Authored by Clarence (Singapore), MSc Living Planet with Ecology, Evolution and Conservation
When most students at Imperial consider Silwood Park, they picture a vibrant, enigmatic, and green campus bustling with wildlife and vegetation rarely found at other Imperial locations like South Kensington or White City. In numerous respects, they’re correct – every depiction of Silwood Park is true!
As a part of this lesser-known community within Imperial, I want to shine a light on the student experience, activities, and community at our natural parkland campus in Ascot, Berkshire.
Introducing Silwood Park
Silwood Park serves as Imperial’s outdoor research facility, covering 77 hectares and encompassing environments such as freshwater streams, lakes, an “ancient” woodland, and open grasslands. A quick inquiry on iNaturalist, an app for charting and sharing biodiversity discoveries globally with an online naturalist community, shows that 1,436 species of plants, animals, and fungi have been recorded on campus, while an additional search on eBird indicates that 111 bird species have been documented on campus to date.
More intriguingly, Silwood Park is also the venue for numerous long-term field research initiatives, with the Nash’s Field Experiment and the Blue Tit Project being two of the more recognized studies conducted on site.
Life as a student at Silwood Park
The campus primarily hosts postgraduate students keen on projects related to ecology, conservation, and evolution. Many of us are involved in various clubs located at Silwood Park. Significant examples include:
- Chicken Club – who care for the chickens raised behind our residence halls
- Book Club – who meet regularly to discuss engaging books
- Gardening Club – who oversee the allotments in our community garden
- Conservation Club – who arrange nature walks and conservation-oriented activities for students at Silwood Park Campus.
As part of the broader Imperial student body, many of us also engage in activities of clubs situated in South Kensington!
Casually, we also have groups that partake in sports like badminton, basketball, and pickleball (my personal favorite!), which take place either on the multi-use games arena (MUGA) on campus or in indoor sports halls in nearby towns like Bracknell or Ascot.
Alongside club activities and classes, there are numerous community-driven events on campus. Silwood Park has its own student council that organizes and coordinates these activities to foster a lively and dynamic student atmosphere! Recently, we organized the Silwood language exchange, where our largely international community came together to share languages and cultures over several weeks, and we also celebrated our annual Chinese New Year event at the beginning of the year, where everyone joined in making dumplings and couplets to welcome the new lunar year. We’ve also had community-hosted gatherings celebrating global occasions (like Carnival), or parties arranged simply out of love for festivities.
My personal favorite campus event must be the weekly pub quiz, organized by our student community. It’s become part of Silwood culture that those who lose the pub quiz are responsible for setting the next one, and I can proudly assert the highest number of pub quizzes set this year. Despite my many losses in pub quizzes due to insufficient general trivia knowledge, there’s always plenty of enjoyment to be found with good company and a fine pint of beer.
Silwood Park: my second home
Even though it is a 30-minute stroll from the lively energy of civilization (e.g., the train station and the nearest village), life at Silwood Park has never felt dull or lacking. With many events and activities, we enjoy a friendly and inviting community made up of students from all corners of the globe. We all share a love for nature, appreciate our stunning campus grounds, and, more importantly,