LSE ALUMNI
NEWS FROM THE LSE ALUMNI ASSOCIATION
Moving forward looking back
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PATRICK MEARS: During your first two years as LSE Director, what have you learned about the School’s alumni? CRAIG CALHOUN:
As soon as I arrived in London, I saw immediately how proud alumni are of the School and of the education they enjoyed here. Over the past couple of years, I have also learned that this pride is accompanied by an expectation that this great institution will continue to lead the world in social sciences and public policy teaching and research. We have a great responsibility to meet these expectations – a duty to you and future generations of alumni to ensure LSE remains excellent.
PM: You called on alumni to participate in the Strategic Review. What did their contributions tell you about their perceptions of the School? CC:
The replies I received – both to my office and via the Alumni Relations team – demonstrated that alumni from every generation continue to think deeply about the School and its role in answering the big political and economic questions confronting society. The range and breadth of responses revealed that it is impossible to generalise what LSE means to people, and perceptions are not necessarily defined by era. We heard from graduates from the 1960s advocating something akin to the “flipped classroom model” of smaller group tutorials discussing online seminars, while more recent graduates recalled packed lectures they wouldn’t dream of watching online as they want to be there to experience the occasion – to share the LSE experience treasured by alumni learning from academic heavyweights such as Laski, Higgins and Morishima in the past.
PM: LSE alumni are drawn from more than 190 countries. How can we collectively have an impact on the future of the School? CC: One of LSE’s great strengths is the composition of its student body – 69 per cent of the School’s students are not from the UK – and the vibrant campus life this diversity makes possible. It follows that the alumni community is similarly diverse, and LSE already benefits from your global reach. You are among LSE’s best ambassadors. As alumni you collectively represent the School in your lives and careers; you become role models for prospective students who see your achievements and want to come to LSE to emulate them. More formally, alumni can have a positive impact by getting involved directly with the School. Volunteers such as yourself and members of the Alumni Association support LSE by maintaining the link between alumni and campus. Others serve young alumni by participating in the mentoring programme, which offers recent graduates access to your expertise and guidance. Many more co-ordinate public lectures in their region or organise pre-departure events for offer holders to help prepare them for
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LSE Connect
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Summer 2014
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Patrick Mears (LLB 1979), chair of the LSE Alumni Association, discusses with the Director of LSE the partnership the School has with its 120,000-strong international alumni community, and the future of the relationship.
London and life at LSE. Just last term, I was welcomed at wonderful alumni receptions in Colombia and Mexico. All of this activity directly helps LSE in fulfilling one of our primary functions: to attract the best students to London to continue to push against intellectual boundaries.
PM: You have spoken about taking LSE forward by “looking back to its founding principles”. What do you mean by that? CC:
Since 1895 the School has sought to ensure the brightest minds come together to analyse and propose solutions to the questions faced by society, and to push against those boundaries I’ve just mentioned. My comment about “founding principles” was based upon ensuring this vision remains as we negotiate our path through the changing higher education landscape. The introduction of tuition fees means higher education has become a competitive marketplace. While LSE should never be defined by university ranking systems which measure us in more general terms against other excellent but less specialist universities, we are competing for the best minds. We are benchmarked against Oxford, Cambridge and Harvard. To maintain that standard and keep that company requires world-class faculty leading teaching and research in excellent campus facilities. That costs money. Against all this, we must adhere to the School’s founders’ aims for LSE to be a centre for the betterment of society through the study of issues including inequality and poverty. As such, LSE must never be a university only for the elite classes who can afford to study here: through philanthropy and enterprise we must endeavour to offer more scholarships to support people who have the intellectual capacity and curiosity to become an LSE student. I am hopeful the alumni community will help us to achieve this. n