Professor Michael Stewart Inaugural Lecture

The Porous University: Creating Partnerships in a Global City

UCL was founded to open the world of learning to the excluded for the betterment of all. Like many institutions, over time and under many pressures, UCL has become encased in a self-protective shell. The founding principle that knowledge would be taken out and applied to make the world a better place is relegated to an aspiration as seemingly more urgent agendas hold sway. In a changing world it is pertinent to ask how we can both fulfil new obligations and uphold the radical empowering spirit of our founders. How do we soften the shell around the university to make it porous to the world around us? What would embedding cultural, social and economic partnerships do to the way we teach, research and engage? What would it mean to truly and deeply think of ourselves as a global university in a global city?