Oh, what a night!

The annual event, organised by the Philanthropy & Alumni Engagement team, applauds the academic successes and enterprising endeavours of students and staff. As well as funding recipients, a range of donors were in attendance including alumni, friends of the university and representatives from local companies and charities.

The evening provided an opportunity to thank university supporters for their generosity and to demonstrate the wide ranging impact of philanthropy.

During the last academic year, prizes and awards worth just under £325,000 were given to student and staff recipients – these included a grant for the Formula Student racing team, scholarships for new international students, awards to facilitate new student volunteering projects, prizes for top performing undergraduate students, sports scholarships for elite athletes and enterprise growth funding for students and staff seeking to build on new business ideas.

One milestone celebrated at the event was the 10^th anniversary of Santander Universities, the charitable arm of Banco Santander, which has been supporting higher education across the globe for 10 years. The university joined the Santander Universities network in 2008 and since then, donations worth over £1million have been given to support a range of activities and to enrich the experiences of students, staff and local partners alike. Before the event began, the fourth funding agreement was signed and a commemorative book was presented to Santander Universities highlighting their impact over the past decade.

Professor Debra Humphris, the university’s Vice-Chancellor, in her welcome, said activities and achievements reflected the University’s core values of inclusivity, sustainability, creativity and partnership. She highlighted the importance of external engagement: “Events like this  illustrate just how talented our students and staff are – and indeed how involved our alumni, friends and partners continue to be, which will be key to our future success.”

Some recipients gave speeches, including Gerry McDonnell-Fletcher, a second-year BSc(Hons) in Computer Science student who spoke about his merit scholarship: “I want to take a moment to thank every single person in this room for making this possible. It's delightful to know the university actively recognises the hard work that students put in, and it's so motivating to be a recipient.”

Nadage Sabatier, now in her final year on the BA(Hons) in Education, won a merit scholarship and a Breakthrough Award and told the audience that she “…chose to come to the University of Brighton because it has a fantastic reputation and my experience confirms this. I am very grateful to the staff who work on my degree, their humanistic approach is truly inspirational. Receiving the award has made a difference for me because English is not my mother tongue and achieving high grades and being given an award exceeded my expectations.”

Fatma Al Khalifin, an international scholarship recipient from Oman who has recently started a Masters in Philosophy of Language, said: “A scholarship is not just about the financial support, it’s a message of appreciation, encouragement and all sorts of support for the learner.”

Guest of Honour was Maureen Chowen, High Sheriff of East Sussex. Maureen and her husband, Michael Chowen CBE DL, are long-standing supporters of the university and the Brighton and Sussex Medical School, and have donated to a number of research projects, to nursing in developing countries and to the recent British Science Festival.

Maureen said: “What we enjoy most as donors is the opportunity to become involved with so many different projects and to help a wide range of students and staff. Universities – and especially the University of Brighton – work on a variety of very important matters, ones that are so relevant to the challenges faced by society today.”