Mansfield College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford. Our membership comprises approximately 50 academic staff, 220 undergraduates, 50 graduates and 35 visiting students. This small size engenders friendly and close relationships not only amongst undergraduates, but also between Junior (undergraduate), Middle (graduate) and Senior (tutors) Common Rooms. Mansfield College opened in Oxford in 1886. The college had previously been located in Birmingham, where it was known as Spring Hill College. Its original purpose was to provide further education and theological training for nonconformist ministers. The college was primarily associated with the Congregationalist denomination. The Congregationalists (also known as ‘Independents’) were a protestant dissenting denomination who called for the separation of church and state and rejected the hierarchical structures of the Anglican church in favour of the self-government of local churches.