Institute of Gerontology King’s College London

On 3rd June this year the Institute of Gerontology at King’s College London celebrated the 21st Anniversary of the flagship MSc Gerontology, with a programme on the theme Gerontology: Past, Present and Future and a keynote address by Professor Alan Walker, Director of the New Dynamics of Ageing Programme. The event heralded the launch of two new degree programmes for the Institute looking to the future of ageing research: an MSc in Global Ageing, and an MA in Public Policy and Ageing, with associated Postgraduate Diplomas and Certificates. The new programmes are a response to rapidly growing interest in global aspects of ageing among international and national policy-makers, academics and private sector organisations. They provide a multi-disciplinary advanced education in global ageing and policy making respectively, examining the benefits and challenges of ageing populations across the world.

The launch event celebrated the Institute of Gerontology as one of the leading centres for the study of ageing worldwide, where teaching and research have made an invaluable contribution to our understanding of old age. Founded in 1986 as the Age Concern Institute of Gerontology, it was at the vanguard of multi-disciplinary research dedicated to the study of ageing and later life. The Institute was the brainchild of Jonathan Barker, joint head of the Age Concern Research Unit, and Tony Warnes, then Reader in Geography at King’s College London, who established ACIOG with the enthusiastic support of the late David Hobman CBE, Director of Age Concern England, its founding Chairman. From the beginning, a key objective was to develop the first MSc course in Gerontology in Britain, drawing on the substantial gerontological interests across all schools in King’s College London to create a programme spanning the medical, biological and social sciences. In 1987 Anthea Tinker took up the post of Director, and with Janet Askham as her then Deputy, and Emily Grundy as Programme Organiser, the first MSc in Gerontology in the UK was born. The MSc in Gerontology was ground-breaking, encompassing the medical, biological and social, offering education at the cutting edge of current research into ageing and later life, and laying the foundations for a generation of professional gerontologists.

There are now several hundred graduates of the Institute, who have gone on to pursue a range of careers including consultant positions in geriatric medicine and psychiatry, work as specialist health care practitioners focusing on older people, analytical positions in government and the public sector, policy positions in public and voluntary organisations and academic posts in Universities around the world. Many past graduates now work in strategic positions influencing lives of older people in medicine, social care and policy, or within local government, voluntary organisations, or non-governmental organisations. 

he audience heard from a parade of former students who have made their indelible marks on the lives of older people paying tribute to their experience at Kings, relating how the MSc and the study of gerontology had affected them and their subsequent lives and research careers, and leaving the listeners overwhelmed by their energy and commitment to improving the lives of older people in society. Dr Ajay Bhalla MD MSc FRCP, Consultant and Honorary Senior Lecturer in Stroke/Geriatric Medicine told of how his MSc led on to MD Thesis, more than 40 peer reviewed scientific articles and abstracts and his position now as Principal Investigator for 5 multi-centre trials. He still retains his strong connections with the Institute as a lecturer and supervisor for MSc dissertations. Maureen Crane, Research Fellow at the Sheffield Institute for Studies on Ageing, spoke movingly of how the MSc helped her to progress a life transition from nursing to homelessness research – her MSc dissertation Why do older people sleep rough in London? was published by the Institute. Her groundbreaking work on older homeless people and tireless campaigning and fundraising have followed relentlessly, leading to a substantial research programme with Tony Warnes on homelessness and older people. Roger Sykes undertook research into equipment for disabled people, spent ten years managing the Research and Information Unit at Anchor Trust, and became head of research at the Local Government Association before taking up his current prominent position as head of the Policy Research and Studies Directorate at the Audit Commission. Alison O’Connell used the MSc Gerontology to transition from her professional life as an actuary to become founder and Director of the influential Pensions Policy Institute, which has played and continues to play such a key role in informing pension reform in this country and elsewhere. 

The audience also heard from the three directors of the Institute, Professors Anthea Tinker, Janet Askham and Simon Biggs. Simon introduced the Institute and spoke of its current research programmes and its ambitions for the future – the expanding PhD community of emerging researchers, the consolidation of a social science based approach to adult ageing while developing broad alliances within King’s through the Institute of Psychiatry , the Health and Social Care Division , the ARK network – Ageing Research at King’s , and the continuing development of international networks on ageing. Anthea talked of the ethos and culture of the Institute, its multi-disciplinarity and the policy importance of much of its research over the years. The audience then heard from Janet Askham, only weeks before her sudden and untimely death.

Janet is deeply mourned by her family, friends and colleagues at the Institute, in the health and research communities and in government, by all who knew her. She touched all those around her with her insight, wisdom, intellect and kindness. In her address at the event, she delivered her reflections on ageing research to the gathered audience, taking us through the changes in suicide, living alone and health and health care – and the contributions that gerontological research has made to our understanding in each of these domains. Her closing comments were about the next twenty years – she hoped that gerontological research would continue to monitor trends, because ‘it is not necessarily onwards & upwards from now until 2028’, to explore unintended consequences of social action, and to examine disadvantage. We may as a society be getting wealthier and healthier but it is not necessarily so for all older people.

Professor Alan Walker then took the opportunity in his keynote speech to address the gerontology community with his personal agenda for ageing research over the next decade. First, that ageing is ‘par excellence’ the topic that requires multi-disciplinary inputs, but this should never be a top-down imposition. Research must begin with the basic research questions – multi-disciplinarity for its own sake does not work. Second, we must co-ordinate efforts to maximise the efficiency of ageing research, both in terms of use of resources, and in outcomes. We must tackle the continued duplication of research between different funders and researchers. Third, there is a need for an international dimension to ageing research. As gerontologists we must understand the intrusive reach of globalisation and especially the institutions of globalisation that have the power directly or indirectly to influence the well being of current and future generations of older people. Furthermore, there is an important role for UK gerontologists in researching and contributing resources to researching ageing in the South, where the population will age rapidly in the context of poverty, lack of resources, and lack of research infrastructure and research capacity. Fourth, UK gerontology remains weak at engaging with users and potential users of ageing research and often fails to ‘close the gap between science and society’ – that is, to inform and educate the public, to destroy the myths about ageing that abound in the media, and to ‘tell the truth to power’. Finally we need to alter our terms of engagement with older people as not just the subjects of research, but as participants in it. Having set out his personal ideas about the future of gerontology, Professor Walker acknowledged King’s as having been at the forefront of ageing research for 21 years, and hoped that this work would continue long into the future, contributing to the extension of quality life. Professor Walker’s full address is available to view on the Institute of Gerontology website.

Under Anthea Tinker’s leadership, then Janet Askham’s and now Simon Biggs’, the aim of the Institute has been to foster understanding of ageing and old age, and to develop the means of improving the well being of older people. The Institute has contributed to inter- and cross- disciplinary ageing research ranging from the ageing brain and the ageing eye, to falls and dementia, medical and health services, community and housing, long term care, inequality and poverty, geographies of ageing, gender and ethnicity, technology and new technology, design for old age, pensions and finance, demography, migration, the living arrangements of older people, elder abuse, ethical issues in gerontology, consumption, and the lives of the very old. There are few arenas of ageing research to which Institute Research has not made a substantive contribution.

Twenty-one years on, the MSc Gerontology continues to provide cutting edge education at the forefront of current research into ageing and later life. With the establishment of new degree programmes in Global Ageing and Public Policy & Ageing, we are taking gerontological research forward to face the challenges of the new century.