Nicola Brewer is the Vice-Provost (international) of UCL. Before joining UCL in May 2014, Nicola was a British diplomat at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. She was British High Commissioner to South Africa, Lesotho and Swaziland from May 2009 to September 2013. She previously lived and worked in India, France and Mexico.
As Vice-Provost (International), Nicola is responsible for UCL’s Global Engagement Strategy: London’s Global University working with partners to achieve fair solutions to global challenges. She supervises one of UCL’s four Schools, the Institute of Education. Nicola is Gender Equality Champion on UCL’s Senior Management Team and also a member of the 30% Club’s Higher Education Working Group. Nicola joined the board of the Department for International Development in 2002 as Director General Regional Programmes, and moved back to the FCO as Director General Europe in 2004 for the UK’s last Presidency of the EU. Nicola became the first Chief Executive of the Equality and Human Rights Commission in March 2007, a role she held until May 2009.
Nicola studied English at the University of Leeds, graduating in 1980. She received her PhD in Linguistics at Leeds in 1988. She was appointed Dame Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George (DCMG) in the 2011 Birthday Honours List. She is a Trustee of Sentebale (April 2014), a charity founded by Prince Harry and Prince Seeiso of Lesotho. Sentebale helps vulnerable children, the forgotten victims of poverty and
of Lesotho’s HIV/AIDS epidemic.She is a Non-Executive Director of Aggreko plc (March 2016) and of Scottish Power Ltd (July 2017). She is also a member of the Trilateral Commission since May 2017.