Executive Officer Reports for SRF
Feb 26th February 2015
Chantel Le Carpentier – President
· Women in Leadership Programme - Plans are in place for the Women in Leadership Programme in Easter.
o The programme is accredited by Sprint, a national consultancy on women’s empowerment at university student level. It consists of a 3.5 day programme to inspire, motivate and empower women into whatever career or further study they wish to pursue. This will be coupled with a mentoring programme that is being sorted at the moment.
If you would like to be involved or take part in the programme, drop me an email at .
· Student Experience and Student Number Growth
o I am working closely with the university on their plans for growth in student numbers for the academic year ahead with a view to make sure that student experience is put at the heart of all the plans.
o So far, the university has decided to not promote accommodation on campus to returners which will greatly improve the accommodation for students starting next year.
o In conversations about the development of accommodation offering on campus
o In conversations about student staff ratios and maintaining and exceeding them when more students arrive next term.
· Student Research
o I am working with the university and staff in the Union on a project to look into what makes a ‘good’ student and whether participation in SU activities has an effect on employability and grades.
o We will use this to not only show the importance of all the stuff students get involved with but will also help guide our work and funding models for the years ahead.
· General Election Strategy
o Working on a strategy to get students to register and vote in the upcoming elections.
· Experience stories
o Working with student support on putting together some stories of student experiences to try and create a picture of experiences at Essex. Targeting first in families, international, women, LGBT etc.
· Southend and Loughton
o I have been working with our excellent VP Southend and Loughton to develop the exec teams on those campuses as well as being involved in Chinese New Year celebrations in Southend. All very promising and exciting!
If you’re interested in getting involved in anything, please email me at
Trustee Report
Michael Spencer – VP Education
I’m working with the University to implement the recommendations from the SU’s student written submission from Quality Assurance Agency’s review process of the University. The outcome is that the University meets the UK standard across range of provision – with the report to be publically available towards the end of February 2015 on the QAA’s website. The next review is scheduled for 2019.
Working with the University to implement HEAR (Higher Education Achievement Record) – which is a rethink of the traditional transcript by including more extracurricular activities on the HEAR. Part of this is ensuring the SU aspect of HEAR is well resourced through working with permanent SU staff.
The Essex student Mobile App which in the capacity of the Education officer I have pushed for has now been approved by the University for in house Development. The resources has been secured – and would represent a saving of £25-50k per year in licencing cost than if we had simply bought the software which would not offer as much possibility to be customised to offer a distinctive Essex experience.
I’m working on developing the Student Voice reports to be more reflective of the students’ opinion, and enabling changes to be made for the students.
Working with the University to develop our work based learning package – e.g. Placement year support / offer - which in the longer term could be distinctive for the Essex degree.
I have given www.HandMeBooks.com – a free of charge used textbook listing / exchange service to the SU for free – which allows the SU to run second hand book service online for the students. In October at the peak approx. 1200 books were listed online. There are over 1,158 users registered as of Feb 2015. Will be working with ISS and SU to further integrate this service so students could more seamlessly buy / sell used textbook.
I’m particularly working with the PG Officer to enrich the University’s PG Offer – to make sure the experience is better.
Looking at CRM portal that would enable the SU to customise support for individual students when it comes to our number 1 and 2 promise.
VP Welfare SRF Report
1. Safety in Quays: I went with the community police over to the Quays and signed up over 200 students to use smart water. This special marking is used on items such as laptops, cell phones, etc, so if in the case the property is stolen and recovered, you will be able to recover it. Students were also issued stickers for their door to inform any potential perpetrator that their room is under the protection of the smart water service.
2. Rights to Rent: We put the finishing touches on the workshops that will take place in March for students to learn about their rights as a tenant and what to expect, as well as what is expected of them as a tenant.
3. RSN: Still continuing with my conversations with RSN management on the program for next year to ensure there is a high level of welfare support for our RA’s.
4. Shadowing Advice Centre: I’m in there every Friday from 3pm-4pm, come see me if you’d like to have a talk in confidence about anything.
5. One World Week and Fit Week: Both went really well and all events were very well attended.
6. Sexual Harassment Campaign: While I’m still helping out Amnesty, I’ve decided to get the ball rolling on my own initiative. This will include a few things from videos, website updates and training. I’ve already start discussing with the external persons on how to implement Sexual Harassment and consent workshops.
7. Exam Tips: I’m working with Student Support on their exam tips campaign in March in Sq 3. Look out for it!
SRF Report
February
Mikya Rozner
1) The Big Food Debate – Currently working on the salad bar to create its own brand and be sure it stays as a legacy to students. Sorting out prices, picking the right packaging, getting the right logo. Just putting all the details and ordering the decorations.
2) Media: the media head roles are up for students to apply and we are currently in the approval stage for the permanent media staff.
3) Ethics and Environment: working on updating the Ethics and Environmental policy
4) Fit Week- body and mind: has been a success judging by the number of people who have attended our different activities with the registrar himself getting involved.
5) Wifi, Parking and Loos: What do they all have in common? They all seem to be creating issues for students and for this reason I will try and work with students closely to get to the end of these issues. The first part of the plan is to collect data so I’m hoping all the students who are upset will contact me about these.
Please let me know if you have any suggestions or queries as I am more than happy to listen to them.
VP International Hristina Kamburova
SRF report
Winter Break Activities
Winter break activities were successful. I had 50 volunteers helping with running the events. 200 people attended the VC’s Christmas lunch. The safety bus was available for students who live off campus to go to the events on campus and to take them back home. After the winter break is over I launched a survey and I am collecting feedback to write recommendations for next year’s winter break. https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/TNBG8V3 .
National Insurance Number Interviews
Another interview date is available for 12th of February. 80 students have slots.
Re-launch of the Buddy Scheme
After electing the new ISA Buddy Scheme Coordinator – Yasmin, we re-launched the signing up for the Buddy Scheme and had 46 new sign ups since. We had a social for the buddies that signed up last term. There were people that made really good friends with their buddies and helped each other practise a language.
Chinese New Year
Chinese New Year plans are under way. It is on 19th February.
We have Tai Chi practice, Chinese food, calligraphy, tea ceremony, dragon dance, buffet, Chinese beer on offer, a party, dragon dance performance and many more activities and celebrations. If you want to get involved contact me.
One World Week
One World Week is 16th – 20th of February. We have food festival, Carnival, World Cup, Cine10, Chinese New Year celebrations and Cultural Showcase. Full plans www.essex.su/oneworldessex
Holi Festival
With Asian society and staff members of the SU we started planning Holi festival of colours for 6th – 7th of March.
Welcoming new exchange students
I attended welcome talks for the new exchange students and invited them to a social in Level Up. Some of them are in Essex just for one term, I told them about different opportunities to get involved and answered their questions.
ISA Awards
We started the plans for international student awards in the beginning of Summer term.
SRF REPORT
BY
OGECHUKWU ONYIA
19 February 2015
On the 6th of February 2015, I organized some fundraising activity to fundraise some fund for the British Heart Foundation.
SRF Report from LGBT* Officer
February is LGBT* History Month and this has taken up the majority of my time. Please find below the advertising for this event showing all of the events I have planned:
The events I have planned have ranged from talks and presentations to film previews and social events.
So far the events have been well attended and have all been successful. The student panel discussion on the 3rd February went amazingly well with a good number of attendees and a very in depth exploration of both personal and topical issues. The Trans* Event with Karen Gale was very inspiring and allowed students and staff an open forum to discuss issues and experiences that trans* students face. Karen exceeded my expectations and I intend to keep a good connection with her so we can use her experience to benefit students.
Ignite, the LGBT* night I organise on campus, has grown from strength to strength with more and more people attending every time. This gives students a safe space to express themselves and not face discrimination. It is a fully inclusive night and enjoyed by all.
Two of the big upcoming events are on the 23rd and 25th February which have required a lot of planning however they will definitely benefit the students. They are both unique and novel events, much like the majority of the other events I have planned.
The History of LGBT* at the University event will explore how LGBT* has been affected over the 50 years of the University operating. It will include a presentation and displays that people can look at. The Vice Chancellor has confirmed his attendance as have some other staff members.
The Careers Event has been difficult to plan however we have a large amount of exhibitors coming to display material.
- University of Essex
- Essex County Football Association
- Capita
- Stonewall
- Essex Police
- Essex Fire and Rescue
- Essex Community Rehabilitation Company
- Southend-On-Sea Borough Council
- Wyevale Garden Centre
There will also be a panel discussion with LGBT* employees from some of these organisations which will explore their experiences in the workplace as well as their opinions on certain aspects. As with the student panel, this panel will be chaired by me in my role as LGBT* Officer.
I have also been doing a few other things such as working with the Ultimate Frisbee club to see how we can promote LGBT*in sport in conjunction with the rainbow laces campaign we have been doing, which has been received very well.
I am also in discussions with Nightline to see how we can train advisers to better serve LGBT* students and their issues. This is also a discussion I am having with the Advice Centre as I feel that, as a Union, we do not offer a structured method of support and advice for these students and the problems they may face that differ from non-LGBT* students. This will allow us to demonstrate how we can best serve all students as well as that the Union does actively support its Liberation groups.
We are currently working on creating a documentary about living at Essex University as an LGBT* student. It is a fly-on-the-wall kind of documentary that follows students around and looks at some of the events that we do on campus. This is being shot by SX:TV and should be completed next month hopefully.
One project that I plan to do after LGBT* History Month is help one of our trans* students raise money to pay for an operation they want to undergo. They have to raise £6000 and are struggling to do this. They are the Chair of the Trans* Forum at the University and have gone through a lot this year and I really want to help them in the same way they have helped me and the Union. They have gone through very difficult issues and this is something I am very passionate about as I cannot imagine how it must feel to identify as one gender and live as that gender but still have the body of another. It would be amazing if we could help, even just a little, to raise money to make such an important and life changing thing happen to someone.