News archive 2003

New Principal for King's

07 Oct 2003, PR 70/03

Professor Richard Trainor has been appointed Principal of King's College London, following the retirement of Professor Arthur Lucas CBE, and will take up the position in September 2004. The appointment is made by the Crown, on the recommendation of the College Council.

Professor Trainor, BA MA DPhil FRHistS AcSS, is currently Vice-Chancellor of the University of Greenwich where he is also Professor of Social History; his research interests focus on the composition and impact of urban elites in nineteenth and twentieth century Britain. He joined Greenwich in 2000.

In the interim Professor Trainor has reorganised the University's internal structure and campuses while introducing a strategy focusing on 'nurturing excellence' in all of Greenwich's activities. He has also emphasised collaborations with other universities, in particular the development of a joint campus with the University of Kent.

Professor Trainor formerly was senior vice-principal and Professor of Social History at the University of Glasgow, where he introduced the institution's first staffing strategy and played an active part in improving RAE and TQA performances.

Following education at Brown and Princeton in his native USA, Professor Trainor took his doctorate at Oxford, where he was a Rhodes Scholar and junior research fellow. In 1979 he took up his first appointment at Glasgow, where he was subsequently Dean of Social Sciences before becoming Vice-Principal.

He has been heavily involved in the application of information technology to university teaching, especially in history and related subjects. He is a member of the Academy of the Social Sciences, a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and Honorary Secretary of the Economic History Society. He is also chair of the Learning and Teaching Support Network (LTSN), a board member of Universities UK and of the London Higher Education Consortium and a member both of the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) and the US-UK Fulbright Commission.

Chairman of King's College Council, Baroness Rawlings commented: 'The decision of the appointment panel was unanimous. We are delighted to appoint Professor Trainor, whose track record of management in higher education is exceptional.'

Professor Trainor said:
'I am very excited to be coming to King's and helping to ensure that it continues to move forward as one of the major academic centres in the country. I look forward immensely to meeting colleagues and students at the College.'

Professor Barry Ife, Vice-Principal of King's since 1997 and holder of the Cervantes Chair of Spanish, will be Acting Principal until September 2004.

Notes to editors

King's College London
King's is one of the oldest and largest colleges of the University of London with some 13,400 undergraduate students and some 5,000 postgraduates in ten schools of study. The College had 24 of its subject-areas awarded the highest rating of 5* and 5 for research quality, demonstrating excellence at an international level. It is in the top group of five universities for research earnings and has an annual turnover of £320 million and research income from grants and contracts of some £90 million (2001-2002).

Photo of Professor Richard Trainor
Photographs are available by email from the King's College London Public Relations Department.
Tel: 020-7848 3202, email: pr@kcl.ac.uk

Further information
Public Relations Department
Email: pr@kcl.ac.uk
Tel: 020 7848 3202

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Tel: 020-7848 3202  Fax: 020-7848 3739  Email: pr@kcl.ac.uk