The college is a fully self-catered college of the university, and is comparatively new in relation to other existing Durham undergraduate colleges. All rooms in the college are en-suite.[1] It is the one of the university's first fully self-catered constituent college in Durham.[2] The college bar is the largest of all the college bars in Durham.[citation needed] The college also has extensive leisure facilities including a library, study spaces, sports hall, outdoor tennis court and music room.[4] It is located within the Howlands Farm site along South Road, next to Stephenson College, Durham.[1]
History
Josephine Butler College was opened in 2006. It became the first new college at a British university in 25 years, and the first completely new college to open in Durham itself since the 1970s.[5][6]
Shield and motto
The college arms are blazoned as "Gules on a chevron Or charged with a Cross formy, with cotises invected, between in chief two lions Argent and in base an open book charged with two covered cups".[7] The arms represent in large the heritage of Josephine Butler, with the lion argent being a symbol of the Grey family. The covered cups on the pages of the books are a heraldic symbol of the Butler family.[8]
The college's motto is "Comme je trouve", which can be translated to "as I find" and is intended to mean "we take life as we find it and make of it the best we can".[1]
Facilities
Howlands Building
The Howlands building is shared with Josephine Butler's neighbouring college, Stephenson College. It contains the college gym, laundry and music room.[9] A large multi-purpose hall is also contained in the building that is used to host formal dinners and paves the way for some sports activities, where badminton and table tennis clubs practice.
Butler Building
The Butler building acts as the main social building of the college and mainly contains the college bar and some other rooms such as the college offices, porters lodge and reception, in addition to the Junior Common Room (JCR), the Middle Common Room (MCR), TV room, college library lounge, IT suite, and study spaces.[4]
Accommodation Blocks and the Mound
Kirknewton Building
Josephine Butler is built around a grass-covered hill called "the Mound", which stands between it and Stephenson College. The college has four separate self-contained accommodation blocks; Kirknewton, Dilston, Milfield, Wooler, as well as a small fifth block called Elm. Each building is divided up into 6 bed-roomed flats, with en-suite facilities. The main four accommodation blocks are all named after locations related to Josephine Butler's life: she was born in Milfield, spent a lot of her early life in Dilston, died in Wooler and is buried in Kirknewton.[citation needed] The buildings of Dilston, Milfield and Wooler are used to house mainly first year undergraduate students, whilst Kirknewton is used for returners and post-graduate students.
In July 2017, Josephine Butler College was ranked as the fourth-best student hall in the UK, based on an analysis of over 10,000 student and graduate reviews.[10]
Student life
Undergraduate and postgraduate students are respectively members of the college's Junior Common Room (JCR) and Middle Common Room (MCR). A committee of students elected from JCR and MCR are elected annually to organise charity fundraisers, campaigning for causes, events, and volunteering initiatives.[11]
Societies
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While university-wide student associations and societies are associated with the Durham Students' Union,[12] the JCR governs the many student societies of the college.[13]
Suffragette Theatre Company (STC), formerly known as the Society of Theatrical Arts at Butler (STAB), is the drama society for Josephine Butler College. The Theatre Company accepts members from in and outside of the college, and focuses on politically and socially charged productions, such as its production of 'The Tempest' at the Gala Theatre in June 2019.[14] The society is primarily known in college for its formal that is held in Michaelmas term every year, involving a Murder Mystery style format.[15]
Sports
Josephine Butler College also has an extensive array of sports open to its students. Some of the sports available include: football, rugby, badminton, boxing, running, rowing, lacrosse, basketball, dance etc., as well as more varied activities such as cheerleading, ultimate frisbee, pool, and darts. Due to the collegiate system at Durham, there are over 700 different sports teams in the university,[16] including Team Durham. Within Butler College itself, there are over 40 teams and 20 sports available.[17] Most sports also have multiple teams to cater for people of differing abilities, allowing complete beginners to pick up a new sports whilst also enabling experienced athletes to strive for success.
Josephine Butler College Cricket Club (JBCCC) is the college's cricket team. As of 2018 the club consists of two outdoor sides, the A team and the Development team, and two indoor teams, an A and B team. Indoor cricket is played across the Epiphany term, and in the Easter term outdoor T20 cricket is played. The club won back to back indoor titles in 2014 and 2015. In 2018 they reached the final of the outdoor T20 competition. In the same year a 24-hour charity cricket match was held in the Howlands, which raised over £700 for the Glenn McGrath Foundation.[citation needed]
Butler College Boat Club (BCBC) is the boat club of Josephine Butler College at Durham University.[18] The club is responsible for hosting its own inter-collegiate head race, Butler Head. In 2015, a BCBC VIII beat 3 other boats including the University of Leeds to get to the final of Durham Regatta.[19] The biggest success came to the boat club in the 2016 Durham Regatta season where the 2015 BCBC VIII took the title of Durham Regatta by winning the Alderman Thurlow Trophy.[20]
Notable people
Principals
The head of college is titled the Principal. Professor Adrian Simpson was the Principal from the college's foundation in 2006, announcing in 2022 that he was stepping down to take on the role of Principal at St Mary's College, Durham. During periods of the Principal's absence, the Vice-Principal takes on the role of Acting Principal. Karen Langdon was Acting Principal for the 2022-23 academic year. In January 2023, it was announced that Professor Gillian Hampden-Thompson would succeed Professor Simpson as Principal of Josephine Butler College a post that she started on July 1st 2023.
