As many of you may know, our OD Ambassador, Dr Murray has been awarded a scholarship to spend academic, research time in Cambridge.  There he will be researching in The Pythagorus, the archives at St John's college.  So for the next few months our loss is going to be their great gain. 

This experience can only be described as a fully immersive one!  Dr Murray will be staying in E1, Chapel Court,  in the very heart of St John's College, Cambridge for the entire duration of his stay.  As a visiting fellow he will be participating fully in the life of the college where he will eat, sleep, work and even go to worship at the Anglican Chapel of St Johns. 

While he is away, we will certainly miss having direct access to his wisdom, knowledge and great sense of humour.  We already look forward to his return.  Since Dr Murray's appointment, we have all seen a surge of activity.  He certainly has a full calendar and the invitations for him to attend events at Bishops and further afield keep coming in.  

This evening Dr Murray leaves for England and just before he left we asked him how he was enjoying his new role and his thoughts on developing it over the next period.  

As part of my experiences of the first two months as the OD Ambassador, I have really enjoyed the work that is related to the position.  I really want to thank everyone for their kind support,  and for supporting each other and the ODU and thus the future of the school.  Communicating with all the Branches is going to be one of the most important tasks for me on my return from Cambridge.  

For this I have already had several meetings with the committee member designated with this task.  I am looking forward to further discussions about this, when in the UK.  Already I have started to make contact with ODs who live around the world with a view of such contact and building relationships, further.  

Another thing that I would also like to do, is to ensure that the Mentee programme is updated so all who are involved are happy to share their experiences with younger ODs building careers. 

Lastly I am committed to working with the school to see how going forward the network can function for the benefit of all ODs and the Bishops Community.

These are some exciting projects that we are looking forward to working on with Dr Murray on his return. 

Paul will be staying in St John's College Cambridge as the Visiting Colenso Fellow until March 2023, and would like to meet informally with ODs whilst there, where possible and where the schedule allows.  Unsurprisingly, there are already a number of events written up in the diary.  

Please feel free to contact him at pmurray@bishops.org.za or on 0835159526.