Our Big Ideas - Strategic Plan 2010-2014 by Leeds University Union

ST R AT EGIC PL AN 2 0 1 0 TO 2014

Our students have set us a really big challenge in the form of our new vision: Together we will make sure that you love your time at Leeds. That means every student studying at the University of Leeds. It’s not going to be easy but we’re confident that we can do it by working together with students, the University, our staff and local communities.

Helping students get the support they need to make their lives easier Page 6

Making it easy for students to improve their skills and enjoy new experiences Page 4

This document explains how we’re planning to do it. Our strategic plan has nine themes, and there are four big ideas in each theme. Everything that you’ll read about in this plan is based on student feedback in The Review where we asked over 4,500 students (from all backgrounds, courses, programmes and study types) what they wanted their union to do for them. The ideas behind this final plan were put together by staff from across the Union – the Student Advice Centre, Joblink, Helpdesk, Student Activities, Venues, Bars and Shops, and the behindthe-scenes staff students don’t always see. Students were consulted on the final recommendations, and some tweaks later (including a huge shift in ambition to reduce our carbon emissions) it went to a crosscampus student vote. In November 2009, 96.2% of students agreed that the Union should adopt this plan to guide our future work. We’re really proud of the way in which students have led our strategic planning, and how this has been supported by the imagination and enthusiasm of our staff.

Building a community for all our members Page 20

Giving students more for their membership and more for their money Page 8

Our Vision: Together, we’ll make sure you love your time at Leeds

Creating a vibrant place for students to meet other people Page 18

Our members experience many challenges, many while at university and we’re going to make sure that we are there to help them every step of the way, throughout their degrees and beyond. Integrated in this plan is the need for us to be sustainable and independent as a charity, but work in partnership with the University of Leeds, the community of Leeds and the national student movement. The plan has been published and we’re keeping everyone up to date with our progress online. You can find out more, and see how we’re doing, at www.leedsuniversityunion.org.uk/vision2014.

Working together for change on the issues that affect students Page 10

Making membership fun and exciting Page 12

Our Core Values

Being sustainable in every way Page 16 Rachel Wenstone Chair of the Board of Trustees 2010 to 2011

Creating a strong work culture that helps our staff help students Page 14

Our Promises to Students :

Fun Democracy Quality Equality Responsibility

Make your life at university fun.

Help you change the things that you want changed.

Give you great support, services and facilities.

Listen to you and understand your needs.

Act responsibly in everything we do.

Theme 1: Making it easy for students to grow their skills and enjoy new experiences.

In The Review, 17% of students told us that the single most important thing we could do for them would be to help them to get a good career.

What will success look like? 40% of students will say that the Union helped them get the career they wanted by 2014. 40% of students working for the Union will say that the Union has improved their future career development by 2014.

Our first strategic theme reflects a new concern for students: getting a job and a great career after their degree. The graduate job market is fiercely competitive and The Review identified that students feel a huge amount of pressure to get a good return on the significant investment that they are making into their degree. Economic uncertainty and recession have amplified this as a pressing concern on campus.

OU R B IG I DE A S

Providing somewhere for students to grow their skills and experiences.

Graduate employability is a huge issue for students. We are going to make it easier to access training and development opportunities by creating a space for information and learning in our building and online. Our partnership working with the University of Leeds Careers Centre and the Leeds for Life project will also be an important feature of this work. The Union is perfectly placed to help students find services on campus which might otherwise be difficult to access. The frank and honest conversations that we have with students will provide feedback to our partners to develop their services even further.

Supporting students and graduates as they enter the world of work.

We can specifically help in this area by supporting other parts of the University who share our goal. We are going to build a support package for students who want to develop their skills. Getting involved with clubs, societies, campaigns, or volunteering projects add real value to a CV. That’s because students develop their team working, enterprise, time management and leadership skills through over 300 activity groups. These skills help our graduates compete in the job market. They also make university life easier to manage. We want to help students turn the things that they learn outside of their degree into skills for life, so we’re going to offer mentoring and self-development workshops.

Ensuring that student staff develop their career for life after the Union.

The Union pays students over £2million per year in wages. This helps students study without worrying about their finances. We also want to make sure that working for the Union helps the careers of students when they graduate. One way we can help is to design a skills portfolio specifically for student employees and record experience and learning using the Leeds for Life web tool. We will also set up mentoring to enable student employees to access vocational training and development in other departments of the Union or University. We will build a profile of our former student staff alumni to form case studies and organise return visits to inspire current and new student staff.

Pushing the skills message from day one.

Students have many messages thrust in front of them when they arrive at university; it is hard to prioritise with so many choices. We want to make sure that students hear the important messages about building skills and experiences at university. A new, high profile “opportunities centre” can be a focal point for this message. We will feature a Skills Week within our regular programme of activity. This will promote the relevant graduate skills, which will enhance employment prospects, in a fun and engaging way. Our partnership with the University of Leeds Careers Centre and development of Leeds for Life are critical to making this work for students. We will use our influence within the University to make these messages relevant to the first year experience as much as for those closer to graduation.

Theme 2: Helping students get the support they need to make their lives easier.

In The Review, 13% of students said that the single most important thing we could help them to do was to achieve academic success. Our second strategic theme is closely linked with our first. It’s all about providing help, advice and support so that students love their time in Leeds even when things go wrong. The Review showed that different groups of students are concerned about different things. However, it also painted a picture of agreement. Students want their union to provide easily accessible, impartial and good quality advice on academic support and living away from home.

What will success look like? 80% of students will agree that it is easy to find help from us in our building and online by 2014. Local people and community groups will have increased an awareness of the positive contribution that students make in their area by 2014.

OU R B IG I DE A S

We’ll make it easy for students to find help.

It sounds an obvious course of action to follow, but we are proposing to put considerable work into making access to help as easy as possible. Students can find it difficult to navigate the various services which are there to support them. This is especially true of students who don’t have lots of time to spend on campus, such as part-time students and students who have dependants. We need to create easy routes for students to access all the support services on campus whether physical or via the web. This will require a close partnership with the University Student Support Managers to develop a single brand for “help”. Within the Union itself, we are going to develop a central point to coordinate help and advice

We’ll help students to make their money go further.

The Review showed that money remains a specific area of concern for one in ten students. Our Skint campaign has been developed with success over the past two years as a way to combine money-saving advice with direct discounts around our own shops. We will introduce more user-generated advice on lifestyle, such as cooking tips, on the Skint website. The focus will be on useful money-saving ideas and practical money management. A Skint development group of students and staff will help to develop the project, agree a set of guidelines for sales that come under the brand, and

We’ll help students achieve academic success.

Students told us in The Review that we should be doing more direct academic support work. We have always supported students through academic representation and advocacy, and continue to grow this work. We will engage with the University to ensure students' views and opinions are heard right at the top. This Big Idea is all about the Union playing a bigger role in supporting academic success where students want that help. One of the particular initiatives we are excited to develop is to create a hub for academic support within the Union building. The “academic hub” will be designed in consultation with School Reps and will bring various forms of help together in one place for the first time.

We’ll support students in the community.

We launched a coordinated plan for our communityrelated work in 2007. Since then we have been challenged to continually do more. We invited feedback from local organisations around LS6 which we used to develop a new plan for 2009-2011. In 2010-11 we will continue to run the Knowledge student safety campaign, building upon positive work with a number of partners over the past few years. Our Volunteering and Community Office has become a centre for student volunteering and community relations and we want to see this grow. Whether it is work on crime prevention and personal safety, housing, volunteering or environmental action, we will seek to develop activity ourselves and in partnership with other organisations to serve our members, needs and the local community.

Theme 3: Giving students more for their membership and more for their money.

In The Review, students told us that we need to continue to offer great quality services but improve value for money.

What will success look like? Students will understand how the Union is funded and where the money goes. Students will be proud of the Union and the impact that we have.

The Union is a charity. We’re going to raise almost £20 million between 2010 and 2014. This is mainly going to come from turnover in our shops, bars and venues (£9 million) and grants from the University of Leeds (£8 million). We expect to raise a further £2 million in other ways. Every single penny of the money we raise is going to be spent on making sure that students love their time at Leeds. This means that we’ve got a responsibility to make sure that they know that the Union is theirs to shape. We’re going to make it easier for students to see where their money goes and how much of a difference their money makes to all our members. Our staff have an extra responsibility to take care of our Union – taking pride in what they do and making sure that students love being a part of Leeds University Union.

OU R B IG I DE A S Showing students where their money goes.

Creating a culture of excellent customer service.

We’re proud to be a charity. We want to make sure that students get to see the benefits of getting involved with the Union. We want to show them how the 99p that they spend on a sandwich in the shop gets used to support other vital services like the Student Advice Centre. We want to show them how when they buy a newspaper from Essentials, they support the Leeds Student newspaper and other clubs and societies. We want our members to understand how the Unions’ finances work. We also want our members to feel proud of the fact that they get to decide where the money we raise together goes.

The Union is a special place. We want to make sure that students love spending time in their Union building. The people who work for the Union are central to this, so we’re going to spend time to make sure that every member of staff provides excellent customer service. We’re already pretty good (73% of students who completed the 2010 Union Survey agreed that the staff in the Union are friendly and helpful) but want to get even better. We’re looking at organisations who have an excellent reputation for customer service to learn how they do it so well in terms of recruiting the right people, training, rewarding, listening to feedback and improving. We’ll be encouraging students to keep giving us their feedback on our service.

Empowering managers so that they take care of their space.

Making sure students have a say in how we develop the Union.

We’re lucky to have so much space in our building and such high traffic to our websites. We’ve got a responsibility to take care of it all and we want to make sure that our staff take real pride in their area of the Union building. We’ll be making sure that every room and space in the Union - and every page on the website - is regularly checked to make sure that it is up to date and attractive to use. When students use our spaces for their own bookings, they should get just as good a space as if they were hiring a private venue. We want to keep our standards high so that LUU remains one of the best student venues in the UK.

It’s vital that students have a say in how their Union is developed for the future. We’re going to make it easier for students to tell us how they want their Union to be run. for example: what should take priority and which areas of the building need improving? We’ll also make sure that we keep to our promises by being clear about what the benefits are for any new development work in the Union building. This is more than just working with our new democratic processes, it is about using feedback on all our services, being transparent with our decisionmaking and involving everyone in our next strategic review in 2013.

What will success look like?

Theme 4: Working together for change on the issues that affect students.

80% of students will agree they have a say in how their course is run.

In The Review, there was a feeling amongst some students that Union democracy didn’t create meaningful change on important issues.

10,000 students will vote in the Exec elections.

We believe that change is possible when we work together on issues that matter to our members. We will help students help each other to influence the world around them – be that the University, Union or wider society. This means having an accessible and effective democratic system that empowers students to make collective decisions and strategic interventions. These processes should be designed to encourage as many students as possible to participate in decision-making. We’ve got a responsibility to make sure that these systems are making a difference. We’ll keep the whole thing going by promoting the impact that these decisions and the hard work of reps and campaigners have on the lives of students and our local communities. By celebrating our impact we hope to inspire more students to use their union to create change.

OU R B IG I DE A S Change through engagement.

Change through participation.

Being a student at university is very different to being a student at school or college. At university you share ideas as an equal rather than being taught in the traditional sense. We’re going to work with the University to shape the expectations and behaviour of students and staff around engagement and learning. Academic representation is at the centre of our work. We’re in the process of recruiting significant numbers of Course Reps and School Reps to guarantee effective student representation and making use of IT solutions to enable communication between student representatives. We’ll also deliver training online, and we’ll be using Banner and the Portal to advertise and record the activity of Course and School Reps and promote the positive outcomes.

We have been consulting members for the last two years over a new democratic system. We’re now proud to be launching a unique system that communicates and coordinates all student viewpoints, holds decisionmakers to account and provides a forum for discussing, and making and implementing changes. Our three new Forums : ‘Better Leeds, Better University and Better Union’ will replace the outdated and cliquey Union Council and will give students the chance to make decisions as part of a student panel. We’ll be supporting the Student Executive to build personal relationships with all sections of the student community, and communicating the impact that they have on the lives of students and local communities.

Change through campaigning.

Change through conviction.

We believe in the power of collectivism and that students can have a massive impact when they work together. We’re going to continue to learn from the rest of the charity sector and improve how we facilitate and deliver campaigns. This will see LUU improve our professional expertise in campaigning, whilst elected representatives continue to sign-off what should be done. We’ll make sure that we’re campaigning effectively on the issues that matter to students by developing a database to log student concerns and hot issues. Our Campaign and Democracy Support team will support political and campaigning societies and provide them more specialised support to campaign more effectively.

Students can have a massive impact when they believe that change is possible. To make this happen we’ll be promoting large scale significant changes brought about by students. We’ll let other students rate, review and recommend Union activities on our website. We’ll also make sure that we’re keeping students up to date with our campaigning activity by updating policy on the website and organising it into clear categories. We’ll make sure that the Student Executive team is able to tell students about our existing policies far more easily. We’ll also improve the way that we offer students the chance to give feedback on the Union and we’ll always act on student feedback and make changes in consultation with our members.

Theme 5: Making membership fun and exciting.

In The Review, 24% of students told us that the single most important thing that we could do was to help them have fun. The Union is one of the things that make Leeds such a great place to study. Students want us to be different to the academic world that surrounds us on the rest of campus. They want us to be fun. So that’s what our fifth strategic theme, with three big ideas, is all about. Fun means different things to different students, but fun at the Union means clubs and societies, nightlife, performance and dance, meeting friends, sport and doing new things. It means meeting friends for life. And it means being part of something special.

What will success look like? 50% of students will be regularly benefitting from participating in clubs and societies by 2014. 30,000 students will be benefitting from a membership card by 2014.

OU R B IG I DE A S Increasing participation.

Our clubs and societies have over 14,000 members who are gaining new skills, trying new things out, and meeting new people. We want to increase the number of students who benefit from life in an activity group. We’ll do this by listening to students who aren’t members of a club or society yet, understanding why some groups find participation difficult or unappealing. We’ll make changes based on this feedback; perhaps broadening the appeal of the Give it a Go programme of events, where students can try things out without paying for membership of a club or society. We are also going to raise the profile of our clubs and societies, making it truly easy to benefit from membership of our activity groups.

Building a fun community of staff and students.

Introducing a membership card.

It can be difficult to feel part of something that is so big, but we want to make sure that students feel right at home here at the Union. We will build a fun community within LUU that integrates all of our activities and encourages students and our staff to be part of one community. We think our clubs and societies offer a huge range of activities but we know some students don’t find it easy to participate, so we’re going to try to find out why. It's important that students know who to turn to in the Union for information or support, so we’re going to make it even easier for members to find the person they need to speak to. Supporting the information and access will be an enlarged “Give It A Go” programme and more incentives for established groups to reach out to new members through such taster sessions.

There are a huge number of ways for students to use their union. There are countless motivations and routes to get involved. Some students use our building as a place to meet friends and buy lunch, some use our volunteering projects, some use our clubs and societies and some use our advice services. We want to reward students who get stuck into life at the Union, so we’re planning a membership card scheme. This scheme will be developed with input from all members, guiding us on what activities should be rewarded and how it should work. We want to understand how to link real benefits to involvement in LUU before we launch the

Theme 6: Creating a strong work culture that helps our staff help students.

83% of people who work here are proud to be part of Leeds University Union.

What will success look like? 100% of staff, including student staff have had an appraisal meeting within the last 12 months. 90% of staff will love working at the Union.

Our sixth strategic theme is our first ‘enabling’ theme. These are the four background themes that are going to help us achieve our vision (our people, our sustainability, our building and websites, and our focus on hard to reach students). The people who work and volunteer at the Union are vital. We spend over £2 million per year on student staff, and we’re passionate about developing their talent as well as providing them with a paid job. This theme is all about making sure that our staff understand how their work contributes to our vision for students. It’s about making sure that Leeds University Union is a great place to come to work.

OU R B IG I DE A S Defining and developing the Union’s culture.

We’ve got a really good work culture in the Union, but we can get better. We asked students and staff what they wanted from our people when they come into the Union. Students want us to be friendly and fun, helpful and supportive, innovative and creative. They want us to have a culture of trust and respect. Most of all they want us to have a positive attitude. We’ve asked our staff to develop behavioural values for their area of LUU which will best support what our members want. We aim to ensure all our staff support these values, and we think this will help them love working at the Union and make it a great place to be.

Finding union people.

One union, one family.

Improving employee engagement.

We are privileged to have so many great people working for us but we need to be constantly renewing and growing the team. We believe that we have a strong culture that retains lots of people and helps others flourish in their roles. The Union should be a place where our people grow and develop constantly. This should be a great selling point to prospective employees. We will establish a new training programme and encourage the development of transferable skills and qualifications, making staff aware of progression within the whole organisation. We will link this training to effective performance management so that all our people feel supported and able to deliver their very best for our members.

We want to bring all our people together and make staff, members or visitors feel they are in a distinctive and welcoming place. We need to build a single identity around what it means to work in the Union across our whole team. We will create opportunities for staff to spend more time together through a series of events outside of work time. The social time you spend with those you work with reinforces bonds and helps build the culture. We will make a very practical change and commit to creating a space for staff to spend more time together in a single staff room. The space our members use will always come first, but the way we treat our staff will naturally improve the way our members are dealt with too.

In the same way that we will be stronger through the participation of our members, we know we will be better at delivering a great union if more staff are involved in determining how their specific area operates. We believe if we really prioritise this under the new plan then we can achieve much more. All staff should feel that they have a voice, have good access to the senior leadership team, and have the value of their work recognised. Every member of our staff team should know how they make a difference and contribute to our vision. We will develop ways to ensure our staff are aware of their impact for students, celebrating achievement and developing storytelling within our culture.

Theme 7: Being sustainable in every way.

What will success look like?

In the 2010 annual research, 91% of students rated the Union as good or very good.

We will be performing well against our financial strategy and reserves policy.

We will have reduced our carbon footprint by 20% by 2014.

The second of our enablers - and our seventh strategic theme - is all about being around for the long term. It’s about our environmental commitments. Students demanded in 2009 that the Union reduces carbon emissions by 5% per year until 2014. This part of the plan ensures that we’re able to do just that. It’s also about our financial planning, making sure that we have enough money in the bank to deliver the things that students want or for when unexpected things happen. It also covers the way we make decisions. Our governance structure ensures that student decision making is at the heart of the Union. Being sustainable is also about being innovative and creative, making sure that we embrace new trends and technologies to deliver services for students. This is a theme that covers sustainability from every angle.

OU R B IG I DE A S Measuring and managing our impact on the environment.

Making sure we have enough money.

Over the past four years we have done much to save energy, recycle and minimise waste. We are recognised within students’ unions as one of the best in this area and our students have a strong history of campaigning on environmental issues. But we know we can achieve more. A fully developed Environmental Management System for the Union will enable us to raise our performance in energy and waste management and radically reduce our carbon footprint. We will continue to assist the University in their work too, providing ideas and being a test-bed for new initiatives. We also need to keep watch of our decisionmaking, promoting the ethical and sustainable choice internally and when we work with other organisations and suppliers.

We are constantly being asked to make financial decisions which affect the long-term viability of our services. It is crucial that we think long-term and ensure that the future students will also love their time at Leeds. In order to deliver what our members need, we will implement a financial strategy that directly links in to longer term plans for development of our building and services. Our financial strategy will be led by prudent budgeting, but releasing financial resources to develop the areas prioritised by students in The Review. A combination of funding streams supports LUU and we will seek to maintain our university support and commercial income through difficult times, and introduce a new fund-raising strategy to ensure new resources for growth.

Making sure our governance structure is fit for purpose and relevant.

Being flexible, adaptable, innovative and creative.

The governance structures of the Union may seem complicated to people outside students’ unions, but they ensure we are fit for purpose and the right people are making the right decisions. Our governance and democratic structures combine to ensure improving life for students is always at the heart of LUU. Since the Charities Act of 2006, all students’ unions in England are required to register with the Charities Commission. As our governance structures develop we also must be open to ideas for improvement. In order to remain relevant and adaptable to best practice, we are committed to conduct a governance review. We will also adopt an effective benchmarking system that will challenge us to maintain a high performing Board which best serves the needs of students.

Our final area for development under this theme of sustainability should protect us from stagnation and complacency. We are proposing that improvement and creativity should be priority areas which will keep good ideas and innovation flowing throughout our new plan. We will encourage and financially support innovative thinking and new ideas. This will be assessed by how innovative approaches create positive outcomes for our members and generate new income. We will be looking for ways to improve quality and improve efficiency in existing systems. We will invest in innovative and leading technology which is relevant to our members’ needs. We know our members have great ideas and we will stimulate creativity in how we work to keep us at the cutting edge of the services we provide.

Theme 8: Creating a vibrant place for students to meet other people.

What will success look like?

In The Review, students told us that the Union is fundamental to their sense of community at Leeds.

95% of students say that we contribute positively to their time at Leeds by 2014.

90,000 visits to the Union building and 10,000 unique visits to our websites each week of term by 2014.

The Union is the most popular building for students to be in on campus. Our websites help students to join new activities, get advice and learn new skills. Our eighth theme is all about making sure that our physical and virtual spaces are exciting, fun, youthful, engaging. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s about making sure that they represent our personality and core values. Students in The Review said that the Union building was fundamental to their sense of belonging at Leeds. Of course the Union extends beyond our physical building and this theme makes sure that we continue to develop, but also that our services are available to students who arenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t on campus so often.

OU R B IG I DE A S Making a better union building.

Talking with each other.

The Union building is one of the busiest and most exciting spaces on campus. It is used by students for a whole host of activities, including getting advice and support, buying lunch, socialising, dancing or performing in our theatre spaces. There is also some under used space in the building that could be brought back to life. We will get the most out of the Union building with some investment and improved maintenance. Creating funds to pay for this development will be at the centre of our new financial strategy. A Building Masterplan will detail what improvements to the Union building need to be made in consultation with members. We want the Union to feel like the best building on campus. to be in.

We will develop better ways of talking and listening to students and stakeholders. Students will be able to find the information that they want and will only receive the information that is relevant to them about the Union. Our websites will allow students to join in with the activities that they are interested in and meet new friends online. We will also make better use of emerging technologies to help us listen to students. It is the way the Union listens to students that will make our building and websites feel distinctive to other places on campus. They will be places and spaces to find help, try new things, and create new connections with each other.

Creating better spaces for us to get together in.

Creating spaces that students want to be in.

We are going to put seating and social spaces at the heart of the Union building. There will be more areas to meet friends, relax, get online, and quiet areas to work. The Union building is a hub of activity and can have over 20,000 visitors per day. The Union is often open from 8.30 am all the way through to 5.00am the next morning. Our spaces need to be multifunctional and well managed to ensure that students get the most out of our building. The use of the building changes radically depending on the time of year, week in term or even by the hour of the day. By having multifunctional spaces we will be able to cater for every type of activity.

We will celebrate our studentsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; personalities and the vibrancy of what they do in the Union by making the building more colourful and enjoyable to be in. We will use design and lighting to encourage and inspire students and visitors to use the Union spaces day and night. We will invest in our amenities. This will see huge improvement in our toilets, baby change facilities and work spaces. We will create a building that students and other visitors want to spend time in, so that they love their time in Leeds. The Union is more than the building, but the physical spaces we can create for students are vital to the vision students have given us.

Theme 9: Building a community for all our members.

When asked whether the Union positively contributes to their time at leeds, only 51% of parttime students said yes compared to the average of 84%. The response was slightly better for other groups, but still didn’t match the average.

OU R B IG I DE A S Being there for mature and part-time students.

Being there for international students.

Part-time students clearly don’t spend as much time on campus as their full-time colleagues. They aren’t as interested in events and entertainment but want the Union to help them in other ways. Part-time and mature students are less likely to want to find out about events, policy decisions, and who runs the Union, but are more likely to want information about advice and welfare, and representation. This group demonstrates a higher concern about the academic effect of part-time work (50% higher for part-time than full-time students). Less likely to view making friends as the most important thing that the Union could do to help them, this group prefer to focus on academic success, health and well being. On the back of what we know, we will package our services so part-time and mature students get the most out of their Union.

Students from overseas are only slightly less likely to be highly involved in the Union than students from the UK. As you’d expect from a group studying in a foreign country, international students are more likely to be concerned about most things, particularly personal safety, accommodation issues and isolation. International students scored slightly lower on managing debt and fun as the most important help from the Union. There are no significant differences in how well international students understand the Union compared to students from the UK. The Union already performs well in this area but we know that, by working with the University of Leeds and with NUS, we can set a higher standard for our work with international students.

What will success look like? Students from our hard to reach groups will say that we contribute positively to their time at Leeds. NUS Internationalising Students’ Union Accreditation.

We’re pretty good at representing the majority of students studying at Leeds but we don’t do well with all our members. The Review showed that part-time, mature, postgraduate and international students were less likely than others to have strong relations with the Union. We want to change that. We want to make sure that we’re here for everyone and that, regardless of background or the number of hours you’re on campus, you can get the most out of us. We are proposing to prioritise certain students who we know could be getting more from LUU – our target groups. These groups are identified by responses to our “positive contribution” question in the 2010 Rate your Union survey and data from The Review. These students are part-time, with dependants, international students and postgraduates. This is the theme that makes sure that every single student loves their time at Leeds.

Being there for postgraduate students.

Being there for students with dependants.

Postgraduate students, especially research postgraduates, often teach undergraduates. This can lead to them feeling like a member of university staff rather than a student. This self-definition can mean that some postgraduates feel that the Union somehow isn’t for them. Obviously, we represent all students studying at the University so it’s important that we understand the specific needs of postgraduate learners. There are 5,334 taught postgraduate and 2,057 postgraduate research students studying at Leeds (2009/10). Help into work is the number one concern for taught postgraduates, which means that our first strategic theme should link with Taught Post Graduate and Research Post Graduate groups. Postgraduates gave lower scores for fun being a core value for the Union in The Review. We must focus on building relations with postgraduate students, which we can only do by responding to their specific concerns and needs.

Students with dependants are particularly concerned about being isolated and the impact of part-time work on their studies. A much higher proportion of students with dependants chose ‘achieving academic success’ (21%) as the most important help that the Union could give them compared with the average. A lower proportion chose ‘fun’ (19%). They are more likely to want to understand more about advice and welfare services. Students with dependants have potentially little relationship with the Union, reflecting the time pressures that this group faces. This also means that they are less likely to be a member of a club or society and far less likely to be regularly active around LUU. We must engage with this group differently and focus on providing opportunities which respond to their specific concerns and requirements from their union.

Thank you to all the students, staff and previous executive teams who were involved in creating our Strategic Plan.

Theme 1: Making it easy for students to grow their skills and enjoy new experiences: Gail Hardwick, Steve Jones, Ellie Stephenson, Georgina Holt, Isabel Swift, Carl Brown, Jessica Parker, Josh Landy.

Theme 3: Giving students more for their membership and more for their money Kevin Hogarth, Alan Collins, Helen Parkinson, Mark Pantling, Jo Lowe, Rose Mountague, Christian Bodden, Laura Mcfarlane-Shopes, Jak Codd.

Theme 5: Making memberhip fun and exciting Andy Winter, Rachel Winfield, Angela Massey, Dawn Stevenson, Emily Marsden, Lou Proctor, Andrea Kerslake, Jessica Parker, Josh Landy.

Theme 7: Being sustainable in every way Darren Buntin, Darren Tomkins , Alison Dumphy, Alan Hill, Richard Simpson, Emma Manning, Rob Damiao, Hannah Greenslade.

Theme 9: Building a community for all our members Steve Keeble, Anne Doherty, Kal Sutcliffe, Clare Hartley, Geoff Banks, Tim Knighton, Maryam Ahmed, Sophia James.

TOGETHER WEâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;LL MAKE SURE YOU

Theme 2: Helping students get the support they need to make their lives easier Diane Pedder, Sue Mister, Jess Hawker, Helen Mackay, Louise Hartley, Paul Thomas, Rose Hampton, Suzy Tobias, Madeline Harris Smith.

YOUR TIME

Theme 4: Working together for change on the issues that affect students James Robertson, Dan Burrows, John Davison, Esther Flannery, Ged Savva, Kath Owen, Danny Adilypour, Maryam Ahmed, Mike Gladstone, Sophia James.

Theme 6: Creating a strong work culture that helps our staff help students Antonia Frezza, Diane Harvey, Lesley Jones, Carys Jones, Anna Nixon, John Munday, Natalie Wells.

Theme 8: Creating a vibrant place for students to meet other people Tom Salmon, Rich Sage, Alan Hill, Ian Whitehead, Kay Morrison, Amanda Brierley, Jonathan Ball, Laura Mcfarlane-Shopes, Jak Codd.

If youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d like to find out more about our strategic plan, or if youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d like to support our work in any way, please contact our Chief Executive: Aidan Grills Email: a.grills@luu.leeds.ac.uk Tel: 0113 380 1204. If you would like this summary in a different format, including Braille please contact Emily Marsden on e.marsden@leeds.ac.uk or 0113 380 1379. www.leedsuniversityunion.org.uk Leeds University Union is a registered charity no. 1136742 and a company limited by guarantee registered in England and Wales no. 7284768. We are committed to reducing our carbon emissions by 20% by 2014. This document has been printed on recycled paper.