The Watt Memorial Trust

What is Watt? It is a fund which provides “grants and loans for education and research at schools, colleges, universities and other places of learning…..in furtherance of a professional career” for Fettesians and Academicals. Set up in memory of Rob Watt, a Fettesian who was also Rector of the Edinburgh Academy, it has been giving out grants for 24 years and facilitating an extraordinary range of projects, initiatives and courses.

The grants for the last two or three years will provide a snapshot of these. Medical students looking for a challenge during their ‘elective’ have gone with help from the Trust to places like Vanuatu, Tanzania and Ecuador. In fact, two separate recipients have gone to Vanuatu, a distinctly remote archipelago in the Pacific, whose inhabitants were recently declared in one of the astonishing polls we are subjected to to be the happiest people on earth. As with Tanzania and Ecuador, those who went there showed themselves ready to move out of their comfort zone, as they travelled by canoe to vaccinate remote communities or dealt with HIV and AIDS, snake bites and leprosy with the most basic of resources. Two others chose to spend their medical elective by contrast at the sophisticated Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. This world-famous unit represents the cutting edge, - “the most revered medical institution in the world”. At it they joined research into, respectively, cancer genetics and rejection problems in pig-to-human transplants. The experience was exhilarating and mind-expanding.

Quite a few have sought the help of the Trust to finance research degrees, - in e.g. Newspaper Journalism, Art Business (at Sotheby’s), Jazz Studies, Decorative Arts, Historical Research Techniques, Counselling, Photojournalism and Advanced Screen Practice. Others have asked for funding to be able to test themselves in a wider academic environment , as with the Psychology undergraduate at Aberdeen (later to graduate at the top of her year) who was helped to present her research study on how the brain uses vision to control skilled movement at the Vision Sciences Society Conference in Florida, provoking the interest of leading authorities in the field and laying the foundation for her own subsequent doctorate. An internship with the Centre for New Europe in Brussels (Europe’s leading free-market think-tank) provided another candidate with unrivalled insights and contacts for a future career in the field.

Some have found the chance to serve communities overseas at the same time as furthering their own education. The trainee ophthalmic surgeon who got the chance of using some of her summer break to be an intern with an eye team in the countryside of Rajasthan enjoyed helping to tackle preventable blindness. Some chose really testing options, like one recipient who went to Uruguay. Her spell helping out in an institution for marginalized young people who had fallen out of the mainstream was, for a time, traumatic. The next stage, working with a pastor among the deeply deprived families of Teniente Rinaldi was also testing but brought some rich rewards. In the engagement with a profoundly unfamiliar culture, crucial lessons were learnt, making this in the end a .life-changing experience. Likewise the prospective M.Sc. student at Oxford in the Economics of Development who headed for Armenia to work mainly at the earthquake-devastated city of Gyumri on development projects.

These are some of the undertakings the Trust has been able to help over the last year or two, - projects which often display fine initiative. The Trustees have been happy to help along the process of opening up new horizons for a future career. We remain open for application from Academicals whose plans have cost implications. Remember this if your resources fall short of your ambitions. Details of how to apply from the Secretary, Robert Philp, at 61 Inverleith Place, EDINBURGH EH 3 5QD (Robertphilp1 (AT aol.com), Telephone 0131 552 1925).

The closing dates for applications are:
(i) 1st February for consideration by the Trustees in March,
(ii) 1st September for consideration by the Trustees in early October.

Applications are warmly welcomed.