Minutes of the Steering Committee on 20 May 2008

THE RANK FELLOWSHIP

 

MINUTES OF THE STEERING COMMITTEE MEETING

 

HELD ON TUESDAY 20TH MAY 2008 AT WARWICK SQUARE

 

 

Present:                     Jason Chaffer – Chairman

 

Clive Baker, Stephen Day, Noomane Fehri, David McCausland, Fred Packard, Simon Turner, Emma Watson-Mack, Tim Young, Gill Zammett

 

Guests:                      June Casey, Paul Connolly, Eduardo Roma (Fundacao Estudar)

 

Apologies:                 Simon Barker, Lindsey Clay, Andrew Cowen, Duncan Gibson, Max Kirby, Kate Kynvin, Benet Northcote, Alastair Rolfe

 

1.       The Chairman opened the meeting and welcomed our guests for the evening.  Stephen Day has accepted the invitation to become an Honorary Rank Fellow and he spoke briefly about his career as British Ambassador to Tunisia and Qatar.  The Chairman also welcomed Simon Turner to the Steering Committee.

 

2.       The Minutes of the previous meeting held on 4th March 2008 had been circulated to all members.  There were two items arising from the Minutes not covered in this agenda.   Clive Baker had mentioned earlier offers of work experience from Fellows.   Tim Young had now traced these offers on the Fellows’ database and would be following these up.    He also informed the Committee that the first state school Fellows had been approved by the April meeting of the Foundation’s Youth & Education Committee.  The Minutes were then signed as correct.

 

3.       Fellowship Dinner, 18th March

 

The dinner at Clarke’s Restaurant had been enjoyed by all who attended.  It certainly achieved its objective of reconnecting a number of Fellows to the mission and activities of the Fellowship..  Subsequently there have been many offers to help in many ways, i.e. charitable, mentoring, serving on the Steering Committee.    Rupert Henson would be using his role as President of the Old Radleian Society to re-establish contact with a number of Fellows.

 

It was felt to be important to involve those who had attended the dinner in some specific task over the next year.   One way would be to address the Time and Talents charity in Bermondsey, as Tarka L’Herpiniere had done.

 

Max Kirby will be gathering a group of younger Fellows who would liaise with others at school and university.   This would allow those liaising with a cohort of younger Fellows to let their flow of emails end after the first year at university.

 

Fred Packard mentioned the need to keep contact with Fellows as they left school and suggested an end of school term celebration for all School Fellows in London at the end of A levels.   This was felt to be an excellent idea if logistical difficulties could be overcome: School Fellows could be sounded out at the Leadership Day in September.

 

 

4.         Charities Team

 

          PR/Marketing Workshop/15th May at Thinkbox 

Six charities participated in the workshop which had proved to be a very worthwhile exercise. Clive Baker gave an interesting account of the proceedings and an analysis of the completed evaluation forms was handed to members for their interest.  The charities were very keen for another workshop to be organised.  Thanks were expressed to Clive Baker, Lindsey Clay and Alastair Rolfe for this excellent event.

 

Fred Packard asked that a feedback paper be distributed to the Rank Trustees.  Fred Packard also suggested that it would be useful to have a specific target of three or four similar workshops during the course of a year: this was felt to be a good idea (as well as a challenging target), possibly with employment law and fund raising as future topics.

 

Clive Baker reported that the charity representatives had agreed that a “chat room” area on the website would be a a valuable opportunity to discuss any queries and issues they might have in common.

 

          Day of Action  

Max Kirby is taking final exams and therefore this event has been postponed until he has established his group of active young Fellows.

 

          Manchester Charities Evening – 20th November 

James Williams and Jennifer Stone are continuing to organise this event and invitations to charities are being sent out shortly.  James is due to take up a post in London but is still expecting to co-ordinate the northern event.  Tim Young and Gill Zammett are in regular contact with James Williams.

 

 

5.         Communications Team

 

          The Spring Newsletter has been sent out, slightly later than anticipated.  David McCausland explained that Graham Dell (Moore-Wilson) has left the company and that his successor, James Sampson, had encountered one or two small problems.

 

          The next edition of the Fellowship Review will be in January 2009.  Tim Young produced a list of possible articles for the next Review.   Larry Parsons has already written about the School Leadership Award Scheme.  Alastair Rolfe has not been approached as yet about production.

 

 

6.         Mentoring Team

 

          Leadership Day – 11th September at Paddington Arts  Arrangements and the programme for the day are in hand.  Further details of this event will be given at the next Steering Committee meeting in September.

 

          Goldman Sachs developments

Although the Global Leadership Awards were under the banner of the Goldman Sachs Foundation, they were organised by the Institute of International Education.   Jason Chaffer and Tim Young had met the directors of the IIE’s leadership programmes and discovered that their approach,  values and objectives mirrored those of the Fellowship.

Rank Fellow Paul Holland had received a Goldman Sachs Global Leadership Award and Tim Young had attended the presentation.  

 

Fred Packard asked how contact with the IIE might benefit the Fellowship.   Both Jason Chaffer and Tim Young felt that this would add to the Fellowship’s international network and provide opportunities for individual Fellows.

 

 

7.         Regional Developments

 

James Williams’ move to London would necessitate some rethinking of the Fellowship’s northern group: the Manchester Charities Evening would give an opportunity to pursue this further.

 

8.         Overseas Links

 

Eduardo Roma and David McCausland spoke about the continuing link with Fundacao Estudar, particularly with three FE graduates now working in London.

 

Stephen Day spoke about the background to Qatar’s huge investment in education and how further links might be developed with the Fellowship.   A successful visit had been undertaken in February by Fred Packard, Stephen Day and Tim Young. 

 

In reply to a question from Fred Packard about progress, Tim Young confirmed that Eton were in touch with Georgetown University (Qatar) about attending the Model UN Conference next January.   Tim Young and Stephen Day would be meeting the Cultural Attache at the Qatar Emnbassy the next day.   Getting a Fellow to a course of study at the Qatar Foundation would be difficult, but Tim Young and Stephen Day were hopeful that there could be Fellowship representation at the major Doha conference in May 2009, particularly with the assistance of Qatar’s Ambassador in London.

 

Noomane Fehri spoke about the school sponsorship scheme in Tunisia, involving Ramla Jarrar and the LMS.   Fred Packard had been generous in his personal support of the scheme and Tim Young was happy to help with advice, given that the scheme mirrored the Rank Foundation’s Leadership Award.

 

9.         Any other business

 

A North African feast had been very kindly provided by Latifa Fehri and this was hugely enjoyed by everyone, along with some excellent wine provided by Fred Packard.  Jason Chaffer presented Latifa with a bouquet of flowers and thanked her for the delicious Tunisian food.

 

10.      Date of next meeting – Tuesday 9 September – venue to be confirmed