Welcome to March’s Alumni newsletter.
After a testing 2020 for all of us, I hope 2021 has started well for you.
As a Business School we continue to operate largely remotely, but a lot of work is being done behind the scenes to ensure an efficient and above all, safe, return to campus in the not-so-distant future. The roadmap set out last week by the UK Government at least offers us encouragement for the resumption of face-to-face teaching for next academic year.
It has been a productive start to 2021, not least in the process of finding a permanent new name for the Business School.
Thank you to everybody who submitted name suggestions and provided feedback in our naming portal which was live during December and January. We are now very much into the Name Testing phase and you will shortly receive a link to a survey, giving you the chance to have your say on the shortlisted names.
I enjoyed virtually meeting with our regional Alumni Ambassadors in February, where Professor Caroline Wiertz and I were able to discuss criteria for shortlisting and received some excellent initial thoughts on the names being considered. The sessions were very useful and productive.
An update on the process is provided later in this newsletter, but please do take the time to participate in the survey when it is live.
Away from the name change, we were delighted to welcome Anneliese Dodds MP, Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer to deliver the Mais Lecture in January to an online audience of more than 300 people. Ms Dodds presented an alternative economic response to the pandemic and a blueprint for tackling the challenges of Brexit.
We also welcomed our 14th intake for the Executive MBA Dubai Programme. This year’s cohort is represented by 23 nationalities with a wealth of collective professional experience.
I hope you and your family and friends are staying well wherever you are in the world.
Best wishes,
Professor Paolo Volpin,
Dean