Somerville College

Huge congratulations to everyone receiving their A Level results today! We hope you’re really proud of yourselves. If you’re joining us at Somerville in October, we absolutely cannot wait to meet you. We have a feeling you’re going to like it here. ❤️🖤

New BBC drama The Rapture has come out at the perfect time, with its themes of extreme heat and a looming climate apocalypse. Somervillian Liz Jensen (1978, English) wrote the 2009 novel which inspired the show, before going on to co-found the Extinction Rebellion Campaign group Writers Rebel. She joined us to discuss the BBC’s adaptation of her novel, cli-fi, and what comes next. https://www.some.ox.ac.uk/news/meet-the-somervillian-writer-behind-the-bbcs-the-rapture/

Last month we said a bittersweet goodbye to some of our brilliant Sanctuary Scholars, who are finishing their studies at Oxford. It has been so wonderful having Senay G. Mengistu, Hadeel Mohammed, Zainab Abdeen, and Fatema D. Ahmadi become part of our community over the past year, and we wish them the absolute best of luck with their next steps!

We’re very proud of our MCR, who organised a donation drive at the end of Trinity term. Students donated clothes, shoes, reusable bottles, bedsheets, blankets, puffers, and many more items, which have now all been given to Sobell House Hospice Shop on Little Clarendon Street. MCR Enviromental Rep, Ashima Gulati, is pictured here with fellow MCR member, Texas Dongare, and a volunteer from Sobell House. We hope this great initiative can become an annual tradition!

Yesterday we welcomed Somerville College Choir back to the UK after their spectacular tour in China, which spanned 17 days, 10 concerts, 7 cities and 8 hotels! We will be sharing a full report from the trip soon, but for now enjoy these little snaps of life on tour, including Will Dawes appearing on Chengdu Today!

Our Development Director Sara Kalim travelled to the Royal Courts of Justice today with two of our Sudanese Sanctuary Scholars, Zeinab and Hadeel. They were there to give evidence in a landmark case challenging the Home Office’s “emergency brake” on student visas.

As a College of Sanctuary, we believe in extending the promise of an Oxford education to bright students of any background whose futures are threatened by conflict or forced displacement. We were strongly opposed to the Home Office’s decision to introduce an arbitrary “emergency brake” on student visas for nationals of Afghanistan, Cameroon, Myanmar and Sudan from 26 March 2026. We remain committed to safeguarding access to education for all, and have been proud to give support to the Visa Brake Challenge led by law firms deighton pierce glynn and Duncan Lewis Solicitors with representation from Ahmed Aydeed, solicitor and advisor to Somerville College’s Sanctuary Programme, and barrister Raza Husain KC.

It was an absolute pleasure to welcome our honorary fellow Sir Simon Russell Beale to lunch in Somerville today. We hope to see him again soon for more conversation and shared inspirational!

Somerville College Choir have been having an incredible time on tour in China, where they performed in the 18th China International Chorus Festival in Beijing - one of the most prestigious choral events in the world! From there, they’ve been travelling around, from Chongqing to Chengdu to Xi’an, performing lots of concerts (number 7 today!) as well as doing lots of exploring. We can’t wait to hear all about it when they’re back!

We are absolutely delighted to share the news that our Fellow & Tutor in International Relations, Professor Patricia Owens has been confirmed as a fellow of the British Academy. Election to its Fellowship is the highest honour that the British Academy confers on UK residents, recognising exceptional scholarly distinction in the humanities and social sciences.

https://www.some.ox.ac.uk/news/professor-owens-elected-to-fellowship-of-the-british-academy/