Commenting on the announcement that Professor Chris Husbands has been awarded a knighthood in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List 2018 for his services to higher education, Liz Bromley, Acting CEO of University Alliance, said:
“This is a much-deserved knighthood for Chris, who has been a driving force in improving teaching standards and transforming students’ lives throughout his career. Alongside his pioneering leadership role as Vice-Chancellor of Sheffield Hallam University – one of the UK’s largest universities and currently a member of University Alliance – Chris has continued to advance the quality of teaching throughout the sector as the inaugural chair of the Teaching Excellence Framework.
“This honour is a compelling recognition of the enormous contribution he has made and I am delighted to congratulate him on behalf of University Alliance.”
Two other members of staff at Sheffield Hallam University have received OBEs in recognition for their services to health and education.
Professor Laura Serrant, who has been named as one of the UK’s most influential people of African and Caribbean heritage in the 2018 Powerlist, qualified as a nurse in 1986 from the then Sheffield City Polytechnic (now Sheffield Hallam University) and was the first person in her family to go to university. She has been recognised in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List for her work on health disparities, and on supporting the needs of marginalised communities, which has directly informed policy development in the UK and internationally.
The list also awarded the university’s Professor Sam Twiselton an OBE, one of the UK’s leading academics in teacher education. She has directly influenced government policy around teacher training and development and was a member of the advisory panel for the Department for Education (DfE) Carter Review of Initial Teacher Training in England.
Sam also founded and established the University’s Sheffield Institute of Education as a leading national centre of education research and practice and it is now one of the UK’s top five providers of teachers with over 700 new teachers entering the classroom each year.
Read more about Chris, Laura and Sam’s achievements here.
A researcher from the University of Portsmouth was also awarded an MBE in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List for his services to youth work and education. Dr Simon Edwards, a senior lecturer in youth studies at the university, works with young people who have been involved in crime, excluded from school or struggle generally during their teenage years. His research focuses on pupils who have withdrawn from mainstream education and endeavours to re-engage them in education.
Simon, who left school with few qualifications, began his career as a baker. He became involved in youth work after helping people on the council housing estates where he lived and was invited to become a paid youth worker and encouraged to study for a degree in youth and community work and applied theology. He later continued his studies for a PhD before embarking on a teaching career. You can read more about Simon’s journey here.
Notes to editors
The full Queen’s Birthday Honours List 2018 can be found here
