February 2018
This is the first edition of The Branch for 2018. Manchester Student Homes’ Good Neighbours Team has been working hard to develop new initiatives for our safety campaigns, here’s a few highlights.
Hate Crime Awareness Manchester 2018 MSH has obtained funding from the Student Safety Group (SSG), a partnership forum that educates students about personal safety and household security. The SSG also encourages students to become more consciously aware of the communities they live in, ensuring a socially responsible approach to living off campus. The funding will be used for our interactive activities and promotional material for Manchester’s Hate Crime Awareness Week in February.
Armed with Quality Street, we will ask students about their knowledge of Hate Crime and signpost them to relevant agencies who deal in these types of incidents. Over a two year period MSH has spoken to over 2,000 students about the significance of Hate Crime Awareness.
We will be gathering information from students and staff to create an art installation to be revealed in October 2018 to coincide with National Hate Crime Awareness Week. Over the last two years MSH has worked on behalf of the Universities with its partners such as Greater Manchester Police and Manchester City Council to develop an effective Hate Crime Awareness campaign. In February, the campaign will continue to raise awareness of what constitutes a Hate Crime, and how and where it can be reported. We will also promote services that support those affected by Hate Crime. Throughout Hate Crime Awareness Week Manchester Student Homes will deliver projects such as interactive information stalls and distribute hate crime related material under the banner of “Equality Street”, to educate students about Hate Crime.
Event details can be found on our Facebook events page. For more information regarding Hate Crime Awareness Week visit our website or contact Poppy Humphrey at poppy.humphrey@manchester.ac.uk.
Manchester Student Homes is a free, university-run housing service for students. Based in Fallowfield, MSH runs a landlord accreditation scheme and can offer support to students in relation to property searches, providing housing advice and contract checking. MSH also works with students, the community and partner agencies to identify issues in off campus areas.
Chinese New Year
Neighbourhood Helpline
The Manchester International Student Safety (MISS) campaign was created by MSH following discussions with Greater Manchester Police (GMP), Manchester City Council (MCC) and international students. Currently, the MISS campaign has three main mediums through which messages are spread; the International Student Safety Guide, containing essential tips and information relating to personal and household security from GMP; the International Student Safety Tea Towel which contains a map of Manchester highlighting places of academic and social importance; and the student safety anime video Mei’s Day Out.
Over the past couple of months MSH has been working in collaboration with partnership organisations and student focus groups to develop the MISS campaign further with numerous new, exciting ideas in the pipeline for 2018. To coincide with Chinese New Year MSH has developed and designed Fortune Cookies containing safety messages that will be distributed to International Students at various Student Safety Stalls both on and off campus.
If you need advice or support about any aspect of living off campus do not hesitate to contact Manchester Student homes on 0161 275 7680 or email neighbourhood.helpline@manchester.ac.uk
Farewell Brett! At the beginning of February we say farewell to Brett, our Manchester Metropolitan University Community Cohesion Intern. Brett has been responsible for delivering the Halls 2 Home programme. We wish him the best of luck in the future.