Flicking through the latest issue of ISP magazine, I came across news of news of their Spring Graduation. Nearly 50 graduates of three ISP educational courses, alongside representatives of the agencies or brands many of them work for, friends and family, gathered in the MPs Dining Room at The House of Commons last February.

The audience listened as Clive Mishon, chairman of the ISP, and John Greenway MP, the ISP’s representative in Parliament, explained the importance of the highest levels of professional education to the survival of the UK’s self regulatory system for advertising and marketing.

Chris Bestley, the ISP’s director of education, pointed out that the fact that a small but significant number of students who had started out on all three courses had actually failed was evidence of the hard work those who passed had put in. John Sylvester a director of motivation company PM&M and one of the main men in establishing the diploma, said the course was as challenging and as relevant today as it was when it fist ran in 2005.