Well I am just back from an absolutely wonderful evening at the Newnham Roll Mums Inaugural lecture - given by the superb Penelope Leach!
The evening went very well indee! It was attended by over 70 Newnhamites ranging from some of today's undergraduates, who played an active part in the discussions right up to some Grandmothers - some of who had had the daughters and their grandaughters attend Newnham!...Anna and I were absolutely delighted to see so many students and alumni engaged in this topic which is so close to our hearts.
Penelope's talk itself was fascinating - giving us an insight into how babies brains develop in the womb, and how the mother's emotions and stress levels can have a significant impact in this even before the child is born. She then talked about the decision many of us have made or will make to become a mother and the many factors that impact on that in today's society...stressing how vital the role of mother is to the upbringning of a happy and settled child. There was much discussion about the ideal age to begin a family with penelope suggesting that there are many arguements for doing in our twenties before we really begin our careers in order to avoid issues with fertility which can arise when people have their families in their late thirties, and while we have more energy.
We were very fortunate that Carl Homer was able to attend the lecture and record the talk! He will now turn this into a podcast which will be available on the Newnham College website in the next couple of week!
The lecture was followed by a very delicious dinner in the college hall, cooked by Newnham's excellent catering team, where the discussions around this issues raised in the lecture continued long into the evening.
For me this was a very special evening as my Mum and Godmother travelled down from Northumberland to attend the lecture. My Mum used Penelope'sseminal book 'Baby and Child' as her bible when she was raising my sister and I and this evening gave my mum the opportunity to final meet Penelope face to face and talk to her about this book which really helped her through thosen early days of parenting. I have my mums original copy of this book and this evening was able to get her to autograph this for her!
We had so much interest in Roll Mums this evening from people from all over the country (including Penelope herself) asking if they could join our Committee, and when our next event would take place....which is absolutely fantastic!
All I can say at the moment is...watch this space!..Anna and Penny and I will meet up next week to talk about where Roll Mums goes from here!...and will no doubt be in touch with you all very soon with news about our future plans!
Friday, 11 November 2011
Wednesday, 9 November 2011
Newnham Roll Mums Launches this friday
Hello!
My name is Kate Wilson (Moss) NC98! For the best part of 18 months now I have been working with my fellow Newnhamite, Anna Wakerley to get Newnham Roll Mums off the ground. The idea for the group came from a number of discussions we had had within in Newnham Roll Committee about the best way to support Newnhamite Alumni who were Mothers. There was a general feeling that college was very happy to celebrate and sing the praises of Newnhamites who became high achievers in their professional lives - be they oscar winning actresses, authors, journalists, rabbi's, doctors, poets, CEO's of national institutions - there was very little mention of the role that a large number of Newnhamites go on the play - that of being a mother. We very strongly felt that it was time to do something about this and from this the idea of Newnham Roll Mums was born! The idea behind the group is that it provides Newnham Mothers to come together, share friendship and support and to participate in discussions about topics which are relevant to modern parents in today's society - e.g.'Do I return to work or do i become a stay at home mum (SAHM to those of you familiar with mumsnet speak!)?', 'Is breast always best?' 'What childcare options are there available to me out there?' , 'how do i maintain my identity at the same time as taking on this all consuming role as someone's mother?' - Quite frnakly to list of topics that this group could discuss are endless and we wanted to provide some form of online presense where members could come together online and share their view, opinions, experience and advice with each other! This blog is the first attempt at this - hopefully people can come here, read what we have to say and then engage with each other in debate through the comments section! We also have a twitter presense - if you follow Rollmumskate you will recieve all our tweets with the latest and most up to date Roll Mums News! And we hope at some point in the futre that we will have a facebook page aswell.
The more we talked about it the more we realised how important that it was for the group to actually be able to meet in person and from this the idea of the annual Roll Mums Lecture was born. These talks will provide an excellent opportunity for the group to hear interesting and relevant lectures from inspirational Newnhamites - some of whom will be mothers themselves or will have contributed to the field of 'parenting' through their work in some way.
I am delighted to annouce that the inaugural lecture for the group will be delivered by Penelope Leach at Newnham on Friday 11th November, who will be addressing the topic of 'Babies and Brains'. We are very excited indeed about this wonderful opportunity to welcome Penelope to Newnham and to hear her speak and will of course report back to you through this blog!
I think that is about all I have to say by way of introduction to the group - other than to say if you are reading this and you are a Newnhamite Mum and would like to join our blog please do get in touch!....email me at krhmwilson@gmail.com and we will make sure you are sent all of our information!
We look forward to hearing from many of you very soon!
Katexx
My name is Kate Wilson (Moss) NC98! For the best part of 18 months now I have been working with my fellow Newnhamite, Anna Wakerley to get Newnham Roll Mums off the ground. The idea for the group came from a number of discussions we had had within in Newnham Roll Committee about the best way to support Newnhamite Alumni who were Mothers. There was a general feeling that college was very happy to celebrate and sing the praises of Newnhamites who became high achievers in their professional lives - be they oscar winning actresses, authors, journalists, rabbi's, doctors, poets, CEO's of national institutions - there was very little mention of the role that a large number of Newnhamites go on the play - that of being a mother. We very strongly felt that it was time to do something about this and from this the idea of Newnham Roll Mums was born! The idea behind the group is that it provides Newnham Mothers to come together, share friendship and support and to participate in discussions about topics which are relevant to modern parents in today's society - e.g.'Do I return to work or do i become a stay at home mum (SAHM to those of you familiar with mumsnet speak!)?', 'Is breast always best?' 'What childcare options are there available to me out there?' , 'how do i maintain my identity at the same time as taking on this all consuming role as someone's mother?' - Quite frnakly to list of topics that this group could discuss are endless and we wanted to provide some form of online presense where members could come together online and share their view, opinions, experience and advice with each other! This blog is the first attempt at this - hopefully people can come here, read what we have to say and then engage with each other in debate through the comments section! We also have a twitter presense - if you follow Rollmumskate you will recieve all our tweets with the latest and most up to date Roll Mums News! And we hope at some point in the futre that we will have a facebook page aswell.
The more we talked about it the more we realised how important that it was for the group to actually be able to meet in person and from this the idea of the annual Roll Mums Lecture was born. These talks will provide an excellent opportunity for the group to hear interesting and relevant lectures from inspirational Newnhamites - some of whom will be mothers themselves or will have contributed to the field of 'parenting' through their work in some way.
I am delighted to annouce that the inaugural lecture for the group will be delivered by Penelope Leach at Newnham on Friday 11th November, who will be addressing the topic of 'Babies and Brains'. We are very excited indeed about this wonderful opportunity to welcome Penelope to Newnham and to hear her speak and will of course report back to you through this blog!
I think that is about all I have to say by way of introduction to the group - other than to say if you are reading this and you are a Newnhamite Mum and would like to join our blog please do get in touch!....email me at krhmwilson@gmail.com and we will make sure you are sent all of our information!
We look forward to hearing from many of you very soon!
Katexx
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