The Chancellor of the University of Oxford, William Hague (1979), conferred eight honorary degrees on distinguished individuals this week, including fellow Magdalen alumni President Dinah Rose KC (1984) and Professor Sir John Curtice (1973).
The ceremony took place at the Sheldonian Theatre and was followed by a special celebratory lunch at Magdalen.
“I am utterly delighted to have been nominated for an honorary doctorate by the Chancellor,” said Dinah. “It is a great privilege to represent Lord Hague’s own college, Magdalen, in this way.”
Sir John, a British political scientist, Professor of Politics at the University of Strathclyde, and Senior Research Fellow at the National Centre for Social Research, is a familiar face to many for his election coverage for the BBC over several decades.
As well as studying Philosophy, Politics and Economics here as a choral scholar, he was a Lecturer in Politics at Magdalen, where one of his students was William Hague.
Lord Hague attended Magdalen in to study PPE, the first in his family to go to university. He was Leader of the House of Commons, Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, and Leader of the Conservative Party. He was created a life peer in 2015 and elected Chancellor of Oxford in 2024.
Honorary degrees were also awarded to:
Irene Tracey – Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford
Dr Dominic Sandbrook – Presenter of The Rest is History podcast
John Kerry – Former US Secretary of State
Christina Lamb – Foreign correspondent and author
Isabella Tree – Conservationist and author
Elish Angiolini – Lord Clerk Register of Scotland
