sir deian rhys hopkin born 1 march 1944 is president of the national library of wales and expert adviser to the first minister of wales for the centenary of the first world war and was from 2001 until 2009 vicechancellor and chief executive of london south bank university england he is an historian originally from wales and a fluent welsh speaker born and educated in llanelli he attended the first ever welshmedium school to be established by a local authority followed by a scholarship to llandovery college he graduated in history at the university of wales aberystwyth where he also completed his phd after a brief period at queen mary college london he returned to the department of history at aberystwyth where he taught for twenty four years and became head of department for most of that time he was also a tutor at the open university and was seconded to the ou to develop new courses in 1991 he was appointed dean of human sciences at city of london polytechnic which became in 1992 london guildhall university now london metropolitan university he was promoted to viceprovost in 1996he has been actively involved in educational policy and in particular the skills agenda of the uk over a number of years he is currently a council member of the university of essex the city and guilds of london institute and the campaign for learning he is a patron of hillcroft college for women and chairmanemeritus of the university centre jersey highlands college he was cochair of the he progression board for the department for children schools and families and he champion for the 1419 diploma in april 2012 he joined the jisc funded students first project board as an independent chairhe is a member of the council for assisting refugee academics cara of which he was vicechairman and is patron of cerebra and was until 2009 chairman of the uniaid foundation the national charity supporting students in financial difficulty which has now merged with the brightside trusthe has published on labour and press history and on the use of computers in history and was cofounder of the association for history and computing and founding editor of llafur the journal of welsh peoples history of which he is now a vicepresident he is a member of the higher education commission chair of the local economy policy unit and a member of the editorial board of its journal local economy he is also a trustee of the institute of historical research development trust university of london and a member of the editorial advisory board of times higher education he has extensive broadcasting experience and was a member of the bbc general advisory council hopkin is a fellow of the royal historical society and is a freeman of the city of london and the worshipful company of educators he has been elected an honorary fellow of the university of wales aberystwyth and of the university of wales trinity st davids has an honorary dlitt from glamorgan university an honorary lld from mcgill university montreal canada and an honorary duniv from the open university he is also an honorary fellow of the chartered institution of building services engineers and has been awarded a fellowship of the city and guilds of london institute he was knighted in the 2009 birthday honoursin 2009 he was appointed interim vicechancellor of the university of east london and in 2010 was appointed interim chair of the student loans company