Halifax College Objectives

Long Term [~5 years]

L1. Make a significant impact on student retention, academic attainment and employability (a)by helping students to transition into independent living and learning environment and (b)by increasing the number of students productively engaged within the college.

Why: The aim here is to improve students confidence and allow them to develop skills necessary for independent and team work in a range of environments.

L2. Improve college’s ability to recruit and retain active, enthusiastic and resourceful students interested in engaging with college experience by advertising a coherent and marketable set of college initiatives and activities on the one hand and by working with DECS and other University stakeholders to improve college’s facilities and ‘accommodation offer’ on the other.

Why: colleges strategy relies on ability to galvanise more active and confident students and to foster their efforts to engage less active parts of membership. This ‘pipeline’ clearly relies on ability to attract leaders (and maintain their involvement in the college) and, in turn, our ability to develop and articulate a coherent and attractive ‘college experience offer’ for those students.

Medium Term [~3 years]

M1. Establish (and maintain) a range of 'structured' programmes that help students improve their confidence (targeting students with average pre-existing level of confidence) and increase attendance of / engagement with these programmes.

Why: Engaging ‘average’ students in the wider university experience will help retain these students, improve their employability and academic attainment whilst allowing college to articulate what it offers to its members.

/17:Revise Skills Programme, revise mentoring scheme (ready to launch in 2017/18), MHFA / First Aid, Guide Dogs training…

M2. Improve participation in HCSA elections and support HCSA committee members in organising a wide range of events, activities and campaigns.

Why: HCSA committee is one of the key student engagement platforms for the college aimed at more confident and motivated students – committee members should be supported in developing skills and confidence. At the same time HCSA is the main source of college activities; wider participation in HCSA elections and their support by the college team should ensure that association’s activities are diverse and appeal all sections of college’s demographics.

2016/17: Specific targets for elections (positioned filled on the first round & voters turn-out)

M3. Increase a number of college members, outside of HCSA committee, who organise college-level activities (whether regular or one-off).

Why: This targets more confident/motivated students, helping them to develop transferable skills and, thus, impacting their employability and academic attainment. The purpose of this objective is to expand leadership opportunities beyond HCSA committee.

2016/17: Leadership Houses (with strong objectives), sports teams, fishing-out individuals

M4. Establish college programmes and activities tailored to engaging students from under-engaged demographics: upper year students, science faculty students, and postgraduates.

Why: This is a deficit-based objective. Without targeting upper-year, science faculty and postgraduate students, the impact of college’s work will remain limited.

2016/17: Focus on one specific demographic, own it and make a difference. Suggest – upper year students (STEM and PGs are more complex at the moment and cannot fully own it)

M5. Maintain 'traditions' for regular low-key events/activities series that facilitate 'unintentional interactions' and integration of more isolated students: weekly quizzes, crafts workshops, etc.

Why: Low-key activities allow less confident students to feel less isolated and to build social and support networks in a less intimidating way. Establishing traditions of such events (rather than re-establishing series of events every year) reduces the amount of effort that is needed for organising them and allows the college to advertise its activities to prospective and new members.

2016/17: Make sure quizzed, crafts workshops and band nights continue. Plan ‘opportunistic’ low-key events usually linked to TV screenings in advance – GBBO, GoT, Doctor Who, Sherlock, Eurovision, 7 nations (Rugby), US elections…

M6. Establish a framework for student support based on pro-active identification of students ‘at risk’ (based on individual observations as well as demographic indicators) and engagement with those students.

Why: A more proactive approach to identifying isolated / disengaged students and students at risk of feeling disfranchised from the university experience will provide the college team with more opportunities to engage with the students and provide them with necessary support, thus, potentially improving retention.

2016/17: Target for CTs visiting a certain proportion (95%?) of students from at risk demographics within the first few (2?) weeks. CTs to track students they see against residents list (with 1-2-1 follow up) – establish framework and action limits. Targets for visiting kitchens (starting with kitchen contracts) on a regular basis & monitoring of achievement.

Enabling objectives [~2 years, with incremental improvement]

These objectives do not replace annual objectives to be agreed at performance review meetings.

E1. Establish frameworks for monitoring attendance and effectiveness of programmes, events and other activities organised by all college stakeholders as well as for tracing individual students engagement.

Why: Programme and events monitoring will enable College Council to agree KPIs, to track progress towards objectives and provide more meaningful advice to the operational team. Tracing of individual students engagement will enable more rich analysis of college performance and may facilitate college’s work on identifying students ‘at risk’.

2016/17: bottom-up attendance monitoring for all events with reports to each council meeting (attendance v expenditure & effort, lessons learned)

E2. Improve pre-arrival orientation and engagement activities

Why: Students enthusiasm and anxieties before they arrive to the university and college provide, currently underused, opportunities for improving their confidence and improving overall engagement.

2016/17: detailed plan for 2017/18 (competitions, gaming, polls for a freshers event…)

E3. Improve visibility and recognition of college stakeholders as well as understanding of the roles within college's student population.

Why: Improved recognition and visibility contributes to the college community feeling small and relatable. This will facilitate students seeking support whether with implementing their ideas or with personal difficulties.

2016/17: on-line quiz with prizes for participants and targets for the team (jan), schedule for staff appearances at events.

E4. Improve the use of communal and currently-unused space in the college by both college members/groups as well as YUSU clubs/societies.

Why: Perceived poor facilities and distance from the main campus are currently cited as one of the key problems in the college. Improvement of facilities combined with their better utilisation and more non-member footfall through the college will partially mitigate these issues.

2016/17: framework for booking of JJ’s after new space opens.

E5. Work with HCSA committee to establish alternative income streams for the association and the college

Why: The current HCSA funding model relies heavily on profits generated during freshers week and sponsorship from nigh club promoters (York Parties). This discourages innovation and incentivises the committee to prioritise alcohol-heavy city centre club nights over more inclusive (and expensive) on-campus events and, in turn, risks alienating significant proportion of college membership.

2016/17: Explore sponsorship opportunities for HCSA

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