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STUDENT GROUPS
February 14th - March 5th 2012
Catherine King Student Groups students@roarnews.co.uk
facebook.com/roarnews
All THE KING’S MEN CONQUER THE WORLD
Cameron Carr
King’s College London’s all-male a cappella group was established by Freshers during their first week of term after seeing a gap in the list of societies. The success of the group started in earnest at the end of that year with their first tour to Edinburgh. In February 2011 the Men embarked on their first USA tour. This year’s success began with winning the London regional round of the Voice Festival UK and a week later the group jetted off to California for a west coast tour visiting L.A, San Diego, San Francisco and Stanford. On their return the group then competed in the final of the VF-UK where they were crowned Voice Festival UK Champions 2012, the first non-Oxbridge group to receive the accolade. Winning such a coveted title meant the Men could go for even greater success. With a week until the exam season began All the King’s Men flew to New York with an invitation to
compete in the International Champships of Collegiate A cappella (ICCA) finals. Up against the six best groups from around the US, 350 other candidates entered this competition. All the King’s Men were the best group to represent Great Britain, Europe and KCL at the Olympics of the a cappella world. In front of an audience of 1500, in a venue where Whitney Houston had performed, All the King’s Men did what they do best and were awarded third place, making them the best all-male collegiate a cappella group in the world. The summer months were therefore a busy period for this now international multi-award winning group and the next tour of the year took the Men to Scotland. Here at the Fringe Festival work has to be put in to selling the show to the discerning public on the Royal Mile. At the end of the busy week the Men had attracted sell out crowds and they were awarded the Edinburgh Fringe Festival wreath for their show, “It’s Reigning Men”. A week spent with family and friends
NEUROSCIENTISTS was soon interrupted with more rehearsals in London before flying out to South-East Asia to become the first British collegiate a cappella to tour in this continent. First landing in Singapore the group visited schools to take conduct workshops and perform as well as answering questions about KCL. The group also performed at the National University of Singapore, one of King’s global partners, where all students were treated to free beer and a pyrotechnic display on the stage. The next stop on the Asia trip was Hong Kong where our tour of Asia was taken to the next level. With the generous support of our sponsor, Fringebacker, we visited countless schools and universities, including performing to over 1,000 students at Chinese University. On one day an open top tour bus was provided to help us with trying to sell our first self-promoted gig in Asia at the prestigious Fringe Club, which finished up as a total success. We are extremely grateful to everyone who has helped over the past year: our Founder and Musical Director Henry Southern; various Departments of King’s College London; the eclectic mix of societies we have sung with; our patrons Paul Phoenix and Michelle Carlin and of course every single student who has come and supported us over the past year. All the King’s Men will be performing at the Greenwood Theatre on 26th October at 7pm. Tickets are available at www.kclsutickets.com. Students £5/Adults £10. If you are interested in All the King’s Men performing at your event please do get in contact with our Manager, Cameron Carr at: contact@all-thekings-men.com
JOIN PEN, PALS!
Jessica Broadbent
versial and their writing is considered outspoken. This is unacceptable.
KCL English PEN is a campaign group working to salvage the voices of journalists and other writers in countries where their voices are suffocated. A registered charity, PEN gathers the information of such journalists and political activists all over the world, particularly in countries such as Vietnam, China and Sri Lanka. These writers are mainly either imprisoned or captured, or in many tragic cases, have merely disappeared. This happens for no good reason except for the fact that their opinions are contro-
At KCL PEN, one of our main methods of helping these people is to lobby Governments, raising their awareness of the injustice these people are facing and to hopefully bring the lost citizens to their attention. This is done through our weekly letter-writing sessions where members of the charity write to presidents or prime ministers, political ministers and so on. It is uplifting when we hear news such as earlier this year, when the prisoner, Albert Santiago du Bouchet, was released from Cuba and returned to Spain. This leaves no more imprisoned writers in Cuba, a country that just over a year ago had more writers in prison than anywhere else in Latin America!
At Christmas time we also send Christmas cards to imprisoned writers who are separated from their families and lacking in hope and inspiration. The aim of these cards is to let them know that they are being thought about, and to bring some little joy into their lives at a time where they feel most alone and isolated. Student Pen provides a great chance to flex those campaigning muscles and to get involved with the brilliant work that English PEN do. Over the summer we also held the very first Student Pen summit, where groups from universities all over the country came to London and discussed how to make student pen a larger, betterknown and more productive force. If anyone would like to know a little more about the running of the group then please send us an email at student.english.pen@gmail.com. It’s never too late to get involved.
ZOMBIE MANIACS OR SECRET GENIUSES?
Haruka Yuki Ever felt your brain wasn’t in tiptop condition after Wednesday night drinking? Or did you ever wonder just how a genius is created? Neuroscience addresses all of these, with applications, not just in biomedical science, but also in Philosophy, Anthropology, Maths, and even Economics. The KCL Neuroscience society is still green. Founded just over three years ago, it’s an up and coming society within the Biomedical community at King’s. World leading experts have come in to talk about topics ranging from Art and Colour, Mindfulness and Tibetan monks, IQ and Social Cognition, and even Pain and Pleasure. But we have big plans this year. NeuroAid, our charity division, have decided to fundraise to build a new health centre in Sierra Leone - a project spearheaded by our own Clementina, a Neuroscience undergrad. The current aim is £300K, of which £3k has already been raised. Although it will be a general health centre, there will be a mental health aspect-currently global mental health is a hugely underfunded area but especially so in the developing world. Back at home, we’re launching a new blog entitled “The King’s Brains” and creating an active network with Neuroscience alumni. In addition, we are also holding talks by leading experts on the creative, musical brain, aggressive personalities, as well as careers and course related informal advice sessions.
Of course we still plan to carry on successful ventures such as the introduction of the global Brain Awareness Week to KCL. We will also continue raising money for Parkinson’s research. We’re rapidly growing and are looking for equally enthusiastic people who are passionate about mental and neurological health, to join us at this exciting time. So, whether you’re a neuroscience fresher, a PhD student or just interested in how the mind works- we want to make YOUR brain BUZZ! We’re also having a NeuroAid Halloween Three Legged Pub Crawl on 29th Octoberso stumble by and see what we’re all about! Drop us a line at info@neurosoc.org. uk, tweet us @kclneuroscisoc, or find