Full-Time Officer 2019/20 Round-Ups

Full-Time Officer Round-ups 2019/20

This year has been by far the most enjoyable and terrifying year of my life. I have created bonds with some amazing people that I hope I never lose. Thank you for being a part of my journe it s been an absolute pleasure Gemma Molli Fifi and Dais I couldn t have gone through this year without you. <3 Now lets get started There has been a number of recruitments, projects and events that I have been involved with created or supported this year.

Recruitment I don t think I started of m ear like a normal sabbatical officer would Within a few months of the job we had to run a recruitment process to hire a new CEO and for 2 recent graduates this was not an easy task. Throughout this process I was interviewing investment managers to ensure the university will more towards a sustainable future with a full divestment from fossil fuels and unethical investments.

While these processes were happening, I was interviewing for a new Dean of Diversity And inclusion with the Vice Chancellor. Simultaneously I was reading application for a Muslim chaplain. I m happ to share that both processes were a success, Dr. Allรกn Laville is the new Dean of Diversity and Inclusion and Javed Kachhalia as the new Muslim chaplain.

Projects As Diversity Officer I worked very closely with Gemma the Welfare office on the #NeverOk campaign. I took a leadership role in the campaign by co-chairing our meeting and ensure student voices are heard at these committees. During my time as co-chair we produced micro-aggression posters, focused our effects on key issues. Created a virtual International Day Against homophobia, Biphobia and transphobia. As of now, we have listed key priorities for next year to focus on such as our bi awareness and increasing the campaigns visibility to all staff and students.

During the year I was involved with a number of public speaking events, but I would have to say my absolute favourite event of the year is the Cultural show. We redecorated 3sixty with flags and gave it a nice little international theme. We had a number of performances which included dances, and songs. We had sold 10 tickets before the night started... we had over a hundred turn up on the door! This was an event to embrace and celebrate different cultures from across the global. This event was such a success we had interested societies ask to sign up for next ear s cultural show Molli and I have pushed the University in going completely fossil fuel free!! This is one of my greatest achievements of the year. It was an extremely longwinded process which involved reading a huge amount of investment tenders and interviewing new investment managers who would secure the university portfolio with no fossil fuel investment.

I want to say thank you to all the Part-time officer, you have really created change this year.

Some of ou have gone above and be ond and this ear wouldn t have been the same without you. It was a privilege working alongside you and sitting to all your updates during Liberation and representation committee.

LGBT+ History month was a great success this year, I worked very closely with the LGBT+ society and our LGBQ+ Officer Edda. We hosted a range of Events which included Trans awareness training, networking events and a Drag night which was a huge success. We had over 1800 tickets sold to the event and we are looking into host many more throughout next year.

Representation IDAHOBIT was a great start for the University to show their inclusive community. I asked a number of senior staff to join me in a video in showing their support to the LGBT+ community. In my second video I asked staff and student to share some of their experiences so that our community could understand how some of our LGBT+ friends and colleagues have been treated.

Black lives matter, I have set up a student led working group to support our black students.

This group has written a letter to the MPs of Reading and Woking, and written a guide on how to be an ally to the black community. We have set up a list of tasks we want to achieve this coming year. This list includes showcasing artwork, supporting local shops, hosting talks and many more. If you are interested in getting involved please email diversityofficer@rusu.co.uk.

FTO End of Year Round-Up – Welfare Officer World Mental Health Day - We held a #1in4 night where 1 in 4 cups were stickered to visually represent the 1 in 4 students that struggle with their mental health, and did glitter face paint to raise awareness.

- We had digital screens up around RUSU with statistics about mental health and support services, to raise awareness and make students aware of support available to them.

- We held a mental wellness fayre where students could pick up information about the support available to them, and also hosted a suicide awareness and prevention speaker. We had badges stating #1in4 you’re not alone to raise awareness for the campaign and remind students that they are not alone.

University Mental Health Day - We held a week of activities to raise awareness for university mental health day. This included a film night showing ‘Inside Out’, a craft session, a talk by the Samaritans and a talk by mental health activist Hope Virgo who spoke about her experiences of mental health and her eating disorder campaign #Dumpthescales.

Calm & Craft - I held Calm & Craft sessions with University’s Counselling & Wellbeing. This involved a mixture of mindfulness and arts and craft. I was so happy that students came to those sessions and found them very relaxing myself!

Podcasts - I started a podcast series chatting about mental health and sharing wellbeing tips. The first was about mental wellbeing at the Uni of Reading, the second was about the impacts of alcohol on mental wellbeing, and the third was about money and mental health. These are up on Apple podcasts and Spotify.

Survey - Ran a survey to find out students’ experience of mental health at the UoR. Key findings were about the long waiting times but also the need for more peer to peer support. A report of this was sent to key University staff members to lobby them to improve mental health support.

Welfare Directory - The welfare directory, now on the RUSU website, acts as a signposting tool, to signpost students to support students to support services on and off campus. Find it at: rusuwelfaredirectory.co.uk Support during COVID-19 - Created an article and wellbeing toolkit for students when lockdown began - Worked with Advice on a letter to send to private halls accommodation providers to persuade them to give students a refund in summer term.

DAAP

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This year I sat on the committee DAAP which stands for Drugs and Alcohol Action Partnership.

In partnership with the University and the Council, we ran alcohol awareness sessions for bar staff and hall mentors.

We started the campaign ‘Be A Mate’ which encourages students to make more informed choices when drinking. Posters were made and we gave out cups which had measurements of units on the side so students can see how much they are drinking. We also had a non-alcoholic bar at union during alcohol awareness week and a ‘think about your drink’ session.

Collected student anecdotes and experiences about drugs to guide future campaign on drug awareness.

Never OK - Zeid and I have been working on the Never Ok campaign throughout the year.

In Freshers we had the caravan theatre which showed a very impactful play on hate crime. We also had a board around campus where students could write what was never ok in terms of bullying, harassment and discrimination.

Florey@RUSU - I did a rebrand of the testing Tuesdays scheme we have here at RUSU. We have a sexual health nurse who comes in every second Tuesday of the month. Usually he would be located in the RUSU corridor but this year I decided to relocate the service to the relaxation room. We also created some new posters and social media posts to promote the service.

- This meant more students accessed the service this year and could get contraception advice as well as the testing service.

Housing - Ran housing talks with RUSU Advice Service to support students who were looking for accommodation off-campus.

Lake Safety - Worked with Molli to ensure lake safety measures (this included posts with reflective strips, zig zag barrier at lake path entrance).

Sports and Society Welfare - Ran Welfare training focusing on consent, mental health and how to signpost students to support available. Welfare reps also received useful information packs to take back to their student groups. Also ran this training online in the summer term for new committees.

- Daisy and I met with committees of the larger sports societies to chat about how they can welcome new members and be as inclusive as possible.

Student experience fund - We secured funding for our Student experience fund ideas. The welfare related projects were paramedic and welfare support during union nights, water fountains in RUSU and further good lad sessions.

Relax With RUSU

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Fifi and I made what is normally RUSU Says Relax, online â&#x20AC;&#x201C; there was a calendar showing ideas to relax and take breaks, and weekly competitions with prizes.

New Halls Committee - Molli and I worked on rebranding JCR to be called Halls Committee. This consists of Event Reps who will work under commercial services at RUSU, and Halls Reps who will work with the welfare officer and student activities.

Events reps will be a paid role and will work to promote and deliver a wide range of events. Halls reps will work with both the welfare officer and student activities in a voluntary role to focus on a more welfare aspect and working closely with UPPâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Home@Halls.

Self-defence classes - Arranged free self-defence classes for students (which came out of a changeit idea), these included female-only sessions as well as mixed-gender sessions.

Being RUSU President threw me straight into the deep end of juggling dozens of different projects and initiatives, constantly picking up new ones with the expectation that you will continue to move at a hundred miles an hour to get it done.

I o ldn change hi for he orld don ge me rong b i doe n lea e m ch ime o reflect so I hope this gives you an insight into what has made me feel proud to accomplish hi ear if I men ioned e er hing e d be here all da Before I get started I think it is important to mention that none of these achievements were completed by me alone but with a RUSU team who now feels a bit like a second family.

Sustainability I d like o hink ha a fo nda ion ha been b il o de elop a c l re of sustainability, ome hing ha ha n been de eloped for he la co ple of ear 1. Fossil fuel divestment perhaps my proudest achievement, we successfully lobbied the University to fully divest from direct and indirect fossil fuel companies!

2. A brand-new Environment policy has nearly been completed that covers every area of RUSU and will truly embed sustainability into the organisation.

3. There will be a brand new sustainability fair in September that joins the other fre her fair during Welcome Week.

4. Funding has been made available for any student to apply and run their own sustainability project.

5. Make your Mark was my sustainability campaign that really gave all these achievements a platform and space to grow and develop. It has received over 200 sustainable pledges from students, caused a new RUSU Environment Committee to form and has meant that, for the first time in years, we have applied for Green Impact accreditation that will give us formal recognition of our hard work.

Democracy Arguably the biggest part of my job and with my wing man Fifi Bangham, I am proud of the sheer volume of accomplishments.

1. RUSU ran a referendum in the space of 2 weeks with the outcome to support UCU industrial action. We have supported UCU across social media, produced stickers and posters to publicly display our support and visited the picket lines to deliver tea and coffee, amongst many other things.

2. Throughout Autumn term we worked hard in encouraging students to register to vote, which included partnering with Vote for your Future and NUS. This followed with a strong presence to get students to vote in the General Election, which included hosting the GE hustings, holding our own society debate and providing a shuttle to the polling stations, amongst other activities.

3. Elections week was a really intense time, only made harder when our online login em en do n on he fir da A Chair of Elec ion Commi ee I m pro d ha we managed to provide voting stations across campus in less than a day to ensure we still provided a robust elections process.

4. Despite having to run a virtual Student Voice (which I am particularly proud we pulled off) we have broken Change It! engagement records this year. We received 10587 vote through the Change It! platform compared to 2104 last year, 5784 votes

for all student campaigns compared to 1042 last year and saw the highest ever number of voters in the Summer Change It! vote this year.

5. Fifi and I thought we would have a bit of extra time on our hands since RUSU was shut (we were wrong about that) so wanted to respond to elections feedback that our information can be confusing. We have nearly finished 4 brand new election handbooks for FTO PTO S den Tr ee and Senior Rep o make i ea ier for candidates to campaign.

JCR I did JCR for o ear and ob io l S George i he be o hi projec ha been clo e to my heart. JCR needed an uplift to be more relevant and effective for students so Gemma and I have completely changed up the system.

Little did we know a global pandemic would come at the same time as us finalising this process but I am proud that we have now created a new Halls Committee with two brand new positions and will hopefully be creating a new partnership with UPP which I believe will be the first of its kind.

CEO recruitment Recruiting Ryan, our CEO, was something I never thought would be included in my role. As an Appointments Committee we worked with Peridot, a recruitment firm, to run the whole process including finalising a job description, short listing applications and running two rounds of interviews.

I hink hi i he ime I e fel mo o of m depth in the job. As the person who leads the organisation there was a lot of pressure to recruit well and I am proud that we ran a robust process and have picked a CEO who cares passionately about the organisation and the developments that can be made to further enhance the student experience (I promise Ryan didn ell me o ri e hi Coronavirus I m no going o linger on hi for long and here are ime hen I co ld ha e done be er b I m pro d of ho e ha e managed o adap Yo don ge raining to deal with situations like this yet you are still looked to for the answers to make it better. I know that although we may not have been able to help every single student we have certainly made the experience, in one way or another, better for many.

For anyone who knows me, I cry at everything so looking back and soon having to say goodbye is going to be really difficult.

I ran for President because I wanted to make sure that every student could have the same fantastic student experience I had. Thank you for giving me this incredible opportunity and I hope ha e en in he inie a I e done ome hing o make o r Uni er i e perience a bit better.

Education Officer Roundup University Projects Feedback Policy Improving the quality and consistency of feedback was one of my manifesto points when campaigning to be Education Officer. I worked with members of staff for the Centre for Quality, Support and Development, and Elizabeth McCrum (now Pro Vice Chancellor- Ed ca i a d S de E e ie ce a d he F c Feedback campaign was launched in the autumn. As part of this, I have been working on the first stage of the review of the University feedback policy. I hope that this will be approved ready for the autumn term, and that this will make the policy more accessible and less confusing. My successor, George, will be working to implement the larger redesign of the policy.

Teaching & Learning conference As part of the work on feedback, I presented our findings of student opinion on feedback at the University teaching and learning conference earlier this year. This was a great opportunity to share student opinion with staff from across the university.

Teaching & Learning sessions To collect staff opinion on feedback and the feedback policy at UoR, and to brainstorm ideas of changes to be made to feedback, a number of lunchtime sessions were held with academic staff at the university. I presented my findings of de feedback feedback hel di ec he academics.

Appointment panels -I sat on the interview panel for Pro Vice Chancellor Academic Planning and Resource over the summer. We appointed Mark Fellowes to this role.

-I sat on the interview panel for Pro Vice Chancellor- Education and Student Experience at Christmas. We appointed Elizabeth McCrum (previously a teaching and learning dean) and Julian Park (previously Head of the School of Agriculture, Policy and Development).

-I was on the appointment panel for the Interim Teaching and Learning Dean. We appointed Louise Hague to this role (previously School Director of Teaching and Learning in Law) TLDF awards panels I was a member of a number of panels for funding awards coming from the Teaching and Learning Development fund this year. These panels give insight into the amazing work that is taking place across the university and in individual schools.

Fitness to Study working group I was a member of the working group reviewing the current fitness to study process at Reading. This project will continue into next year, and I hope will improve the process for students.

Extenuating Circumstances redesign project The EC redesign group are examining the whole ECF process. Academic staff, support centre staff and students are involved in the process, and have given incredibly valuable feedback and thoughts on how the process can be changed to improve the system for staff processing the ECFs, and most importantly for students requesting

ECFs. I believe the new system will be more accessible and easier for students to use, and I look forward to seeing the end result of this project.

Quality assurance review group I have been inputting into the start of the Quality assurance review, ensuring the student representation is present in all areas of the review, and that the new system ensures the student voice is heard and acted on.

Student Hearings I have sat on panels for different student hearings this year, to ensure that the outcomes are fair and reasonable for students.

RUSU Projects Trigger/content Warning policy The trigger warnings policy was an action from Change It. I researched trigger warnings in place in other institutions, and also read information from people who were against trigger warning, so that I could ensure the policy encompassed the views of as many different sides as possible. I wrote the policy, and submitted it to DELT (Subcommittee for the Development and Enhancement of Learning and Teaching). The policy was approved at the University Board for Teaching, Learning and Student Experience, and is now a University policy.

Study Space I have worked with Katja Strohfeldt (Teaching and Learning Dean) this year, on a project to renovate study spaces on campus. With money from the Student Experience Fund, we have identified spaces that need renovation, and worked with a project manager, University Estates and RUSU staff to implement these changes. We also have planned a renovation of the RUSU Study. Much of this work has been put on hold due to COVID, but will take place next academic year, however the furniture for the Hopkins Foyer has been delivered.

Plug sockets in Agriculture With money from the Student Experience Fund, I worked with staff from Estates to install plug sockets in John Madejski lecture theatre and John Nike Lecture theatre.

Both of these lecture theatres had only two plug sockets, so the addition of these sockets has made a big difference to students using these spaces.

Y e e cellen cheme I worked with Hannah Smithson from RUSU to im leme he Y e E celle scheme. This recognised staff working in any area of the uni, who have gone above and beyond in their job. Students can nominate staff on the postcards around campus, and staff receive their postcards and a pin badge.

Halls residence notifications As an action from Change It, I worked with staff from the Accommodation Contract Management Office to improve the communications to students in halls of who is coming into their flat. Student now receive emails when a student is moving in or if planned maintenance works are taking place.

Elections I was on the RUSU Elections Committee this year with Molli (president) and Ryan (CEO). It was an amazing experience organising and running the election.

Referendum

In the autumn, Molli and I organised the referendum on supporting the UCU strikes at the University. We hosted a debate, wrote the referendum and assisted the agents.

No detriment policy We held an emergency Change It Vote in April to vote on no detriment. The vote passed with over 4000 votes in favour, and we have been lobbying the University on these issues since.

Relax with RUSU Gemma and I worked with Abiee and Sian from RUSU to run Relax with RUSU online this year, giving students the space to relax and unwind with a calendar of relxing activities.

Rep Conference In January, we hosted the annual RUSU representation conference in RUSU. We invited Sal Pearman (a former RUSU officer) back to present our keynote speech.

ACTIVITIES OFFICER 2019/20 DAISY O’CONNOR

END OF YEAR ROUND-UP! This article summarises some of the key things I’ve achieved this year as Activities Officer, including my manifesto and non-manifesto projects.

Manifesto Point #1- Complete Funding Boosts- I successfully changed the timeline of the grants provided by the University’s Alumni team- so for 2020/21, your committee can apply for a funding boost in October to cope with any unexpected costs from a growth in membership. I also created resources for committee training including 10 other methods of getting more funding, and a guide to understanding your group’s finances better.

Manifesto Point #2- Complete Committee freedom- I re-wrote the Activities Constitution to add more protections for small societies, and allow groups to add new committee members at any time during the year.

This also allows groups to cope with an unexpected growth in membership and has further become particularly important recently as we encourage groups to think about electing a BAME or Black students’ representative.

Manifesto Point #3- Complete Buddy Scheme- In September and January I launched Buddy Schemes to increase participation in sport, particularly for students who felt they didn’t “fit in” with the sport they wanted to try. 193 students signed up in total and joined a new group!

Manifesto Point #4- Complete Reduce Food Waste- We introduced the OLIO app to Monterey café, meaning that packaged food was given away to the student and local community instead of being wasted.

I also got 200+ students to use OLIO, and promoted the food banks in Halls receptions during the student move-out period.

Non-Manifesto Projects…

Knights Pride- I ran a campaign promoting LGBTQ+ inclusion in sport at Reading, as my research showed that homophobia, biphobia, and transphobia were all still significant problems on campus. I produced a video showcasing six students and their experiences of being LGBT+ in sport, which has reached 5000+ people on Facebook.

With the input of the LGBQ+ Officer Edda and the LGBT+ Society committee, I also produced a resource booklet for sports committees which included key LGBT+ definitions, how to be an ally, a myth-busting section, and our sector-leading guidance on trans participation in University sport. Unfortunately, the Pride Sports Day I had planned was cancelled, as was the awareness work I’d planned for Varsity.

Culture Show- Zeid and I relaunched the Culture Show, in which seven fantastic performers from our Culture and Faith societies performed and competed to be the “audience favourite.”

With each performer, I produced an introduction about the cultural significance and history of their performance, and read them during the show.

APPG- I did research amongst Reading students and wrote a paper summarising your views on tuition fees, which was considered by the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Students in Westminster.

Sporting Excellence Scholarship- We supported 13 students who play sport at national level with Reading’s first ever Sporting Excellence Scholarship (funded by UoR alumni). I organised a network for the scholars to meet each other and led the selection panel.

Committee Workshops- Gemma and I led 12 workshops to meet sports committees and start conversations about welfare, alcohol, and socials. We used their ideas to make a resource of 130 social ideas, none of which focus on alcohol. We also hosted 30+ Team Talks led by the Good Lad Initiative, for male and female teams, which focused on consent, team culture, nights out and mental health. These team talks had fantastic feedback with 98% of you saying you’d recommend them to a friend.

Supporting Our Students- I ran a scheme to pair students who were feeling lonely during COVID-19 up with another student or a staff member trained to offer them support. In total, 370 people signed up for the scheme and we have made plans to continue the support past COVID-19.

Accessibility in Sport- I created a comprehensive survey for sports clubs, with the Disabled Students’ Officer Charlotte, which will assess each club’s accessibility. The answers will be used to create a resource for disabled students so you know which clubs you can access.

Running routes- I mapped out and designed three running routes around campus which are readily available for every ability of runner, which you can find at www.rusu.co.uk/run or by following the signs around campus.

Bike maintenance stations- We installed three bike pumps and tool kits on UoR campuses to allow you to fix your bike and travel more sustainably.

Sports storage- Following student feedback, we installed card access machines on the storage behind SportsPark so you know your kit is more secure.

3G pitch- Currently we are in final discussions with the council about planning permission, however these conversations have been paused for many months as the council understandably have their resources allocated elsewhere. Nonetheless a huge amount of progress was made on this project this year, with community exhibitions and resources created to help the local community understand the benefit the pitch will have to thousands of students.

Outdoor gym & Media expansion- The University had agreed to fund my proposals for a free outdoor gym facility and a renovation of the student media centre. These plans are currently on pause due to COVID-19.

Awards Shows- I produced and filmed the Activities Awards Shows from my living roomwe were the first students’ union in the country to do online awards shows and the videos have over 7,000 views! You sent in 1,600 nominations in total for the awards which is the highest ever by a long way, and more groups than ever completed the Knights Accreditation Scheme and Society Laurels.

Committee Training- We transferred the entire committee training programme online for the first time, to train 1,000+ committee members. More clubs and societies than ever before successfully elected a committee for 2020/21, despite the elections happening during COVID-19.

Housing- I collected feedback about what you were worried about around moving house during COVID-19. Our expert housing advisor wrote answers and we published these on our website.