Volleyball voyages to Cambridge for play-offs

Playoffs for the National Volleyball League (NVL) will take place in the University Sports Centre and Gym this year. Teams from both the men and women’s division one, different regions from the men’s division three, and seventh place teams from the volleyball super leagues will battle it out on the 12th of April 2025, in the arena on Philippa Fawcett Drive. Exact timings are yet to be confirmed, but around five games and six hours of volleyball will be played.

Cambridge revealed as the sixth most stressed city in England

A new report by Deskup has announced that Cambridge residents are some of the most stressed in the country, performing poorly in health, crime, and social environment metrics. The study, which analysed a variety of data from the Office of National Statistics (ONS), and accorded each major town a score based on, among other things, life satisfaction, access to green spaces, drug misuse and road safety. It ranked Cambridge as the fourth worst city for mental health, behind only Oldham, Manchester, and Barrow-in-Furness. Cambridge, which has the 13th highest annual wage out of the 90 towns studied, also ranked amongst the worst in terms of workplace safety and life satisfaction.

Take it or leaf it: Botanic Gardens says it has reached full capacity amid plant extinction fears

Research carried out by the University of Cambridge shows that botanical gardens are failing to protect many endangered species as they run out of space. The Cambridge University Botanic Garden (CUBG) curator, Professor Sam Brockington, has said that “the risk of extinction is accelerating and our response is too slow”. The CUBG, which houses over 8,000 plant species, added half a million seeds and plants from threatened species to its collection last year, but warns that these endangered plants may bring less visitors and interest to the Garden. Brockington also highlighted the “costly” “bureaucracy of seed exchange” and the lack of botanic gardens in the global south as factors in this ecological emergency.

Library with a few Twix up its sleeve? 50-year-old wrapper found in the UL

Workers carrying out renovations at the UL accidentally discovered a more than 50-year old relic that had been hiding beneath the shelves. A bright orange Fry’s Crunchie wrapper was unearthed by the facilities team while dismantling some shelves. The price of the chocolate, advertised as 6d (sixpence) places the date pre-decimalisation in 1971, but some internet investigators have suggested that it is from the 1960s. Lizzie Woodman, the ULs social media coordinator said that “with millions of books and more than 205km (127 miles) of bookshelves, it’s hardly surprising that things sometimes stay hidden for so long”. The University has posted on social media, imploring the culprit to “fess up” to their confectionary crime.