Vol. XXV • Edition 12
An Focal Editor Says Goodbye pg 5
April 2017
UL SU United Ireland Referendum pg 3
Handball pg 22
What to Expect of New Sabbats: JCB EVIE KEARNEY & PAUL SAUNDERS The electoral ticket of JCB (Jack Shelley, Roberta “Bob” Harrington, and Conor Hussey) was recenly elected to all three sabbatical positions. What can we expect from our new team? We sat down with two of the incoming sabbats, Shelly and Harrington, to take a look at the year ahead. Unfortunately, incoming Academic Officer Conor Hussey could not be reached at the time of his scheduled interview. We spoke to a range of sources including the Student Academic Administration, UL Sport and ULFM to assess the feasibility of their manifestos. One shared promise between the team is that they will introduce a referendum and subsequent levy for gym membership to be given to all UL students, much like the system in place at University College Cork. UL Sport claims that although they would love inclusive membership, they definitely do not have space to accommodate 14,000 students with active memberships. However, Ms Harrington stressed that a gym membership does not mean exclusively using the machines in the gym, and that it would benefit students who swim, run, and want to take classes, or play 5-a-side soccer. “People are looking at the inclusive gym membership as just a load of people herding into the gym. “There’s so much more going on in the gym that just the actual gym…I think that the gym would definitely be able to cater for it,” she said. President-elect Jack Shelly’s main goal once he gets into office is to get first years to attend mandatory mental health and nutrition workshops. “I think that’s just huge, they have
to be brought in,” he said. Attendance at SU-run workshops has been an issue with recent consent classes cancelled due to poor attendance figures. Mr Shelly has a simple approach to getting students into his workshops: “I’ll go to every single lecture and talk to them two minutes before every lecture, if I had two minutes before every lecture; I could explain what they would be, what they’d entail and how they could benefit every student.” One promise that dominated Jack Shelly’s campaign was the promise of pitchers of beer and a late night bar on Wednesday night in the Stables. Mr Shelly said: “It got out of hand all together, it doesn’t bother me at all, when people aren’t happy with the results they just go to the negative points and hammer down on them and people just say I’m mad for the beer and forget about the points that actually make a difference.” In his manifesto, Mr Shelly promised to work on the above mentioned promises as well as getting heaters in the smoking area
of the Stables courtyard. “Pitchers are a definite possibility and the late bar I know is a tough one, it would cost about an extra €750 a night and they’d have to change the set-up of the bar.” An Focal spoke to Stables Club Manager Declan Collins on the feasiblity of Mr Shelly’s election promises. Mr Collins explained that the Stables used to give out pitchers and that students would hand in their ID which would be given back when the pitcher was returned. He said it created a lot friction between the staff and students over IDs and that they decided to just lower pint prices instead. Mr Shelly responded: “I’d rather pay the extra euro [for a pitcher]. I’m not going to fight him on it but I’ll discuss it with him.” A controversial promise made by Ms Harrington to introduce mandatory sexual and mental health workshops for first years was slammed by students who have previously worked as guides during Orientation Week due to time
constraints. “There’s definitely time that’s wasted during orientation,” she said. “If you can be a little bit more organised over all, make sure that everything is running on time, then there’s absolutely no reason why any of those workshops couldn’t be fit in.” The incoming Welfare Officer wishes to implement these workshops and fine students up to €250 if they do not attend – a similar system to the current module registration fine. “No parent is going to fork out €250 because their son or daughter was too lazy to go to a mandatory mental health or sexual health workshop. “I would have no issue in doing it.” Ms Harrington’s manifesto states that she wants music playing the courtyard every day because “music makes everyone feel good.” She said she had spoken to current Welfare Officer Caolan O’Donnell, who told her that, “ULFM would be very on board because they’d love to get their station out there.” An Focal spoke to ULFM, the DJ Society and the ULSU Marketing and Communications Administrator, who all turned down the idea of daily broadcasts in the courtyard for various reasons including scheduling, equipment management, and noise complaints from nearby offices and religious centres. Harrington said: “You could even just invest in a speaker, we all have Spotify. You don’t need to have everything manned all the time.” However, according to the Phonographic Performance Ireland Music website: “If you use copyright record music in public you will need a PPI Licence, including radio, TV, PC, iPod or any other means. “A PPI licence ensures that record companies and performers are being fairly paid for the use of their music.” An Focal would like to wish the incoming sabbatical team all the best for the upcoming academic year.