As the new academic year kicks off there are plenty of freshers' events going on in CMF groups around the country. This is an excellent time for putting on evangelistic events and recruiting new members to CMF. Sandra Hartley has sent out over a thousand freshers' packs to help spread the word about what CMF has to offer.We also revised and expanded a freshers' strategy document to give student reps advice and support on organising their freshers' events.

During July and August, several summer teams went to Russia (Samara & Tver), Armenia, Georgia, Albania, France, Estonia (Scandinavian team) and Czech republic (German team). As usual they aimed to build up local groups of Christian medics through evangelism, Bible teaching, medical and ethics teaching, as well as a good dose of fun and silliness. A number of UK students joined the teams and they are always life-changing experiences for both hosts and guests alike. Reports can be obtained on individual teams from Jonny Thiessen (jonny@cmf.org.uk).

We will be running a number of Confident Christianity events during the coming months to train students in reaching their peers with the gospel. Look out on the website for details of an event near you. We have also produced a resource pack to help students set up special study modules in Christian medical ethics at their medical school – these have already run at four medical schools and we are hopeful that a couple more will set them up this year.

Another resource that should soon be available is a speakers' list to help student leaders to find good speakers on particular topics. This has been badly in need of revision for several years and is a welcome development.

The National Students' Committee will meet again on 7 October, when we hope to be able to announce a successor to John Greenall as committee chair. Do pray for them as they help shape the direction of our student ministry.

Publicity is available for the National Students' Conference at Swanwick, Derbyshire on 9-11 February. The title is 'The God we Serve is Able', with Hugh Thomson speaking from Daniel. Book now and plan to take a good group from your medical school! All student members will receive a booking form and PDFs are available on the CMF website.

We had a great staffworkers' retreat at L'Abri Fellowship on 18-20 August. This was the first time we had got the team away together like this and may well become an annual event. Sadly Kerrie Bavidge was unable to get flexible training funding to work part time, so will be unable to work for us as Scottish staffworker this year.

I am due to finish as a GP registrar on 17 October and so will no longer be a junior doctor! I am very grateful to the Lord for getting me this far and we would value prayer for us as a family as I look to take the next step both medically and with CMF.