I write this having just returned from an event for our alumni in Kuala Lumpur at which our alumni were greeted by a team of some thirty staff from Anglia Ruskin, who were in Malaysia to develop our international activity following a similar visit to Beijing earlier that week. It was a delight to meet so many of our former students and I felt extremely proud of what they all told me they are doing now. For example, I met three of our first ever cohort of nursing students who began their studies in 1996; two are now lecturers at the University of Malaya. Law was best represented of all academic disciplines and as well as practising lawyers, our law students have found their way into corporations large and small and even the Police Service. A very recent (2012) graduate of Accounting and Finance (who studied through our partner, the London College of Accountancy) has just begun work for the Royal Bank of Canada. Several people were making their way in the teaching profession. And so on - the most senior alumnus going back to 1988.

It made me realise that our aim ought to echo that of one of our partners in Malaysia, HELP University, who hope to have an alumni member in each and every major corporation and institution in Malaysia: our version of that aim would be to be thus represented in each country from which we welcome more than 100 students a year! Of course, we shall only know about your achievements if you tell us, so please do keep us posted. I am especially keen to have alumni stories that could feature in next year's graduation ceremony speech and to hold more alumni events worldwide. To that end, if you can convince us that you could get more than 100 alumni together, with enough notice we will give serious thought to whether we can fly out someone to host an alumni event to meet and update former students to further our shared pride.

As we travelled around we had to be at pains to explain our own dismay at the UK government's continued unwelcoming 'body language' with regard to international students coming to the UK to study. Things do seem to be getting a little better, but the clear UK government message that all immigration is bad has been picked up by the world's press even though it is self-evidently false: studies have shown the UK economy to benefit by no less than £5billion thanks to its international students, never mind the social and cultural benefits and the importance of making the world a smaller place.

Generally, the uncertainty around UK full-time student recruitment remains following the tripling (or thereabouts) of their fees. While many reputationally advantaged institutions found themselves several hundred students below their targets this year, as did several of our sister institutions, I am pleased to say that we at Anglia Ruskin bucked the trend with record student intakes. At the time of writing, the UK context is one of a drop in applications but again, we are seeing a slight increase. So, for the time being at least, we are in fine fettle.

As I finish this I am off to address our Research Conference where my key messages will be that we expect to submit for 12 world-leading ratings in the coming government assessment of research rather than the 8 we have at the moment, and that we have record research income and record numbers of research students. So just as our alumni are upwardly mobile, so too is your alma mater. All the more important to keep up with progress and to keep in touch. Best wishes for a wonderful 2013.

Professor Michael Thorne
Vice Chancellor