Yesterday, the officials talking on behalf of the globally respected and prestigious Oxford University have been more than happy to make a historic announcement. Although it took 800 years for Oxford University to appoint a female to the position of Vice Chancellor, the event has finally happened. It is a victory for the evolution of the modern day morals and, to be more specific, an evolution in the way women are regarded in our present day society.
If you were to wind back the clock a hundred years ago, you could not imagine that a woman would gain access to such a highly important position within a university. Actually, it would have been hard to image a woman getting into a university at all, since education was not a right properly guaranteed by the societies of the past. This has led to a fantastic fight that women have fought on the field of critical thinking and philosophy but not only, since such ways are not as efficient as they would be needed to to be in the short term.
Now come back to the current year. It is 2015 and a woman functions as Vice Chancellor of the Oxford University for the first time in the history.
Her name is Professor Louise Richardson and she is currently in the position of head of the University of St. Andrews, in Scotland. Professor Louise Richardson is well known for the strategy that she has implemented over the recent years, which implies getting more disadvantaged students into higher education institutions.
Professor Richardson was raised in an Irish village near the seashore. She was one of the first members of her family that went to university.
After she has been informed of her recent appointment as VC at the Oxford University, Professor Louise Richardson has said that she feels very fortunate and privileged to have been selected for such a position. She will start her new work at the beginning of the following year. By being appointed as VC at the Oxford University, Professor Louise Richardson is not only the first female to ever be in such a position. Also, she will become one of the few members of the academic communities that have not studied or worked at the Oxford or Cambridge universities.
“We have to work hard to raise the attainment and ambition of students in deprived areas.“
professor Richardson has said in a statement, reiterating the main principle of her academic activity.
Image Source: The Australian