St Andrews Alumni Return to Fife
Twenty years since they met as students at St Andrews, The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge returned to their alma mater on Wednesday 26 May to hear from current students about how they have coped and supported each other during the past difficult year.
During the visit, Catherine (History of Art 2005) and William (Geography 2005) were accompanied by St Andrews Principal, Professor Sally Mapstone and the President of the St Andrews Students’ Association, Dan Marshall
The Royal couple – known as the Earl and Countess of Strathearn when they are in Scotland – met current students involved in the St Andrews Can Do scheme.
Can Do was introduced in September 2020 as a joint University and St Andrews Students’ Association initiative to provide safe socialising activities and events as a way of addressing the frustration and mental health challenges students faced during lockdown. The Duke and Duchess helped finish painting socially distanced hearts on St Salvator’s Quadrangle lawn – one of the icons of the Can Do initiative.
The couple paid a visit to the Can Do marquee where they met students who were able to plan and host their Covid-secure extra-curricular activities and society events in the space. The marquee has hosted a diverse range of more than 500 events since its launch – from Ballroom and Latin dancing to charity and wellbeing activities – and has acted as a vital morale boost for students on campus.
During their visit, the Duke and Duchess also took the opportunity to plant the first tree for the St Andrews Forest – one of the key initiatives in the University’s Environmental Sustainability Strategy to become Net Zero by 2035.
As a member of the University’s Environmental Sustainability Board, Deanna Coleman – final year International Relations student – single-handedly researched and proposed the St Andrews Forest Initiative which seeks to offset student travel emissions.
The forest will have multiple sites across the world and will help to draw down carbon from the atmosphere and to provide new habitats for wildlife, green spaces to aid mental health and wellbeing and opportunities for education and research. The Initiative has been nominated by Yale University for the Global University Climate Forum.
St Andrews alumni, friends and supporters are being asked to support the Forest initiative by planting trees across the globe and signing up to a crowdfunding effort to help maximise the impact of this ambitious carbon reduction scheme.