Your Reps & Council Elections 2012 Candidates’ Pack
imperialcollegeunion.org
Your Reps and Council Elections 2012 Candidates’ Pack Page 1 imperialcollegeunion.org/elections
Contents Introduction
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What Positions are Available?
4
Timetable
5
How do I stand?
6
Campaigning
6
Hustings and Manifestos
7
Budget
7
Student Media
8
Voting System
8
Rules and Regulations
9
Your Reps and Council Elections 2012 Candidates’ Pack Page 2 imperialcollegeunion.org/elections
Introduction This year we are electing Year and Course Representatives, the 16 Ordinary Members of Council and Disabilities Officer simultaneously. This is a brilliant way to get involved and be part of ensuring student views are expressed to the right bodies to make changes for the benefit of students. Whether you want to be involved with representing your Year Group or Master’s cohort to your Department, or be one of the ‘voice of the students’ in Union Council, we hope this guide will help you.
Paul Beaumont Returning Officer E: elections@imperial.ac.uk
Inside you will find ideas as to what to expect from Imperial College Union elections, as well as some tips and rules regarding campaigning. Please make sure you read it fully. So whatever position you’re running for, I wish you the best of luck!
Your Reps and Council Elections 2012 Candidates’ Pack Page 3 imperialcollegeunion.org/elections
What Positions are Available? Here is a list of the positions you can stand for and a short job description about what you’ll be expected to do if you win, and how you can make a difference.
they are allocated proportionally. As such the following number of positions are available:
Union Council Ordinary Members Union Council is the policy and accountability forum of the Union. It is here to be the legitimate voice of the student body; passing policies that state the Unions stance of issues which may be local, national or international.
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Your Sabbatical Officers bring reports to Council to ensure you know how they are representing you. This also provide an opportunity for you to ask them questions about their work. If elected as a member of council you are expected to read these reports and we encourage you to speak to friends and course buddies about issues before coming to the meeting – you will be there to represent them! Any student can attend Council (and they are encouraged to do so), however only an elected member can vote. You can only stand for one of the positions within your faculty. The number of positions available varies between Faculty and degree stage as
Your Reps and Council Elections 2012 Candidates’ Pack Page 4 imperialcollegeunion.org/elections
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Faculty of Engineering: 4 x Undergraduate 2 x Postgraduate. Faculty of Natural Sciences: 3 x Undergraduate 2 x Postgraduate Faculty of Medicine: 3 x Undergraduate 1 x Postgraduate Non-Faculty (eg. Business School and Humanities): 1 x Postgraduate
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Welfare Officers Disabilities Officer
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Course Reps At least one per Master’s Course
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Year Reps At least two per year of each Department
Disabilities Officer Remit: To work with College and the Union to represent and engage students of all disabilities.
Timetable Year (or Course) Representative To make sure the academic concerns of all students are heard, the Union facilitates a representation structure which starts with the Year (or Master’s Course) Representative and ends with the Union President. The Year (or Course) Rep works together with the Departmental Representative to find solutions to issues within the course. This can range from providing more printer credits to influencing the course structure. All Year (or Course) Reps along with the Dep Rep attend meetings with the senior management of the course, known as the Staff-Student Committee.
Please note: Blue text means applicable to Council Ordinary Members and Disabilities Officer candidates only. 00:01 01/10/12 Nominations Open 23.59 14/10/12 Nominations Close 12:30-13:30 15/10/12 First Candidates’ Meeting (Union Dining Hall) 12.00 17/10/12 Deadline for manifestos to elections@imperial.ac.uk (if Council) or Departmental Representative (if Year Rep)
When issues are too big, or don’t get resolved, they can be passed onto the Deputy President (Education) and the Union President, who often find solutions.
18:00 19/10/12 Online Hustings
The Year (or Course) Rep is genuinely the first and most important cog in the representation system. They can cause the most direct changes in their course, making the student experience better for everyone currently on the course, as well as future students.
23:59 23/10/12 Voting Closes
If you want to make an impact on your course during your time at Imperial College London, this role is definitely the one for you.
10.00 18/10/12 Voting Opens
12:00-13:00 24/10/12 Second Candidates’ Meeting (Union Dining Hall) 12:00 25/10/12 Results Announced Location to be confirmed
Your Reps and Council Elections 2012 Candidates’ Pack Page 5 imperialcollegeunion.org/elections
How do I stand?
Campaigning
To stand for election you must first nominate yourself by going to imperialcollegeunion.org/elections.
Campaigning is going out and telling students why they should vote for you. There are many different ways to campaign such as:
A Year (or Course) Rep does not require any ‘seconders’ to stand; however Council Ordinary Member Candidates need to acquire 5. A ‘seconder’ is someone who put their name down as supporting your candidacy. This is quite simple; just ask your friends to log on to imperialcollegeunion.org/vote and second you. Once you have reached the required number of seconders for your position, you can prepare your campaign, but you are not allowed to start campaigning until the nominations period has closed and you have been given an initial briefing by the Returning Officer. If you start campaigning before you are allowed you may be disqualified.
Your Reps and Council Elections 2012 Candidates’ Pack Page 6 imperialcollegeunion.org/elections
• Student Media (Felix, Stoic, ICRadio) • Posters • Leaflets • Speaking in lecture theatres • Facebook and Twitter • Running around in a costume • Getting your friends to help you • Stickers • Billboards and sandwich boards Your campaign is up to you but make sure you read the rules later on or the Returning Officer will hunt you down.
Hustings and Manifestos The Union helps you in your campaign by putting your manifesto on the website and arranging a hustings. Your manifesto should be no more than 150 words and should be sent to elections@imperial.ac.uk with a photo of you by 18:00 on Wednesday 17 October (again, if for Year (or Course) rep send to the Dep Rep). Hustings for the Ordinary Members roles is a chance for any student to ask you a question about why you want to stand for a position and what you intend to do. This year hustings will be held online. This will work by students emailing questions to elections@imperial.ac.uk that will then be sent to all candidates at 18.00 on Thursday 18 October. You will have until 19.00 to respond and these will be published on the website. Be prepared and don’t be scared.
Budget Ordinary Member candidates can spend up to £30 on their campaign, whereas Year (or Course) Reps can spend £10. You must provide all receipts to the Returning Officer upon request before the results are announced. This is to ensure fairness and to stop people ‘buying’ the election. Prices for printing are calculated at the College prices:
A3 A4 Monochrome: 6p 3p Colour: 24p 12p
Your Reps and Council Elections 2012 Candidates’ Pack Page 7 imperialcollegeunion.org/elections
Student Media There will be election coverage in Felix, to which the Union will pass on your manifesto and photo. You can further promote yourself in student media with advertisements by getting in touch with them at these addresses: Felix: felix@imperial.ac.uk Stoic: info@stoictv.com ICRadio: info@icradio.com
The Voting System All voting will be done online. The voting system that the Union use is the “Single Transferable Vote with Quota System”, sometimes referred to as STV. This enables students to list their preferences for a position, using numbers, with 1 for the first choice, 2 for the second and so on. The result of this system is that students whose first choice is not elected can still get a chance to state further preferences. Furthermore it makes it possible that, whilst an individual student may not be the most popular, if they have a larger base of support among the students they typically will be elected. RON (Re-Open Nominations) is a candidate in all elections. People vote for RON if they don’t support any of the candidates. People can also choose to abstain from an election.
Your Reps and Council Elections 2012 Candidates’ Pack Page 8 imperialcollegeunion.org/elections
Rules and Regulations The penalties for breaking rules and regulations can be found in the Union Constitution, which is on the website. The Returning Officer (elections@imperial. ac.uk) is responsible for enforcing them and will use discretion when punishing candidates for breaking them. Just play by the rules and the election is fun for all. They are designed to create fairness, not crowd out inventive campaigning: Do • Send ALL Campaign material to the returning officer before using it so it can be checked by the Returning Officer. • Add RON Imperial as a friend on Facebook and invite ‘it’ to your campaign group. Facebook groups must be checked before they can be used. • Put the voting times, hustings time and location and the voting website on all campaign material. • Write campaign material in English. Other languages can be used as long as English is the main language and everything is translated. • Send manifestos to the Returning Officer by the deadline. Late entries may be refused. Do Not • Put the Union or College logo on your campaign material. • Use official mailing lists to advertise yourself. This includes all club, society, project and departmental lists. This is spamming and is an unfair advantage. You will probably be disqualified. • Put offensive language on your campaign material. • Break the poster rules (see below). Campaign Publicity Rules • Posters must be no bigger than A3 in size. • Posters must not be placed on open brickwork. • Posters must be at least 6 meters apart (within line of sight). • On the Sherfield Main Walkway, you may place one poster on every other pillar and may not place posters on any two adjacent side-wall poster boards which are facing each other. • Posters must be put up using blu-tack or drawing pins (as appropriate) – do not use sellotape. • Do not take down other candidates’ posters or put yours on top! For full election rules, see Regulation 4 of the Union Constitution https://www.imperialcollegeunion.org/your-union/how-were-run/constitution-and-regulations Your Reps and Council Elections 2012 Candidates’ Pack Page 9 imperialcollegeunion.org/elections
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