Summer Institute makes a home in Oxford
25 September 2008
Christ Church's famous Quadrangle
The World Nuclear University's (WNU's) fifth Summer Institute will take place at the University of Oxford's Christ Church college. This venue will be a new long-term home to the annual training event.
As the WNU's leading education program, the Summer Institute has until now travelled from continent to continent. The first event took place at Idaho Falls, USA in 2005; the second at Stockholm, Sweden; then Daejon, Korea; and most recently at Ottawa, Canada. Each event has seen some 100 nuclear professionals under the age of 35 attend a wide-ranging six-week residential course.
WNU planners now envisage keeping the event at Oxford. The organisation's president, John Ritch, said this would give the Summer Institute "a permanent and prestigious home that combines a world-class learning environment, proximity to major European nuclear facilities and greatly simplified logistical support for a complex annual program."
The course remains focused on a series of morning lectures which cover nuclear power's global setting, its international regimes as well as its technology and aspects of its operation. Afternoon practical sessions are designed to foster teamwork and leadership, while the course as a whole is intended to build a global network of potential leaders which now counts some 367 former WNU Fellows from 58 countries.
Applications will soon be accepted for the next Summer Institute, which will run from 5 July to 15 August 2009.
The WNU is supported by the World Nuclear Association, the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency, the World Association of Nuclear Operators and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). For certain activities, the IAEA provides financial assistance to support the participation of applicants from developing countries.