The name of the body established by SOAS to manage the £15 million Alphawood donation is the Southeast Asian Art Academic Programme (SAAAP). A mouthful, to be sure, but still, only five words – which SOAS management cannot seem to get right in some of its most important correspondence with the donor.
Each year, SOAS presents a SAAAP Annual Report to the Alphawood Foundation. The front cover of the first report, for 2014, calls the programme the “Southeast Asian Arts Academic Programme,” adding an extra ‘s’ to Art. This error is repeated in the Director’s Introduction and in the footer of each page. The report contains a number of other mistakes, including a reference to the Professor of Southeast Asian Art as “Ashley Johnson” instead of Ashley Thompson (page 30).
The 2015 Annual Report repeated the same error in the programme name on the front cover and in the Director’s Introduction. On page 42, Dr. Louise Tythacott’s name is prominently spelled wrong in the title of her profile page.
Will SOAS managers get the SAAAP name right in the 2016 report?
Discouragingly, in the LinkedIn profile of Project Board Chair Tamsyn Barton, she refers to herself as Chair of “South Asian Arts Academic Board.”
(LinkedIn profile viewed 18 Feb 2017)
Other errors can also be found on SAAAP’s website. As of today, in the list of members of the Project Board, two names are missing: Valerie Amos (Director of SOAS) and Matthew Gorman (Director of Development, Alumni & External Engagement). In the list of members of the Scholarships Committee, the name of Prof. Ashley Thompson is missing. On another page which describes the SAAAP Academic Support Fund, stated to be available to SOAS alumni, the Fund Application Form, as of today, is downloadable only from the intranet and therefore not actually accessible to alumni outside the university.
These various errors may appear minor, but in view of the many millions donated by the Alphawood Foundation, one would expect SOAS administration’s focus, dedication and attention to detail in every matter concerning SAAAP. The mistakes appear, sadly, to be symptomatic of the management disengagement and dysfunction that have been plaguing the programme.
