Intellectual Forum
The Intellectual Forum at Jesus College was created in 2016. We are an interdisciplinary centre, interested in the broadest range of issues.
We focus on bringing people together in person or virtually to discuss important topics of our time, as well as providing global education courses and conducting our own research.
IF:Events
We run a wide range of events every year, most of which are open to the public and are live-streamed around the world. Highlights have included external speakers such as Jimmy Choo, Helen Clark, Peter Frankopan, Lori Adelman, and Mary Beard. We also showcase the work that is being done by people within the College, from sustainable finance and synthetic biology to the history of taboo language and ultra-cold atoms.
We also run a number of conferences, on subjects as diverse as education, health technology and AI, and health care in refugee and conflict zones in the Middle East and North Africa. Many of these are also open to the public.
"The Intellectual Forum is invariably interesting and stimulating - as a member of the 'community' I really appreciate having access to the quality of thinking that is so often locked behind academic doors. Thank you." - event attendee, 2022
We have hosted World, European and UK premieres of several films, including discussions with the directors, performers, or main subjects of the film. We have also hosted events such as Radio 4’s ‘Any Questions’, and workshops for a number of UK government departments and other organisations.
We also run the high-level Jesus College Perspectives conferences, which over the last 10 years have brought together invited experts from academia, industry, government, civil society and the media to discuss key issues of our time.
You can register for forthcoming events on our Eventbrite page and see recordings of many of our previous events on the Jesus College Youtube channel.
IF:Education
We run bespoke training courses for a number of organisations around the world. These include broad-based university-level courses for Universities that wish to expose their students to the Cambridge approach to thinking, scholarship and discussion. We also run more focused courses for corporate clients on executive leadership, and conduct medical education courses.
As part of our global outreach, in 2021 Jesus College partnered with edX, an online learning platform, to deliver courses on a variety of topics. Our courses on Preventing and responding to sexual harassment and violence, Digital wellbeing and productivity, and Polarisation in the workplace and beyond can be taken for free by anyone in the world with an internet connection.
Further information about our education opportunities
IF:Research
We conduct some of our own research projects, and have secured grants from numerous bodies to support this work, as well as hiring dedicated research staff to conduct this work. Current IF projects include work on sustainable finance and Universal Ownership, as well as topics around public health and public policy. We are grateful to the wide range of organisations that have funded our research activities.
List of Intellectual Forum publications
Our Data Protection page has information about how we deal with your data.
If you would like to be involved in any aspect of our work, please email if-events@jesus.cam.ac.uk.
