LSESU Memorabilia shop relocated
As part of the Centre Buildings Redevelopment decant, the LSESU Memorabilia shop is currently found at Lincoln Chambers.

Jenni Hastings

Jenni, LSESU Advice Manager, cannot live without Diet Coke, lipstick and her running shoes, and is currently attempting to learn swing dance.

Science undergraduates from Imperial College are joining forces with LSE undergraduates to conduct a unique series of research projects on the theme of social change in London under the LSE/Imerial GROUPS 2015 programme.

Imperial’s 25 undergraduates will work with around 70 LSE students on the intensive two week course, taking place at LSE from 22 June to 3 July. They are working full-time in groups of 5-6 with a dedicated research supervisor.

LSE would like to congratulate all staff, former staff and alumni recognised in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List 2015, including Dr Hong Lu from LSE's Confucius Institute for Business London (CIBL),  who has received an Order of the British Empire (OBE) for her contributions to the Chinese community and for her efforts in promoting China UK relations.

Professor Tim Besley (pictured) is to become the inaugural Sir William Arthur Lewis Professor of Development Economics at LSE.

The William Arthur Lewis Chair, created by LSE to mark the centenary of the Nobel Prize winner’s birth, was formally announced at LSE’s Sir Arthur Lewis Centenary Event on Understanding Economic Development earlier this week.

Professor Stuart Corbridge, Deputy Director and Provost of LSE, said: “LSE is proud today to be honouring two pioneering economists, one born 100 years ago this year, the other still providing expertise to policymakers today. William Arthur Lewis was a leader in the field of development economics and LSE is delighted to honour him with the creation of the named professorship. With his expertise in the same field, and long history with the School, Professor Timothy Besley is the perfect recipient of this inaugural professorship.”

LSE Student Stewards were on hand all last week to help staff, students and visitors find their way around campus following the start of the Centre Buildings Redevelopment.

Mike Redmayne, Professor of Law at LSE, has died at the age of 47.

He started his career at the University of Manchester in 1993, moving to Brunel in 1997 and then, in 1999, to LSE, where he taught until only a few weeks before his death.

Mike’s contribution to academic life was impeccable, his service to LSE exemplary. He sat on various Departmental and School committees and was awarded the 2008 Departmental teaching prize in recognition of his consistently high scores in student surveys and his exceptional contribution to undergraduate and postgraduate teaching.

Did you know? One thing the LSE Refectory did indisputably well in the 1960s was produce rock cakes. LSE alum Tom Emmerson (now Professor Emeritus at Iowa State University) shares his LSE memory at the LSE History blog.

David Rockefeller, who celebrated his 100th birthday this month and is reputedly the oldest living billionaire in the world, studied at LSE 1937-38. Read more in LSE – Rockefeller’s Baby? by Mick Cox on the LSE History blog.

Monetary incentives to encourage people to live healthier lifestyles only work in the longer term when they are designed to stop negative behaviour, rather than promote positive choices, suggests new research from LSE.

A paper published in Social Science and Medicine describes the results of a laboratory experiment where participants were invited to watch a series of videos while eating as many jelly beans as they liked. Partway through, incentives were introduced to encourage some participants to eat the sweets and for some participants to not eat the sweets for the duration of the next five minute video. For the purpose of comparison, another group of participants watched the video without an incentive. The experiment was then repeated two days later, when none of the participants received incentives.

Only the incentive to not eat sweets was found to still have an effect two days later. Participants who had been previously offered a £3 incentive to not eat any jelly beans ate significantly less sweets than the participants who had not received a monetary incentive.

Being a parent – before and after a split

Dads who are actively involved in bringing up their young children are more likely in the event of a split from their partner to keep in regular contact with their child, according to new research by Professor Lucinda Platt from the Department of Social Policy.

She and her co-author, Dr Tina Haux from the University of Kent, also found that mothers who separate from their child’s father have a poorer view of their abilities as a parent than those who stay in their relationship.

These are just two of the key findings from a Nuffield Foundation research project on parenting.

Professor Platt and Dr Tina Haux wanted to see if dads who are close to their child when they are very young are likely to see their son or daughter more in the event of a separation. They also looked at what other pre-separation factors were at play in the amount of contact after a split, such as the length of time since separation and the age of the child.

New Gearty Grilling online

A new Gearty Grilling video, part of the series of short video debates between Conor Gearty, director of the IPA and professor of human rights law, and leading researchers at LSE, is now online.

This week Judy Wajcman (pictured), the Anthony Giddens Professor of Sociology, discusses the impact of digital technology on our lives. More

Join the LSESU Welcome Team

Want to make the LSE Freshers' experience the best it can be? Why not volunteer to be part of the LSESU Welcome Team 2015 and help new students settle in to life at LSE.

Meet new students from a multitude of backgrounds, make new friends, and develop your leadership and problem solving skills as a member of a dynamic group of volunteers! Sign up here.
 

LSESU Memorabilia shop relocated

As part of the Centre Buildings Redevelopment decant, the LSESU Memorabilia shop has been relocated to Lincoln Chambers on Portsmouth Street (between George IV pub and SAW) and opened its door to customers on Monday 15 June. The remaining part of the LSESU shops in Lincoln’s Chambers will open on 1 July.
 

Are you a cyclist? If not, would you like to be?

LSE’s Health and Social Care Green Impact Team and LSE Cities are conducting a travel survey to seek your views on facilities around campus for cyclists. Even if you have no intention of ever being a cyclist, they would still like to hear from you.

To take part in the survey, go to http://delivr.com/2hm96. The survey has been extended to 1 July. Participants can enter a draw to win one of two £25 Waterstones vouchers.

Do you have some holiday photos you’d love to share? Taken any impressive snaps while out and about in London? Send them in to Perspectives and they could be featured in future editions of LSE Perspectives. Each month 12 photos taken by the LSE community are chosen to appear in LSE Arts online gallery.

LSE is seeking nominations for an Honorary Fellowship of the School. 

The criteria are as follows: The LSE Court may elect as an Honorary Fellow any individual who has made an outstanding contribution to the School, over the course of a number of years, beyond that which might reasonably be expected.

Honorary Fellowship nominees are expected to have a direct link with LSE either as a member of the School, or as someone who has made an outstanding contribution to the School.

This is an early notification since the deadline for nominations for consideration in Michaelmas Term 2015/16 is Friday 4 September 2015. Full details, and a nomination form, can be found here.

Are there specific topics you’d love a quick lesson on in Excel, PowerPoint or other Microsoft Office applications? Want a quick way to get your head around macros?

Microsoft has a free 15 minute video tutorial that will get you started on macros.

Tutorials on this free online training portal cover a huge range of topics in all versions of MS Office applications from 2007 onward. In addition, the IT Training Team can create an account for you to access whatever level(s) of training you require on any Office application through the online Microsoft Academy. (please contact IT.training@lse.ac.uk).

If you’d like internationally recognised certification of your advanced Office skills, enroll in LSE’s Microsoft Office Specialist (MOS) certification programme, providing internationally recognised, industry standard qualifications for your CV. Certification is offered at three levels: Specialist, Expert (Word and Excel only) and Master. Expert and Master levels demand very advanced skills, including use of macros and VBA. There are separate exams for each program (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, etc).

Northbank Summer Festival

The Northbank Summer Festival, which kicks of on Monday 29 June, will include a free festival screening the first rounds of Wimbledon in the beautiful Victoria Embankment Gardens, with music and more!

Come and enjoy the tennis with Savoy éclairs, Hotel Chocolat nibbles and Champagne+Fromage hampers. The event will also feature a collaborative community art piece, bee hotel-making workshop, hawking demo, Real Food Festival, charity picnic sponsored by Champagne+Fromage … And of course the mandatory strawberries and cream, and Pimms.

#NorthbankSummer for a chance to win prizes! More
 

Security officer and former boxer Daniel Beckley is running skip fit lessons for all staff and students 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 30 June, Tuesday 7 July, Tuesday 21 July, Tuesday 28 July, Tuesday 11 August, and Tuesday 18 August. Just turn up on any of these dates with your own skipping rope. All lessons are free.

On Wednesday 29 July at 6.30pm in the Hong Kong Theatre, Clement House
Speaker: Ryan Pyle

Join adventurer and renowned photographer, Ryan Pyle, as he spends months exploring and photographing Western China’s remote Sacred Mountains in an effort to better understand these most sacred Tibetan regions. His human-powered adventure is “one of the ages” as he explores the remote provinces of Qinghai, Tibet, Sichuan and Yunnan.

Other forthcoming events at LSE include:

Still Pushing for the Humanities
Date: Monday 29 June 2015 6.30pm
Location: Old Theatre, Old Building
Speaker: Professor Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak (pictured)

Above the Parapet - Women in Public Life
Date: Tuesday 30 June 2015 6.30pm
Location: Wolfson Theatre, New Academic Building
Speaker: Professor Ruth Simmons

When Firms Become Persons and Persons Become Firms: neoliberal jurisprudence in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores
Date: Wednesday 01 July 2015 6.30pm
Location: Hong Kong Theatre, Clement House
Speaker: Professor Wendy Brown

On Monday 29 June at 6.30-8pm in the NAB.1.04
Speakers: Stephen Booth, Open Europe, Lucy Thomas (pictured), Business for New Europe, and Peter Wilding, British Influence

‘Influence’ is a key measure of a member state’s effectiveness within the collective decision making of the EU, but ‘influence’ is an elusive commodity which can be hard to measure. As the EU’s ‘awkward customer’, does Britain materially damage its national interests or is Britain’s track record as an EU agenda-setter more creditable than it is often given credit for? A panel of experts will debate the issue.

This event is free and open to all. Admission is on a first come, first served basis. More
 

Would ‘Brexit’ spell the end of European defence?

On Tuesday 30 June at 6.30-8pm in the NAB 1.04
Speakers: Dr Claire Chick (pictured), Franco-British Council, Dr Bastian Giegerich, International Institute for Strategic Studies, and Professor Karen Smith, LSE

Britain and France are nuclear powers, partners in NATO and the EU, permanent members of the UN Security Council, and are Europe’s leading security actors. Together they represent the EU’s best (only?) hope of building a Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) and, finally, sharing with the US the burden of collective Western defence in an increasingly unstable and dangerous world. Britain and France have taken major steps to pool their defence capabilities. What do they need to do to be more effective global security actors? A panel of defence and foreign policy experts will debate the options.

On Thursday 2 July at 6.30-8pm in the Wolfson Theatre, New Academic Building
Speaker: Michael Maccoby (pictured); Panelists: Marc Stears, Mari Sako; Moderator: Stefan Stern

Leadership training is big business around the globe. But can leadership really be taught? What does it take to lead nations, global cities, and corporations today with declining authority and sceptical populations?

Twitter hashtag: #LSELeaders

On until Saturday 11 July in the Atrium Gallery, Old Building (Mon-Fri 10am-8pm; Sat 12-5pm)

This exhibition, in association with LSE Arts, showcases the most stimulating and challenging responses to Theatrum Mundi’s 2015 ideas competition 'Designing the Urban Commons'.

You are invited to lunchtime Praise and Worship sessions with LSE Rejoice every Friday at 12-1pm in the LSE Faith Centre, second floor of Saw Swee Hock Student Centre.