Mercers' Lectures 2024-25
We are delighted to be able to share our Mercers' Lectures Programme for the 2024-25 season. This year we have a diverse range of speakers covering travel journalism, adolescent psychology, adventure, international affairs and television production.
The Mercers’ Lectures are named in recognition of the links between Dauntsey’s and the Mercers’ Company, which go back to Mercer founder Alderman William Dauntesey, Master of the Worshipful Company of Mercers, who founded the School in West Lavington in 1542.
The Lecture Series runs annually. Everyone is welcome and entry is free, but you are required to reserve your seat online and bring confirmation of booking to the event. All lectures start at 19.30 and will be held in the Memorial Hall.
We very much hope to welcome you to Dauntsey's for one or more of these lectures.
Spring Term 2025
Sam McAlister
Wednesday 12 February
Sam McAlister is a former criminal law barrister turned TV producer who spent a decade negotiating, securing and producing exclusive BBC interviews with some of the world's most high profile personalities.
As the BAFTA-nominated interviews producer on BBC 2's flagship news programme Newsnight, Sam's role was to facilitate head-to-head pieces with wide-ranging subjects from Silicon Valley CEOs and world leaders to Hollywood superstars. In doing so, she has negotiated with organisations from Buckingham Palace to The White House and from Facebook to Tesla.
Most notably, Sam McAlister led year-long negotiations for the ground breaking interview with HRH Prince Andrew. The first time a senior royal had agreed to such a journalistic interview, and in the midst of an international scandal, it went on to make headlines around the world and have a serious impact on the Royal Family itself.
In 2022, Sam’s memoir Scoops: Behind the Scenes of the BBC’s Most Shocking Interviews was released.
THIS LECTURE HAS NOW PASSED
Rageh Omaar
Wednesday 19 March
Rageh Omaar is International Affairs Editor of ITV News and presenter of ITV’s flagship News at Ten programme. He is also the presenter of ITV's global current affairs programme On Assignment.
Previously, Rageh was Senior Foreign Correspondent and Africa Correspondent for the BBC. He reported regularly from Israel and Gaza after the Oslo Accords and covered the second Gulf War from Baghdad. During the war in Afghanistan, he was the only western journalist permitted by the Taliban to report from inside Kabul before their forces fell to the US and their Afghan Northern Alliance allies in 2001. He has also been BBC Africa Correspondent and presenter for Al Jazeera English.
Rageh has won numerous international awards for his reporting, and is a published author of two books - one on the 2003 Iraq Invasion and one on growing up as a British Muslim. He is a Trustee of the British Council and was educated at New College, Oxford University.
THIS LECTURE IS NOW FULLY BOOKED