Emeritus, Honorary and Foundation Fellows

I’m Jo Ockwell and I’m Somerville’s Student Welfare Lead and Disability Co-ordinator.

I lead the College’s welfare team who are here to help with life’s ups and downs. We’re all trained to support you in a non-judgemental way and will do our best to help.  I’ve worked at Somerville for almost 15 years so have helped students with all sorts of problems. While I’m not an expert on every possible welfare concern you might have, I will definitely know someone who is!

Adjusting to university life at Oxford is exciting and fun, but it can be difficult too. Here at Somerville we are a supportive and caring community: we believe that seeking help is always the start of sorting out an issue, and never a sign of weakness. The whole welfare team, which includes me as well as our Student Welfare Advisors, college counsellor, and nurse, are here to support you to find the resources or methods that you need to manage any welfare concerns you have and for you to be in control of your own wellbeing.

Part of my role is to support our disabled students. If you have a disability, seen or unseen, please let me know so that we can put in place support to help you through your academic studies. I also co-ordinate examination adjustments, so if you have a disability or health condition that means you need adjustments for examinations, please let me know. There is more information about how we support disabled students here.

Some students understandably worry about confidentiality. I want to assure you now that all members of the Welfare Team at Somerville work within the same guidelines on when they should share any information that a student has told them in confidence. You can find out the detailed guidance on our website, but here it is in a nutshell; we don’t disclose anything that you have told us in confidence unless we are seriously concerned that you might harm yourself or someone else. That basic principle underlines how we work.

I am always pleased to chat to anyone who knocks on my office door (House 4, on the ground floor of House Building) who needs a confidential chat or advice/guidance on all manner of welfare or disability concerns. We can talk in my office, or take a walk and chat if that works better for you; just let me know what you prefer.

My training includes:

A note for parents: We would sometimes like to be able to speak to parents about our students if we are concerned about them. However, we are unable to do so without the student’s explicit consent unless there is an emergency situation and the parent is listed as the student’s trusted contact on their Oxford University student record. 

Hi! My name is Chibuzor, and I am a DPhil student in Population Health. My research focuses on using genetic evidence from blood proteins measured in thousands of individuals to inform the repurposing of existing drugs for the prevention and treatment of various cancers.

I was born and raised in Nigeria and trained as a medical doctor. My work reflects my broader interest in precise prevention and treatment strategies for complex diseases like cancer, particularly in low-resource settings.

Beyond academics and research, I enjoy watching movies, listening to – and occasionally dancing to – good music, spending time with friends, and occasionally hitting the gym. I also have a keen interest in history, theology, and philosophy, as well as social issues involving race and minority groups.

I’m excited to be part of the amazing Somerville community. Please feel free to reach out if you need any support or just want to have a friendly chat.

Student Welfare Advisors are available to support students in crisis overnight and at weekends. We provide a listening, support and signposting service. We can listen, provide guidance and support if you’re experiencing difficulties such as personal problems, poor mental health, or other welfare/wellbeing matters.

I have undertaken the following training for my role as Student Welfare Advisor:

• Sexual Violence Awareness provided by the Sexual Harassment and Violence Support Service
• First Aid Training offered by St John’s Ambulance
• Junior Deans Training offered by the University Counselling Service
• Health and Safety Training – Somerville Lodge Porters
• Fire Evacuation Training – Somerville Lodge Porters
• Welfare Policy and Procedures – Student Welfare Lead
• College Rules and Procedures – Decanal Officer
• Active Bystander Intervention training provided by the University’s Equality and Diversity Unit

Patricia went to a comprehensive school in London and, as the first in her family to go to university, did not even think to apply to Oxbridge… She particularly welcomes applications to study PPE from students at non-selective state schools.

Her research interests include twentieth-century international history and theory, disciplinary history and the history of international and political thought, and historical and contemporary practices of Anglo-American counterinsurgency and military intervention. She was Principal Investigator of the multi-award winning Leverhulme Research Project on Women and the History of International Thought.

Antony graduated from Oxford University Medical School in 2006 and commenced Higher Surgical Training in Trauma and Orthopaedics in 2010. Having previously completed the Oxford Academic Foundation Programme and an Academic Clinical Fellowship, he is now an Academic Clinical Lecturer.

During his training he spent three years out of programme working towards a DPhil in Musculoskeletal Sciences in Oxford supervised by Professor Glyn-Jones and Professor Carr. His thesis explored how activity levels during adolescence effect hip development and the future risk of osteoarthritis.

Antony currently has three main research interests:

1) Blood Management in Trauma and Orthopaedic Surgery. Blood conservation is essential for the care of surgical patients. He is working to optimise each step of the patient pathway and investigating how tranexamic acid is best delivered to reduce intra-operative blood loss. This work is a collaboration with Professor Mike Murphy from the NHS Blood and Transplant Unit.

2) Understanding how activity levels influence joint injury and osteoarthritis. This research compares the joint structure and function of elite athletes with general population cohorts. He is investigating the effect of physical activity and exploring interventions that may prevent injury and osteoarthritis. This research is in collaboration with Southampton Football Club.

3) Musculoskeletal MRI for detecting early osteoarthritis. Novel MRI sequences are able to provide information on the biochemical composition of joint structures. He is working on the clinical translation of these imaging techniques to facilitate development of new treatment strategies for joint disease. This research is in collaboration with Professor Neal Bangerter at Imperial College, London

Aarthee studied PPE at Somerville and previously acted as the JCR Access and Admissions Officer.

As Treasurer and Domestic Bursar, Andrew Parker is responsible for the College’s finances and investments including legacies, building projects and maintenance, and commercial property, as well as Human Resources, health and safety, the College gardens, and the Bursary.

Andrew, who is a qualified accountant, has had an extensive career in Finance and Administration. From 1988-2002 he was Finance Director of Oxford University Press, as well as Group Financial Controller and Interim Managing Director of OUP’s International Division. From 2003 to 2013 he was Director of Finance and Administration at the Royal Shakespeare Company, with responsibility for Finance, HR, IT, Estates and Health & Safety, as part of the senior executive team.

Dame Judith Parker DBE QC is a former High Court judge.

She was called to the Bar in 1973, took Silk in 1991 and was elected a Bencher in 2000. She was appointed an Assistant Recorder in 1998, a Deputy High Court Judge in 1999, a Recorder in 2000 and a Judge of the High Court (Family Division) in 2008. She was a Family Division Liaison Judge from 2011 to 2016 and a Judicial Role Model from 2016 to 2019.

My current research examines English translations of a selection of German language novels, from Irmgard Keun’s Das kunstseidene Mädchen and Gilgi to Sasha Marianna Salzmann’s Ausser Sich. I focus on consciousness narratives whose authors have attempted to (and sometimes struggled to) articulate the mind of a gendered subject, and investigate how, and how successfully, these attempts have been translated into English. I am particularly interested in how creative, radical translational decisions seem especially suited to recreating the force and flavour of the original text.

I have a particular interest in teaching translation from German to English, at all levels and in a variety of ways. Recently I held a feminist translation micro-conference with second years, in which students workshopped German extracts together and presented their findings in the form of lightning talks. Other recent classes have focused on the translation of wordplay, children’s books, newspaper reports, and prose poetry. I also teach the core German Literature paper, and offer modules on Psychoanalysis, ‘Postwar Restoration Frenzy’ in Austria, Representing Trauma, as well as Goethe, and the Enlightenment.

I design and deliver outreach sessions for the Medieval and Modern Languages Faculty, to promote progression to languages A-Levels and GCSEs. I am working with schools in the North of England as part of the Faculty’s VOx programme, and have developed and led sessions around tactile translations of German poetry, the bilingual identity, and English-to-English translation classes.

I’m Jairus Tristan Patoc, a third-year DPhil student in experimental Particle Physics. I like techno, Common Ground Oat Flat Whites and thrifting.

As one of the MCR Social Secretaries, I help curate the MCR’s social scene, with: safe but electric bops, community socials that bring us closer as an MCR, and unforgettable College exchanges which connect you people from the wider University community. By day (and often by night), I’m also your LGBTQ+ Rep, pushing for inclusivity and making sure our voices are heard loud and clear in the MCR and at the College’s Equality and Diversity Working Group with other EDI representatives

Professor Phillips holds the Professorship in Linguistics, and he currently is head of department (“Faculty Board Chair”) in the Faculty of Linguistics, Philology, and Phonetics, a department whose existence owes a great deal to the efforts of legendary Somervillian Anna Morpurgo Davies, Professor of Comparative Philology from 1971-2004.

Professor Phillips returned to Oxford in 2024 after 33 years based in the United States. As an undergraduate student in Oxford he came to Somerville for tutorials in medieval German. Later, in a career spent mostly at the University of Maryland, where he retains a part-time role, he built an interdisciplinary research programme on the moment-by-moment processes involved in speaking and understanding, drawing on diverse languages and methods from linguistics, psychology, cognitive science, and computational modeling.

Beyond his primary research focus, Professor Phillips is also a passionate evangelist for language science. During more than two decades in Maryland he built a broad community of language scientists that spans 17 departments and centres across the university, from education to engineering, leading to the creation of the Maryland Language Science Center, a unique interdisciplinary hub that he directed from 2013-2023. As part of these efforts he led innovations in postgraduate training that trained 100 PhDs from 10 fields. In Oxford he is working on building connections across language experts across the university.

Outside work, Professor Phillips is enthusiastic about community building through running and walking. He supported the spread of parkrun events in Maryland and across the US, and in Oxford he supports healthy communities through his role in the weekly University Parks parkrun and the Oxford University Cross Country Club.

Recent publications

Colin’s website

Hey, I’m Chloe the First Generation and Low Income Student Rep in the MCR.

I am a first year DPhil Student in Primary Healthcare Sciences, exploring Sarcoma and AI using social science research methods, I’m a Sociologist by background. I am also a first-gen student! In the coming year I will be running some events and workshops within the MCR to support the first gen and low income graduate students. Outside of my DPhil I am a powerlifter, coffee lover and reader.

Feel free to contact me with any concerns or queries.

Matt leads Somerville’s Communications team.

Matt manages Somerville’s social media presence and website, as well as working on the team’s regular publications and reporting on College life and research.