“A place where everyone belongs” – Wolfson members celebrate College's 57th Foundation Day

“It’s been 57 years since we were founded in 1965, and all that existed in those days was Bredon house. Look how far we’ve come,” said Wolfson’s President Jane Clarke as she welcomed alumni and friends to our online Foundation Day celebration. “At Wolfson today, we have well over 600 full time students, and about another 350 part time students, so we’re knocking on 1000 current students. We’ve grown hugely.”

With this growth comes change, and there are big plans on the horizon for the future of the College in the form of the new masterplan. To help facilitate this transformation, the College has appointed a new Director of Development.

“We’re actually doing something different. We’ve taken the development office and we’ve split it into two,” said the President, highlighting Sian Cook’s new role as Director of College Networks, and the appointment of our new Director of Development, Simon Crookall.

“It’s a very exciting time to join Wolfson,” said Simon, “I am going to try to raise the money to make the masterplan happen, and we’re working hard to raise money for scholarships so that we can attract the very best students to Wolfson and continue our record of academic excellence.”

Innovation and entrepreneurialism

In addition to grand designs for the expansion of the College, the Foundation Day celebrations also recognised exciting and innovative work being conducted by College members in both research and its application.

One area where this is particularly apparent is in the Interdisciplinary Research Hubs, which tackle themes of Gender, Global Health, and Sustainability and Conservation. For the President, the hubs represent “what we can do here in Wolfson when we put our minds to it, when we bring together people from different disciplines.”

As in previous years, the Wolfson Research Event showcased a wide array of the research talent at the College in a variety of fields, and many of the presentations from the 2022 event can be watched back online.

Research was put into practice at the Wolfson Enterprise Competition, won this year by a Wolfson student, Ben Woodington, alongside his business partner Elise Jenkins (Trinity Hall), for their innovative bioelectronics pitch to tackle serious medical conditions in the brain. The event was judged by highly experienced entrepreneurs from the Wolfson Alumni community, including Dr. Ronjon Nag

Wolfson spirit

“Wolfson has always been very special to me. I was enchanted by the atmosphere at Wolfson, the friendly nature of meeting people and the internationalism character of the college”

All of these developments are set against the backdrop of Wolfson’s distinctive character, and many of those present at the Foundation Day celebrations took the opportunity to reflect and commended the friendly, diverse, and international character of the College.

One attendee said: “What stands out for me about Wolfson is friendliness, sociality, the international character of the College, it’s intellectual but also open and kind to all, there's a lack of hierarchy, and that’s what keeps me coming back to Wolfson.”

Masters students, who were only in Cambridge for a year, were nonetheless inspired by their time at Wolfson and grateful for the brief time they spent at the College, saying: “It was a terrific part of our lives, that year at Wolfson”.

The College would like to thank all those who came to celebrate Foundation Day with us this year, both online and in the dinner in the evening. We’re looking forward to welcoming many more students into our College community in October, as well as continuing to engage our growing body of alumni across the world.