Council

Professor Ian Jacobs - Chair of Council

Professor Ian Jacobs is an academic, doctor and university leader. He commenced the role of inaugural Chair of Council at City St George’s on August 1st, 2024.

Ian has held senior leadership roles in higher education as Dean of Biomedical Sciences University College London (2004-11), Vice President University of Manchester (2011-2015) and President & Vice-Chancellor of the University of New South Wales in Sydney (2015-2022). He has an international reputation for his research in cancer screening and early detection which has led to >400 publications and 30 years of experience working in the NHS as an obstetrician & gynaecologist and then a consultant surgical oncologist at The Royal London Hospital, St Bartholomew’s Hospital and University College London Hospital.

Whilst in Australia he served as Chair of the Group of 8 universities and held a number of board roles including Research Australia, Ovarian Cancer Australia, Universities Australia and The Conversation. His current roles include: Chair, Barts Health NHS Trust ; Trustee, Eve Appeal Charity which he founded in 1985; Board member, African Stem Education Initiative; Emeritus Professor UNSW Sydney; and Honorary Professor University College London.

(Prof.) Sir Anthony Finkelstein CBE FREng – President

President, Professor Anthony Finkelstein joined City St George's in June 2021.

Read more about the President's appointment.

Godfrey Allen

Godfrey is a Non-Executive Director at Lewisham and Greenwich NHS Trust, having been a NED at Croydon Health Services and Wandsworth PCT, as well as the Chair of NHS South West London Support Services Partnership Board. The former founding Chair of South Thames Colleges Group, Godfrey remains a board member on two International NGOs, including the International Association of Youth and Family Judges and Magistrates. Godfrey has held CEO and MD roles since he was 27 in the public, private and charitable sectors.

Godfrey holds a MSc in Public Service Management and is a Fellow of the Institute of Directors, Chartered Institute of Management, and the RSA.

Professor Robert Allison CBE

Professor Robert Allison has held senior leadership roles in a number of top UK universities, most recently (2012 to 2021) as the Vice-Chancellor and President of Loughborough.

During Professor Allison's time at Loughborough, the University rose up into the top 10 in every national league table and named University of the Year an unparalleled five times. He oversaw significant expansion, which included opening the University's London campus on the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park and developing the UK's most rapidly growing Science and Enterprise Park. Bob was the driving force behind the Loughborough student experience, widely recognised as one of the best in the UK.

Since stepping down from his role at Loughborough University, Bob has developed a portfolio of responsibilities, including appointments as a Trustee of The Chatham Historic Dockyard Trust, Chair of the Board of Trustees of the St Philip’s Centre, Chair of the Board of Trustees of The Air Ambulance Service and Children’s Air Ambulance and Senior Non-Executive Member of Chapter at Leicester Cathedral. He was appointed Deputy Lieutenant for the County of Leicestershire in 2022.

During his career Bob received the Cuthbert Peek Award from the Royal Geographical Society, the Charles Lyell Award from the British Association of the Advancement of Science and the Jan de Ploey Prize from the International Association of Geomorphologists. He was awarded the Outstanding Leadership Award from the Council for Advancement and Support in Education in 2019 and was appointed Commander of the British Empire in 2021 for services to education and supporting young people’s talent, equality and achievement.

In his spare time Bob is a keen gardener and mountain biker.

Mark Evans

Mark is Director of Operations at British Land plc a FTSE 100 property business. He brings a wide breadth of experience across commercial real estate, with a particular focus on property and facilities management, having previously led Broadgate Estates Limited.

With a background in construction management, Mark is also currently an independent Non-Executive Director of Acivico Group, a building consultancy based in the West Midlands.

Mark has a degree in construction management, is a member of the Chartered Institute of Building, Associate of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors and holds a Certificate in Business Continuity.

Adrienne Fresko CBE

Adrienne is an experienced independent director and advisor to public and charity boards, specialising in higher education and healthcare. Most recently as vice chair of Council for the University of Sussex and a member of the joint board of Brighton and Sussex Medical School, until July 2022.   She sits on the advisory board of a social purpose consultancy.

Adrienne has a depth and breadth of expertise in the development of governance and board effectiveness as well as a special interest in leadership and strategy development.

Adrienne’s professional experience includes:  Partner lead for the leadership and governance practice in GE Healthcare Partners;  co-founder of Foresight Partnership, a specialist consultancy supporting effective governance in healthcare and public services.  She has led the development of highly respected key national guidance for boards in public services.  Before establishing Foresight Partnership, she worked as the Head of the Centre for Public Governance at the Office for Public Management.  Her early career included human resources director level  roles for Citicorp in Europe and the US and as a consultant specialising in change management and coaching in the private sector.

Adrienne’s previous public and charity sector appointments include: Vice Chair of the Health Foundation; Deputy Chair of the Audit Commission and acting chair of the Commission for a year.  Adrienne chaired Croydon Health Authority for eight years.

Adrienne has an MA in Experimental Psychology from Oxford University and an MSc in Occupational Psychology from Birkbeck College, London.  Adrienne was awarded the CBE in the 2003 Queen’s birthday honours.

Josh Joshi

M ‘Josh’ Joshi joined the Council in 2021. Josh is a veteran digital infrastructure executive with nearly three decades’ experience in the European data centre sector. He co-founded Storm Telecommunications and later served as CFO of Telecity and Interxion, before becoming Executive Chairman of AtlasEdge. Over his career, he has helped build and institutionalise the sector across Europe. Josh is currently Chairman of Rubix Data Centres and holds several advisory roles across digital infrastructure and AI.

Josh holds a degree in Civil Engineering from Imperial College, London and was a fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales.

Max Khan

As SVP A&G Solutions at Elsevier (part of RELX group), Max works with governments, universities, researchers and industry to provide solutions that support decision making, showcasing and improved operational efficiency. Max’s responsibility includes solutions such as ScienceDirect, Scopus, SciVal and Pure as well as the underlying linked data behind these solutions."

Rachel Lock

Until July 2023, Rachel served as an independent member of the Council of the Open University for 8 years. She was also a member of the Open University Audit Committee and Chair of the Remuneration Committee.

Rachel is an experienced HR professional having carried out various HR Director roles in her 33 year career with Lloyds Banking Group.  More recently she served as the HR Executive Director for TSB Bank.

Rachel’s area of expertise is managing large scale people change, employee engagement and communication, remuneration policy and union relations. She has a strong record in building effective executive teams and Boards and encouraging employees to be the best they can be.

Now retired, Rachel enjoys keeping fit, gardening and socialising.

Sir Mark Lowcock KCB

Mark had a career spanning 32 years in the UK civil service, including more than six years as Permanent Secretary of the Department for International Development.

From 2017 to 2021 Mark was Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs at the United Nations. He is a Senior Fellow at the Center for Global Development, a Visiting Professor in Practice at the London School of Economics, and a Fellow of Birkbeck College.

Mark is Vice President of the Chartered Institute for Public Finance and Accountancy, Vice Chair of The Howard Partnership Trust (a Multi Academy Trust comprising 13 schools in Surrey), a Richard Von Weizsacker Fellow at the Robert Bosch Academy in Berlin, and an Independent member of the Board of Trustees of the University  of London.

Catherine McGuinness CBE

Catherine is a financial services lawyer by background and has been a partner in a City law firm and head of a bank legal department.  She has had a parallel career as a councillor in the City of London, including five years as Policy Chair, leading the organisation through the turbulent period of Brexit and Covid.

Catherine now sits on a number of boards, including as a non-executive director of Connected Places Catapult and a trustee of the Chartered Institute for Securities and Investment.

Catherine has long experience of governance in educational institutions and is a trustee of a large multi academy trust.

Catherine was awarded a CBE in the 2023 New Year Honours List for services to the Financial Sector and to educational inclusion.

Anant Prakash

Anant Prakash is General Counsel Europe and Asia Pacific at Ultra Electronics, a FTSE 250 company listed on the London Stock Exchange, serving the defence, security, transport and energy sectors. In his role, Anant advises Ultra’s Board and its businesses on a broad range of legal and commercial matters – including significant contractual disputes, complex regulatory investigations, and strategically-important governance and compliance transformation initiatives.

Prior to joining Ultra, Anant worked at Slaughter and May, a leading international law firm headquartered in the City of London, where he developed a broad Corporate and Commercial practice with a particular focus on M&A. Whilst at Slaughter and May, Anant also gained valuable experience living and working in Madrid and Hong Kong. Originally from India, where he was born and was raised until the age of 11, Anant now lives in West London.

Damian Reid

Damian Reid became an independent member of Council in 2024 having joined the Council of St George's, University of London in 2018. He is an experienced finance and strategy professional and has been responsible for leading finance teams for over 15 years.

Most recently, Damian was CFO at Upp Corporation Limited, a business that provided broadband to residential and business customers over its full fibre network in the East of England. Prior to that Damian was interim Finance Director at Sports Supplements Limited, an e-commerce business selling sports nutrition products in the UK and Europe under the Bulk brand, CFO of Pro Bono Bio, a developer and marketer of innovative nanotechnology-based healthcare products and CFO at Augere, a broadband services provider using wireless networks in emerging markets trading under the Qubee brand.

Damian has also held the positions of Executive Vice President, Strategy and Planning at France Telecom (now Orange), a pan-European telecoms service provider and Chief Strategy Officer at Marconi, which was a major UK listed technology business. Damian started his career as an investment banker at SG Warburg (now part of Union Bank of Switzerland) having qualified as a chartered accountant with Arthur Andersen in 1987.

AG Agarwal

AG was elected as the President of City St George's, University of London Students' Union in July 2026.

Ruby Boland

Ruby is the Deputy President (Tooting & Sport) of  City St George's, University of London Students' Union.

Professor Elisabeth Hill

Professor Elisabeth Hill joined the University in September 2022.

Elisabeth was previously Deputy Warden at Goldsmiths, University of London. She held this role since 2017 and the role of Pro-Warden (Learning, Teaching and Enhancement) since 2015.

As Deputy President and Provost Elisabeth has responsibility for shaping and delivering the Strategic Transformation Programme which will enable City St George’s new strategic plan.

Professor Richard Payne

Richard works in the areas of empirical market microstructure and empirical asset pricing. He has written on topics that include the determination of exchange rates, the links between exchange rates and equity index returns, algorithmic trading and market dynamics, the effects of transparency in equity markets and the effects of short selling on equity markets.

Richard holds a PhD in Economics from the London School of Economics and has worked at the LSE, the University of Bristol and Warwick Business School. He has also worked in the asset management industry and actively consults for banks, funds, regulators and government departments.

Ms Helen Watson

Helen joined the University as Chief Operating Officer in February 2022, after five years at Goldsmiths University of London as Registrar and Secretary. In July 2025 Helen became Deputy President Operations of City St George's.

Previously, she worked for six years at the University of Oxford where she was Director of Planning and Resource Allocation, Head of the Council Secretariat and a Fellow of Exeter College. Before that she worked in a variety of roles at City University London including Head of Administration for the School of Allied Health Sciences and Deputy Academic Registrar; she also set up and led City's Strategy and Planning Unit. Helen read music at Exeter College, Oxford and has a Masters in Higher and Professional Education from the Institute of Education.

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