Annual Review 2011
London; she was one of only four women in only the second year women that had been accepted there. At Girton she supported access to education in medicine by generously endowing a bursary fund in her name, for medical students from less financially secure backgrounds. An obituary of Dr Barton appears later. In terms of the support given to the College, even in difficult economic times, Girtonians’ generosity is phenomenal, and the college is always immensely grateful for this. Donations and pledges to Girton totalled over £2.5 million in the financial year to July 2011. Within this total, Girtonians donated nearly £170,000 during our annual telethon, with most supporting teaching fellowships and making unrestricted gifts. This is remarkable in the context of the financial pressures many now face, and is the secondlargest total given to a telephone campaign since 2000. Exciting initiatives include the start of funding for the endowment for economics, thanks to generous support from Professor Angela Yergin (Stent 1966) and her husband David Yergin (Trinity 1968), and support for an endowed law fellowship thanks to a generous gift of £250,000 from Gladys Li (1966), who has also endowed a fund for postgraduate students, to be named the Joyce Biddle fund, after her former Classics teacher, who was also a Girtonian (1926). We have also launched something this year which is a little different – Girton Advance. This prize for entrepreneurship has been inspired by alumnus Asim Mumtaz (1998) who wishes to encourage the spirit of innovation in Girtonians, having himself won a similar competition. His company, Enecsys, which was built out of his PhD research whilst at Girton, supplies micro inverters and monitoring systems for use in photovoltaic arrays. The prize is intended to be annual and is open to Girton students, fellows, staff, and alumni who have graduated in the last 5 years – the top prize is up to £20,000 of investment. Please see www.girton.cam.ac.uk/advance for more details. We were delighted to witness Mrs Rosemary Lonergan being welcomed into the Cambridge University Guild of Benefactors, which recognises gifts of over £1 million to colleges and the University. She received this honour for her own and the late Professor Jack Todd’s support of Mathematics at Girton, and for their support of St John’s College. We welcomed three new Barbara Bodichon Foundation Fellows in June 2011. These Fellowships recognise outstanding contributions to Girton’s endowment and future funding needs. Professor Sir Laurence Martin, Miss Sarah Holt (1972) and Mr Colin Grassie (1980) were welcomed to their new roles in a short ceremony which took place in June. Respectively, they have made significant contributions to the teaching endowment, general endowment and to the building of the sports pavilion. On which note, Girton is delighted that the new pavilion building will be going ahead from the academic year 2011‒ 12. A ceremonial turf-cutting led by Dr John Marks took place in November 2011, coinciding with the alumni rugby, football and netball matches, and the new building is expected to be completed in time for the academic year beginning October 2012 – fittingly the Olympic year. The Girton Alumni Sports Association is planning to host a dinner to celebrate this, in the spring of 2012. The completion of the pitches and pavilion project sees the drawing to a close of the Twenty-First Century campaign, which was publicly launched in 2006. Since the 70