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What they support

The gift will enable Lucy Cavendish’s unique outreach and student support programmes to be carefully evaluated, developed and expanded over the next 10 years. The College’s mission is to attract students of exceptional potential from under-served communities – students who have an enterprising mindset and the determination to make a positive contribution to society. Its outreach programmes, delivered online, are designed to raise the academic attainment of these students in the last two years of their schooling so that they can meet the University’s exacting entry requirements.

Why they support Lucy

"The drive and determination that the College has shown in finding creative and practical solutions to widening participation, and to giving all students appropriate support, is inspiring. Lucy Cavendish is a small college with bold ambition, and we feel privileged that we can help support that.”

Christina and Peter Dawson are extremely generous long-term supporters of the University and several of its colleges, and both are Honorary Fellows of St Catharine’s College where Peter studied Natural Sciences as an undergraduate. For example, their recent cornerstone £5 million gift to the University for the new Foundation Year programme starting next September will give talented students from disrupted educational backgrounds a new route to undergraduate study at Cambridge. And Lucy Cavendish is proud to be one of the 13 colleges participating in the programme’s pilot year.