Fletcher flies in

17 December 2020

Tom Fletcher CMG became our 14th Principal since 1874 in September, and started his Hertford career quarantined in one of our newly-refurbished first-year bedrooms. This wasn’t an unusual experience, as Tom was a Hertford fresher himself back in 1994. After his Hertford history degree, Tom worked as policy advisor to three Prime Ministers, as the UK’s Ambassador to Lebanon, and as a visiting professor at New York University in Abu Dhabi before returning to Oxford. In his welcome address, Tom emphasised the importance of building bridges rather than walls, inspired by our own iconic ‘Bridge of Sighs’ which, he said, “is a symbol of what we stand for as a community.” To ensure he didn’t get off lightly with in-person events postponed, Tom joined a Zoom conversation with alumna Fiona Bruce who quizzed him on his plans for the principalship.