UCL's committees haven't yet properly kicked back into action, so I have little to report on that front; as I was attending a meeting at the House of Lords, I couldn't make it to Library Committee and asked the Academic Affairs Officer to go in my stead.
At Personal Tutoring Project Board, I pushed for minimum institutional standards to be introduced, so all students have access to a minimum expectation, rather than departments deciding what to provide their students. I also made sure that the needs of PGT students were specifically addressed within the new strategy (although I didn't need to push too hard - college are well aware that they need to do more for Masters students).
On a more serious note, following the establishment of a Redundancy Committee, I have had a meeting with the secretary to UCL Council to discuss the provision in UCL's statutes that enables students representatives to be excluded from such discussions. I am hopeful that the statute will be reviewed; I will keep Council informed of progress.
I was in Manchester two weeks ago for the NUS Strategic Conversation eventm where we discussed the NUS' - and the wider movement's - future. I would like a couple of Council members to help me formulate UCLU's response to NUS's proposals, and this event will further inform that response. If you'd like to read the associated documents, they are the Wave of Change and Surfing the Wave, and How the National Organisations will deliver Surfing the Wave.
At the last meeting of the Aldwych Group, we discussed strategies to encourage students to register to vote in the upcoming general election, and to think about student issues - fees! - when voting.
Work on StARs has continued, with a first attempt at a StARs Forum (to which 2 people turned up - we are going back to the drawing board slightly), and the first edition of the StARs newsletter.
In terms of the Union campaign on student travel, this has taken a back seat thus far. An initial timeline drawn up before Christmas has been abandoned as other events have overtaken somewhat. The plan now is to do some initial work this term, so the campaign can be built into officer and Council handover to kick off the campaign properly at freshers fayre. This also gives us more time to coordinate with other Unions around London, by building it into ULU handover days.
Josh
At Personal Tutoring Project Board, I pushed for minimum institutional standards to be introduced, so all students have access to a minimum expectation, rather than departments deciding what to provide their students. I also made sure that the needs of PGT students were specifically addressed within the new strategy (although I didn't need to push too hard - college are well aware that they need to do more for Masters students).
On a more serious note, following the establishment of a Redundancy Committee, I have had a meeting with the secretary to UCL Council to discuss the provision in UCL's statutes that enables students representatives to be excluded from such discussions. I am hopeful that the statute will be reviewed; I will keep Council informed of progress.
I was in Manchester two weeks ago for the NUS Strategic Conversation eventm where we discussed the NUS' - and the wider movement's - future. I would like a couple of Council members to help me formulate UCLU's response to NUS's proposals, and this event will further inform that response. If you'd like to read the associated documents, they are the Wave of Change and Surfing the Wave, and How the National Organisations will deliver Surfing the Wave.
At the last meeting of the Aldwych Group, we discussed strategies to encourage students to register to vote in the upcoming general election, and to think about student issues - fees! - when voting.
Work on StARs has continued, with a first attempt at a StARs Forum (to which 2 people turned up - we are going back to the drawing board slightly), and the first edition of the StARs newsletter.
In terms of the Union campaign on student travel, this has taken a back seat thus far. An initial timeline drawn up before Christmas has been abandoned as other events have overtaken somewhat. The plan now is to do some initial work this term, so the campaign can be built into officer and Council handover to kick off the campaign properly at freshers fayre. This also gives us more time to coordinate with other Unions around London, by building it into ULU handover days.
Josh