Jesus College Strategic Plan 2023 - 2027

Jesus College 

Strategic Plan 2023 - 2027

Contents 

04 The Principal’s Welcome 

08 Academic Strategy 

14 Access and Outreach 

Jesus College’s last Strategic Plan covered the five years 

from 2017 -2021. In light of the COVID-19 pandemic, 

it was agreed by the Governing Body that the College 

would extend the plan’s lifecycle into the academic year 

2021/2022. The achievements and data presented in 

this document reflect that one-year extension, and the 

College’s new strategic objectives cover the next five 

years, from 2023 - 2027. 

18 Sports and the Arts 

22 Our People 

26 Equality, Diversity and Inclusion 

30 Key Facts and Figures 

32 Infrastructure 

36 Sustainability 

40 The Cheng Kar Shun Digital Hub 

44 Development 

48 Communications 

52 Finance 

56 Governance

5 

The Principal’s 

Welcome 

Beyond our Elizabethan heritage and our 

outstanding academic community, one of Jesus 

College’s greatest qualities is our ability to 

respond to globally-critical challenges as they 

emerge, while also continuing to value and 

support research that engages with what it is 

to be human in the context of history, literature, 

language, and the arts. 

The past six years have seen extraordinary global events 

unfold: the COVID-19 pandemic, the impact on lives 

wrought by climate change, Brexit, and the war in Ukraine. 

In facing these challenges, the University has consistently 

justified its position at the top of the Times Higher Education 

Global Ranking. It delivered novel vaccines for COVID-19, 

accelerated research towards global zero carbon targets, and 

increased the scale and scope of its central research fund to 

grow capacity to pump-prime and match-fund major research 

initiatives in critical areas. 

The breadth and depth of Jesus’ academic expertise in 

tackling real-world problems also continues to inspire. Our 

exceptional researchers lead and support the international 

research agenda across disciplines, countries and continents; 

driving advances in knowledge, creativity and innovation. 

However, there is no doubt that global events have 

impacted our community deeply and, as we set our strategic 

objectives for the next five years, we do so with an enhanced 

understanding of the unpredictability of the world we 

currently live in, and what really matters to our people. 

Our academic community has grown significantly since the last 

Strategic Plan. The College Fellowship has expanded by 34% 

(from 82 to 110), and our student numbers have risen by 27% 

(from 566 to 718). Oxford’s exemplary tutorial system continues 

to play a central role in our students’ learning experience here 

at Jesus, and we are delighted to have welcomed many new 

tutors who are experts in their field. As we go forward, we will 

consolidate this growth in our community and remain agile in our 

response to changing needs in higher education and research in 

the 21st century. 

Jesus is an outstanding Oxford college 

which attracts the very best students 

and holds its Fellows, staff and alumni 

in the highest regard. We are proud of 

our history and excited for the future. 

It is a mark of the seriousness with which we take our 

responsibility to become more sustainable, and our commitment 

to equality, diversity and inclusivity, that we are featuring both 

as strategic priorities. We will work harder to embed inclusivity 

across all aspects of College life and continue to seek out and 

support the brightest young people, no matter what their 

background. We will also embark on projects to improve 

accessibility on our historical site, and address the University’s 

challenge of becoming net zero carbon by 2035.

6 STRATEGIC PLAN 2023 – 2027 

7 

The pandemic has provided a catalyst for accelerating 

digital transformation in higher education; there is 

now huge momentum to deliver a more creative and 

innovative learning experience for university students, and 

an opportunity to utilise the latest digital research tools 

and methodologies to transform research. In this regard, 

Jesus is ahead of the curve. 

The integrated digital facilities in our new Cheng Yu Tung 

Building, and the Digital Hub specifically, will enable our 

students and academics across all subjects and disciplines 

to harness the latest technologies and methods to 

enhance both learning and discovery. 

Now, in the midst of the current costof-living 

crisis, our strategic objectives 

must continue to be supported by 

pragmatic financial decision-making. 

We do not take our financial position 

for granted. Fundraising will remain 

key to delivering our core purpose 

and activities going forward, and 

the continued support of our Old 

Members and friends of the College 

will be invaluable as we look to the 

next five years. 

Going forward, we aim to maximise the opportunities 

presented by the Hub to benefit the needs of our 

community, the wider academic research community, the 

general public and the young people who participate in 

our access programmes. 

We are very fortunate to have an alumni community that 

supports our ambitions, and the successful completion 

of the Cheng Yu Tung Building, and the ten-year 450th 

Anniversary campaign to raise £45m towards academic 

priorities, has been a great cause for celebration across 

College. As ever, we are extremely grateful to all our 

alumni and friends for their generosity. 

Professor Sir Nigel Shadbolt FRS FREng FBCS 

Principal of Jesus College, Oxford 

Our students are already embracing the opportunities 

provided by the new Cheng Yu Tung Building. 

The walkway between the College’s old and new buildings. 

JESUS COLLEGE OXFORD

8 

STRATEGIC PLAN 2023 – 2027 9 

Our Academic 

Strategy 

Achievements 2017-2022 

Our primary mission is to deliver academic 

excellence in our teaching and research, 

and provide a transformative educational 

experience for our students. We place the 

success, welfare, and happiness of the College 

community at the heart of everything we do. 

Our 2017-2022 Academic Strategy set out a series 

of bold plans to develop new spaces in which our 

academics and students could thrive; to improve 

support for Tutorial Fellows; increase financial support 

for students (especially postgraduates); support the 

development of our students’ skills sets; and to improve 

resourcing for the Academic Office. Despite the 

pandemic and its short-term impact on College life, 

we have delivered these objectives. The College has 

grown both in size and ambition, not least with the 

development of the Cheng Yu Tung Building, and the 

addition of many outstanding new academics to the 

Fellowship. 

Delivering academic excellence 

in teaching and research 

The postgraduate facilities, built around a new raised Fourth 

Quad, provide practical and comfortable spaces in which our 

students can live, study and socialise, with 68 ensuite rooms, 

spacious communal kitchens, and a new Postgraduate Study 

Room. 

The building is centred around the Cheng Kar Shun Digital Hub 

– an exceptional learning and research facility for the digital age. 

Unique to Jesus, the Digital Hub will harness the latest digital 

technologies and research methodologies to bring both College 

members and wider academia together, facilitating knowledge 

exchange, encouraging interdisciplinarity and innovation, and 

enhancing our work in access and public engagement. 

Expanding and supporting the Fellowship 

Over the past six years, our Fellowship has grown from 82 to 

110, at all levels and across disciplines. 

In 2019, we welcomed Professor Dirk Van Hulle to the newlycreated 

post of Professor of Bibliography and Modern Book 

History. In 2020, a successful £3.5m fundraising campaign led 

to the restoration and permanent endowment of the Jesus 

Chair of Celtic. In March of the same year, the then Prince 

of Wales visited College to celebrate the restoration of the 

Chair and meet Professor David Willis, the latest in a line of 

six Celtic scholars to have held this prestigious University post. 

More recently, we elected Professor Ben Goldacre MBE to the 

Fellowship. Ben is the first Bennett Professor of Evidence-Based 

Medicine, a new Statutory Chair that will provide academic 

leadership in the field of data science across the University. 

The endowment, funded by philanthropist Peter Bennett and 

his wife Desiree, also enables a series of four consecutive 

Junior Research Fellowships (JRFs) at Jesus to complement and 

support his work. 

His Majesty King Charles, then HRH The Prince of Wales, visited College 

in 2020 to celebrate the restoration of the Jesus Chair of Celtic. 

JRFs bring a wonderful combination of research excellence 

and exuberance to our academic community, and we 

prioritised growth in this area. In addition to the new Bennett 

scholars, we welcomed seven JRFs in subjects including 

Climate Science, Law, and Linguistics, co-funded a JRF in 

Mathematics, and have directly funded JRFs in Classics, Politics, 

and Philosophy. Of those JRFs whose time at Jesus has come 

to end, more than 90% have gone on to further academic 

employment at universities and research institutions across 

the globe. 

At mid-career level, we increased our number of Hugh Price 

Fellows and Senior Research Fellows from 18 to 21, with 

six more joining College at the start of the 2022/23 

academic year. 

Professor Renée B Adams, Senior Research Fellow and Professor 

of Finance at the Saïd Business School. 

The Cheng Yu Tung Building 

The Cheng Yu Tung Building, on the site of the old 

Northgate House, has added an additional 7641m 2 to 

our footprint. It houses bright and flexible teaching and 

study spaces, meeting rooms, postgraduate facilities, a 

cafe, and multifaith room. Fundraising for a new gym 

is underway. 


10 STRATEGIC PLAN 2023 – 2027 

11 

We added five endowed or funded Tutorial Fellows 

in Biology, Computer Science (x2), and Linguistics and 

Philosophy, and continued to support our Tutorial Fellows 

(TFs) to manage the multiple demands on their time, 

including the creation of a Postgraduate Assistant Scheme, 

and increases to the Official Fellows’ Allowance and Major 

Research Grants. 

Thanks to the efforts of the Development Office, we raised 

funds to support six Career Development Fellows (CDFs) 

in English, History, Engineering, and Music, as well as in 

Access and the Digital Hub. Our subject-based CDFs have 

enriched subject families, and provided additional support 

to our Tutorial Fellows. 

The membership of our Honorary Fellows (HFs) diversified 

with the election in 2020 of Tom Ilube CBE and Dame 

Jocelyn Bell-Burnell. In the future, we will continue this 

diversification by broadening the HF nomination process. 

Our students 

Our students are the beating heart of College life, and we 

are committed to providing them with exceptional teaching 

and extracurricular opportunities. 

The pandemic and subsequent restrictions on travel, sports 

and socialising proved challenging, but didn’t dent our JCR and 

MCR members’ strong sense of community, or their approach 

to study. 

Both our undergraduate and postgraduate student numbers 

have risen significantly over the past six years, and we also 

increased the number of part-time postgraduates, which has 

further diversified the College’s postgraduate community. 

Student numbers 2022 2016 

Undergraduates 384 332 

Postgraduates 298 230 

Part-time postgraduates 36 4 

Total number of students 718 566 

Financial support 

Financial support continues to be a priority as we strive to 

encourage more students from disadvantaged backgrounds to 

apply to Oxford. Our undergraduate bursary awards almost 

tripled in this period, thanks to generous funding by College 

alumni, and made a huge difference to students joining us from 

very low-income households. The figures speak for themselves: 

in 2016/17 the College awarded £38,000 in undergraduate 

bursaries, but by 2021/22 the figure was close to £100,000. 

We doubled the number 

of endowed postgraduate 

studentships from three to six, 

and currently directly fund 60 

postgraduates at £445k - an 

increase on 41 students at £180k 

in 2016. We also converted our 

four Writing-Up Scholarships to 

Writing-Up Grants, meaning all 

4th year postgraduates are now 

eligible to apply. 

In 2016/17 the 

College awarded 

£38,000 in 

undergraduate 

bursaries, but by 

2021/22 the figure 

was close to 

£100,000. 

Celebrating the end of Finals. 

Welfare, wellbeing, and skills 

In 2020, the College appointed a permanent Welfare Officer who, along with the wider 

Welfare Team, has provided exceptional student welfare support, especially during the 

pandemic. We also recruited a dedicated Disability & Grants Officer to support students 

with disabilities and short-term conditions, and those experiencing financial difficulties. 

To enhance our students’ skills, we created a student mentoring scheme, delivered by 

postgraduates, and offered work experience and internships through our Access programme. 

There is further work to be done in this area - especially for those students joining us from 

disadvantaged backgrounds, and those who do not have English as a first language, and so a 

new Inreach programme will be initiated as part of our future plans. 

Academic Office 

The Academic Office continued to work at full capacity to enhance, promote and protect 

College’s core academic purpose. The Office moved many of its resources online and 

introduced a new online portal to receive academic job applications, all submissions related 

to undergraduate admissions, and funding applications. It also digitised our student records 

archive and is currently working towards the total digitisation of all student records. 

The relatively rapid growth of both our student and academic staff communities over the 

past six years led to a substantive review of the department’s resourcing needs. As a result, 

we recruited a new Academic Registrar to support the work of the Academic Director, in 

addition to the new Disability & Grants Officer. 

Kirren Mahmood, the 

College’s Welfare Officer. 


12 


Our Academic Strategy 

The next five years 

Academic excellence will of course remain 

central to our purpose. As we begin to explore 

the academic opportunities presented by our new 

building and its facilities, we will work to enhance 

the lively and innovative interdisciplinary research 

environment that is so special to Jesus, and adopt 

a flexible approach to changing needs in higher 

education. 

Size and shape 

Over the next five years, we aim to consolidate the progress 

we have made in terms of the size and constituency of the 

College Fellowship, taking into account the increase this year 

in the number of Senior Research Fellows, Hugh Price Fellows, 

and Junior Research Fellows. 

Dr Bettina Ip, Hugh Price Fellow in Neuroscience, joined 

College in 2022. 

The same approach will apply to our student body, although 

we will continue to remain agile to changing academic needs. 

For example, we will monitor closely and respond as required, 

to developments in the Medical Sciences Division, given 

the possibility that the Government may wish increase the 

number of university places available to train doctors. 

Support for Tutorial Fellows and Lecturers 

Buy-out for new Tutorial Fellows 

Workload remains a concern for our Tutorial Fellows (TFs) 

at all levels. To support our newest TFs, we will offer them a 

degree of buy-out. A minimum offer comprises a two-hour 

buy-out for the first two years in post. This will allow new TFs 

to get up to speed on their teaching whilst also allowing them 

to maintain their research. 

Those with caring responsibilities 

We want to ensure that academic life is equitable for those 

with caring responsibilities. For members with children of 

nursery age (0-4 years), College will continue to support 

priority places at University nurseries, and a fund will be 

established to help the additional childcare costs necessitated 

by research e.g. when travelling to a conference or on 

fieldwork. We will also work to manage the number of College 

academic activities and events that take place outside of regular 

office hours. 

Supporting early-career researchers (ECRs) 

We plan to increase our ECR numbers, and build a supportive 

research culture in which they can develop their academic skills. 

To oversee this progression, the new Academic Registrar will 

work to ensure that they receive the academic support they 

need, and facilitate activities and events to nurture a sense of 

community when they first join College. 

Research Associates 

For ECRs, the opportunity for peer-to-peer networking and 

academic mentoring is invaluable. We plan to create a new 

type of association for ECRs under the working title ‘Research 

Associate’. This will give up to 30 postdoctoral researchers 

a Jesus College affiliation, enabling direct contact with other 

colleagues working in the same or other disciplines, and 

opportunities to have meaningful interactions with members of 

the SCR. MCR postdocs would also be encouraged to become 

a Research Associate. 

In return, we expect them to take on a small number 

of College advisees, and will prioritise offering Associate 

membership to those in fields where we are short of 

Advisors relative to the number of postgraduates we have. 

More Junior Research and Career Development Fellows 

Both our Junior Research Fellows (JRFs) and Career 

Development Fellows (CDFs) remain essential contributors 

to the College’s academic and cultural life, and we will work 

with the Development Office to raise funds to secure more 

such posts. In particular, we propose to establish a CDF in 

Study Skills who would oversee a programme of student skills 

development on topics such as time-management, writing, 

presentation, and how to approach assessed work, especially 

dissertations. In the case of JRFs, we will seek to offer both 

stipendiary and non-stipendiary Fellowships, although 

postdoctoral researcher support through stipendiary posts 

will be prioritised. 

A Working Group will be established to consider the creation 

of a Community Fellowship, to build our engagement with 

community stakeholders who represent the values and 

objectives that College promotes. 

Our Students 

Academic skills support 

In addition to the CDF in Study Skills, we will continue to 

offer specialist subject support through the Postgraduate 

Assistant Scheme. 

Undergraduate inreach 

The Access and Outreach Team will develop an inreach 

programme to support our most disadvantaged students 

when they join College. This programme aims to help them 

to build confidence in their abilities and skills set by providing 

opportunities such as paid access work and professional 

skills development, connecting them to relevant alumni and 

businesses that support our access projects. 

Postgraduates 

Ensuring that all those with the potential to excel in 

postgraduate studies at Oxford can do so, regardless of 

background, is vital to both the University’s academic success 

and its reputation. However, obtaining and maintaining 

funding for doctoral research remains challenging. Having 

significantly enhanced the College’s postgraduate facilities with 

the development of the Cheng Building, we will continue to 

build momentum in our fundraising efforts for postgraduate 

support – whether that’s fully funded or co-funded places. 

We will also continue to offer studentships in areas where 

we want to attract more students, for example the Academic 

Futures studentships (which College now co-funds), and 

support the University’s UNIQ+ Research Internships 

programme. 

Our Libraries and Archives 

The Cheng Building provides many new spaces in which our 

students can study. These study spaces are fully accessible, 

open plan, and include a range of desks for laptop work and 

informal seating areas for reading and reflection. 

Strategically, our focus now turns towards exploring 

opportunities for more extensive and integrated library 

facilities in College, in order to improve accessibility, layout and 

functionality. Our first step, as outlined in the Infrastructure 

Strategy (pages 34-35) is to undertake a review of our 

existing library facilities – especially the Meyricke Library – to 

establish how best to move forward. 

Undergraduates working in the Upper Meyricke Library. 

To maximise our ability to make the most of our library 

collections, and improve the student experience, we plan to 

recruit a professionally-qualified Deputy Librarian who will 

take responsibility for acquisitions, cataloguing, and circulation. 

A larger team will enable the Librarian to make full use of 

their expertise in rare books and digitisation, secure business 

continuity, and enable the libraries to develop new services, 

including information skills training and outreach, to potential 

students and Old Members. 

We will also create a long-term plan for the complete 

digitisation and cataloguing of our collection of medieval 

manuscripts and early printed books, in order to make 

these widely accessible to members of our community and 

researchers across the world. 


14 


Access and 

Outreach 

Opportunity and equity of 

experience for all students 


Access and outreach remains a priority for the College. 

We firmly believe that a university education at Oxford, or 

other leading universities across the UK, should be open to 

anyone with the academic ability and potential to benefit 

from it. 

Young learners take a tour of Oxford as part of an 

access visit in 2021. 

Dr Matthew Williams, Access Fellow, who leads our 

Access and Outreach work. 

Over the past six years, our access and outreach programmes expanded 

significantly, and we now engage with over 12,500 young people annually 

across our link regions of Wales, Lambeth and Wandsworth. 

In collaboration with the Welsh Government’s Seren programme, we 

piloted our first Summer School for 22 academically-gifted students from 

Welsh state schools in 2017. Thanks to a £1m gift from alumnus Oliver 

Thomas (2000, BA Economics) and his family to endow the summer 

Jeremy Miles MS, Minister for Education and Welsh Language, 

meets Seren Summer School learners in College in 2021. 

schools, we now welcome 75 young learners 

annually to our residential week, and hundreds 

more to the online residential Summer School 

week, and hundreds more to the online version. 

Around one-fifth of all current Oxford students 

from Wales attended the residential Summer 

School. More than half of attendees at the 2022 

Summer School applied to Oxford. 

We became founding members 

of the Oxford-Cymru consortium, and 

led the University’s access initiative 

for pupils of Pakistani and Bangladeshi 

origin, which has been successful 

at reaching over 600 of these most 

underrepresented students. 

Our role in supporting the University’s access work also 

grew. In 2020, we became founding members of the 

Oxford-Cymru consortium, and led the University’s access 

initiative for pupils of Pakistani and Bangladeshi origin, 

which has been successful at reaching over 600 of these 

most under-represented students. We worked closely with 

the Brilliant Club, IntoUniversity, Universify Education and 

Target Oxbridge to further inspire and enable talented minds 

to reach extraordinary futures, and appointed an Access 

Assistant in 2019 to support our endeavours. 

As well as participating in the University’s Opportunity 

Oxford scheme to increase the number of disadvantaged 

students at Oxford, the College also committed to joining the 

new Astrophoria Foundation Year programme. This Oxford 

initiative is a one-year foundation programme for UK state 

school students with significant academic potential, who have 

experienced severe personal disadvantage and/or disrupted 

education that has resulted in them being unable to apply to 

the University. The course aims to motivate them to reach 

their academic potential through a supportive and challenging 

academic curriculum that develops their skills, self-belief and 

confidence. 

We also widened our reach by utilising digital communications 

tools, including social media and our Access YouTube channel; 

the most subscribed-to across Oxbridge with over 1.2 million 

views in the 2021/2022 academic year alone. 


16 

STRATEGIC PLAN 2023 – 2027 

17 

Access and Outreach 


Our Access and Outreach team will continue 

to deliver its outstanding work; offering a wide 

variety of access initiatives to state schools and 

colleges, and under-represented groups within 

our link regions. 

Contributing to the University’s Action 

and Participation Plan 

To ensure that the College is meeting or exceeding the 

University’s Access Agreement targets, as set out in its Action 

and Participation Plan, the Academic Office will produce an 

annual audit of College admissions by subject, comparing 

these figures to University-wide equivalents, and reporting 

every Michaelmas term to Academic Committee and 

Governing Body on our position relative to the University on 

key metrics, and for which subjects improvements need to 

be made. 

The Access and Outreach team will establish contact 

with all non-selective state schools in Wales, Lambeth and 

Wandsworth to describe our minimum offering (one online 

or in-person access event) and signpost these schools to our 

digital resources. We will also sustain our existing targeted 

programmes for West Wales, Women in Sciences, and British 

Bangladeshi and Pakistani students. 

Postgraduate access 

Providing access support to postgraduate students is an 

emerging priority, and we will look to invest in additional 

resources to support a wider postgraduate access 

programme: possibly a part-time position or internship in 

this area. We will also continue to support the University’s 

UNIQ+ Research Internships, which are designed to provide 

UK students from under-represented and disadvantaged 

backgrounds with the opportunity to experience 

postgraduate study. To reach more potential doctoral 

researchers, we plan to create new access videos about 

postgraduate life at Jesus and the University for our access 

YouTube channel. 

Digital outreach 

Building on the success of our access YouTube channel, we 

will work with the Communications Manager to explore 

new opportunities for targeted digital engagement with the 

young people we are trying to reach. We plan to expand our 

YouTube channel outputs by offering study skills videos, and 

including more content produced by our undergraduate and 

postgraduate members. 

Utilising the facilities in the Digital Hub, we will introduce a 

podcast series for prospective students, and one for teachers, 

and develop hybrid access events such as for Women in 

Sciences and the British Bangladeshi and Pakistani outreach 

programme. 

Widening participation 

We intend to work to widen participation in higher 

education for the most socio-economically disadvantaged 

groups and individuals. This work will not only involve 

improving applications and diversity at Oxford, but also 

targeted engagement with those for whom Oxford is 

not a desirable or realistic prospect. Such activities attain 

significant indirect benefits by emotionally connecting 

with communities that have little or no sustained 

relationship with Oxford. 

Specifically, within the next five years we intend to 

develop sustained programmes (10 hours in at least two 

non-continuous sessions) for young students aged 10-16 

who are on free school meals, students who are careexperienced, 

and disabled students. We also intend to 

develop programmes for mature students. 

Undergraduate inreach 

Our students join us from a wide range of backgrounds 

and life experiences. We are committed to ensuring that 

every Jesus student has an equitable journey during their 

time at the College; one that builds their confidence, life 

skills and ambitions. 

Seren Summer School learners listen to a talk in the 

Sheldonian Theatre. 

As identified in the Academic Strategy, to achieve equity of 

student experience we plan to develop and launch a new 

inreach programme to support our most disadvantaged 

students when they join College. The establishment of a 

professionalised student ambassador programme with the 

JCR will enables these student to develop their career skills, 

receive training in education, public speaking and media 

production, and take on paid work across our access events. 

Student ambassadors at our University Open Day. 

In 2022, the JCR established its own Access website, with 

written and video content that provides student-focused 

resources for prospective undergraduates. In the future, the 

College will look to support this website by advertising its 

existence widely and assisting with the development of new 

content. 

Impact assessment 

To ensure that our work is resource-efficient and effective 

in meeting our goals, we will develop more detailed impact 

assessment criteria for key stages 2-5, with differentiated 

metrics for years 12 and 13. 

We will use feedback questionnaires developed from 

these criteria to test the effectiveness of our offering. By 

integrating our own impact assessments with systems 

used across the higher education sector, we can bolster 

our understanding of the efficacy of access work on a 

wider scale. 


18 


The Principal continued to host termly musical soirées in 

the Lodgings. More recently the College, in partnership with 

the Faculty of Music and Saïd Business School, welcomed its 

inaugural Visiting Professor in Music Business. This new role 

is designed to recognise the achievements and contribution 

of diverse figures across the music industry, and to forge 

connections between students and academics in the 

University and the wider music industry. 

Sports and 

the Arts 

Jesus students won Blues 

across many sports, most 

recently in rugby, golf 

and rowing, and we saw 

Cuppers wins in basketball, 

football and more. 

As the University’s only Elizabethan college, it seemed fitting 

that Jesus took the lead on a project to bring the works 

of Shakespeare to new audiences. In 2021, the Access and 

Outreach team, in collaboration with the Development Office, 

launched the Jesus Shakespeare Project, which aims to bring 

Shakespeare to wider audiences, and to young people especially, 

by presenting accessible and abridged versions of his plays. So 

far this unique project has reached over 400 people of all ages, 

with more productions in the pipeline for 2023/24. 

The cast of the Jesus Shakespeare Project’s production 

of The Two Gentlemen of Verona. 

At governance level, the Arts and Chattels Standing Committee 

continued to address issues (loan, display, maintenance) 

pertaining to the College’s existing collection of 

books, manuscripts, paintings and other arts chattels. 


Sporting and cultural endeavours provide an 

opportunity for members of our community 

to come together, whether that’s cheering 

on the Jesus College Boat Club (JCBC) 

at Summer Eights, or enjoying one of the 

Principal’s termly musical soirées. 

Sports 

We continued to encourage wide participation in 

sporting activities across the College and, in addition to 

to traditional sports, we now have amalgamated clubs in 

billiards, ice skating, hockey, and even cheerleading. Jesus 

students won Blues across many sports, most recently 

in rugby, golf and rowing, and we saw Cuppers wins in 

basketball, football and more. Sporting successes, no 

matter how big or small, are celebrated at the annual 

student Sports Dinner and, with an ever-increasing 

number of sports represented in College, every seat 

in Hall was taken for the 2022 event. The College 

Development Fund continued to provide invaluable 

support for our sports teams, funding new kit every 

year. The JCBC received annual funding for coaching, 

travel equipment and competition entry fees. 

The annual Oxford Town and Gown 10km race 

remained a popular event for College runners, with a 

team of 26 taking part in 2022. 

Arts and cultural life 

Despite the pandemic, the cultural life of the 

College continued to thrive, with a range 

of clubs and societies across the arts and 

literature. We have a small but active student 

community of poets, writers, musicians, and 

visual artists, as well as the Chapel Choir. The 

size and level of commitment of the College’s 

artistic community inevitably fluctuates from 

year to year, but the student-led Turl Street 

Arts Festival, held in conjunction with Lincoln 

and Exeter Colleges, continues to be a 

highlight of each Hilary term. 

The Chapel Choir, while founded as an 

adjunct and support to religious worship, also 

represents an artistic voice in College. 

A generous £125k donation from two alumni 

created the Cantorion Jesu Fund, which 

supports the funding of our Chapel Music 

Coordinator and the Jesus College Choir. 

Under the Music Coordinator’s guidance, the 

Choir has gone from strength to strength, 

and now has over 70 members. We currently 

have three Organ Scholars, who help to 

organise and direct the music at Chapel 

services, and the Chaplain hosts lunchtime 

recitals and events each Thursday during 

term-time. 

Current and past members of Jesus College joined forces for the Dragon Boat Race 

with Water Aid in London in July 2022, in honour of the late alumnus Sean McGrady (1982). 


20 


Sports and the Arts 


With the Cheng Building now open, it’s an ideal 

time to consider the place of sports and the arts 

in the life of the College over the next five years. 

Upgrades and new sporting facilities 

To further encourage sporting pursuits in College, we will 

invest in infrastructure upgrades to our sports facilities. 

Specifically, we plan to make improvements to our tennis 

courts and the College boathouse. We will also raise funds 

to develop a new gym in the lower ground floor of 

the Cheng Building, and ensure that this and other new 

facilities and activities are made available at times suitable 

for everyone, including those members with childcare 

responsibilities, additional employment demands, and other 

restrictions on their time. 

Enhancing and supporting artistic endeavours 

Until now, the physical limitations of the historical site have 

meant we were unable to create, rehearse and host larger 

public performances or exhibitions. 

We will also create a new Arts Fund to support College 

members wishing to pursue arts projects, and consider the 

arts in the context of how they might support wellbeing for 

members of our community. 

The new Tower Room will host a display of artworks 

generously donated to the College by philanthropist and 

internationally renowned art collector Roasline Wong and, as 

part of the Digital Hub events programme, plans for digital 

art exhibitions are already underway. Complementary to 

this, we are shortly to welcome two contemporary artists as 

Short-term Visiting Fellows to the College. Over 12 months 

they will have access to Jesus’ people, buildings, libraries and 

archives with the aim of producing a new body of creative 

work that not only enhances our art collection, but inspires 

future artistic endeavours. 

The completion of the Cheng Building coincides with the 

start of construction of the Stephen A. Schwarzman Centre 

for the Humanities in the Radcliffe Observatory Quarter, 

which has a well-established Humanities Cultural Programme 

(HCP). We will consider how the College’s artistic ambitions 

might usefully align with the goals of the HCP, which 

include social impact, and developing connections between 

Humanities and AI. We will also learn from other successful 

models of arts and performance spaces and programmes, 

where the focus is on digitally-oriented work. 

In 2020, the College took part in the Photo Oxford Festival, 

featuring the work of Togolese-Italian photographer Silvia 

Rosi on the Cornmarket Street hoardings around the Cheng 

Building development. 

Yang Pei, a fourth-year DPhil student in Medical Sciences, 

won the Individual Men’s Recurve competition in the British 

Universities and College Sports Archery Championships in 

2022. 

However, the opening of the new building in a central 

location, with the Cheng Kar Shun Digital Hub as its 

centrepiece, provides the College with new and dynamic 

performance and artistic display spaces, and the opportunity 

to enhance public engagement in the arts. 

To oversee the next exciting steps in this journey, we will 

stand up the Arts Committee which the College resolved to 

establish before the pandemic. 

Our thriving College choir now has over 70 members. 


22 


Our People 

We have introduced an 

Employee Assistance 

Programme which 

offers confidential 

24/7 face-to-face or 

telephone counselling 

to all staff. 

Strategy Supporting and valuing our staff 


Jesus is now home to over 90 support staff 

and 150 academic staff, and we aim to create 

an environment in which the people who work 

for us thrive and succeed. Over the past five 

years, our focus has been on implementing 

initiatives across pay and performance, inclusion 

and wellbeing, in order to recruit and retain the 

best people. 

Pay and performance 

Since 2017, Jesus College has been accredited by, 

and a member of, the Living Wage Foundation, and 

we introduced an annual salary survey to review the 

competitiveness of our staff salaries in the University 

context. 

We rolled out an annual performance-based bonus system 

for our support staff, while the Remuneration Committee 

replaced the Housing Allowance given to Fellows with a more 

generous Official Fellows’ Allowance. 

We encourage our support staff to develop their skills 

and confidence, and implemented a written performance 

management system to enable line managers to carry out 

annual reviews for their team members. Managers receive 

ongoing HR support when required. 

Inclusion and wellbeing 

In the last Strategic Plan, we placed a strong emphasis on 

actions to enhance the wellbeing of our Fellows and support 

staff, and providing an inclusive environment where everyone 

feels valued, respected, and a part of the College community. 

We have introduced an Employee Assistance Programme 

which offers confidential 24/7 face-to-face or telephone 

counselling to all staff, as well as free annual flu jabs. During 

the first 18 months of the pandemic, we hosted a free 

COVID-19 vaccine clinic in College. 

We made steady progress in our inclusivity work, with the 

establishment of the Equality & Diversity Committee in 2020 

to provide strategic oversight and objectives, and we now 

produce an annual gender pay gap report for Government. 

While COVID-19 paused our plans for combined staff social 

events in 2020, we were delighted to welcome staff and their 

families to a weekend College brunch in autumn 2022, and 

similar events are planned for the future on a termly basis. 

Members of the College’s Housekeeping team. 

Mark Trafford, Sales Ledger Officer in the Accounts Department, 

is a three-times Bar Billiards World Champion. 


24 


Our People Strategy 


As we emerge from the pandemic and face new 

challenges, such as the current cost-of-living crisis, 

our response and the lessons we have learnt will 

help to inform how we recruit and retain talent, 

how we manage development and welfare, and 

how we create an inclusive and equitable working 

environment going forward. 

Oxford remains an expensive city to live in, with high rents 

and a shortage of affordable housing. For many of our staff 

this means having to live further away and incur both the 

financial and time costs of commuting to work. In addition, 

like many employers, we are deeply concerned about the 

unprecedented cost-of-living crisis and the further financial 

impact this has on our staff. 

We remain committed to ensuring that we offer competitive 

and realistic remuneration packages, and will continue to 

adapt to the evolving needs of our people in light of current 

events and the pressures these place on work, life and 

financial circumstances. 

Members of the College’s Lodge Team. 

Both the College and the University have already provided 

extra financial support to academic and support staff 

members to help with rising costs, and we will continue to 

monitor the situation closely and respond as necessary. 

The right people in place to deliver 

Recruiting and retaining skilled people promptly and 

appropriately is vital to delivering our objectives. Our people 

need to have the confidence, resilience, and agility to innovate 

and deliver, in order to meet the exciting priorities described 

throughout this Plan. 

We will explore what the skills landscape might look like in 

the future, and review our salaries and reward schemes to 

help us attract and retain the best people. Oxford has a high 

employment rate, so we will consider innovative recruitment 

strategies to attract applications for roles that prove difficult 

to fill, and create a retention strategy to ensure continuity in 

these roles and inform succession planning. 

We will also incorporate the advice and recommendations 

of the Equality and Diversity Committee in our recruitment 

activities, working closely with the Committee to ensure 

that we apply best practice in our advertising, short-listing, 

and interviewing processes as we move to become a more 

inclusive employer. 

Staff wellbeing 

Staff support comes in many guises, but we know that 

whatever form it takes it can positively impact wellbeing in 

the workplace, increase overall job satisfaction, and reduce 

sickness. By continuing to look at opportunities to provide 

both practical and emotional support for our people, we 

hope to further strengthen our College community. 

We will review the effectiveness of the current Employee 

Assistance Programme, and implement new policies that 

reflect our staff constituency, such as a Menopause Policy. We 

will maintain the Flexible Working Policy, which has been well 

received by staff, and keep this under review. We will also 

initiate a new independent disability audit, and look to raise 

awareness of mental health issues across our staff, including 

the introduction of mental health first aiders. 

Workforce development 

The College will invest in its people through a number of 

development programmes that will support them to do their 

jobs to the best of their abilities, and grow their skills. The use 

of internal and external learning and training will support our 

drive in this area, and ensure we continue to keep abreast of 

new initiatives in employment strategy and skills development. 

We will encourage our people to take part in life-long 

learning initiatives, and continue to build a work environment 

where we demonstrate and celebrate our values of equality 

and diversity. 

Staff engagement and internal communications 

How we engage and communicate with our staff underpins 

everything we do, and is fundamental to the success of our 

retention strategy. We want everyone, across all grades and 

functions, to understand and connect with the College’s 

strategic goals, and to feel valued and appreciated for the role 

they play in helping us to meet those goals. We also want 

them to feel valued as team members and an important part 

of the wider College community. 

Our approach to leadership and management is an essential 

part of this, and we will focus on supporting our leaders and 

managers by ensuring they have the guidance and tools to 

effectively manage and engage their teams. 

We also want to enable those who lead or manage teams, 

as well as potential managers of the future, to develop 

their knowledge and skills in this area through personal 

development and training. 

How, when and what we communicate to our staff will be 

the subject of an internal communications review across 

departments, and at different levels of membership of the 

College. We will encourage all our people to share their 

thoughts and ideas to help us plan how we move forward, 

making new connections and strengthening existing ones. 

Oxford remains an expensive city to live in, with high rents 

and a shortage of affordable housing. 


26 


Celebrating Black History Month in 2021. 

Equality, 

Diversity 

Embedding equality, diversity 

and inclusivity in College life 

and Inclusion 

A Sri Lankan themed Hall dinner, hosted by the JCR. 


We are committed to nurturing an inclusive 

environment where the rights and dignity of 

all our staff and students are respected. 

We encourage and celebrate diversity among our 

applicants, students, staff, and visitors, recognising the 

contributions to our mission which can be made by 

individuals from a wide range of backgrounds and 

experiences. We are also aware that more work needs 

to be done in this area, and so established the Equality 

and Diversity Committee in 2020 to develop a College 

strategy for equality, diversity and inclusivity (EDI). This 

Committee is led by the Equality and Diversity Fellow. 

Through the Committee we delivered a range of 

activities across College that promoted and celebrated 

EDI, from events marking Black History Month and 

Transgender Day of Remembrance, to hosting 

international food nights, and a social media campaign 

celebrating the women of Jesus for International 

Women’s Day. 

The College updated its Equal 

Opportunities Statement to better 

reflect its ambition, including it in 

all staff recruitment advertising. 

Members of Governing Body took part in Implicit Bias 

training, and our staff undertook online equality and diversity, 

and bullying and harassment training. We also hosted 

workshops on these themes for College members who 

found it easier to learn in a facilitated group environment. 

To maintain momentum, two College Officers undertook 

training to deliver the University’s Implicit Bias course to all 

staff involved in recruitment. The College updated its Equal 

Opportunities Statement to better reflect its ambition, 

including it in all staff recruitment advertising. 

Our students were also actively involved in promoting EDI 

across the College, with both the JCR and MCR committees 

hosting events such as film nights to mark LGBTQ+ History 

Month, cookery workshops to celebrate the Lunar New Year, 

and annual College celebrations for Diwali, Eid al-fitr, as well 

as other religious festivals and holidays. 

Chinese lanterns hang in First Quad 

to celebrate the Lunar New Year. 

Our alumni also supported our efforts: in 2021 we 

established the Joan Erene Corine Martindale Clarke and 

Lionel Da Costa Clarke Scholarship - our first bursary 

that specifically supports Black British students, thanks to a 

generous gift to College by alumnus Alwyn Clarke 

(2011, Jurisprudence). Shortly afterwards we announced 

the new Bradley Wilson Scholarship in Geography and the 

Environment, which offers a fully-funded Doctor of Philosophy 

(DPhil/PhD) scholarship for UK Black and Mixed-Black 

applicants, and was funded by Geography alumni Bradley 

Wilson (1967) and Rodney Wright (1962). 


28 


We will explore 

opportunities to 

make the College 

more physically 

accessible for our 

community. 

29 

Equality, Diversity and Inclusion 


The benefits of an inclusive culture are many, and 

by making everyone feel valued and supported, 

we build a stronger community. Therefore, over 

the next five years our priority is to embed EDI 

across all aspects of College life. 

Our staff 

As already recognised in this Plan, the College’s workforce 

needs will continue to evolve as we adapt to changing 

demands on work, life and financial circumstances. Further to 

this, we must promote cultural and structural change in our 

recruitment processes. 

Benchmarking 

Adopting a systematic approach, we will first assess and 

formalise our data collection processes to strengthen our 

benchmarking data for how our policies, practices, activities 

and decisions meet the needs of our community, and where 

we could make improvements. We will then develop and 

implement an Equality Impact Assessment tool and apply the 

data collected to this tool to inform future actions. 

To deliver such an extensive programme of work will require 

additional resources, and so we propose to appoint a 

part-time EDI Officer to support the project and the wider 

activities of the EDI Committee. 

The College Chapel illuminated with tealights to 

mark the beginning of Christmas celebrations. 

We will establish diversity targets across all equality strands, 

and consider the composition of recruitment panels and 

interviewer training in this context. 

We will improve transparency and accountability across 

all recruitment activities, with equality data presented to 

Governing Body through the relevant Committee, and the 

publication of an annual Equality and Diversity Report to 

highlight our outputs and successes. 

As set out in the Our People section of this Plan (pages 22 - 

25) we want to ensure that all our support staff feel included 

and recognised as valued members of the College, and we 

will introduce new initiatives to this end. 

Our students 

Student intake across all equality strands will continue to 

be a priority, and we will increase data collection to enable 

us to set equality benchmarks, increase accountability, and 

identify areas of priority. We aim to better understand what 

is happening to candidates who apply, what we may be able 

to do differently, or where we need to offer assistance. We 

will also agree and introduce standardised and systematic 

data collections for all students, to include admissions data, 

academic performance data, and international student data. 

In addition, we will review the Student Charter and develop 

a code of conduct for academic staff relating to diversity. The 

EDI Committee will also consider opportunities to introduce 

wider postgraduate access initiatives to support diversity, 

in addition to promoting University initiatives that target 

postgraduate students in protected characteristic groups. The 

Equality and Diversity Fellow will work with the Academic 

Office to create a pipeline for access in this regard. 

Events and communications 

Our community comprises people from across the globe, and 

from a range of backgrounds and experiences. Their wellbeing 

and sense of belonging is vital to fulfilling the College’s vision 

and ambitions. There is much to be gained though providing 

inclusive events that encourage interaction between each 

of our constituent groups, and activities that build strong 

connections within specific groups. To this end, we will extend 

our programme of inclusive events, collaborating with staff 

and students across College to further strengthen a sense of 

community. 

Communications will also be vital to demonstrating our 

commitment to an inclusive culture. The Communications 

Manager will work to ensure that the written and visual 

content we produce for our members and wider audiences – 

such as prospective students, the general public, or individuals 

with accessibility needs – reflects this commitment. We will 

also reach out to other colleges, the University, and partner 

organisations to learn about the successful measures they 

have taken towards embedding EDI. 

Physical space that promotes inclusivity 

Across this Strategic Plan, we have set out our desire to make 

College more physically accessible, especially within communal 

areas such as the libraries, bar and Upper SCR, and we will 

carry out a full cross-site accessibility audit to this end. 

We will also review the provision of disabled accommodation 

at Barts. In addition, we will look at how we provide 

appropriate space in College for other protected groups. 

We want to make sure our communal spaces encourage 

EDI, both in design and layout, and in the representation of 

College role models for EDI in our art collection. We will 

seek to redesign the Lower and Upper SCR, and the Sir Peter 

North Room, to make them more reflective of the College 

Fellowship. Building on projects such as the photographic 

‘Portraits of a College’ exhibition, we will look to further 

showcase the diversity of our current and Old Members 

across College communities. 

Educating for inclusivity 

Training is key to how we embed EDI in College, and we 

will extend targeted training for members of our community 

across areas such as implicit bias, race awareness and 

neurodiversity. We will also cultivate a positive teaching 

environment where all our students feel included and 

respected. In support of the University’s Oxford Against 

Sexual Violence campaign we will deliver in-College sexual 

consent workshops for all students, and ensure information 

and help is there for those who might need it. 

We will also promote other University EDI resources and 

campaigns to our staff and students, and monitor training 

developments in the wider EDI context. 

Broadening general awareness of inclusivity is also vital; 

for example, considering the language we use to promote 

inclusive events, the timings of such events, and whether they 

are recorded for wider dissemination. We will work across 

College to implement processes and activities that encourage 

awareness of such issues around inclusivity. 


30 


Jesus College 

Key facts and figures for the past six years 

ACADEMIC 

2022 2016 

FELLOWSHIP 110 82 

STUDENTS 

Undergraduates 384 332 

Postgraduates 298 230 

Part-time postgraduates 36 4 

Total number of students 718 566 

BURSARIES 

Undergraduate £98K(77) £38k(67) 

Postgraduate £445K(60) £180k(41) 

COMMUNICATIONS 

2022 2016 

News articles on website 84 38 

Website engagement 7025 1437 

(av. per month) 

SUPPORT STAFF 

2022 2016 

Headcount 112 93 

(at full complement) 

INFRASTRUCTURE 

2022 2016 

Teaching and meeting rooms 16 10 

Dedicated student study spaces 10 5 

Quads 4 3 

Fully-accessible student flat 1 0 

Fully-accessible Fellow’s room 1 0 

Fully-accessible meeting room 1 0 

TOTAL FUNDS 

July 2016 £194m 

July 2022 £257m 

450 TH ANNIVERSARY CAMPAIGN 

£28.4m 

raised for Academic Priorities 

£15m 

raised for Infrastructure 

CHENG YU TUNG BUILDING 

7641m 2 

of new College space 

87% 

construction waste 

diverted from landfill 

3691m 3 

concrete 

51.7k 

working people days 

of construction 

ENVIRONMENTAL SUSTAINABILITY 

20 

solar panels installed 

(Cheng Building) 

1 

electric 

vehicle 

2 

ground source heat pumps 

(Cheng Building) 

100% 

eco-friendly College 

laundry washing 

£1.6m 

raised for Access and Outreach 

29k 

tonnes of steel 

8k 

hand-cut pieces of 

limestone cladding 

£1.5m 

insulation upgrade 

(Stevens Close) 

81 

extra spaces for bicycle 

storage (Turl Street) 

580m 2 

of glass 

£40m 

development cost 


32 


Infrastructure 

Strategy Modernising the College estate 

The new Welsh Access Fund Fourth Quad provides the 

College with a new outdoor convening space, and muchwelcomed 

College Café, which doubles up as an informal 

study space, or events space, when the café is closed. 

A resource for the Oxford community 

The lower ground floor of the building is home to the 

new NHS Northgate Health Centre, a state-of-the-art 

medical centre combining three GP practises and a range of 

primary care services for 20,000 patients across the Oxford 

community. On Cornmarket, flexible spaces for retail tenants 

have been created, and the College is actively marketing these 

through a commercial property consultancy. 

While the new building was our key project of the past 

six years, we also carried out other work to improve the 

College’s infrastructure. Following an accessibility audit in 

2019, we took a number of steps to improve accessibility 

across the College’s historic buildings, including the installation 

of lifts at the two entranceways to Hall, the development of 

a new accessible meeting room in First Quad, and a fullyaccessible 

Fellows’ office in Second Quad. We also completed 

an accessible flat conversion at Steven’s Close, our North 

Oxford annexe site. 

Built to budget, and adding a further 

7641m 2 of fully-accessible space 

to the College footprint, our new 

building will serve many purposes in 

the years and decades ahead. 


The development of the Cheng Building is 

the largest transformation to the College’s 

infrastructure in its 450-year history. 

The Buchanan Tower Room and Rosaline Wong Gallery, with its unique 

views across the city, will host a range of events from art exhibitions to 

fine dining experiences. 

Built to budget, and adding a further 7641m 2 of fullyaccessible 

space to the College footprint, our new building 

will serve many purposes in the years ahead. 

Enhancing teaching and research in the 

digital age 

The Cheng Kar Shun Digital Hub, a three-floor elevation 

in the centre of the building, incorporates the latest digital 

technologies into a range of new spaces, including five 

carefully designed study areas for students with a range 

of desks, bespoke lighting, and informal seating. Six new 

teaching and meeting spaces have been created, with 

integrated partition walling to enable room size flexibility. 

There are open plan convening areas across all three 

floors, and a sunken garden on the ground floor for quiet 

reflection in the warmer months. 

As well as becoming a fulcrum for academic endeavour, the 

Hub also provides the College with significant additional 

event space for our pioneering access work, innovative 

public engagement programmes, and conferences of 

all sizes. The new Buchanan Tower Room (integrating 

the Rosaline Wong Gallery) offers the opportunity for 

exhibitions, drinks receptions, or fine dining experiences, 

with panoramic views across the east and south of Oxford. 

The new Welsh Access Fund Fourth Quad provides a welcoming 

new convening and events space for the College. 

Accessed via a new ground floor entrance on Market Street, 

the Hub has a wheelchair-friendly lift to all floors and disabled 

bathroom facilities. 

A home-from-home for our community 

The building is also home to four Fellows’ suites for Short- 

Term Visiting Fellows and accessible postgraduate facilities, 

including ensuite bedrooms, a laundry, and kitchens for 68 

postgraduate students, as well as a Postgraduate Study Room 

and Multifaith Room. 


34 


Infrastructure Strategy 


The College will now begin an 

operational management review 

of its whole infrastructure, and the 

further steps we need to take to 

ensure our estate is fit for purpose 

in the 21st century. 

Optimising the use of new spaces 

Accessibility and management 

Our first priority is to conduct an option 

appraisal on the College’s retail units on 

Cornmarket to the north of the Cheng 

Building, with a view to determining the 

development potential of these spaces. 

This appraisal will also stimulate thought 

and discussion on what the College might 

consider more generally in terms of 

accessibility for the internal areas of the 

College -this includes the Meyricke Library 

and Third Quad. Improving accessibility across 

our Oxford estate, including spaces such as 

the Upper SCR and College bar, will also be 

a priority. 

As we familiarise ourselves with the cadence of College life now our new 

building and exciting Digital Hub are open, we will work to understand 

how these developments interact with the College’s diverse requirements 

and activities. We will seek ways of balancing the academic needs of our 

community, and our wider access and public engagement work, against the 

building’s commercial potential as a conferencing and events venue. An 

operational review will take place 12 months after the full opening of the 

building, and an annual Conference Action Plan will be produced to ensure 

both financial and strategic objectives are being met. 

Improving our IT infrastructure 

We have already invested significantly in improving our IT infrastructure. 

This work included a complete refresh of the Wi-Fi system across the whole 

Oxford estate, and a new 1Gb/s network link to the Herbet Close annexe, 

giving a ten-fold increase in connection speed. We introduced dual firewalls, 

core switches and server nodes to improve resilience, and overhauled our 

data flow processes so that our databases are now automatically updated 

with the overnight data feed from the University. 

The College will continue a rolling plan for 

modernisation and maintenance to ensure 

that our estate is managed efficiently and 

fully fit for purpose. This work will include the 

updating of student accommodation. We plan 

to develop the student bedrooms in Third 

Quad, to create more ensuite rooms for 

undergraduates, with the potential to free up 

some non-ensuite rooms for additional Tutor 

offices. To ensure we can respond quickly 

and efficiently to the future accommodation 

needs of both students and staff, we will 

undertake a review to understand what 

those needs might be. 

We will further strengthen our IT infrastructure to enhance and 

simplify user experience for all members of our community. 

Building on this progress, we will now focus on boosting connection speeds, enhancing 

security further streamlining of IT systems management, and simplifying the user experience 

for our community, enabling the IT team to support users with more complex issues. We 

will also complete our action plan for the provision of hybrid meeting facilities, which will 

enable both in-person and remote-working participants to attend. 

The College will conduct an 

option appraisal on its retail 

units on Cornmarket to 

determine the development 

potential of these spaces. 


36 


Sustainability 

Strategy A greener Jesus College 


We recognise the urgent need to 

address the climate crisis and are 

committed to reducing our impact 

on the environment. The University 

of Oxford has set an ambitious goal 

to reach net zero carbon and achieve 

biodiversity net gain by 2035, and the 

College is committed to this goal. 

Over the past six years, we developed and 

implemented a wide range of sustainabilitydriven 

initiatives designed to realise this 

ambition, being mindful of the challenges 

presented by the Grade I Listed status of our 

historical central site. 

Reducing energy consumption and 

adopting renewable energy solutions 

Over the past six years, we developed 

and implemented a wide range of 

sustainability-driven initiatives designed to 

realise this ambition, being mindful of the 

challenges presented by the Grade I Listed 

building status of our historical central site. 

Utilising zero-carbon services and products 

In preparation for the new Zero Emission Zone in Oxford, 

which aims to improve air quality, cut carbon emissions, and 

move towards zero emission travel in the city, we worked to 

reduce or remove the carbon footprint of the services provided 

to College. We moved our entire laundry service to a local 

sustainable laundry business and, wherever possible, now source 

products that are sustainable, recyclable, and manufactured using 

ethically sound processes. 

We also encourage our community and visitors to the College 

to use sustainable travel options wherever possible, and recently 

increased our capacity for secure bicycle storage on the main 

College site, as well as leasing our first electric van. 

Managing consumption and waste 

The College introduced a number of initiatives to 

reduce food wastage, and promote healthy and 

sustainable eating. This included introducing an online 

booking system for Hall lunches and dinners, and 

regularly updating menus with nutritious, meat-free 

and locally-sourced options. We have also moved 

increasingly towards the use of digital materials for 

meetings, publications and general College business. 

These measures, focused on sustainable consumption, 

were complemented by significantly reduced reliance 

on single-use plastics, and enhanced water and waste 

recycling capacity. 

Improving biodiversity 

From the endeavours of the JCR/MCR Gardening 

Club to the enterprising eco-initiatives of groundsman 

David Mead at Herbert Close, our community 

remains passionate about making the best of our 

green spaces. At our annexe sites, we introduced a 

wide range of environmentally sustainable practices 

and projects to improve biodiversity and encourage 

wildlife. On the main College site, new plants were 

introduced to encourage pollinating insects. 

David Mead, Groundsman at our Herbert Close site. 

Bees enjoying the alliums in Second Quad. 

Guided by the results of an independent 

feasibility study undertaken in 2019, we carried 

out a range of additional energy reduction 

measures across the historical site, including the 

installation of low-energy LED lighting, window 

draft-proofing, boiler upgrades, and enhanced 

roof insulation. We are nearing completion of a 

£1.5m project to upgrade insulation at Steven’s 

Close (an all-electric building). 


38 


Sustainability Strategy 


The Cheng Building sets a benchmark for best 

practice in environmentally sustainable building 

management. 

In developing this new part of the College, we used high 

performance, low carbon materials from sustainable and 

recycled sources. The building is heated using renewable 

energy technologies, such as ground source heat pumps and 

photovoltaic panels, in line with the College’s strategy to 

move towards net zero carbon emissions.The new building 

demonstrates what is achievable as part of our overall 

environmental strategy, giving the College a strong foundation 

on which to enhance the sustainability of all our operations 

over the next five years. 

Sustainability Working Group 

The College’s ambition is to comply with the University’s 

net zero strategy by 2035. We will direct our academic, 

operational and financial resources to this end, establish a 

Sustainability Working Group to oversee the development 

and delivery of our plans, and ensure that sustainability 

becomes firmly embedded in all parts of the College and in 

all our activities. We will continue to address the direct impact 

our activities have on the environment by further developing 

our programme of carbon reduction and sustainability 

improvements. This work includes initiatives to minimise 

energy consumption – such as completing the insulation 

upgrades at Steven’s Close and beginning a similar project at 

Herbert Close – and installing heat monitoring systems across 

our buildings. 

Biodiversity 

To mitigate for changes to the UK climate, we will review the 

types and forms of planting in all four College quads, with a 

view to introducing more perennials and drought-resistant 

species. The sustainable planting programme at Steven’s Close 

will continue, as will our support of student-led environmental 

initiatives, and those of the University, such as the ‘Be Energy 

Friendly’ campaign and Green Action Week. 

Reporting 

The Sustainability Working Group will establish measures 

to monitor the impact of our steps towards sustainability, 

reporting on progress regularly both internally and via our 

website. 

We will also address the impact of our activities on 

sustainability in the wider world, most importantly in our 

role as an institution with the mission to educate future 

generations. We will support progress towards achieving net 

zero emissions of carbon dioxide, both in the UK and globally, 

by means of our investment policy, and we will also explore 

opportunities to inform wider public decision-making on 

issues around sustainability. 

The mandate of the College’s investment manager, as well 

as that of our internal team that manages the College’s 

estates, are aligned with these objectives. Accountability and 

transparency of reporting, will be essential features of the 

Strategy and consequently we will provide an annual report 

on our environmental impacts and progress towards our 

sustainability goals. 

Investments 

The principal objective of our Investment Strategy is 

to preserve and preferably grow the real value of our 

endowment over the long term, having regard for our 

expenditure rule and the need to protect the value of 

College assets against erosion by inflation. We recognise the 

growing importance of environmental, social and governance 

(ESG) criteria when selecting and managing investments. 

Investments are made on a total return basis; this means that 

there is no preference for capital growth or income. Together 

with our property holdings, we invests in funds rather than 

making direct investments. We expect all fund managers 

to adhere to the United Nations principles of responsible 

investment, to have an ESG policy, and to confirm that ESG 

criteria are included in their investment decisions. 

Our commitment to achieving overall net zero status by 2035 

will be reflected in our investment portfolio, where we will 

seek to achieve net zero by 2030 at the latest. Having regard 

for our financial return objectives, the Strategy has three 

components: 

1. Decarbonise: This will involve reducing exposure to 

companies that have the highest carbon emissions and 

disinvesting from those companies that promote or extract 

fossil fuel reserves before the end of the current Strategic 

Plan period in 2027. 

We will review the types and forms of planting in all four 

College quads, with a view to introducing more perennials 

and drought-resistant species. 

2. Invest for positive impact: Where appropriate, we will invest 

in new companies that seek to have positive environmental 

impacts in order to speed up the transition to a low 

carbon economy. 

3. Engage: Either through our investment manager, or directly, 

we will engage with our investment partners to encourage 

the low-carbon transition of economic sectors in line with 

science and in consideration of associated social impacts. 


40 


The Cheng 

Kar Shun 

Digital Hub 

Showcasing research in the digital age 

The Cheng Kar Shun Digital Hub presents us with a unique 

opportunity to enhance our reputation as an innovative and 

outward-facing Oxford college. 

Dr Janina Schupp joined the College in the summer of 2021 as SOUTHWORKS 

Career Development Fellow of the Digital Hub - a position supported by Jesus and 

Saïd Business School Associate Alumnus Alejandro Jack and his SOUTHWORKS 

business partner, Jonathan Halife. Ahead of the opening of the Digital Hub, this new 

Fellowship enabled the College to develop its first programme of original activities 

themed around scholarship and research in the digital age. 

Digital Bootcamps 

In Michaelmas 2021 we launched the Digital Bootcamp series; workshops for 

the College community to boost their digital skills, personal development, and to 

discover cutting-edge technologies. These workshops provided a rare opportunity 

to learn more about the enormous potential of new interdisciplinary methods, 

tools and technologies, and how digital tech and processes can be utilised across 

a wide range of applications. Over 60 students, staff, and Fellows enthusiastically 

joined the workshops to gain insights into digital text editing, 3D object scanning 

and digital film production, and to benefit from the College’s first personal 

development training sessions, including public speaking in the digital age. 

The launch of ‘New Era’, a postgraduate-led digital 

project that explores solutions to 21st century 

societal challenges. 

Over 60 students, staff, and 

Fellows enthusiastically joined 

the workshops to gain insights 

into digital text editing, 3D object 

scanning and digital film production. 

Digital Hub Reading Club 

The student-founded and curated Digital Hub Reading 

Club gave College members the opportunity to read 

and discuss contemporary fiction on AI, robots, and 

everything digital. The Club also provided an important 

social function, bringing together staff, Fellows, and 

students in an informal setting to explore a shared 

passion. 

Academic and public events 

In Trinity 2022, we hosted the first of our Digital Hub 

external events. ‘Evolving Earth: An Interdisciplinary 

Challenge’, co-organised by DPhil student Harriet 

McKinley-Smith, brought together researchers from 

across the University to discuss interdisciplinary 

perspectives around the changes affecting our planet. 

This was followed by ‘Immers-eXpo: Immersive Research 

and the Metaverse’, a large-scale showcase of the latest 

uses of immersive technology in academia and industry. 

Most recently, the College hosted the inaugural Oxford 

Synthetic Media Forum and ‘Archives of the Future’, 

an exploration of how archivists of the future might 

preserve and keep secure digital archival materials. 

The Immers-eXpo conference showcased the latest uses 

of immersive technology in academia and industry. 


42 


Website 

The Cheng Kar Shun Digital Hub 


With the Digital Hub now fully open, we will 

develop new and innovative programmes of 

activities that explore and support research and 

learning in the digital age. 

Digital Bootcamps 

We will offer more opportunities for College members 

to participate in digital skills training workshops, which 

introduce them to new digital teaching and research tools and 

methodologies. Enhancing digital communications skills will also 

form part of the Bootcamp programme (see Digital Media Lab 

on page 43). 

The inaugural Oxford Synthetic Media Forum brought 

together colleagues from interdisciplinary research 

institutes across the UK. 

To support our efforts, we will create a new web presence for the Digital Hub on the 

College website which will provide a repository for digital research materials generated 

by our Fellows, as well as event booking information, event videos, podcasts and more. 

Digital Media Lab 

We also plan to develop a Digital Media Lab (DML). The DML, located on the Hub’s 

second floor, will provide our students and researchers with the latest digital and audiovisual 

tools, and digital communication skills training to enhance knowledge transfer, 

and widen the reach and impact of the research they carry out. The first phase of the 

development of the DML will focus on equipping the space, and trialling and evaluating a 

range of activities. This will include skills training in podcasting and digital videography, and 

the production of audio-visual content-such as talks, podcasts, lectures-to be hosted on 

the Hub website to widen the reach of research dissemination. 

We will also use the new facility to produce digital materials and content to enhance 

audience experience across all Hub activities, and explore the option, in the future, to 

offer the DML as a ‘hireable’ resource to the wider University (especially colleges) or 

local community organisations who lack such facilities themselves. 

Events 

Under the curatorship of the Digital Hub CDF, and in 

collaboration with members of our community and the wider 

University, the events programme will expand and become 

more ambitious. Hackathons, digital music performances, 

and digital art exhibitions are already being planned. We also 

want to reach out to new potential partners who share our 

vision, and who are open to sharing their academic expertise, 

networks, and resources, or who might consider financially 

supporting an event or tailored programme of activities. The 

needs of our community will, of course, always be prioritised 

when considering the size and shape of future programmes. 

New networks 

We want to build a sense of community and engage more 

deeply with the people who use or visit the Digital Hub 

regularly, whether they are College members, the wider 

academic community or general public. To achieve this, 

and subject to resourcing, we plan to develop two new 

communications networks; one for academic members, 

and one for general public members, through which to 

share information on upcoming events, promote early-bird 

ticket bookings to symposia, conferences, events and skills 

workshops, and facilitate opportunities to create or support 

Hub programmes. 

Jesus Fellows (l-r) Paul Riley, Georg Holländer and Shankar Srinivas hosted a Hub event 

on ‘Regenerative Medicine in the Digital Age’. 


44 


45 

Over the past decade, approximately £28.4m 

of the total £45m campaign target was raised 

for academic priorities, including the creation 

of new bursaries and graduate studentships. 

Development 

Strategy 

College Principal Professor Sir Nigel Shadbolt welcomes guests 

to the dedication of the Welsh Access Fund Quad. 

Supporting academic excellence, 

College environment and community 


Each one of our students becomes a 

valued member of College for life, and 

we are regularly in touch with a connected 

network of over 6,000 alumni across 

the globe. 

The 450th Anniversary Campaign was launched in 

2012, primarily to raise £45 million in support of 

our priority areas for College: teaching 

and research, fabric and environment, student 

support, and access and outreach. At the time of 

the 2017-2022 Strategic Plan, £10m of this target 

remained to be raised, and it is thanks to the 

unwavering support and generosity of our many 

Jesus alumni and friends that we were able to 

complete our campaign successfully in July 2022. 

Creating life-changing academic opportunities 

Over the past decade approximately £28.4m of the 

total £45m campaign target was raised for academic 

priorities, including the creation of new bursaries 

and graduate studentships. This tremendous support 

enabled us to participate in co-funded opportunities 

with the University, such as the Graduate Endowment 

Matched Scholarships funding scheme, Clarendon 

Scholarships, and the newly created Oxford 

Academic Futures programme. 

A campaign gift of over £1m from alumnus Christopher 

Richey (1984, MPhil Management Studies), for example, will 

be combined with GEMS matched funding to endow an 

unrestricted graduate studentship in any subject. Similar gifts 

also funded early career research through the creation of new 

Junior Research and Career Development Fellowships across 

a range of academic disciplines. 

Significant legacies from College alumni also played an 

instrumental part in funding 12 new endowed and spenddown 

Teaching Fellowships, as well as helping to restore a 

£3.5m historic University Chair, the Jesus Chair of Celtic. 

Creating new College spaces 

The realisation of the Cheng Building was due in large part to 

a £15m lead donation from philanthropist Dr Henry Cheng 

Kar Shun. This generous benefaction from the Cheng family 

also created the Cheng Kar Shun Digital Hub. Their support 

of the College’s fabric and environment was complemented 

by additional donations from our alumni and friends, many of 

whom are also recognised by name in the new building. 

Creating opportunities for Access and Outreach 

A £1m gift from alumnus Oliver Thomas and his family was 

transformative for our outreach work in Wales, and enabled 

the College to endow in perpetuity its Welsh summer school 

programme. We also received over £600k in donations from 

both alumni and corporate supporters towards College 

access visits from schools in London and across Wales. Thanks 

to generous support of this kind, we are able to participate 

in University co-funded programmes such as Target Oxbridge 

and, more recently, the Ukrainian Graduate Student Support 

Fund. 

Creating new alumni communications and networks 

Since College’s last Strategic Plan we have sought to grow 

and strengthen the bonds of our diverse and ever-expanding 

alumni community through an engaging programme of 

events that encourage intellectual curiosity across all College 

disciplines. 

The result saw increased participation and a more diverse 

stratification of age groups attending our events. In tandem, 

we have built a large digital library of video content from the 

events programme, generating thousands of post-event views. 

We have also re-vamped our flagship print publications 

to reflect the vibrant aesthetic of our digital presence, 

and introduced two new online alumni publications. These 

communications have a growing alumni following, and have 

helped us bridge the technological gap between older and 

younger alumni groups. 

We upheld our promise to invest in our alumni community by 

creating more opportunities to gather and celebrate them. In 

2018, we launched the 1571 Society, the College’s first official 

legacy society. This group enjoys exclusive stewardship, and 

our number of known legators to Jesus has doubled since 

launching. In addition, the Jesus Entrepreneurs Network (JEN) 

now serves a much wider alumni professional ecosystem. 

Other special long-standing alumni groups - such as the XL 

Network and Cadwallader Club – continue and, although 

they operate independently of the Development Office, we 

offer support of their annual activities. 

Celebrating the 45th anniversary of the admission of women 

to Jesus College in 2019.

46 


Development Strategy 


The Development Office’s first priority will 

be to ensure that the c. 2,500 alumni who 

contributed to the 450th Anniversary Campaign 

are properly thanked and feel a strong sense 

of collective achievement. We will also use this 

post-campaign period to analyse our donation 

data to understand our key donor demographics 

and participation over the past decade, and 

inform our fundraising and alumni engagement 

strategies going forward. 

Our ambitions for a ‘greener Jesus’ will be at the heart of 

this message and will include projects that will improve our 

historical buildings and allow us to make the vital changes to 

College’s fabric and environment needed to meet our 

net-zero pledge. 

Alumni engagement: exploring new opportunities 

The Digital Hub creates an extraordinary opportunity 

to position Jesus as a top college for technology-driven 

research and learning. The potential of our new building 

to host bigger events and symposia that will attract 

participation from the University and supporting institutes 

is an exciting step-change for College. The use of the space 

will be central to our alumni engagement strategy over the 

next five years; exploiting the Hub’s technologies will allow 

us to bring the research of the College Fellowship to life for 

our alumni and stakeholders in dynamic new ways. 

To support the delivery of these activities and to help the 

Digital Hub reach its potential, the Alumni Engagement team 

will need to play a more significant role in supporting alumni 

and College events in the Hub. The Development Office plans 

to add resource for the Alumni Engagement team to support 

the Digital Hub CDF with the planning and promoting of 

future Hub events. There is an opportunity to work together 

over the coming years to promote the Hub more broadly 

and ideally harness financial support for Hub activities and 

academic research from our networks. 

Whist this important data work is underway, our fundraising 

activity continues as usual, with an emphasis on securing 

unrestricted donations and maintaining momentum with 

our annual fund programme. The donation data we have 

collected over the past decade, and the opening of our new 

building, will both provide opportunities for us to shape our 

Communications Strategy to connect and re-engage our 

donors and alumni. The new Cheng Building evokes a great 

sense of pride in our alumni, and we will continue to create 

opportunities for them to visit College to help grow affinity 

with Jesus in the coming years. 

Supporting ongoing and new priorities 

Building on our recent campaign success, our focus in 

the coming years will shift toward raising significant funds 

for ongoing and new academic priorities, such as Tutorial 

and Early Career Fellowships, graduate studentships and 

bursaries, and Research Associates. We will also continue to 

work closely with the Jesus Access Team to help support 

their plans, including new programmes in undergraduate 

in-reach, digital outreach, and widening schools participation 

in London and Wales. 

Another key priority for us, in addition to supporting the 

academic vibrancy of College, will be a renewed focus on 

raising support for our College estate, with sustainability 

squarely in mind (see pages 38-39). 

Alumni and students enjoy watching Summer Eights from the 

College boathouse. 

The new academic and sustainability goals for College will 

require significant additional support to be raised over 

the next decade as outlined in the financial strategy. The 

Development Office plans to address this need by introducing 

alumni and potential donors to our new College priorities 

and creating opportunities to support individual projects, 

rather than launching a new campaign in the immediate term. 

Jesus Entrepreneurs Network 

We will continue to promote innovation and 

entrepreneurship through this network over the next five 

years, and will do this by developing more curated online 

content, and by creating more opportunities for JEN 

members to volunteer and share their expertise. 

Dr Henry Cheng Kar Shun and Professor Sir Nigel Shadbolt 

cut the ribbon to open our new Cheng Building at a formal 

dedication event in October 2022. 

Alumni engagement: new generations 

Our alumni marketing and communications strategy will 

also need to pivot over the next five years to help us 

effectively engage a younger alumni audience that is digitally 

literate, and widen our reach to more non-alumni networks. 

Now, more than ever before, we are carefully watching 

social media trends and using analytics to understand what 

engages and motivates our alumni and online followers. 

The future of College philanthropy will soon depend on 

understanding the nuanced desires of these networks, and 

for us to be able to communicate College messages and 

our USPs most effectively across a wide range of channels. 

To support this important work, both the Development and 

Communication teams will need more resource. Critically, 

the Development Office will also need to evolve to become 

more marketing and insights focused, which will mean a 

strategic shift towards a more data-led operation. 

Over the coming years we will continue to work closely with 

key members of the College to develop messaging around 

our shared vision of positioning Jesus as a future-facing and 

exceptional Oxford college for teaching and research, and 

continue to nourish the belief in our alumni and friends that 

this is an institution that is well worth their generous support. 


48 


Communications 

Amplifying the College’s story 

Since fully opening, many tours of the new building 

have taken place for the media, University colleagues, 

and local interest groups, such as the Oxford 

Preservation Trust and the Oxford Civic Society. 

To complement these tours, and various alumni 

celebratory events over the summer, a special 

commemorative brochure was produced, and this is 

now on its second reprint. 

We maximised opportunities to 

proactively communicate our 

research, our people and our 

activities to the media and wider 

audiences, publishing over 180 news 

articles and features on the website. 

How we present ourselves to the outside world 

– whether that’s the wider University, regional 

and national media, prospective students, alumni, 

or members of the local community – plays an 

important part in the success of our core mission. 

In February 2020, in response to the 2016-2021 Strategic Plan, we 

appointed a Communications Manager to develop and deliver a 

Communications Strategy for College. That initial 2-year Strategy 

saw the creation of a new user-friendly and accessible College 

website, streamlined social media channels, the implementation of 

timely and efficient editorial processes, a new College intranet for 

internal news and information, new digital prospectuses in both 

English and Welsh, and more. Around 7,000 new users now visit 

our website each month, and our reach is global. Our Admissions 

section, which is targeted specifically at prospective students, 

receives the highest audience traffic. 

We maximised opportunities to proactively communicate our 

research, our people, and our activities to the media and wider 

audiences, publishing over 180 news articles and features on 

the website, issuing 34 press releases, and responding quickly 

and effectively to emerging issues such as COVID-19. In 2021, 

the announcement that actor Michael Sheen was to fund a 

Welsh undergraduate bursary at Jesus reached an estimated 1.8 

million people through online interactions, television and radio 

broadcasts, and print media. 

We also strengthened our relationships with the University’s 

central Public Affairs Directorate, and communications colleagues 

in departments, divisions and other Oxford colleges. We worked 

in collaboration on campaigns such as Black History Month and 

Women in Science Week, and to promote research news, new 

scholarships, and Access programmes. 

Communications during the pandemic 

Timely and accurate communications were key during the 

pandemic. Supported by the Communications Manager, 

the College’s COVID-19 Planning Group produced over 

260 separate email updates and guidance documents for 

our community in 2020/21 alone. The pandemic also led 

an increase in demand for digital content. In collaboration, 

the Communications and Development offices produced 

hundreds of social media posts, website features and 

videos to keep current and Old Members abreast of our 

activities during lockdown, including the development of 

the Cheng Building and the 450th Anniversary. This had a 

significant impact on levels of engagement. For example, in 

2021 the Cheng Building section of the website was 

viewed over 7.5k times. 

Community engagement 

The development of the new building provided an 

opportunity to engage with local communities about the 

College, our people, and the remarkable research carried 

out by our Fellows. As well as keeping the website up to 

date with news and films from the construction site, the 

Communications Manager worked with the local media 

to keep Oxford residents informed on progress, and the 

Oxford Mail ran 16 individual news articles about the project 

(in print and online) from 2020 to 2022. The beautifullydesigned 

hoardings, which ran along the perimeter of the 

site for nearly two years, drew interest 

and compliments from those who viewed them. The 

opening of the new NHS Northgate Health Centre in 

the lower ground floor of the building also garnered 

praise for the College from the local Oxford community 

it now serves. 

Ahead of the 2022 Oxford/Cambridge Boat Race, Oxford crew 

member and Jesus Masters’ student David Ambler (in white t-shirt) 

was interviewed in College by the BBC. 


50 


Communications Strategy 


We are proud of the progress we have made 

to build the College’s reputation in the public 

domain. The ambitions set out in this Strategic 

Plan, and the future opportunities presented by 

the Cheng Kar Shun Digital Hub, now provide a 

platform from which to strengthen and amplify 

our story over the next five years. 

Our communications objectives will align with the wider 

objectives of the College’s Strategic Plan and, alongside our 

existing communications tools, we will use podcasting, and the 

latest digital technologies to enhance the reach and impact of 

our messaging. Our goals are to: 

- Position Jesus College as a leading institution for 

teaching and interdisciplinary research in the digital age; 

communicating news and features about our people, our 

research and achievements to new audiences; 

Gale Digital Humanities Fellow Dr Xiurong Zhao was interviewed for a film 

on the Gale Fellowships programme. 

- Support the work of the SOUTHWORKS Digital Hub 

CDF by engaging with existing and new audiences about 

the Digital Hub events programme, including an enhanced 

web and social media presence; 

- Support the College’s access and outreach work through 

enhanced engagement with prospective students, especially 

those from disadvantaged backgrounds, and develop 

student skills in digital media so they can share their 

experiences and insights more widely; 

- Support efforts to attract and retain the best talent across 

both academic and professional staff by enhancing our 

internal communications toolkit; 

- Demonstrate the College’s commitment to equality, 

diversity and inclusion by communicating more widely 

about our EDI work, programmes and collaborations; 

- Demonstrate our commitment to, and delivery of, projects 

to make the College more sustainable and accessible. 

We will conduct data analysis and evaluation of our efforts 

to further inform how we engage with our various audiences 

and stakeholder groups, both in the UK and internationally. 

College website 

Building on the successful launch of the new College website, 

we will integrate new design features that enhance the user 

journey, and undertake an accessibility audit to ensure that 

it meets the requirements of the international Web Content 

Accessibility Guidelines. We will also continue to use data 

analytics software to understand how our audiences use the 

website, and make improvements where necessary. 

Reactive communications 

As demonstrated during the COVID-19 pandemic, our 

ability to be able to respond proactively to rapidly emerging 

issues will remain critical. We will further strengthen our 

communications processes to ensure we disseminate accurate 

and timely information as and when required. 

The pandemic also facilitated a closer relationship between 

the University’s Public Affairs Directorate (PAD) and 

the collegiate University, and led to new communication 

structures that enable the rapid two-way dissemination 

of information during times of crisis, or when urgency is 

required. We will continue to build on these new structures, 

and relationships to enhance the College’s ability to respond 

to emerging issues and, more widely, to amplify our story to 

public and academic audiences. 

Investment in communications resources is key to achieving 

our goals. Therefore, our first step will be to create a 

permanent Communications Manager role in College to 

develop and deliver our communications objectives. 


52 


Finance 

The College’s unrestricted 

income grew by 24% over 

the past six years. 

Strategy Protecting our long-term interests 


The growth of our student community, a successful 

fundraising campaign towards key academic 

priorities, and strong investment returns across 

our endowment have ensured the College has 

maintained a solid financial footing over the past six 

years. Delivering the £40m Cheng Building within 

1% of budget despite the pandemic is a tribute 

to the College’s careful and prudent planning and 

project management. 

The return from the College’s investments accounts for 

nearly half of all College income, and so is vital to funding our 

academic mission, both today and in the future. Our investment 

returns exceeded target despite the much changed retail 

environment that affected our commercial property. We have 

seen significant growth across both our securities portfolio 

and our agricultural property, with the latter benefitting from 

progress in realising value from our Lincoln asset. 

The College’s unrestricted income grew by 24% over the past 

six years. Of this, charitable income grew by 20%, primarily 

driven by the rise in our student numbers, and tuition fees 

rose by 36% compared to 8% for residential income. Rental 

income from our commercial premises on Cornmarket 

inevitably ceased during the Cheng Building construction period, 

leading to a decline in cash investment income, but this was 

compensated for by drawing on the overall return from our 

endowment and the positive trend in donations. 

Our commitment to supporting our academic mission 

financially enabled the College’s academic community to 

grow significantly. Academic expenditure on staff and student 

support increased by 55%, which enabled our Fellowship 

to expand and provide more bursaries and scholarships to 

support our most disadvantaged students. While constrained 

by fixed fees and capacity in terms of our UK undergraduates, 

we benefitted financially from the significant growth of our 

postgraduate community. 

We have carefully managed expenditure relating to the 

maintenance of the College’s Oxford estate to ensure our 

infrastructure remains fit for purpose. The Cheng Building 

development has already brought benefits in terms of 

enhanced physical and IT facilities for the College, and we are 

exploring how these new spaces can boost our conferencing 

business, which was significantly restricted during the 

pandemic. 

Fundraising remains vital to delivering our strategic objectives. 

The impact of the 450th Anniversary Campaign, which raised 

£45m for College priorities, cannot be underestimated. 

Alongside the £15m philanthropic gift to College by Dr 

Henry Cheng Kar Shun, donations, legacies and endowments 

raised significant funds towards academic priorities, College 

infrastructure and fabric, and our access and outreach 

programmes. 

In the previous Strategic Plan, we set a target of growing the 

College’s total funds by 25%. This was ambitious but realistic 

given previous success. We are delighted that, with growth of 

32%, our total funds reached £257m at July 2022. 

See Appendix 1 (page 58) for further financial information. 


54 


Finance Strategy 


Across this Strategic Plan, we set out the 

College’s ambitions for the next five years. We 

want to improve the fabric of our buildings, 

and address challenges around sustainability, 

accessibility and recruitment. We will continue 

to focus on our academic priorities, such as 

endowing academic posts, and supporting 

studentships and bursaries. 

At the time of writing, we are in the middle of a challenging 

financial situation. As we address the remaining consequences 

of the pandemic, the re-emergence of high inflation creates 

pressures not seen for many years. We must therefore 

proceed with an element of caution in financial decisionmaking 

in the short-to-medium term, to ensure that we can 

deliver the College’s strategic objectives while protecting its 

long-term interests. 

Investments 

Despite uncertainty around the conditions that have favoured 

investments for so long, we believe that some investment 

growth is achievable, particularly in regards to our property 

portfolio: 

• We will seek to exploit the opportunity to develop 

housing on the College-owned land at Lincoln. Having 

been included in the local area development plan, this asset 

has the potential to provide a significant contribution to 

College funds; 

• We will conduct an option appraisal into the scope for 

redeveloping parts of our Cornmarket properties to 

improve the retail space, and inform further discussion and 

decision-making on the future use of the vacant element of 

these properties; 

• We will appraise options for improving the sustainability of 

our residential properties in both North and East Oxford; 

• We will continue to seek quality tenants for our 

commercial property in Oxford; and 

• We are updating our securities investment strategy to take 

advantage of the College’s position as an ultra-long-term 

investor and to drive investment performance. 

Operational management 

Providing effective and efficient operational support remains 

a crucial part of ensuring that the College can deliver its core 

academic mission and ambitions. The following actions will 

contribute to this: 

• The cap on UK undergraduate fees limits our income at 

a time of high inflation, such that accommodation and 

event income offer the best opportunities for growth 

in operational income. We will implement an annual 

Conference Action Plan to ensure optimum use of both 

our existing and new facilities; 

• We will develop a rolling plan of works that spreads 

significant expenditure over the five year period of the Plan 

(and beyond) in order to enhance College infrastructure, 

particularly with regard to accessibility and the introduction 

of initiatives towards sustainability goals; 

• We will continue to work closely with the Academic, 

Accommodation and Development Offices to identify 

and support the College’s strategic objectives, such as 

endowing academic posts, supporting studentships and 

bursaries, and delivering against our sustainability targets. 


56 



Governance 

Strategy 

New opportunities for 

best practice 


Participation of Academic Fellows 

in the governance of the College 

has always been key to its 

effectiveness. 

Consistent with the objectives of the 

last Strategic Plan, our Governing Body 

(GB) now includes a Research Fellow 

representative, while College Officer 

meetings include a representative from 

the academic members of GB. Staff and 

student representatives also attend 

GB meetings. 

Additionally, we planned to extend 

our arrangements for formal training 

in Trustee duties to existing and new 

members of GB, and offer annual training 

in the financial affairs of College. This has 

now been delivered. New members of 

GB receive a briefing from the Estates 

Bursar on trustee responsibilities and the 

College’s financial affairs. 

Academic priorities continue to be the focus for 

all our decision-making, and going forward we will 

explore new opportunities to further improve 

our management of the College. 

Mandatory Trustee training 

We will ensure that all Trustees, both on appointment and 

periodically thereafter, receive specialist training in governance 

and regulation, legal and financial responsibilities, and strategic 

and operational considerations. 

A new Governance Committee 

A new Governance Committee will be appointed to ensure 

that both legal and Charity Commission developments are 

considered regularly. 

Once appointed, the Governance Committee will undertake 

a review of the effectiveness of College governance, 

addressing questions around the size of Governing Body, 

attendance of members, delegated authorities, and an audit 

of skills and diversity. 

Membership of committees 

We will conduct a review of the membership of our 

committees, and both the Academic and HR Committees 

will consider appointing independent members in order to 

ensure broader perspectives in decision-making. 

In addition, the HR Director will attend the Remuneration 

Committee, which is responsible for setting and reviewing 

the remuneration strategy for the College. 

Senior appointments 

We will look to review the appointments process for senior 

roles in College. 

Transparency 

Working with the Communications Manager, we will 

undertake an exercise to ensure that all College policy 

statements are clear in purpose, up to date and accessible. 

Sustainability Working Group 

We will establish a dedicated working group to provide 

governance oversight for the development and delivery 

of our new Sustainability Strategy (see page 36). This will 

have the task of ensuring that the principle of sustainability 

becomes firmly embedded in all parts of the College and in 

all our activities. 

Arts Committee 

We will stand up the Arts Committee which the College 

resolved to establish before the pandemic. 


58 


Appendix 1 

Financial information 

Y/e July 2022 Y/e July 2016 Change 

Change statistics £’000 £’000 £’000 % 

Unrestricted income 13,800 11,149 2,651 23.8% 

Charitable income 6,778 5,632 1,146 20.3% 

Tuition fees 3,039 2,241 798 35.6% 

Residential income 3,461 3,201 260 8.1% 

Academic expenditure 4,083 2,636 1,447 54.9% 

Total funds 256,798 194,261 62,537 32.2% 

July 2022 July 2016 Change 

Balance sheet statistics £’000 £’000 £’000 % 

Tangible fixed assets 44,510 11,796 32,714 277.3% 

Agricultural property 63,224 30,629 32,595 106.4% 

Commercial property* 32,224 57,355 -25,131 -43.8% 

Securities investments 164,490 97,663 66,827 68.4% 

Total investments 259,938 185,647 74,291 40.0% 

*Approx £20m is the impact of the decline in Northgate House. The balance is the rest of Cornmarket and Ship Street reflecting sharp changes in retail values. 

With huge thanks to the Jesus College Fellowship, and in particular the College’s Strategic Plan 

Working Groups, for their support in the development of this document. Thank you also to 

the following photographers and staff who provided accompanying images: John Cairns, Sophia 

Carlarne, Jude Eades, Brendan Foster, Sarah Jones, Ed Nix, Andrew Ogilvy Photography, 

Silvia Rosi, Bev Shadbolt, SK Photography and Brittany Wellner James. 

Managing Editor: Jude Eades, Design by Imageworks. © Jesus College Oxford 2023 


For more information about Jesus College 

visit www.jesus.ox.ac.uk 

Jesus College, Turl Street, Oxford, OX1 3DW

Jesus College Strategic Plan 2023 - 2027

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