End of 1st Term Report by the Activities President 2006-07

UWESU Finances

You may or may not realise that currently UWESU is in a financial crisis. With projections presented to the board of trustees (made up of the four presidents plus two external trustees) showing a £100k loss this year it was clear that we were in dangerous waters. The main problem though was that we were projected to lose £50k next academic year as a result, this cannot happen as it is not something the university will allow us to do, and rightfully so. Read this article for further information.

NUS

We're having some continued interaction with NUS, and over the past couple of months we've had some developments that are worth noting.

- National Conference

We have successfully sent off three motions to NUS National Conference to be considered in their compositing session. There the motions will be looked at along with others sent from all around the country and relevant, popular motions will be detailed ready for their submission to National Conference next year. If people are interested in becoming delegates for the National Conference then keep your eyes peeled next term for details on how to apply and get elected to represent UWESU in Blackpool.

- Women's Conference

We have had, so far, nine women show an interest in representing UWE at the NUS Women's Conference. I take this as a great achievement to have so many women eager to represent and follow a UWE constructed motion into the event next March. Elections will take place on the 6th of February next year at 5:30pm in an especially open "Activities Council" where all candidates will get to speak about why they want to be a women's delegate before all women present are able to elect their favourite. If you want to stand you can still get the form to do so, and if you are interested (and female!) I would urge you to come along to the meeting to vote.

Events and Entertainments

It's no secret that our events and entertainments were prescribed to be a lot bigger than they actually turned out to be. It's all our own fault, as said above, but now is the time to get our feet on the ground and work with what we've actually got. All doom saying aside it is important to remember that in real terms we are doing much better on Frenchay than last year, which is exactly what we thought we'd do"¦we just over-estimated what the success would be to our own detriment!

-Weekly

This years events have not gone down so well, however we've been discussing the way forward and have come up with a new weekly events line up that we hope will entertain you to a more satisfactory level. It'll include the retention of the Friday night Crunchie, and the Thursday night Route that is growing in popularity every week. The shipwrecked pre-party will be re-jigged to become more attractive, while the addition of a Bar FTSE night and a second party night on Saturday (run by the same people that run the amazing Shipwrecked in Oceana) will give our entertainments program a well rounded feel through the week.

And of course our affiliation to Reflex on a Wednesday and Oceana on a Tuesday will continue!

-Snowball

The Snowball has been and gone and was largely successful aside from an unfortunate traffic issue. If you didn't realise, a gas carrying lorry overturned on the motorway and caused a large amount of traffic to be displaced around the very area we were trying to bus people through! It was a calamity and an unfortunate one we couldn't control, and it did mean some people missed the main attraction of Karl Kennedy. We are looking for feedback for the Snowball and want to make sure next years is better, so get in touch!

-Bar FTSE

The latest success at UWESU! Bar FTSE is a bar trading "game", though shouldn't be taken lightly. Certain bar prices are displayed on the TV screens all around the Red bar and rise or fall depending on the popularity of the drink. Popular fast selling drinks get more expensive while less popular slow selling drinks start to cost less.

With stock market crashes that bring prices down to amazing sights of people rushing to the bar it is something that we certainly can't leave to be experienced just once a term, so expect it weekly from now on.

-Survey

We're conducting an events survey at the minute to really try and get an idea of how you want your events to be on campus. It will be completed by the end of January so look out for the results and even some changes to accommodate your needs as early as February.

Smoking Provisions

The bar managers are all now reviewing what it is they require for each of the bars to bring them in line with the provisions needed to operate successfully after smoking is banned nearer the summer. The main things on the list are fairly obvious, awning covers for shelter, heating for the cold, seating and balustrades to define the area as being specifically part of the bar area.

In January the bar managers will bring back their own individual needs and the required resources will be sourced and put into place well in advance of the legislation taking effect.

RAG (Raise and Give)

RAG is back and alive! We managed to raise a total of £578.50 this week for the National AIDS Trust and it is a true testament to the hard working RAG committee members that each provided a different aspect to making this week work.

Needless to say we're not stopping here, and have set ourselves a target of £4,000 by the end of the academic year raised for charity. With Comic Relief next March, a Fair Trade campaign and a charity bar crawl late in January we are confident we can get fairly close to reaching this ambitious but realistic target. If we do we'll be sure to hold a special celebration party (charity based of course!) to show just how amazing it is going to have a RAG that works after two rocky years.

Site Surgeries

Site surgeries for the term have now been completed and have been a greater success than we thought they'd be! By not sitting around in offices and actually going to you, the students, we've found out much more than we would have. The rep co-ordinators at UWESU have sat down with us and all of your queries are being picked apart, questioned and made ready for us to answer properly and fully ASAP. This is a new system of doing things, but it clearly works"¦we just have to make sure that everything that comes from it is now communicated in some way effectively.

Transport

Transport is always on the agenda, and with our transport survey being analysed and collated we will have a good solid standing to take on the second stage of the transport campaign next term. Expect people on bus stops checking regularity and frequency of buses, students reporting back on grumpy drivers, and motions going in to our AGM!

Also I have met with the new Travel Planner, Steve Ward. He used to be a student here so understands exactly what we're going through and is very forward thinking on the transport issue. After only a couple of weeks he has already come up with some very fresh and simple ideas on how to encourage public and sustainable transport and UWESU is very excited to work with him in the future.

UWE

A bit more work has been done in the last month directly with the university, and below are the key areas from this interaction.

- Fair Trade

One of the meetings UWE and UWESU have throughout the year is on the commitment of both parties to Fair Trade. Last year the University achieved Fair Trade status and we are now looking on how to both keep it and improve upon it. From the next meeting we should have some key deliverables to show everyone and campaign for during Fair Trade Fortnight next February.

- Head of Hospitality

I was recently included in the hiring of the new Head of Hospitality at UWE, and it was an interesting process which goes to show just how much of a balancing act the job will have to be with many different types of situations and questions needing to be posed. The question is now what it will do for UWE and the services it offers to students in the bars and eateries?

Bower Redevelopment

Bower redevelopment is moving on, I took Kat's place on the project board as she had other commitments this last term, and it's clear that everything is on track and going well. Things are being well thought out and nothing is being done that neglects students without there being a necessity to do so.

Response to DFES Guidelines

One very positive thing to happen recently is the universities clear stance on standing against the very narrow nature of the recent DFES guidelines asking universities to "spy" on Muslim students. Chris Anthony and I were able to work with the Chaplaincy to ensure that the response to the issue was adequate in conveying our welcome to the need to recognise and stop extremism, but annoyance at targeting only one group in a prejudiced way.

Vandalism

One of the more negative sides to this month is the culmination of several weeks of problems in our toilets turning to criminal vandalism. Some of your fellow students (or perhaps local residents) have taken it upon themselves to absolutely trash one of the toilets, threatening the opening of our end of term party as well as costing the university god knows how much of YOUR money to repair the facilities.

Take a look at the pictures and see for yourself . If you know of anything that can help us find out who did this then we want to hear from you.

Strategic Planning

As the other presidents have said, we're undertaking a key strategic planning process, and are now at the stage of setting preliminary goals. These will be consulted with the staff at the union then students, we're going to fine tune these into being exactly what everyone at UWESU wants for the next 3-5 years.

Constitutional Review

Constitutional review is still on going, but due to all of the recent issues arising with finances a lot of the issues have had to be put on a more realistic time scale. My wishes for changing the title and defining the job role more completely for the SRC Vice-President is out the window for this year, but in 2008 look out for elections for a new type of officer instead of that SRC Vice-President!

It's all happening, and we are looking forward to a complete re-write by this time next year of the constitution in to a document that is more accessible to its members and makes more sense. What we don't want to do is shoot ourselves in the foot with the board of governors with lots of minor changes when we can explain the errors of the document as a whole to them and ask that they accept our better written and more accessible document.

"Backstage Sluts"

Finally, a complaint was made at the start of the year as to our hiring of this band to play on our then Saturday night "Heist" night. At the time it was only informal and our response was as such. At the last activities council it was brought up that another person wanted to complain as well and so I took it forward as a formal complaint. The four presidents, including myself, have all sat down and discussed the situation, and while recognising the sensitive nature of the subject that those complaining are linking the name to (domestic abuse), we cannot see that the word slut alone in the context given in this name has any connotation nor positive indicator to domestic abuse. The term slut is one that is used negatively and positively and isn't even necessarily linked to sexual relations in some contexts. As such the trustees haven't upheld the complaint though we are in agreement that future bands with potentially offensive names need prior approval from the trustees.