The RSE Young Academy of Scotland (YAS) has announced the appointment of 48 new members. The group represents some of the nation’s most innovative young professionals from across the arts, business and industry, government, the public sector, research, and academia, the third sector, and beyond. They will join YAS’s existing members in realising its mission to achieve transformative societal change through citizenship, innovation, collaboration, evidence, and leadership.
Among the new members are three individuals who have been appointed through YAS’s At-Risk Academic / Refugee (ARAR) membership initiative. This initiative encourages outstanding individuals with a refugee or asylum-seeking background to apply to YAS and provides them with support to complete their applications. In joining YAS, ARAR members regain some of the social and professional capital they lost during their displacement, and YAS benefits from ARAR members’ talents, experience, and unique perspectives.
YAS encourages individuals from all sectors of society to apply for membership. This year, YAS is pleased to welcome members joining from business, the non-profit sector, and the arts, who include:
- Robert Colvin (above, left), an architect, researcher and educator who worked on the redevelopment of the Ulster Folk Museum in Belfast and the refurbished Scottish galleries at the National in Edinburgh.
- Matthew Jackson (above, center), Associate Director of the Scottish Future Trust, who is working with the Scottish Government, Local Government, and industry on innovation in funding and financing. His primary focus is the delivery of electric vehicle charging infrastructure across Scotland.
- Laura Westring (above, right), Laura Westring, a civil servant in the role of First Minister’s Speechwriter and Senior Fellow of the Landecker Democracy Fellowship.
The new cohort also includes a diverse group of researchers with specialisms ranging from climate sciences to data law. In addition to academic achievements, the selection committees placed significant emphasis on public outreach and collaboration across boundaries. Among the new members from academia are:
- Emma Bush (above, left), an ecosystem scientist seeking to address fundamental challenges to human society through her research on plant functional ecology and climate adaptation.
- Ievgeniia Ivanova (above, center), a researcher in philosophy who specialises in the methodology of knowledge, epistemology, and philosophy of social science. She is also a keen advocate for public engagement with the social sciences and is the editor-in-chief of the Ukrainian popular science journal about philosophy, culture, and urban studies, Prostaranstvo Media.
- Kimia Witte (above, right), a bioengineer whose research seeks to understand how cells, both individually and collectively, perceive and respond to their spatially defined microenvironments. They use this knowledge to engineer Blood-Brain Barrier organoid models using microfluidics for applications in disease modelling and drug discovery.
Gary Kerr, co-chair of YAS said: “The Young Academy of Scotland is thrilled to welcome this incredible group of new members, whose experiences and knowledge will bring so much to our work. We are pleased to see our At-Risk Academic / Refugee membership programme continue to bring us opportunities to induct inspiring leaders from Scotland’s vibrant refugee and asylum-seeking communities into our membership.
“On behalf of all our current members, I look forward seeing all our new members bring their proven creativity, expertise, and vision to YAS.”
Professor Sir John Ball, President of the RSE said: “It is wonderful to see such a talented group of young professionals join Scotland’s Young Academy. The Young Academy represents some of the most innovative emerging leaders in Scotland today, and together they bring great insight and spirit to the RSE – both through their contributions to the RSE’s programmes, and their portfolio of interdisciplinary public benefit projects.”
