Emdad Rahman
Regents Lake Banqueting Hall was the venue as Brit College celebrated ten years of delivering Higher Education as an independent provider. Brit College was established in 2006 and since 2013 it has delivered a single Higher Education programme to UK and EU learners on a full time, face to face basis.
The Colleges mission is to become a leading provider of skills development to hard to reach communities through the delivery of innovative and customised learning opportunities.
After a registration and networking event guests were welcomed by Vice Principal Chris Mabika. There was a special viewing of a Brit College promotional video and students spoke of their experience of learning at the College. As a business case learner, HND student Rachel Godfrey said, “I really like the atmosphere at Brit. There are great teachers and the flexibility is good. My advice to new students would be ‘go ahead and do it.’ I took the step and never looked back. This is the best choice I have made.”
Student awards were presented in three categories:
Academic Excellence Tunde Gyurcsovics, Suzan Hamilton, Farah Khan
Student representative recognition Email Sandoiu, Enam Islam, Harun Miah
Outstanding student support Rao Tahir Saeed Khan, Sandra Medina, Muhammad Ali
Guest speaker Professor Geoffrey Alderman said, “Today I have had the pleasure of chairing the Brit College oversight board. Although it has no executive powers it does have a great deal of influence on strategic decisions. Chairing this board was emotional for me. I myself am in essence going back to my roots. My family came from Whitechapel and Stepney. My father was a packer in a local warehouse and in ‘’Ackney’ (Hackney) and money was very limited. I was fortunate and went to a grammar school and Oxford. I am I would say a product of widening participation.
“We are in the midst of a revolution in higher education. Our ambition may strike some of you as extraordinarily high but it is attainable and I assure you that I will be at the forefront to guide the college into the next decade and the next stage. I thank everybody, particularly the students, whom I want to assure will have a champion voice in me at the college.”
Other speakers included: •Will Naylor from the Quality Assurance Agency (QAA), which promotes standards and safeguarding quality in higher education amongst private colleges; •Tim Murari, Principal of the London Language Foundation; teachers Dr Roman Puchkov and Shahriar Khan; •Zakir Khan from Canary Wharf Group, who said, “Congratulations to Brit College on such monumental achievements. I have a close relationship with senior management at this institute. I wish them many years of great success.”
Chief Executive Musaddiq Ahmed concluded, “We thank our MP Jim Fitzpatrick and our Mayor John Biggs for their support. There is a Chinese proverb, ‘Long journeys start with a small step.’ We have a really dedicated team and, moving forward, our vision is to achieve degree awarding powers and through new legislation we believe we have the expertise, knowledge and experience to deliver this. Many of our learners are hard to reach students and our support has really inspired and empowered them.
“It is an amazing feeling that we have achieved such a milestone and reached such a significant milestone in our journey. In the long term we hope to achieve university status.”
•For more information about Brit College in Commercial Road, go to: www.britcollege.org.uk
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