A Stewartry woman has been recognised in the New Year’s Honours list.
Sandra Kinnear, who is originally from Tongland, is to receive the British Empire medal for her services to the environment and to charity.
Sandra, nee Broll, is the daughter of Molly and the late William Broll of Highboreland Cottage. Proud sister Pamela Spencer (nee Broll) writes that Sandra attended Kirkcudbright Academy before studying at cookery college at Heathall, Dumfries.
She then joined the University of Edinburgh’s catering department and over the past 42 years has worked her way through the ranks with various roles in accommodation, catering and events. After moving on from catering she took up a roll as a housing officer in accommodation management before eventually moving to her current role as health, safety and sustainability adviser.
She has also transformed the university’s approach to climate change mitigation by winning it two landscaping awards – one for installing apiaries to help in sustaining plants and the other for creating a hedgehog and bat friendly campus by recycling unwanted wooden pallets to create homes for the creatures.
Sandra was the driving force behind a recycling programme that raised money for Syrian refugee charities and £350,000 for the British Heart Foundation, which also saw 20 furniture points installed across the university. Her hard work also helped the Pollock Halls residential campus achieve Zero Waste status in 2014.
She said: “It’s team work and is reached with the help of some very special, hardworking and enthusiastic people.”
Away from the university, Sandra has been a volunteer at Lismore Rugby FC where she was a founder member and player in the women’s team.
She also served as chairwoman of Scottish Women’s Rugby and the passion of her and the rest of the committee saw the women’s and men’s games amalgamated in 2009.
Sandra also became the first women representative on the Scottish Rugby Council.
She has also been part of a volunteer group called Free Cakes for Kids, whose members make cakes for children’s charities.
They are given to children who would otherwise not receive a cake on their birthday, bringing joy to so many little ones.
She is looking forward to working with various members of her university team to come up with new and viable concepts to assist in the environmental challenges, alongside doing more to help charities – especially as we emerge from the pandemic.
