St Cross College, Oxford

The head of the Romanian Foreign Intelligence Service has been nominated as Prime Minister of Romania after Emil Boc stepped down in the face of street protests against an austerity programme. 

St Cross is now holding the annual photography competition for student members of College.   This year's theme is 'Hidden Oxford'.

During January St Cross undertook a successful telephone fund-raising campaign in conjunction with the University Development Office.

The College congratulates St Cross Emanoel Lee Junior Research Fellow Dr Gkikas Magiorkinis on a splendid achievement, namely the recent award of a Medical Sciences Prize by the Academy of Athens.

Four of the College Fellows have recently been honoured with the title of Professor in the recent Recognition of Distinction exercise undertaken by the University.

Diarmaid MacCulloch, Fellow of St Cross and Professor of the History of the Church, has received a knighthood in the 2012 New Year Honours, in recognition of his services to scholarship.

St Cross junior member Ben Hebbert (DPhil Music) has recently taken a major part in a remarkable musical project.  Ben is at present combining completing his DPhil with a post as head of early stringed instrument making at West Dean College, Chichester, West Sussex, and was part of the team assembled by Charles Hazlewood, conductor of the BBC Concert Orchestra, to make an entire orchestra of 44 instruments from scrap metal, unwanted furniture, the contents of roadside skips, or junk from any other source they could find.

Another play directed by St Cross student Griff Rees (DPhil Sociology) has just been produced in Oxford, following his well received version of Strindberg's A Dream Play in Hilary Term 2011.

The annual College carol service was held in the Chapel of Pusey House on Tuesday 6 December.  It was conducted by Bishop Jonathan Baker, the Principal of Pusey House, assisted by Fr Philip Corbett and Fr Mihai Novacovschi and the chapel was full of members of College, their families and friends.

'Is it really student accommodation?  Looks more like smart flats to me,' was the comment of a local passer-by on Stonemason House in Magdalen Road, the newest addition to the range of accommodation provided by St Cross for its students.