We were delighted to welcome Bill Gates, co-founder of Microsoft and co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, to Queen Mary on Friday 25 January for a wide-ranging Q&A session with students. The conversation explored Bill’s interests in global health, clean energy, technology, philanthropy, innovation and leadership.
When asked by a student medic about the healthcare issues likely to present a challenge in the near future Bill Gates said they would be malnutrition, but also obesity for the ‘rich world’.
When asked why he chose to visit Queen Mary, he said: “Students are the people that are open minded and are going to shape where things go. Queen Mary was appealing because I’ve never been here before and yet the fact that this is a research university doing a lot of great work and it’s very diverse and it’s very engaged in the community, I was fascinated by that. I thought it would be a great group of kids to answer questions with.”
The conversation with the world-leading technologist, business leader and philanthropist was moderated by Dr Shahidha Bari, Senior Lecturer in Romanticism at Queen Mary and a regular broadcaster on BBC radio.
Principal Professor Colin Bailey introduced the event and said after: “We were delighted to welcome Bill Gates to Queen Mary and to provide our students with an opportunity to speak with such an inspiring and influential person. His work has shaped the world we live in and we share his passion in tackling a number of global issues through our own academic research. Hopefully the event will encourage our students to think about what can be achieved throughout their lives.”
The event was open to Queen Mary taught students based in London, who booked up all available tickets within 10 minutes of registration opening.Afia Ahmad, a second-year student at Queen Mary studying accounting and management, said: “Bill Gates has done phenomenal work for promoting equity in health and opportunity around the world, which is one of the core values of Queen Mary, and I think having him here with us was an invaluable opportunity for students to learn from his life experiences.”
A recording of the event is available to watch below.
View photos from the event below, or read the press release on the Queen Mary news pages.