Balance Your Books

One of my manifesto promises was to make the mentor scheme more dynamic and inspiring, and during my hustings I spoke a lot about making the campaigns that the student mentor scheme runs more relevant and pro active.

The first campaign that I have fed into was launched this week, and can be viewed on the Guild website here.

Balance Your Books is a campaign which addresses the financial difficulties that many students face, and offers easy advice and sources of information. Last year at NUS regional conference, we were presented with a cheque to represent the massive underspend on the part of our University on bursaries. This means that students were entitled to financial help from the University, and for some reason or another, did not recieve it.

This makes it clear that many students are confused by the bursary system, which is riddled with complexity.The campaign aims to heighten the awareness of financial help available to our students, how to apply, and where to find the support to guide you through your application.

The campaign is so relevant in the current economic climate, with the expected increase in food and fuel costs more and more students are going to find themselves in serious financial difficulties.

Check out the website- which has loads of information and a budget planner that you can download

Broke and Broken- NUS Video

NUS Broke and Broken Report

Guild TV News

The first Guild Council of the year...

Last night was the first meeting of Guild Council (and also the first official post GC curry of the year- see photo)

It was a good meeting we had some good debates- and it finished at a reasonable time- an advantage that we are rarely awarded. It was also great to see some new faces in the room.

Guild Council voted on 11 motions all together, but I am most excited about the following...

-> to call NUS Extraordinary conference, and vote in favour of the reform proposals
-> To stock One Water in our bars and to lobby The Spar, and other outlets on campus to stock One Water and One Condoms (woop!)
-> To endorse the NUS 11 Point Manifesto on Sexual Health
-> To look into creating a Guild letting agent
-> And also an enforcement of having an affiliated Taxi company, and relaunching the night bus!

Broke and Broken- Students in the Red

I wrote blogs over the summer, on why HE is unfair and why we need a fairer funding system. If any of you were at my introductory talks during Welcome Week you would have heard me speak about the 2009 review of the cap on tuition fees and the national campaign for a fairer funding system.

Ben Whittaker, from the NUS National Executive Committee (NEC) was also at our fresher's fairs explaining the national campaign (see picture).

Variable fees represent the biggest threat to students in years- student debt is reaching record levels. The whole system is underpinned by an overly complex bursary and support system, typified by massive inequality.

This is why the National Union of Students (NUS) passed policy at annual conference, to oppose the marketisation of higher education and demand that the national campaign addresses all of the failures in the current system.

Vice President (Education and Access) Tom Marley will be writing a series of blogs to keep you informed on the campaign, but I am going to use this blog to tell you about the upcoming West Midlands Area NUS (WMANUS) action.

WMANUS are holding a regional day of action, which will take place some time in November (date to be confimed). The regional campaign will include action on individual campuses, and then a regional collective rally with speakers. The theme of the day is students in the red, and every MP and Vice Chancellor in the region will recieve a red suprise! Keep reading for updates!

Calling Student Parents

The National Union of Student's Welfare and Women's campaigns, have combined to conduct research on the experiences of students with children in both further and higher education. The results of this research will be utlisied to shape the NUS campaigns on improving the experience of students with children in the future.

"We know from the research that we have already carried out that learners can face problems to do with student finance and benefits, course organisation and childcare, and that studying with children can sometimes be an isolating and stressful experience. We also know that individuals and their families benefit enormously from parental education and that further and higher education can have a huge impact on child poverty and children's educational attainment."

The survey should take 15-20 minutes to complete, and everyone who completes it will have the chance to be entered into a draw to win one of three £50 High Street Vouchers.
The survey results are completely anonymous and can be completed here

Central Kitchen

The sabbatical officer group were lucky enough to get an invitation to University Central Kitchen over on The Vale last week. We got a tour of the HUGE kitchen, which produces 37,000 meals per week, for all catering outlets across campus.

We went all around the kitchens, through walk in fridges with very tempting cakes, saw Fresh Thinking- where many student groups and the RAs get food for events and even a fridge just for cheese. WOW WOW WOW.

Some fun facts from the tour....

-> The kitchen use non alcoholic wine in their recipes- to cater for students with specific dietary requirements
-> They get through 39,000 kgs of chips each week
-> And 15 litres of soup per day!
-> AND 140 cucumbers

I will add more facts when the rest of the sabbs remind me what they were!
We are all off to the Hub at Shackleton soon for tea- will let you know how Central Kitchen fair up!

Abortion Rights

The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill was debated in the last session of parliament, before the summer recess. The Bill was established to update the 1990 Act- however amendments to restrict abortion law were tabled during the passage of the bill.

During this time, the Guild of Students passed policy to enforce our pro choice position- opposing amendments to decrease the time limit for women wishing to have an abortion and solidifying our commitment to the belief that it is the right of individual women to decide what happens to their own bodies.

The amendments were an area of contentious and intense debate, but they eventually fell by 233 in favour to 304 votes against. Members of last years sabbatical team- Laura, Naush, Rhea and Lizzy went to parliament to join the Abortion Rights lobby and even got snapped by BBC News.

In addition to my role at the Guild of Students, I also help out with the West Midlands Area NUS Women's Campaign. Along with Sophie Kettell, WMANUS Convenor I attended a public meeting in the Houses of Parliament in October, regarding further amendments tabled regarding abortion law, due to be debated on the 22nd of October. Such amendments included extending abortion law to Northern Ireland, letting women take the abortion pill in the comfort of their own homes and removing the law that requires women to visit two doctors before an abortion is approved.

Other amendments, designed to restrict abortion law were tabled, including enforcing a 'cooling off' period before an abortion is approved and increasing the number of doctors required to approve the procedure. After attending this meeting, I set about the task of writing to every MP in the West Midlands, urging them to vote accordingly on all relevant amendments when the Bill is in its final stages of debate (check out the stack of letters in the first photo!).

With allegations of fillibusters and procedural motions to push specific amendments off the agenda, and thus away from the governmental radar, Abortion Rights organised another lobby outside parliament.

Myself and some of the Women's Network Association went along to show our support the Abortion Rights movement, and our solidarity to the women of Northern Ireland (see second picture).

Wellbeing Fair

Myself and Sparky planned and organised the Wellbeing Fair, which took place in the Underground on Monday the 22nd of September. It was really busy and I got to meet lots of students- old and new.

We decided to develop the Wellbeing Fair this year, and progressed from the usual focus of sport and exercise, expanding the theme to include mental wellbeing, sexual health, drugs and alcohol and then general niceness.

The fair definately had something for everyone- there were loads of stalls so I am going to list my top 5 features of the fair.

1 -> FREE massages
2-> "Smoke Free" PINK bingo pens
3-> Self Defence Demonstrations (plus LOADS of sign ups to Domeneque's self defence classes)
4-> My wheelie bin full of condoms
5 -> Wii Sports

There were LOADS of stalls, a body pit stop, where students could find ouy how fit they are and a pledge wall, where 100s of students set themselves goals for the year ahead. There were loads of pledges, ranging from "I will go swimming 5 times a week" to "I will quit smoking" to "I will walk to the pizza shop instead of ordering in"- every step counts I guess! Thank you for everybody that came along! Hope you had a good time!

Welcome Week

As you can all possibly guess, Welcome Week is probably the busiest week of the year at the Guild of Students and my favourite week of the year (other than Christmas Week- I like Christmas).

I just thought I would write a quick blog to fill you what I have been/will be up to this week....

-> I visited students in Mason, Tennis Courts and Elgar Court as they moved in and had their welcome talks
-> I enjoyed a wonderful interpretive dance from Timothy Stillwell, President of Tennis Courts (see picture 1)
-> I represented 2 students in University disciplinary hearings- yes, in Welcome Week!
-> I ran the Wellbeing Fair with Mark Smith, Vice President Sport- to follow in a later blog
-> I went to the Tennis Courts welcome BBQ
-> I collected 100s of questionnaires with Domeneque- Women's Officer on single sex gym sessions and active lifestyle classes- this data will be collated and hopefully used to lobby the Munrow for more female only sessions
-> I went to Gatecrasher as a "POSH VIP"
-> I got over 500 students to sign Oggy's petition stating that halls of residence prices at Birmingham are too high- it was great to see that so many students feel so strongly on this issue- home students to students on campus, first years to post grads everybody had an opinion... it's going to be a biggy!
-> I took LOADS of photos of people with the petition (see picture 2 on the right for a picture of me with it)
-> I got a goody bag full of amazing freebies
-> I gave away 3 wheelie bins full of condoms
-> I had a free massage
-> I made the Guild Officer Group travelling stall for the fairs (it looks AWESOME- see picture 3 below)
-> I started recruiting for the Multicultural Week steering group, with Rich Walker- VPSAD
-> I helped out Hannah at the Change Your World Fair on Tuesday the 23rd of September
-> I joined Birmingham Labour Students
-> I went to the International Student Welcome Ball, and watched cultural performances and a fashion show
-> I disco danced in the silent disco marquee at the Masquerade Ball =]
-> I watched Scott Mills from the balcony in the Deb Hall
-> I talked to students about Broke and Broken, the NUS Higher Education Funding Campaign
-> I joined Carnival
-> I gave presentations on the Guild to new students in Sociology, Accounting, Medicine, Maths and Computer Science

So what have I been up to so far?

Browsing through my blog roll, I noticed that the majority of my blogs have been on issues that I care about that are related to my job role. So as not to lose focus of the actual action behind these random rants and musing, I decided to write a quick blog before bedtime to list the things I've been up to since the 1st of August.

-> I lobbied the PCT to include sexual health provisions in the services offered by Selly Oak's new GP led health centre
-> I secured some funding from the University towards the Nightbus project
-> I planned the Wellbeing Fair, with VPS Mark Smith
-> I set up the Nightbus task group, which has began the research that I spoke of in my Nightbus blog, in addition to researching sponsorship opportunities
-> I developed the terms of reference and established the Guild's Equality and Diversity Committee

-> I started to write a code of practise for taxi companies who bid for our business to adhere to
-> I attended 3 external training courses- NUS APL and ATA, and Common Purpose Frontrunner
-> I revised our No Platform policy

-> I won an extreme rock paper scissors championship at Frontrunner training (see picture)
-> I commissioned a mentor campaign on bursaries and budgeting
-> I helped to plan the launch of B WISTE- Birmingham Women in Science, Technology and Engineering
-> I began to plan Multicultural Week, with the VPSAD Rich Walker
-> I started to develop the actions for our equality and diversity strategy as a part of our strategic planning

The Mermaid

This Saturday (13th of September) was one of the first of the University undergraduate open days for the 2009/10 intake! Weird to imagine that before this years freshers have even arrived the University are recruiting new ones!

The University pull out all the stops on open days to make the campus look its best (I'm sure that you have all heard the rumours about the grass being sprayed green). In keeping with this, they asked the Guild to turn on the Mermaid fountain!

I was lucky enough to switch it on, and I have to say, it was a very exciting job! And it looks very pretty! The fountain will be switched off soon, in order to get ready for Welcome Week next week, so I thought I would share this picture with you- the Mermaid fountain... blink and you'll miss her!

One Water

I am so happy to blog and tell you that the Guild will soon be stocking One Water in our bars! I've been speaking to venues and now whenever you buy water from our bars 100% of the profits will go towards funding Playpumps water projects.

"as kids play, clean water is pumped out of the ground into storage tanks for use by the community. So not only do people get clean water, but because it's readily available it means time isn't wasted collecting water - and that's great because the kids go to school to get an education and the adults look after their crops and families."

One Water.... AMAZING

What is Diversity?

When this video clip was part of the latest all sabb email, bellows of laughter echoed around the exec corridor. However abstract, when I actually thought about it, this clip actually rings true. It always surprises me how few people in this movement ever recognise the value, or importance of diversity and equality of opportunity. Instead as a Welfare sabb, I often find myself having to justify widening participation initiatives, and the liberation campaigns- the very campaigns that should be at the heart of, and shaping the direction of our movement. The only thing that I can attribute this to is ignorance, or indifference, neither of which are acceptable today.

So what is diversity? "Diversity describes the range of visible and non-visible differences that exist between people whilst equality means having the same value - indicating a state of balance. When we talk about managing diversity therefore, we are referring to the harnessing of these differences to create a productive environment in which everybody feels valued, where talents are fully utilised and in which organisational goals are met" (Kandola and Fullerton 1998).

And what is equality? Equal opportunities ensure that everyone is entitled to freedom from discrimination in every form.

Why do we have liberation? The liberation campaigns exist to represent and campaign for equal opportunities, for particular groups who face discrimination in education, and are oppressed in wider society. The 4 liberation groups are women, LGBT, ethnic minority and disabled. We don't have a men's officer because men aren't discriminated against, or oppressed in education because of their gender. We don't have a white students officer, because white students aren't discriminated against, or oppressed in education because of their race.

The NUS produced a booklet entitled 101 Reasons for Liberation in Students' Unions, which can be viewed here.

The Guild, as a Union, has a responsibility to represent and campaign for the equality of these groups, celebrate their diversity and to ensure that the University do not tolerate discrimination or oppression in any form. We do not live in a society where discrimination is either tolerable or justifiable.

This is why, when we began our 3 year plan last week equality and diversity was included as one of our core strategic objectives. This must, remain one of our core objectives until we have achieved true equality. Until this day, we cannot be complacent.

Gay Pride, Manchester 2008

At the weekend I went to Manchester for this years Gay Pride.
I had a brilliant weekend catching up with some friends who have recently moved to Manchester!

Forgive me if this blog is vague, or woolly but I find it difficult to write about an issue that is so close to the hearts of many, but that doesn't effect me as a person. For a much more articulate, absolute gem of an article written by a friend of mine, check out page 14 of The Pink Paper here.

Despite my troubles in expressing this properly, I find it hard to accept the overly commercial focus of the contemporary pride movement. The aim of pride is to advocate and work for equal rights and opportunities for people who are LGBT. Above you will see a photo of the NUS LGBT campaign who, commendably sought to remind us that we should never forget this core purpose. Attempts to mirror Birmingham's very own 'Pride is a Protest' campaign were thwarted by event organisers, true implication that we have forgotten what pride is really about.

The focus of pride that began 35 years ago has detracted from the liberation movement that once existed, and unfortunately the focus of the event is driving profits, with the weekend wristband costing £20 not to mention the additional extortionate entry prices to enter clubs and on top of that drinks prices to rival Selfridges champagne bar. I find it wholly outlandish to ever contemplate that we may one day make money out of people as a part of "Reclaim the Night"- why is pride so different?

Too often in my work, I find myself defending, or jusifying the liberation campaigns, the campaigns that in student unions should be shaping our every action. Not only should gay pride should signify the celebration of the lengths secured towards equality, but should be the lead in campaigning to secure the extra difference.

I can think of no better way to end this blog, than by quoting the wise Wes Streeting, "changing legislation is easy with the right government. Changing attitudes is a lot harder. When every child can grow up in an atmosphere of freedom, tolerance and respect then we'll finally have something to be proud about. Until then, pride remains a protest and shouldn't come at a price."