New Regional Champions needed for Midlands, Scotland and the South-West

This year we are looking for new Regional Champions to lead the Academy’s work in the Midlands, Scotland and the South West. Our Champions from across the country play a vital role in promoting and connecting the Academy and its local Fellowship, building on the existing connections amongst Fellows to increase our reach across local networks and raise awareness of the Academy’s work within the wider local biomedical communities. New Champions will be joining the scheme at an important time as the Academy focuses on maximising the opportunities for promoting connectivity and regional engagement, enabled by virtual meeting technology.

Our Champions act as ambassadors for the Academy and the Fellowship election, helping support and encourage nominations from their regions to help us achieve our goal for the Fellowship to be as representative as possible of the UK's full diversity of talent, both geographically and across gender, ethnicity and areas of expertise. Champions also help us bring the Academy onto the radar of the next generation of researchers and introduce them to our careers schemes and programmes.

This year our network of Champions hosted Anne Johnson’s virtual regional tour as new President. While face to face events in this programme have been interrupted for more than a year, we hope to be able to resume soon this important area of activity. Previously our Champions have contributed to an array of events ranging from career development opportunities for early career researchers and regional celebrations of success to public lectures, research conferences and networking events for local Fellows.

Champions handing on their positions at the end of this year are: Professor Philip Baker (Midlands); Professor Mandy MacLean (Scotland) and Professor Ashley Blom (South West). They will be standing down from their roles at our AGM in December when incoming Champs will take office. We sincerely thank Philip, Mandy and Ashley for their support of the regional programme and we look forward to working with the next Fellows taking on these roles.

Regional Champions are provided with dedicated funding for events, opportunities to meet with the wider Champions network, and access to resources, insight and support from the Academy staff. Any Fellow within a rotating region is eligible to apply for these three-year roles. Incoming Champions will be offered an induction session in February next year.

An expression of interest form, person specification and brief role description including background information about the scheme is available to download from this page. Fellows interested should complete the expression of interest form and send it to Alison Rojo by Friday 1 October 2021 at the latest  (alison.rojo@acmedsci.ac.uk)

In the event that more than one nomination is received for a region, Academy Officers will be invited to select a preferred candidate. Fellows who would like to have an informal chat about the role are invited to contact Simon Denegri (simon.denegri@acmedsci.ac.uk) to find out more about the scheme.