Judith Rees is new president of the Royal Geographical Society

LSE's Director, Professor Judith Rees, has been elected president of the Royal Geographical Society, the first woman to take the role.

The Amartya Sen Lecture

Nobel laureate Professor Joseph Stiglitz will deliver two public lectures at LSE on 28 and 29 June. The first will feature Nobel laureate Amartya Sen acting as a discussant.

In the final editions for this academic year, we speak to students who are involved in the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games. Next up is.... Angela Ebiner
Angela, a master's student at LSE, will be a volunteer dance performer in the Opening Ceremony at the 2012 London Olympics.

Professor Judith Rees CBE (pictured) has been elected president of the Royal Geographical Society, the first woman in the Society’s history to take on this role.

At the Society’s Annual General Meeting on Monday 11 June, Professor Rees was elected unopposed to the position for its three year term. She takes over as the Society’s figurehead and chair of its elected trustees from Michael Palin CBE.

A distinguished academic geographer by background, Professor Rees is currently Director of LSE. She also acts as director for both its ESRC Centre for Climate Change Economics and Policy (hosted jointly with the University of Leeds) and the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment.

Commenting on her appointment, Professor Rees said: 'To be asked to take over the presidency of such an internationally acclaimed and respected body is an enormous honour and I am only too aware of the distinguished figures whose boots I will have to try and fill.' More
 

Introducing LSE's new School secretary

Susan Scholefield (pictured) replaced Adrian Hall as School secretary at the beginning of last week, following an intensive handover period that started on 26 April.

She has taken on the reconfigured role of School secretary which, in addition to the line management of the Planning, HR and Business Continuity functions, will play a major role supporting the Director and Council on governance, legal compliance and ethics issues as well as contributing to the strategic direction of the School.

'I am delighted to be at LSE and am extremely excited about working again in an academic environment,' she said. 'I remember my own student days very fondly and hope to contribute to making LSE a very special place, for students and staff alike.'

After taking a double first at Somerville College, Oxford, and an early academic career at the University of California at Berkeley, Susan joined the Civil Service and rapidly rose to a senior rank. Roles in the Balkans Secretariat, Northern Ireland Office and a post in the Cabinet Office as head of the Civil Contingencies Secretariat were followed by a series of top level positions in the Communities Department and MOD, culminating in her most recent role as director general, Human Resources and Corporate Services. In 1999 she was awarded a CMG in the New Year's Honours for her work on Bosnia.
 

A report published by LSE reveals the horrific scale of mental illness in Britain, and how little the NHS does about it. Mental illness is now nearly a half of all ill health suffered by people under 65, and it is more disabling than most chronic physical disease. Yet only a quarter of those involved are in any form of treatment.

The report by the Mental Health Policy Group, a distinguished team of economists, psychologists, doctors and NHS managers, was convened by Professor Lord Layard of LSE's Centre for Economic Performance.

Lord Layard says: ‘If local NHS Commissioners want to improve their budgets, they should all be expanding their provision of psychological therapy. It will save them so much on their physical healthcare budgets that the net cost, will be little or nothing.

Archives reading room opening hours are changing during the summer period.

From Monday 25 June, the reading room will be open:

• Monday and Thursday: 10am-5.30pm
• Tuesday and Wednesday: 10am-8pm
• Friday: 10am-5pm
• Saturday: 11am-6pm (term-time and Easter vacation only)
   

The Chair and Vice Chair Selection Committee will shortly begin the search for a successor to Peter Sutherland, whose second and final term of office will end in 2013.

The Chair is the senior non-executive governor of the School charged with leading the governance of the university by the LSE Council.

Suggestions from all members of the School are invited. They should be sent to Jayne Rose, head of governance, at j.rose2@lse.ac.uk if possible by Monday 9 July.

Nominations for Honorary Doctorates are invited.

The LSE Council may award an Honorary Doctorate to ‘persons who have made an outstanding contribution to the increased understanding, or appreciation of “the causes of things” and their practical application in the social sciences or related fields.’

PhD Studentship: structural model error in the context of an evolving (non-stationary) physical system

A NERC funded PhD studentship is currently available at LSE's Centre for the Analysis of Time Series in the Department of Statistics.

The thesis topic will focus on structural model error in the context of an evolving (non-stationary) physical system. The supervisors are Professor Leonard Smith and Dr David Stainforth.

Model inadequacy (structural model error) is arguably the most devastating source of failure in science based decision making, as it is arguably impossible to see it coming. Aspects of the system that lie outside the dynamics accessible to any member of the current model class can lead to misleading simulations of the future even when the model is tuned to achieve a high degree of consistency with observations. Current methods, including sampling (over a small set of initial conditions, parameter values, and/or existing models), enlarging the model class (as by introducing "stochastic physics"), and exploiting background knowledge of the system will be considered in a computationally tractable case, and then applied in the context of actual decision making.

LSE Perspectives features photographs taken by LSE students and staff, with 12 new images published every month, and LSE Arts is currently looking for submissions for next month’s gallery.

If you have taken any artistic images on your travels, from your home town or even just here in London why not submit them for LSE perspectives so that they can be shared with the LSE community.

Any LSE Catering customer using their card as a method of payment and spending £30 or more a month will be entered into a prize draw, with five winners each month getting £10 added to their loyalty purse.

The winners of the prize draw for May were:

• Lloyd Gruber
• Silvia Milano
• Da Jin
• Gavin Eves
• Ulf Axelson
   

Skip fit lessons

Security officer and former boxer Daniel Beckley is running skip fit lessons for all students and staff at LSE.

Build up your fitness, burn calories and increase your stamina, all within an hour.

The next lessons will take place from 1-2pm at the Badminton Court, Old Building, on Tuesday 3 July, Tuesday 10 July, Tuesday 14 August, Tuesday 21 August, Tuesday 4 September, Tuesday 11 September, Tuesday 25 September and Tuesday 2 October.

Just turn up on any of these dates with your own skipping rope. All lessons are free to attend. More sessions will take place during Michaelmas term.

For more information, email Daniel at d.beckley@lse.ac.uk.

Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz to deliver two public lectures at LSE

Professor Joseph Stiglitz (pictured), former chief economist at the World Bank and university professor of the Columbia Business School, will deliver two public lectures at LSE later this month.

On Thursday 28 June, Professor Stiglitz will deliver The Amartya Sen Lecture, where he will be in discussion with Professor Amartya Sen. The following evening (Friday 29 June), Professor Stiglitz will discuss his new book The Price of Inequality.

Both events are free and open to all, but tickets are required. For more information, visit the web listings above.
 

Upcoming LSE events include....

Berlin 1961: Kennedy Khrushchev, and the most dangerous place on earth
On: Tuesday 26 June at 6.30pm in the Hong Kong Theatre, Clement House
Speaker: Frederick Kempe (pictured), president and CEO of the Atlantic Council.

The Price of Inequality
On: Friday 29 June at 6.30pm in the Old Theatre, Old Building
Speaker: Professor Joseph Stiglitz, former chief economist at the World Bank and university professor of the Columbia Business School.
This event is free and open to all, but a ticket is required. One ticket can be requested via the online ticket request form after 10pm on Thursday 21 June.

Tubes: behind the scenes at the internet
On: Tuesday 3 July at 6.30pm in the Hong Kong Theatre, Clement House
Speaker: Andrew Blum (pictured), correspondent at Wired (US) magazine.

How Much is Enough? Work, Money and the Good Life
On: Wednesday 4 July at 6.30pm in the Old Theatre, Old Building
Speaker: Dr Edward Skidelsky, moral philosopher at Exeter University, and Professor Lord Skidelsky, Emeritus Professor of Political Economy at the University of Warwick.

Burma's Rohingya: a panel discussion
On: Monday 16 July at 6.30pm in the Hong Kong Theatre, Clement House
Speaker: Greg Constantine, freelance photojournalist, Chris Lewa, director of The Arakan Project, and Melanie Teff, senior advocate and European representative at Refugees International.
 

On: Thursday 21 June in room 1.04, Connaught House

This workshop focuses on the significance of transnational labour movements for revolutionary struggles in the late 19th and early-mid 20th centuries in countries as diverse as Cuba, Egypt, India, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, and Vietnam.

Programme:

• 11am - Evan M Daniel, City University of New York
  In the Belly of the Monster: Cuban cigar makers in New York City, 1860s-1895
• 12.15pm - Lunch break
• 1pm - Malini Cadambi Daniel, New School for Social Research
  Bharat and Internationalism: race, labour and contested identities in California’s heartland, 1900-1924
• 2.15pm - John Sidel, LSE
  From Shanghai to Singapore, Sydney, and Surabaya: networks of solidarity in support of revolution in Southeast Asia
• 3.30pm - John Chalcraft, LSE
  Migration, Border-Crossing and Labour Protest in Egypt and the Arabian Peninsula in the 1950s and 1960s

The workshop is free and open to all. For more information, email Professor John Sidel at j.t.sidel@lse.ac.uk.
 

On until Friday 29 June in the Atrium Gallery, Old Building.

This exhibition showcases a selection of prints and drawings all connected to Wittgenstein’s life as a philosopher and his interest in photography.

It presents pictures taken by Wittgenstein, pictures from his photo album, and pictures taken by friends and relatives. They are illuminated by quotations from Wittgenstein's writings and from his correspondence with his Cambridge friends, colleagues and his family.

The exhibition will be of interest to students and researchers, and anyone interested in learning about Wittgenstein through his own writing, photographs and through correspondence about him.

The exhibition is free and open to all, with no ticket required. Visitors are welcome Monday-Friday between 10am and 8pm (unless otherwise stated).

Podcasts of public lectures and events

The Past and Future of Social Democracy and the Consequences for Europe
Speaker: Professor Sheri Berman
Recorded: Tuesday 12 June, approx 87 minutes
Click here to listen

The New Growth Strategy: how responsible companies are profitable companies
Speaker: Anders Dahlvig
Recorded: Wednesday 13 June, approx 93 minutes
Click here to listen

"Enough": policies for a sustainable economy
Speaker: Professor Diane Coyle
Recorded: Thursday 14 June, approx 58 minutes
Click here to listen

Nicole wants to hear from you!

Do you have some news, an achievement, or an aspect of LSE life that you would like to share? If so, then I would love to hear from you, contact me at n.gallivan@lse.ac.uk or on ext 7582.

The next edition of Student News is on Wednesday 26 September. Articles for this should be emailed to me by Friday 21 September. Student News is emailed on Wednesdays, on a weekly basis during Michaelmas and Lent term and fortnightly during Summer term.