation technique, which can give a better quality of life for patients in a shorter time. Besides my degree, I make videos where I simplify medical conditions to promote community understanding, including neurological diseases. My next step will be to create videos to promote education for girls, especially in Arab countries. Reyam Rammahi Oxford Qatar Thatcher Scholar DPhil English I am a first-year DPhil candidate and an alumna of the Fulbright Foreign Student Program from Baghdad, Iraq. I am the first in my family to study at graduate level and the first woman in my family to study abroad. I graduated from San Diego State University with an MA in English and Comparative Literature in 2020. For my research on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, I won the College of Arts Dean’s Award. Prior to my MA, I studied English Language and Literature at the University of Baghdad, graduating in the top 10 in my class. It was there that I developed my passion for British Romanticism. Knowing that Oxford is the best place to study this major, I applied. I was overjoyed not only to get a place, but also to receive the Thatcher Scholarship offer letter. My DPhil dissertation will be an exploration and analysis of the presence of the Oriental and Muslim women in nineteenth-century British literature. Besides working on my DPhil, I am writing my first novel in English. I am also co-writer of two screenplays about the Middle East, and I will serve as Presiding Officer of a number of academic conferences in the USA. I am passionate about teaching British Romanticism. I plan to teach as part of my long-term academic career, and will soon be giving virtual lectures on the Romantic Gothic. Salma Daoudi Oxford Qatar Thatcher Scholar DPhil International Relations Born and raised in Morocco, my long-lived interest in politics and international relations is driven by a desire to gain a deeper understanding of the social issues underpinning uprisings and revolutions throughout the Arab world. Over time, my interests matured to focus on the interrelation between human development and security in complex humanitarian emergencies, focusing particularly on health insecurity in conflicts. Following my MPhil thesis dedicated to the right to health in Syria at Cambridge as a Gates Scholar, I have continued to research topics related to health security and asymmetric warfare in Africa and the Middle East at the Policy Center for New South. My DPhil in International Relations at Oxford represents an opportunity to further explore this weaponisation of health in Syria post-2011 and its impact on regional human security. This project hopes to help expose the changing nature of warfare and violence in the country, as well as highlighting the interlinkages between political, socio-economic, and health vulnerabilities. Outside of my studies, you can often find me enjoying Arab and French literature or listening to music (especially rap), volunteering with local NGOs, or travelling in aid of self-discovery.
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T H E 2 0 2 1 T H AT C H E R S C H O L A R S
Juliette Caucheteux Oxford Thatcher Scholar DPhil Economics I am a DPhil student in Economics at Somerville. I am interested in topics in environmental economics, public economics and political economy, and in particular in finding ways to bring science and our knowledge of climate change into economic models. I also explore how to economically incentivise firms and individuals to tackle climate change. For instance, I would like to work on carbon taxation, both in terms of its design and its political feasibility. Prior to Oxford, I studied maths, physics and engineering at the Ecole Nationale des Ponts et Chaussées in the Paris suburbs. I then moved to the UK to attend the London School of Economics, graduating with a Master of Public Administration. I also worked in the private sector (in green finance and securitisation at Crédit Agricole) and public sector (at the French Embassy in Germany and the European Central Bank), and in academic research (at the LSE). I am deeply grateful to have been awarded my Thatcher Scholarship, without which coming to Oxford would have been impossible. Being at Somerville, where brilliant people with very different backgrounds and research interests meet and exchange ideas, is extremely inspiring and motivates me to bring together my scientific, economic and policymaking skills in the hope that my work will make a difference. Aside from economics, I enjoy horse riding, playing the piano, baking and learning new languages. I speak French, English and German, and I am currently teaching myself Persian. I also enjoy cycling around Oxfordshire and admiring the beautiful countryside.
SCHOLAR & ALUMNI HIGHLIGHTS •
Talitha Slabbert (2017, DPhil English, Oxford Thatcher Scholar) and Kharthik Chakravarty (2017, DPhil Engineering, Oxford Qatar Thatcher Scholar) became the first MTST doctoral candidates to graduate. Talitha’s thesis, which passed with no corrections, explored the ideological and historical significance of the sea in 20th century modernist literature, while Kharthik’s work focussed on expanding the use of novel optical diagnostic techniques in high-speed flow applications such as Particle Image Velocimetry, Polarised-depolarised Rayleigh Scattering and Infrared Thermography.
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Mathew Madain (2019 MSc Modern Middle Eastern Studies, Oxford Qatar Thatcher Scholar) was selected from a field of over 1500 applicants to intern with the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee during last summer.
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Following an internship with Facebook in the summer of 2021, Minh Le Quoc (2017, Computer Science, Qatar Thatcher Scholar) has accepted a role in software engineering with Amazon.
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Vicky Brown (2020, MSt History, Oxford Thatcher Scholar) has been offered the position of Philanthropy Coordinator at Restless Development, a global organisation which supports youth leadership and empowers young people to create change in their communities.
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After completing her studies last summer, Telemi Emmanuel-Aina (2018, PPE, Michael Bishop Foundation Thatcher Scholar) enrolled on the Jumpstart graduate scheme following its involvement in the Thatcher Development Programme. This led to a role as a Digital Marketer at Generation Home, a mortgage lender with a focus on innovative solutions to help first-time buyers.
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Following an internship last summer, Luca Webb (2019, History, Michael Bishop Foundation Thatcher Scholar) will be joining design and construction company TSL Group in August as Head of Communications.
T H E 2 0 2 1 T H AT C H E R S C H O L A R S
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REPORTS FROM
JESSICA MANNIX T R U ST D I R E C TO R Despite the hardships and restrictions of the last two years, the MTST continues to flourish. There are now 25 Thatcher Scholars currently studying a Somerville, a figure that could scarcely be imagined when the first scholarships were awarded in 2016. The geographical span of scholars encompasses four continents and 19 countries. We are working on establishing a scholarship for the remaining continent – Australia! As Jan has said in her foreword, one of the most exciting elements is seeing the Thatcher Scholars tackling the issues that really matter, whether in their research or in the roles they are undertaking when they graduate: research into cancer; climate change; the geopolitical issues affecting the Gulf region and the Middle East; water security. Cross-cultural influences in art and literature may seem niche to some, but in a world where we are becoming ever more polarised by nationalism and divisive politics, investigation into cultural exchange and interdependence can lead to a better understanding of others. As the late MP Jo Cox said “We are far more united and have far more in common with each other than things that divide us.” Our international Thatcher Scholar and Alumni community exemplifies this beautifully! It is not just the number of Thatcher Scholars that has flourished; under the sterling stewardship of our Treasurer and Oxford University Endowment Management (OUem), our funds have grown to £11.9m, a rise of £2m in the year. This meant that we were able not only to honour all commitments to scholars and the Thatcher Scholarship Programme over the year, but the Trustees approved the reinvestment into the endowment of sufficient funds to endow a further undergraduate scholarship in perpetuity. This means that the endowed funds of the Trust will support 16 Thatcher Scholars in perpetuity, along with the matched funds from the University for graduate scholarships. This next term will see the awarding of two further overseas undergraduate scholarships and there will be five new graduate scholarships awarded for 2022 entry. They will be joining a strong, diverse community of Thatcher Scholars in a College that is welcoming, nurturing, academically challenging, and empowering. Thank you for making this possible.
£11.9 million
Current endowment
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£2 million
Growth this year
THE DIRECTORS
D R C L A I R E CO C KC R O F T P R O G R A M M E D I R E C TO R It was another year filled with a degree of uncertainty as the pandemic continued to disrupt our daily lives. While 2021 initially saw a return to online teaching, as the year unfolded we edged back towards normality and in-person events. Despite the ups and downs, there have been many positive moments and 2021 concluded on a high note: our first two DPhil Scholars — Kharthik Chakravarthy (2017, DPhil Engineering, Oxford Qatar Thatcher Scholar) and Talitha Slabbert (2017, DPhil English, Oxford Thatcher Scholar) — completed their research. We wish them every success in their future careers. Our alumni continue to excel, and two recent scholars are now pursuing an academic path. Anna Gee started a PhD at Imperial College in forest conservation, examining carbon capture and ecosystem restoration in the Yucatan forests, while Osamah Sufiyan’s PhD research in quantum optics will explore the technological possibilities of photonic quantum computers. Our careers events have also created professional opportunities: PPE scholar Telemi Emmanuel-Aina was recruited by Jumpstart, a scheme that trains graduates in an entrepreneurial environment. She now works for Generation Home, a start-up mortgage lender aiming to create innovative solutions to help first-time buyers. We welcomed nine new scholars in October (see pg. 4), broadening the cultural and intellectual diversity of our community, now twenty-five strong. Shared interests are emerging across the fields of biomedical research, linguistics and climate change, which we hope in the years ahead will lead to scholar-led academic discussions and events addressing topical global issues. Involving Junior Research Fellows ( JRFs) in the Development Programme, through termly talks to showcase their research, has borne intellectual fruit in the form of summer internships. Six students gained invaluable insight and training in the fields of water security (pg 20), medical linguistics and machine learning in healthcare, potentially paving the way towards research careers. As restrictions eased, we pivoted to hybrid events to celebrate World Environment Day in June. After many terms on Microsoft Teams, there was a genuine buzz as speakers presented to a live audience for the first time in months, with other students and alumni tuning in digitally to hear talks on topics from biodiversity conservation to reforestation, and from wetland preservation to natural solutions for marine carbon removal. In 2021, Somerville was recognised as a college of Sanctuary, reflecting our founding ethos to include the excluded. During International Refugee week, we hosted an event to give students a platform to share their research in Forced Migration Studies, as well as their personal reflections and lived experiences. These inspiring stories are leading to collaborations to support marginalised communities (see pg.10). Through the ongoing generosity of our donors, the Development Programme is able to support the academic and personal development of the whole student body with seminars, career guidance and symposiums. This remains a unique offering in Oxford colleges, helping students to achieve their potential academically and equip them with life skills to make their mark in the world.
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THE T H AT C H E R DEVELOPMENT AWA R D S Volunteers, Movement on the Ground staff and residents play a Volleyball game organised by Development Award recipient Benjamin Freeborn on the newly-restored Vial refugee camp football pitch
The Thatcher Development Awards offer grants of up to £2000 to enable Somerville students to pursue an innovative project with wider social benefits and that facilitates personal growth. The funding that the Awards provides can allow students such as Benjamin Freeborn (2020, BA Law) to make an impact on the ground where it matters most. Ben used his award of £1558 to travel to Greece to volunteer in the Vial refugee camp on the island of Chios with Movement on the Ground (MOTG). MOTG is an organisation that believes that refugee camps should be run by engaging the resident community and empowering and assisting them to make a difference to their quality of life. They rely heavily on community volunteers in all activities, from maintenance and construction to cleaning and sports coaching. Ben was expecting to work in a maintenance and construction-based role, but circumstances meant that on his first day he was thrust into the more complex task of managing the community volunteer teams. “In Chios, I was working with a community of people from Syria, the Gambia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and more. I quickly found that getting such a diverse group of people to work together wasn’t an easy task,” said Ben. “It was important above all to listen, even when I disagreed with what I was hearing. Rather than trying to keep everyone happy, it was better that everyone felt respected. I quickly learned that there was a good deal of value in just asking ‘how are you’ (‘kef halek’ in Arabic, ‘chetor asti’ in Farsi) each day.
A D.I.Y. foosball table was a popular addition to the camp’s communal living area
“There wasn’t always going to be a perfect solution, but the best way to deal with things was patiently and by example. If I wanted a group to clean up the sludge below the toilet containers… I had to be the first one to start scooping!”
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Benjamin was also able to travel to the neighbouring islands of Samos and Lesvos to observe how other refugee camps functioned. He plans to take what he learned from his experience in Chios and apply it to his ambitions to work in the development sector. Other award holders such as Aneeska Sohal (2020, MSc Modern South Asian Studies) chose to expand the reach of her project by working in an online space. She received an award of £1000 to help her create a new series of her mental health podcast, responding to the crisis of mental wellbeing in students and young people, which has been greatly exacerbated by the pandemic. During the first lockdown in 2020, Aneeska interviewed higher education students about how their interests and outlets helped to ground and support their mental health. The resulting podcast series, All Things Mental Health, reached a global audience on Spotify and Apple podcasts after being featured by Students for Liberty, and led to a role as a Trustee for Aneeska with the mental health charity Student Minds. Aneeska’s Thatcher Development Award allowed her to mobilise leading clinical psychologists, higher education policy makers, activists, writers, researchers, mindfulness practitioners and more to create a second Listen to ‘All Things Mental Health’ series focused on specialist work supporting student mental health. She by scanning the QR code above was also able to commission a designer to create a cover for each episode to engage potential listeners. The episodes have now been downloaded over 2,000 times, a figure which does not include the streaming audience. Her work attracted the attention of Kings College London’s student mental health research network, SMaRteN, who have commissioned her to work with them on a third series of the podcast to be produced in 2022. “We have received some really moving feedback,” said Aneeska. “Students have stressed how helpful the episodes have been for them, in particular the Distress Tolerance in Young Minds episode with leading clinical psychologist Dr Anna Colton.” Aneeska’s funding allowed her to commission an illustrated cover image for each episode of the series
“We have been contacted by students from as far afield as the National Institute of Technology Calicut in Kohzikode, India, who are interested in our ‘by students, for students’ approach to tackling the subject. It’s been a pleasure to share the podcasts far and wide, and see students on the ground benefiting.” Following her work with the podcast and with Student Minds, Aneeska has recently accepted a new role leading a division of the national mental health charity Mind. Anna Yakovleva (2020, Graduate Entry Medicine) used her Development Award of £996 to make a difference in public health for vulnerable displaced populations and build Ukraine’s native capacity to sequence viruses including Covid-19 when she travelled to the country last summer to work with NGO Alliance for Public Health. In concert with the L.V Gromashevskiy Institute for Epidemiology, Anna and her team developed Oxford Nanopore-based genetic sequencing protocols for HIV and Hepatitis C suitable for use with mobile laboratories in low resource, hard to reach environments. With the help of a portable gel electrophoresis machine and accompanying reagents funded by her Development Award, Anna and her team were able to formulate the new protocols and begin assembly of the mobile sequencing lab, as well as completing sequencing for a survey of HIV and Hepatitis C in 164 injecting drug-using patients who had been internally displaced. Anna and the study’s director, Assistant Professor Tetyana Vasylyeva, are now performing
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phylogenetic analysis on their data and plan to share their results in The Lancet.
Anna visiting one of the Alliance For Public Health’s HIV outreach mobile laboratories to help plan the installation of sequencing equipment
Anna also helped to provide training in Oxford Nanopore Covid-19 sequencing to local healthcare staff in her spare time. With their assistance, the Institute was able to sequence 26 patient samples, marking the first time the virus had been sequenced in a lab in Ukraine since the pandemic began. They plan to follow up their work with a collaborative article in PLOS One, and they have also successfully applied for a $60,000 grant to continue supporting local Covid-19 sequencing capacity.
“Working on this project allowed me to bring all of my knowledge to bear on the challenge of working with infectious disease in a low-income country,” said Anna. “We worked alongside local organisations, scientists, outreach teams, nurses, doctors, and other staff members in a fully collaborative process, resulting in a sharing of expertise and transfer of knowledge and the publication of two joint papers.” Anna donated the portable gel electrophoresis machine purchased with her award to the L.V. Gromashevskiy Institute at the end of her placement. The instrument is now being used regularly for sequencing Covid-19, HIV and Hepatitis C. The next phase of their work will involve completing work on assembling their mobile laboratory before embarking on a pilot mobile, real-time molecular epidemiology screening project in Kyiv in summer 2022.
RECIPIENTS OF THE 2021 T H AT C H E R D E V E L O P M E N T AWA R D S
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Maria Rotaru (2020, PPE) received £1100 to support a project aimed at finding ways to fight for the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals on access to education and clean water through policy research, design and analysis. She undertook a six-week policy research internship with Somerville JRF Dr Hussam Hussein at the Oxford Martin School, followed by five weeks of volunteering with the Romanian education NGO “Together”.
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Benjamin Freeborn (2020, BA Law) received £1558 to volunteer with Movement on the Ground in the Vial refugee camp on the Greek island of Chios. He is returning in Easter 2022 to conduct a trial of VitaeGum, a vitamin-infused chewing gum aimed at tackling malnutrition and improving oral health.
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Aneeska Sohal (2020, MSc Modern South Asian Studies) used her award of £1000 to develop a second series of her successful student mental health podcast, All Things Mental Health
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Jamie Walker (2019, Biology) was awarded £1448 to support a peat restoration project in the local Lye Valley nature reserve, a rare wetland habitat which is being restored by a team of students, academics and local residents.
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In collaboration with the Ukrainian NGO Alliance for Public Health and the L.V. Gromashevskiy Institute for public health, Anna Yakovleva (2020, Graduate Entry Medicine) used her award of £996 to allow her to help develop HIV/HCV Oxford Nanopore based genetic sequencing protocols suitable for use in low resource, hard to reach environments, enabling surveillance and research into virus transmissions in mobile populations like refugees.
Qatar Thatcher Scholars Esraa Sha’Ban (2021, MSc Clinical and Therapeutic Neuroscience) and Reyam Rammahi (2021, DPhil English)
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C A R B O N TA X : APOPULAR ANSWER FOR A GLOBAL PROBLEM? JULIETTE CAUCHETEUX O X F O R D T H AT C H E R S C H O L A R
The climate crisis is humanity’s biggest existential threat. Engineer turned economist Juliette Caucheteux (2021, DPhil Economics, Oxford Thatcher Scholar) embraces knowledge from across disciplines to develop new policy ideas that can both reduce carbon emissions and, crucially, win popular support in a western liberal democracy. Before coming to Oxford, I studied maths, physics and engineering in France, followed by public administration at the LSE. My varied academic background helped me realise two fundamental truths: that climate justice is the defining question of our age; and that the answers lie at the juncture of science, politics, and economics. Now, as an economics researcher and a member of an interdisciplinary academic community at Somerville College, I am in the perfect environment to get to the heart of our climate crisis inertia. In my DPhil thesis, I will propose a way to get the wheels moving again through a carbon tax. The crux of the problem was perfectly summarised by an unlikely candidate: US President George H. W. Bush. When warned by environmentalists in 1992 ahead of the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro that the United States was the biggest energy consumer and polluter on the planet, President George H. W. Bush simply replied: “The American way of life is not up for negotiation. Period.” Bush’ avowal belies a certain inconvenient truth: climate change was caused by the search for productivity, profits, growth, and therefore lowering carbon emissions to the requisite level must inevitably mean at least some change to our way of life. This makes for a distinctly unappealing offering for democratic leaders seeking election. Rather than promising to hit citizens with a higher cost of living and higher taxes to pay for new infrastructure and climate change mitigation, many politicians opt for
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Climate change policies like a carbon tax need to be votewinners to gain political support.
distant targets instead. After thirty years of world summits, international conferences, negotiations, pledges and promises to decrease greenhouse gas emissions in order to limit global warming to +1.5°C relative to preindustrial levels, this challenge remains. How can we ever tackle climate change if citizens are not willing to vote to sacrifice their way of life? If climate change is partly an economic problem, then part of the solution lies in economics too. This idea is at the heart of my research. I want to find fair and efficient ways to tackle climate change and encourage climate justice through economic policy in a way that can gain popular support in democracies. In particular, I am interested in how a carbon tax could be implemented widely around the world. Economists agree that tax can be a highly efficient tool for encouraging behavioural change in an economy. The climate crisis cannot be addressed if private companies and individuals do not change their behaviour to account for the fact that what they produce and consume results in carbon emissions. A carbon tax would be a straightforward policy intervention to disincentivise people from consuming more environmentally harmful products by increasing the price of goods based on their carbon footprint. By forcing consumers to start to consider the unintended negative consequences of their choices, a carbon tax has immense potential to encourage more climate conscious behaviour. It would also raise much needed funds for further green measures. But, as the gilets jaunes movement in France demonstrated, implementing this in practice is fraught with political danger. Those of lower wealth and income who rely on their car to drive to work every day, who cannot necessarily afford to buy an expensive new electric or fuel efficient vehicle, would be hit disproportionately hard by any new carbon tax, not to mention that everyone would face higher prices across the board. This makes the measure a hard sell for elected politicians, and there is little functional purpose in proposing any measure with no hope of successful political passage. What are the right supporting redistributive policies we need to alleviate the shock that a carbon tax and help it to achieve popular support, so that we can put forward a meaningful carbon tax proposal? This will be at the core of my work over the next three years. Finally, I will also be evaluating some of the existing policies to tackle climate change, such as the expansion of the Low Emission Zone in London or the European Trading Scheme on carbon emissions. We need to assess at this point whether such policies are actually effective and should be replicated in other contexts, or whether they are ineffective and have unintended consequences and need modification. This wonderful opportunity would never have been possible without the support of my Thatcher Scholarship. In Oxford’s vibrant environment, I am surrounded by people who are driven by the desire to make a difference in the world. They inspire me and motivate me to strive for excellence; to ensure that my work can contribute to a solution to climate change. There is no time to waste.
Juliette Caucheteux
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DEVELOPING NEW TOOLS IN THE FIGHT AGAINST CANCER MARTIN FELLERMEYER O X F O R D T H AT C H E R S C H O L A R
Martin Fellermeyer is a third year doctoral student and Oxford Thatcher Scholar based at the Weatherall Institute of Molecular Medicine. We visited him there to learn more about his work developing life-saving cancer therapies, and how the support of the Margaret Thatcher Scholarship Trust has galvanised his work both in and outside the laboratory. Unlike a virus or bacterial infection, cancer is an intrinsic pathology: it arises due to problems with our own cells. Considering that the human body consists of around 37 trillion cells, any of which can develop into a tumour cell, it didn’t take long for me to become fascinated as an undergraduate by the mechanisms of how our body stops the ‘natural’ build-up of cancer cells. Most importantly, I came to believe that understanding these processes could translate into more effective drugs to treat patients in the clinic – this was the starting point for all my research. Generally, a cancerous cell is one of our own cells that developed mutations in its genetic material (the DNA), which lead to changes and perturbations of the cell’s behaviour, most importantly an increase in cell divisions that allows the tumour to grow. Luckily, there are different ‘self-defence’ systems in our body that aim to prevent exactly this from happening. Firstly, our cells are constantly scanning themselves for injuries, such as missing or broken DNA, and seeking to repair themselves. If a cell is unable to repair itself, it will voluntarily die in order to prevent further damage to the body. That is why developing cancer cells seek not only to increase growth rate through DNA mutations, but also to manipulate DNA damage detection machinery and prevent cell suicide. Secondly, if a cell’s intrinsic protection mechanisms fail, there are also extrinsic mechanisms in place to reduce the chance of tumour development. Most importantly, immune cells travel through our body looking for ‘different’ cells, including cancerous ones. A developing tumour will always seek ways to evade these protection mechanisms. Conventional chemotherapy is not designed to support these protection mechanisms with much accuracy: it simply kills all quickly growing cells, leading to the familiar side effects of hair loss and gastrointestinal problems as gut and hair cells are also targeted due to their fast cell growth. That is why there has been a lot of interest in finding drugs that target the different protection mechanisms of our own body in an effort to ‘re-activate’ them. I hope my research will play a part in this important work. Specifically, my DPhil aims to develop novel drugs
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that will bind and block to what are known as the ‘stop signals’ used by cancerous cells to prevent immune cells from attacking them. Our immune system works by maintaining a delicate balance of rapidly and effectively eliminating threats (e.g. viruses, bacteria, cancerous cells) and keeping our body intact by not interfering with normal processes (e.g. microbiota in the gut and on the skin). The problem with cancer is that a developing tumour utilises immune-stopping factors to disrupt this process, either by sending immune cells away Martin in his lab at the Weatherall Institute or dramatically reducing their killing functions. In particular, some tumour cells use a ‘stop signal’ on their surface to prevent the patrolling immune cells from identifying them as a threat and killing them. Consequently, there has been a huge effort from the scientific community to find drugs that block the different ‘stop signals’ so immune cells can function as usual and eradicate the cancer. The first drug based on this idea was approved in 2011 (ipilimumab), leading to the 2018 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for the two scientists who facilitated this discovery. My research looks to build on this work by developing novel drugs that will bind and block the ‘stop signals’, thereby unleashing the power of our immune cells. As mentioned, there is a great variety of immune cells in our body, all with very specific functions. In my first project, I am testing new drug combinations that focus on the ‘re-activation’ of different immune cells, aiming to create an improved therapy as compared to only activating one type of immune cell. In the second part of my project, I am re-engineering existing drugs that are used in the clinic to make them more effective in their blockade of the ‘stop signal’. I am deeply grateful to the Margaret Thatcher Scholarship Trust for enabling me to come to this inspiring city and carry out the research for my DPhil. The financial support allows me to follow my passions, both through my research and outside the lab. Giving something back has always been important to me – and not merely through my work. In the first months of my DPhil, I trained as a peer supporter, offering mental health support to students in Somerville and the Medical Sciences Division. Shortly after, I became vice president of a new University-wide peer support initiative and, when Covid-19 hit, I started delivering hot meals on a weekly basis to local households in need of support. Finally, I was elected this year as president of the Graduate Student Association at my institute, following a term as welfare officer. There I hope to be able to have a positive influence on the academic and social environment for my peers.
Martin Fellermeyer
It’s a privilege to do this work here in Oxford, and I hope it makes a difference.
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H E A LT H I N A T I M E OF MONSTERS T H E W E A P O N I S AT I O N O F H E A LT H C A R E I N S Y R I A SALMA DAOUDI O X F O R D Q ATA R T H AT C H E R S C H O L A R The aftermath of a rocket attack launched by the Syrian government on the al-Shifaa Hospital and surrounding residential areas in Afrin. The town is controlled by Turkish-backed rebels. According to a war monitor, the attack killed 21 people, including 17 civilians.
The Syrian Conflict has witnessed the evolution in the brutal tactics of weaponising and strategically damaging healthcare. Our new Oxford Qatar Thatcher Scholar Salma Daoudi (2021 DPhil International Relations) is carrying out vital research to increase awareness of the strategy and evaluate its impact on the health security of the region as a whole. “When the old world is dying and the new world struggles to be born…[it] is the time of monsters”. – Antonio Gramsci (1891-1937) Witnessing the ‘monstrosity’ of the Arab Spring left many people (including myself) feeling utterly powerless in the face of raging injustice. While these movements began in hope, they soon progressed to violence as regimes fought back. In light of what many term to be failed democratic experiments, such as in Tunisia or Egypt, it might be tempting to lose faith in Arab revolutions as a force for good. But the failure of a revolution lies not in the maintenance or re-establishment of an authoritarian government. Rather, it is when that order is longer contested. The uprisings of the last decade in the Arab world are an ongoing and transformative social, cultural and political phenomenon, continuously resisted by counter-revolutionary movements: there is no clear break separating the pre- from the post-revolutionary order. The best example of this struggle for freedom and democracy in the face of repression is the Syrian revolution. As a scholar of health insecurity in conflicts and asymmetric warfare, the bravery and resilience of the Syrian people has long fascinated me and inspired my work. They have faced extremely difficult circumstances; the country has become the setting for high levels of indiscriminate violence, with severe human rights violations a fact of daily life. In particular, the conflict has featured the strategic use of healthcare services as a weapon at hitherto unprecedented rates. This prompts several concerns: how and why has this been carried out in the course of the war, and how does the instrumentalisation of health infrastructure in this way translate into a threat to regional health security? Answering these questions lies at the heart of my research. Health weaponisation refers to a broad range of tactics used to restrict or deny access to care, including the
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demolition and destruction of health facilities, or their subversion for military purposes; deliberate attempts to obstruct access to medical aid and facilities, such as curfews, checkpoints, or the shooting of ambulances; the criminalisation of medical neutrality through the imprisonment, torture, or killing of health workers who provide care to enemy factions; and humanitarian aid blockades. In Syria, weaponisation has mostly taken the form of destroying healthcare facilities. Between 2011 and 2021, there over 1000 attacks were made against healthcare between 2011 and 2021, leading to the full or partial destruction of over 50% of local health facilities. The frequency of these attacks and their strategic targeting of hospitals in opposition-held areas hint to the incorporation of this warfare strategy to the Syrian regime’s arsenal of methods to punish dissent and weaken resistance. Many Syrians have been left vulnerable to the development or worsening of their pre-existing health conditions, with infectious diseases such as leishmaniosis, measles, tuberculosis, and polio surging in the country. Additionally, the years of protracted unrest and targeted destruction of health facilities eroded the resilience of the heavily fragmented Syrian healthcare system, rendering it profoundly ill-prepared for the COVID-19 pandemic. These odious tactics, used mainly by the regime, represent a strong challenge to the human rights of Syria’s people. In a globalised context, they not only undermine local livelihoods but also present an international risk of epidemic disease, given Syria’s porous borders, refugee crisis, and poor capacity to provide adequate care and living conditions to refugees. A lack of international political and financial assistance can allow refugee camps to become vectors for transmitting diseases, a situation not aided by local healthcare infrastructure which lacks the resilience to prevent, diagnose, and treat infections. Conflicts, therefore, represent a multidimensional human and health security threat - the ramifications of which are far from spatially bound. In my doctoral thesis, I aim to explore how the weaponisation of health in Syria fosters conditions favourable to the regional spread of infectious diseases, and how this increases socio-economic and health vulnerabilities. I will decipher challenges to the right to health within Syria, and then carry out a comprehensive overview of the obstructions to refugees’ right to health in neighbouring Lebanon and Jordan in order to understand how transboundary health threats perpetuate structural violence against both vulnerable refugee and host communities. I am deeply grateful to the Oxford Qatar Thatcher Graduate Scholarship for its financial as well as academic support, which enables me to shed light on an understudied aspect of the suffering caused by the Syrian conflict and raise awareness about the importance of safeguarding international humanitarian laws and the right to healthcare. This project is, at its heart, not only a call to explore an overlooked phenomenon and the wider interrelation between health and security, but also an attempt to put the importance of human life and dignity at the heart - instead of the margins - of the security literature. Carrying out this research in Oxford’s interdisciplinary and academically stimulating environment will prompt collaboration and intellectual exchange, helping me to develop the intersectionality of this work - and, I hope, its reach.
Salma Daoudi
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EVERY DROP M AT T E R S Along with seminars supporting students’ personal development, our Development Programme also creates opportunities to disseminate research and facilitate dialogue on global concerns, writes MTST Programme Director Claire Cockcroft. Dr Cayenna Ponchione-Bailey speaking at the ‘Every Drop Matters’ event
From rural, sub-Saharan Africa to the megacities of the world, there’s a global water crisis on the horizon. One in 10 people around the world - around 800 million - do not have access to clean water and, by 2025, half of the global population will live in countries with high water stress, raising the prospect of water wars. With sustainability a central tenet of Somerville’s strategy, we held an interdisciplinary event last October blending music, sound and film with community research projects to raise awareness about one of the greatest challenges of the 21st century: water security. Heralding a return to live events, the panel highlighted some key issues — from water scarcity and flooding caused by climate change and glacial melt, to inequality of access to safe water and coordinated management of urban water. They also tackled the intricacies of transboundary agreements and diplomacy in shared water sources. Flowing throughout the event were dramatic soundscapes, the result of some unique creative collaborations between composers, filmmakers and researchers. Alaskanborn conductor, Dr Cayenna Ponchione-Bailey, formerly a Junior Research Fellow at Somerville and Director of Research at the Oxford Conducting Institute, uses orchestral music to promote social justice and environmental sustainability. She was instrumental in a collaboration with Oxford-based band Pecq and Alice Chautard at the School of Geography, who uses photography to communicate the science around water security and climate research.
‘Every Drop Matters’ Watch on YouTube
”Through orchestral music we have an opportunity – and perhaps a responsibility – to engage with pressing social and environmental issues. Creating new compositions is one such way, and may help orchestrate behavioural change,” Dr Ponchione-Bailey explained. “Earth Flow, was composed in response to research recounting stories of climate change along the Gandiki River in Nepal. Focusing on themes of erosion, landslides and glacial melt, the music incorporates field recordings of wind, water, landslides and rivers. We hope it will get audiences reflecting on the connection between climate change and global water security, as well as their own water consumption.” A second work, Reaching Water, was inspired by stories from local communities in Ethiopia’s Awash River Basin. The piece explored the long journeys faced by many people as the climate crisis challenges their access to water: the average woman in rural Africa walks 6km daily, hauling around 18kg water. Globally, women and girls spend an estimated 200 million hours every day carrying water, time that could be invested in education or income generating activities to improve their lives.
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Rising global water use and agricultural demands to deliver food security, alongside population growth, expanding urbanisation and climate change, are some of the key drivers of water insecurity. Water availability is becoming more unpredictable as climate change influences the global water cycle. To increase resilience, large urban areas need better coordination of surface and groundwater use and robust water governance. Safa Fanaian (2018, DPhil Geography), a water security researcher from the Oxford-India Centre for Sustainable Development at Somerville whose work focuses on waste water and sewage release into rivers in urban India, spoke at the event about the challenges of urban water management.
Safa Fanaian
“The water problem is one of a gradual normalisation of pollution,” she explained. “Like the story of the frog in hot water, as the water gets gradually hotter the realisation that the water is too hot comes a bit late. Similarly, the urban rivers are gradually getting more polluted, such that sadly now it is ‘normal’ to look at urban rivers as open sewers.” Social, cultural and political factors all play a role in developing long-term solutions to water security risks that are looming as a consequence of climate change, water use and policy decisions. Dr Hussam Hussein, a University Lecturer in International Relations, Fellow in Water Diplomacy and JRF at Somerville, presented a global perspective on water politics. His research focuses on water policies for protecting shared water in the Middle East, transboundary water governance, and issues related to the political economy of water resources. “The Middle East is the most water scarce region in the world,” he said. “Most of its freshwater resources originate outside of the Arab region. By looking at water security from an international relations perspective, I can be involved in processes of water diplomacy and facilitate just and fair outcomes of negotiations for the allocation to shared waters.” “We need to work towards a sustainable use of water while facilitating dialogue between stakeholders and across borders. To solve the water problem, we need interdisciplinary and holistic approaches that are able to consider water in its relation to food and energy security.” Dr Hussam Hussein
As part of the Development Programme’s mentoring scheme, Dr Hussein introduced three undergraduates to the field of water policy to gain research skills and insight into academic careers. Ruby Cooper (2020, Philosophy, Politics and Economics) said of her internship: “With financial support from a Thatcher Development Award, I was able to devote my time to researching and gaining insight into a field that is so theoretically and practically valuable,” said Ruby. “It has allowed me to further my interest in the academic study of politics, as well as the field of international development and conflict resolution. I am very grateful that college has provided me with this opportunity as both an insight into and facilitation of the career path I am keen to follow.” Throughout the pandemic, the Development Programme has grown to provide a forum that enables researchers to share their passion for their subject with students. As the ripples of uncertainty from the pandemic subside, we look forward to fostering further career-enhancing opportunities for students to gain research experience, hone their public speaking skills, and engage in dialogue about topical issues and future global challenges.
‘Earth Flow’ by Pecq Listen on Bandcamp
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TRUSTEES The Rt Hon. the Baroness Royall of Blaisdon, Chair of Trustees ex officio Mrs Clara Freeman OBE Lord Sherbourne of Didsbury Professor Almut Suerbaum Professor Stephen Weatherill Mr Andrew Parker ex officio Professor Daniel Anthony
PATRONS The Rt Hon. Tony Blair The Hon. Dr Robert Gates President Mikhail Gorbachev The Hon. Dr Alan Greenspan Ho Ching The Hon. John Howard The Hon. Dr Henry Kissinger The Rt Hon. Sir John Major The Rt Hon. Brian Mulroney The Rt Hon. the Lord Owen The Rt Hon. the Lord Patten of Barnes The Lord Powell of Bayswater The Hon. Dr Condoleezza Rice
S omerville C ollege W oodstock R oad O xford OX2 6HD R egistered C harity
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1154547
