Kent Magazine Obituaries
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Obituaries
Dr David Shrimpton 1954~2007
Deaths: Since the last issue of KENT went to press, we have learned of the deaths of the following alumni, staff and friends. If you would like to be put in touch with the families or friends of anyone listed here, please let us know. We may be able to help.
It is with great sadness that the Computing Laboratory mourns the death of David Shrimpton, who died on Saturday 29 December 2007 in the Kent and Canterbury Hospital. David was diagnosed with cancer of the pancreas and bile duct in January 2007 and, throughout his illness, was remarkably positive about his condition and his circumstances, and was very much helped in this by his wife, Terry, and his children Ian and Hannah.
Alumni: Sara Cristina Aires Alves R04 Helen Blackwell K96 Karen Boddy (née Morris) R70 Peggy Brunt R96 James Carter K99 Simon Carter E77 Natasha Collins D95 Brian Crook K98 Martyn Dryden K66 Jordan Farrara D04 Paul Harris E67 Katie Hayes K99 Valerie Journet E92 Robert Kempson K74 Annabel Kinnear D00 Ralph Lownie D83 Christopher McCarten R67 John Milner R86 Gillian Smith R88 Felicity Warnock (née Edge) K76. Staff and friends: Daniel Boucher, honorary graduate 2004. David Shrimpton, Computing. Douglas Wood, Honorary Senior Member of Rutherford.
After a first career in mental health nursing, David studied Computer Science at Oxford Brookes University, remaining there to complete his PhD and subsequently as a member of staff. In 1998, David joined the Computing Laboratory at Kent as a Lecturer, and, in his nine years in the department, he contributed hugely to its life and work. In his most recent role as Head of Teaching, it was David’s role to negotiate and agree staff teaching loads, and he always accomplished this onerous task smoothly and with great good humour. The reason that it ran so well - and this was something that he brought to all his interactions with students and staff - was his uncanny ability to understand other people, and what made them tick. This empathy made David an excellent teacher, on both undergraduate and postgraduate courses, as well as an outstanding PhD supervisor, who will be very much missed by his present and past research students.
When David joined the Lab his main research interests were in distributed systems and support for multimedia applications, particularly the convergence of digital television and internet technologies. This led more recently to interest in many aspects of the World Wide Web. David played a key role as evangelist for new web technologies, and had taught a number of tutorials for the World Organization of Webmasters. Its Executive Director, Bill Cullifer, said: “David was an amazing man and he’ll be missed.” David was also the Computing Lab’s representative on the World Wide Web Consortium; the Chief Executive of the W3C, Steve Bratt, also extended his condolences to David’s friends and family. In tribute to David’s life and work, the Computing Laboratory will be planting a tree on the campus later in the spring. Professor Simon Thompson Head of the Computing Laboratory
Kent Magazine Kent Union
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KentUnion
Student newspaper InQuire is available online at www.inquirelive.co.uk It has been a busy start to the year for Kent Union, beginning with the refurbishment of Rutherford Bar. The old bar was in desperate need of a makeover, and during the Christmas vacation, it has been transformed into a beautiful, stylish and comfortable space. We’ve also introduced a fantastic new Mediterranean style menu. In addition to this, you might not know that Woody’s was rejuvenated over last summer putting the ‘pub feel’ back into a campus favourite.
www.inquirelive.co.uk, aims to be the most up to date source of student news and provide a forum for views at Kent. It also means that alumni can now read every issue.
As Kent is now a multisite university, with students at a number of campuses across Kent and also in continental Europe, Kent Union tries to make sure that students at our associate and partner colleges get the same representation and experiences of university life as those Canterbury Student Radio at the main Canterbury campus. We have just (CSR), the UK’s first recruited a new Advice student led community and Outreach worker to FM radio station had its first birthday in January. help Kent Union interact with students at other The first year has been campuses and to ensure fantastic with input from that they can get advice hundreds of Kent and from a qualified student Christ Church students adviser on the site where as well as students they study. from local schools and colleges. The radio This year’s Varsity has station broadcasts across just ended, seeing Kent Canterbury on 97.4FM reign victorious over with a mix of music, talk Christchurch once again. shows, live events and Over 30 sports teams more recently coverage competed to beat the of the Kent Union AGM. friendly rivals with a We are currently looking final score of 21-6. Our for External Directors BUSA teams are having for Canterbury Youth a fantastic year with 13 and Student Media (the company that oversees the teams going through to knockout rounds. The running of CSR) so if you first three weeks of this are interested in taking year have been dedicated part, please email Joe to a ‘Fresh Start’ Cooper at J.R.Cooper@ campaign, trying to get kent.ac.uk for more all students on campus information. active and thinking about their overall health. The InQuire (which you may campaign, run by Sports remember in its previous Sabbatical Tom Marsh, incarnations as KRED and InCant) has just been has been highly successful launched online thanks to with a charity fun-run which raised over £300, a grant from the Annual workshops on stress Fund. The InQuire reduction and access to team wanted to create sports for students with electronic, interactive, disabilities on campus. informative space for students and the website,
Louise Shaw R02 Marketing Communications Co-ordinator Kent Union
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02 01. Student life 02. Gulbenkian café bar 03. Rutherford bar