Harry Lownds

Thursday 22 January saw the winter graduation ceremony for the School of Life Sciences of Sussex University take place at the Brighton Centre. The 2024/25 holder of the Harry Lownds Scholarship, Furkan Unlukaplan, joined other graduands from the Masters programme  in Genetic Manipulation and Molecular Cell Biology in having their degrees conferred by the University’s Chancellor, Sanjeev Baskar. Harry’s Dad, Matt, was pleased to be able to join Furkan’s family in celebrating his success.

You can see the graduation ceremony online at https://vimeo.com/1157327498, with Furkan’s moment in the spotlight coming at 27:17 in.

Harry’s family are pleased to be able to share the latest  Scholarship Report providing an update from the 2024/25 award holder, Furkan Unlukaplan, on his year at Sussex and plans for the future.  We hope that everyone who has supported the scholarship established in Harry’s memory feels as inspired by Furkan’s update as we have been.  Thank you again for the generous support you continue to provide to the scholarship fund which is allowing more young people like Furkan to pursue their academic ambitions.

To mark World Sepsis Day on 13 September Harry’s family shared the story of his death as part of Sepsis research’s ‘Sepsis Stories’ for Sepsis Awareness Month

Harry’s Sepsis Story

Our family fundraising continued on Sunday 13 July when Matt Lownds and Charlie Hicks, supported by Becky and Eve Lownds, completed the ‘Race to the Stones – Ridgeline 50k’ trail run from Wantage to Avebury.  They started shortly after five in the morning on what was forecast to be one of the hottest days of 2025.  As first time trail runners Charlie was pleased to finish in a very creditable 50^th place (20^th in his age-group), while Matt wasn’t too disappointed to get to the end in a rather more modest 274^th place (31^st in his age group – if the race had been three weeks later he’d have been a more impressive-sounding 4^th in the next one). Their efforts raised another £2,000 again split equally between the Sussex scholarship and Sepsis Research.

Our 2025 fundraising for the Sussex scholarship and for Sepsis Research  kicked off on the weekend of 3-4 May when Becky Lownds, Martin Allen, Neil Allen, Izzy Allen, Manon Allen and Charlie Hicks, supported by Evie Lownds, Margaret Allen and Matt Lownds, took part in the Isle of Wight Ultra Challenge.  Together they walked 475km around the island raising over £2,000 in the process, which was split equally between the two good causes. A brilliant effort by all concerned.

Harry’s Dad Matt was up bright an early on Friday 24 January to get down to Brighton for the University of Sussex’s School of Life Sciences winter graduation ceremony.  He was there to help celebrate the graduation of Hannah Baker, the 2023/24 recipient of the scholarship awarded in Harry’s memory.

It was pleasure to be able to join Hannah’s family to mark her fantastic achievement in being awarded the MSc in Genetic Manipulation and Molecular Cell Biology – and to meet up again with Rob Yates from the Sussex Alumni team who do so much behind the scenes to keep the scholarship running.

You can see the graduation ceremony online at https://vimeo.com/1050020573, with Hannah’s moment in the spotlight coming at 22:35 in.

Harry’s family are very grateful to the 2023/24 receipent of the scholarship, Hannah Baker, and this year’s award holder, Furkan Unlukaplan, for providing updates on their studies and plans for the future.  We hope that everyone who has supported the scholarship established in Harry’s memory enjoys reading the Harry Lownds Memorial Scholarship report 2024 every bit as much as we have.  Thank you again so very much for your donations which allow the scholarship to continue to support inspiring young people like Hannah and Furkan.

Harry’s Dad, Matt, spent the weekend of 6-7 July out on the hills around Bakewell, not far from where he grew up. He was far from alone – almost 3,000 people started the Peak District Ultra Challenge, covering distances ranging from 10km to 100km, the vast majority doing so to raise funds for charity. The organisers claimed over £800,000 had been raised before the starting hooter went and forecast that the event would generate well over £1 million in all for a wide range of good causes. Some people really did it the hard way, like Daniel Fairbrother from Stevenage who carried a fridge the full 100km without a break to raise money for Great Ormond Street Hospital. Others Matt chatted to along the way were raising funds for some well-known charities like the British Heart Foundation and Cancer Research UK, and some much less well-known ones supporting local hospices or ‘rare disease’ charities (including Vasculitis UK, who the family raised funds for after Harry’s Grandma Lownds’ death in 2016 from microscopic polyangiitis).

Matt was one of the 420 finishers in the ‘100km continuous challenge’ – walking through the night to complete it in a little over 23 hours, half an hour faster than last year.  Although the weather was relatively kind to participants (while London and the South East saw a month’s rainfall inside two days), nearly a quarter of those starting dropped out along the at-times-gruelling route.  Matt’s aim was to kick-start a planned year-long family fundraising effort to collect £20,000 to continue the scholarship established at Sussex University in memory of Harry.  Our goal now is to build on the fundraising after Harry’s death to ensure that the scholarship can continue for at least another five years – celebrating Harry’s life by ‘paying forward’ the love and support that friends and family have offered us since his death.

Thank you for reading – and for your support to Harry’s scholarship.

(Harry’s Mum, Becky, presenting Matt with
his finisher’s medal at 06:10 on Sunday morning)

Harry’s Dad Matt travelled down to Brighton on Thursday 25 Januuary to help celbrate the graduation of the 2022/23 recipient of the scholarship, Tiffany Clements.  A thoroughly fun afternoon was had by all.  You can see the graduation ceremony online at https://vimeo.com/906672389, with Tiffany’s moment in the spotlight coming at 21:42 in.

The Lownds family was very pleased to receive letters from the 2022/23 scholar, Tiffany Clements, providing an update at the end of her studies for the MSc in Genetic Manipulation and Molecular Cell Biology at the University of Sussex, and from the recipient of the scholarship for 2023/24, Hannah Baker, introducing herself.  You can read their letters here and here and get a sense of the difference the scholarship is making to the lives of these inspiring young people.