Ambassadorial role for Professor

Professor Laura Serrant-Green, Associate Dean of Research & Enterprise in the University’s School of Health & Wellbeing, has been announced as the latest Ambassador for the Mary Seacole Memorial Statue Appeal.

Professor Serrant-Green is the thirtieth ambassador for the campaign, and follows in the footsteps of actor Rudolph Walker OBE, baritone Sir Willard White CBE and Children’s Laureate Malorie Blackman OBE.

Mary Seacole, a Jamaican nurse of Scottish and Creole descent, rose to prominence for her dedication to nursing the wounded personnel of the Crimean War.

She was posthumously awarded the Jamaican Order of Merit in 1991, and in 2004 she was voted the greatest black Briton.

The appeal aims to raise £500,000 for a memorial statue in her honour to stand within the ground of St Thomas’ Hospital in London.

Speaking about Mary Seacole’s legacy and her role as an ambassador to the appeal, Professor Serrant-Green said: “As a previous Mary Seacole Nursing Leadership award winner, Black woman, academic, and most importantly a Nurse, I have looked to inspiring and determined leaders to guide me.

“Mary Seacole, for her intelligence, perseverance and unswerving belief in rights, responsibility and above all the need to help where it is needed, is one of the Giants on whose shoulders I proudly stand.”

For more information on the appeal, visit http://www.maryseacoleappeal.org.uk/index.htm

ENDS

For more information please contact Patrick Campbell in the Media Relations Office on 01902 322448

Date Issued: Thursday 12 September 2013