STUDENT COUNCIL

Wednesday 21st October 2015

6pm, Council Chambers, Leeds Civic Hall, Portland Crescent

REPORTS

OFFICER REPORTS

Report 1

Officer Reports: Jay Malpass-Clark (President)

General Update from Officer

Having the years’ experience behind me this year I was determined to use the summer to roll through some of my

objectives.

You’ll be pleased to know now that Bright Ideas is now released alongside a brand new website. Fairly soon we will be

able to actually email our own students also which is a huge step for us as an organisation.

I’m also really pleased to announce that there will now be a position on the FSR Committee in the Uni. Amongst other

things this is where the University decides how student fees will be used. This is a huge achievement, one that I doubted

I would get but I am so pleased is actually happening.

I have also successfully lobbied the new VC to remove our Student Survey and replace it with the Student Barometer. In

essence the survey asks less question than the Student survey but with the way the questions are arranged the uni get

more info.

A last note in saying that this year I’m very pleased with the progress that they have been making. They have taken to

their roles tremendously quickly and already making great progress on their objectives. It’s a tad sad but I feel very

proud!

Progress on Objectives

Achievements last year:

- Re-wrote the Student Charter - Wrote the Unions perspective on the universities strategy moving forward - £1 Beckett Bus between Arndale & Broadcasting steps - Gaining student representation on both the Vice-Chancellors search committee and the Chair of the

Board - Founded a GOATING Exercise called ‘Beanbags & Teabags to go out and listen to Students - Student Consultation Framework (Ongoing) - Changed the menu (there is now pudding on the menu!)

Objectives for this year:

- Finish the Student Consultation Framework: Produce a governance document that requires the university to adhere to a minimum level of consultation on matters that will affect students.

Our proposals on the framework to the Universities Thinktank have been received really well and only come

back with a few minor adjustments and thoughts. After speaking to students about their thoughts on the

framework as well the main feedback was that they didn’t need to see the full document, they wanted

another document that could ‘Reassure’ them that the university does it.

This lead to an idea of producing 2 separate documents. The ‘for information’ document to be done

completely by the Union and a further document intertwined with QAA standards to be done in partnership

with the Dean of Quality.

Design work on the Framework will begin ASAP however please bear in mind that for most of the summer the

Marketing Department has been just one person so there is significant backlog.

- Launch Student Bright Ideas: Im pleased to say that Student Bright Ideas has now launched. It can be accessed via the Student Voice tab on the new website.

Although the main achievement has been done of producing it I feel my work here is not yet done. There are

many things that could be done to add to the experience. For example, on the new website you have to create

an account to gain access to most features including Bright Ideas. This we felt was an unnecessary barrier to

student being able to suggest ideas and want to make the experience as streamlined as possible,

In mid-september we signed a datashare agreement with the university so that people can log on to our

website with the same login as My Beckett, additionally if you are already in My Beckett you won’t need to

sign- at all.

Some student enterprise development work would also help in making the experience more modern. The

code for Bright Ideas is closed in some areas so it will be to the limit that they can change it but nonetheless it

will still make it more student friendly.

My last point is in the idea below.

- Produce a Bright Ideas week: A week to encourage students to submit Bright Ideas.

- This is basically a week where we as a Union will launch a campaign to make sure students know about Bright Ideas we will be postering up the campus with students ideas to help populate and get active use of Bright Ideas.

- Review Tiger Buses performance and take appropriate action: Anybody who has had a decent amount of contact with me last year will know that I spent the majority of my time dealing with Tiger Bus. They are currently on final review and will be having a deciding meeting in December to decide their future with Leeds Beckett University.

Progress on Mandates from Student Council

Earlier in the year we resolved the issues around policy for the university to subscribe to Electronics Watch.

I think we need to keep pushing on the Electronics Watch policy that was passed at Council last year.

In conversations with Pete Briggs (Associate Finance Director) he noted notes that the university hasn’t become a

member of Electronics Watch because the NEUPC Northern Eastern Universities Purchasing Consortium) is already a

member.

A call to NEUPC recently has confirmed that they are in fact not a member and that it is the individual organisations

that would need to sign up. NEUPC said that they had considered it but there was not enough support for the

consortium to become a member itself.

I will be chasing this up between this report and the next student council, making note to mention this to the VC.

Any other business

The University is one of the first in the UK to sign up to NUS CutTheCosts Campaign. This is a really positive step to the

ultimate goal of parliaments voting against the changes however I have been pushing NUS to consider the changes to

Special Support Grants in an isolated agenda as our most vulnerable will be affected by this change.

We have also announced our campaign on the refugee crisis ‘Refugees Welcome in Leeds’

Report 2

Officer Reports : James Starnes (VP Education)

General Update from Officer

Since the start of the year, we have all been on various residential and training provisions, on these we set out our main

objectives for the year and gained valuable insight to Our University and the areas of collaborative working ability.

Objectives for VP Education are:

Data Recovery Service – “Restore” o Student operated service to recover lost or corrupted data from students’ personal devices (laptops,

USB sticks etc.) o Work to be undertaken by mostly Computer Forensics (and Security) student volunteers which the work

of will meet and enhance the learning outcomes of the course modules and provide valuable experience, up skilling and team working abilities.

o Service provided free* (with minimal donation to cover costs, expected to be around or less than £1 per item) to Leeds Beckett Students with expected turnaround designed to fit the requirements and time dedication efforts of the volunteers.

Cost of Submission o Campaign to reduce costs associated with submission of assessments (printing etc.) o It is a strong belief that with student living costs being at an all-time high, that the university levying

‘backdoor’ charging by way of mandatory submission of hard copy documents for assessments is deeply unfair and is something that will be actively fought this year with a commitment to digital submissions where possible or costs absorbed by the Faculty for where this is not.

Returning from Placement Support – “Back to Beckett” o Intended as a framework for communications as much as for an effective reintroduction to student life,

“Back to Beckett” will allow for reintroduction sessions to topics such as the University, Course, Student Areas (Headingley, Hyde Park etc.) and the Students’ Union, in addition to provision of areas and modules of work to be undertaken in the year following a Sandwich Year Placement to allow for less of a detached feeling for placement students.

In addition to these there have been many meetings with senior members of staff from the University, including the VC

and DVCs which has allowed the identification of where cross collaborative approached and resources from the

University may be apt.

Further to this, there have been a number of conferences attended particularly around the areas of Quality in regards

Pedagogy and other such practices, a notable development is around conversations over the incoming TEF – Teaching

Excellence Framework which will serve as a ranking system for universities across the UK. Currently this is being released

as a Green Paper close to the time of writing this report, however there will be much deliberation over the impact and

our united stance to opposing any potential fee increases off the back of Leeds Beckett’s place in the rankings.

Finally a new methodology has been developed and designed with the purpose of being one of the ways in which we

engage with students on a 1:1 level. This is called “Recharge” and will serve as one of the roaming presences for the

Union Exec to talk to students about issues, ideas and suggestions over a hot drink and charge up which-ever personal

mobile device they have (iPad, iPhone, Android, laptops etc.).

Progress on Objectives

Restore o Branding outline completed o Policy and Legal obligations fleshed out and identified o Framework for Process & Volunteers o Detail written for how the service should proceed o Location obtained for where work will be carried out (above HC SU Bar)

Cost of Submission o Working with ITS to identify the exact level of costs being incurred by students for printing, especially at

high demand times (around assessment). o Working with Libraries, Learning & Innovation to identify areas of good practice currently in existing

courses with high levels of digital submission o Reviewing incoming policy proposals around the university commitment to utilizing TurnItIn on all

courses where physically possible.

Placement Support o Working currently to identify areas of affected students. o Working with the School of Health in HSS to see how their areas of good practice with Placements can

be applied to other courses.

Progress on Mandates from Student Council

Any other business

Report 3

Officer Reports: Sarah Gillborn (VP Welfare)

General Update from Officer

• Zero tolerance campaign - design for zero tolerance posters, pull-up banners, business cards, and mirror

stickers was completed. Spoke to the head of university’s Services for Students, who agreed to display A2 Zero Tolerance posters in noticeboards around university, to purchase two of their own pull-up banners to display in student hubs, and to put business cards in 10,000 freshers packs in order to make all new students aware of the policy.

• Sexual assault section on SU website - after it came to my attention that there was no guidance for students on our website following experiences of sexual assault, I wrote a section for the website with suggestions of external services students could use following these experiences and it was put on our SU website.

• Rent due dates - after it came to the exec team’s attention that many students were having to pay their rent before their loan came in, I spoke to many different halls providers, including Leeds Beckett halls and private halls, and made alternative arrangements for the students this affected.

Progress on Objectives

• Little to no progress on objective around support groups. Needed assistance of relevant staff member who

wasn’t yet in post. In the meantime I have been working with the volunteers from ReThink and Student Minds, especially for freshers fairs, to make sure they have all the support they need and I organised for both groups to have stalls at the World Mental Health Day event in Headingley on 7th October.

• Good progress on Housing and Letting Fees campaign. Although not much has been done as of yet the groundwork has been firmly laid for an effective campaign. Have started organising what messages to give to students at what times over the year, and have begun research in preparation of writing to letting agencies and asking them to lower their tenancy fees in line with average.

• Very good progress has been made with the Consent Campaign. Posters are up around university and these have already caught the attention of students. We gave a workshop to all Student Union staff members, have offered it to society committees, and have had a date set to give this training to Residential Officers. We are also continuing our collaboration with the AU over giving these workshops to sports teams, and although this has taken longer than expected I am still confident that these workshops will go ahead.

Progress on Mandates from Student Council

I have been working on resubmission of lapsing motions in order to maintain their relevance and ensure they are kept as policy at student council. The exec team has held discussions on motions that still stand in order to ensure that resolutions from council are known and actioned by officers, and we will be focusing this year on ensuring that resolutions from council are actioned in good time.

Any other business

Officer or panel members can raise any other items for discussion here, such as upcoming events or activities where support may be needed.

• I will be doing stalls soon to raise students awareness of housing market, putting out important information to students so they are aware of the process of looking for and moving into a house and ensuring they get their deposits protected.

• Beginning work on NUS Alcohol Impact accreditation criteria in order to positively impact students’ lives and experiences and promote more responsible drinking behaviours. We are putting together a working group that should be made up of a variety of people including students and student representatives.

• Putting together a ‘no bystander’ campaign as part of zero tolerance to encourage people to challenge street harassment - any help on this would be greatly appreciated.

Report 4

Officer Reports: Grace Lawrenson (VP Equality and Diversity)

General Update from Officer

Since starting my role in July, I have received a lot of training and have had many initial meetings for key university staff. I

have set myself three main objectives and then general plans for the year.

My three main objectives are:

- To support the integration of international, exchange, EU and home students through a weekly Language Café with different activities and cultural events.

- To work with the university to provide suitable and adequate faith spaces that have 24-hour access at both City and Headingley campuses.

- To set up peer-led support mechanisms to support International students that identify as LGBTQ* (or would identify)

As VP Equality and Diversity, I am also meeting with individual diversity reps and will arrange a minimum of one monthly

meeting with each rep. I will also organise the following Equality and Diversity forums:

-Equality and Diversity closed Forum- All diversity reps will be invited to attend this monthly and campaigns and plans

will be discussed and where relevant, joint campaigns planned.

-Open Equality and Diversity forum- All diversity reps will be invited to attend this monthly meeting and this will be open

to all students and staff. Diversity reps can discuss their plans and reps can talk about the progress of their objectives.

Everything is going really well, ensuring the university is aware of the role being re-introduced and that I am invited to

relevant committees and meetings has proved the biggest challenge. I have had regular meetings with the Equality and

Diversity manager and advisor as well as other teams within the university.

Progress on Objectives

Improved integration of International, EU and Exchange students with Home students- Café Lingo (Language Café)

- Over 10 volunteers trained as Café Lingo Assistants with a huge variety of nationalities and languages spoken - First Café held on 8th October and was successful- 23 students from 12 different countries attended.

Issues:

- Needs to be pushed out more to home and part-time students- had issues with Languages For All and the Part-Time Language course coordinators not putting publicity in packs although I gave them everything with plenty of

time and liaised with relevant staff members. I will also email the course leader for the Full-Time Language courses to be passed on to all the students (have already done this and spoken in their induction talks).

- Marketing- information needs to be put on the website rather than just on Facebook so that those without Facebook can still access all the details. Have contacted our marketing team about this.

Faith space provision (better prayer facilities, 24 hour)

- I have very recently been involved with the planning of the new prayer rooms in the Woodhouse building at City Campus with estates and these are almost certainly going to be approved.

- I have regularly been in contact with Zain, the ISoc president to ensure that the plans fit the needs of Islamic students.

- Overall progress is good on this as the facilities were of a much poorer condition at City Campus.

Issues:

- New provision will still not be open 24 hours due to security issues- I am planning to meet with LLI to see whether a room could be provided in/or near the library for students using the library overnight. This will also be discussed for Headingley Campus.

Student-led support mechanism for LGBTQ* International students

-I have met with the volunteering manager to begin to plan this and how it would work alongside Be-You.

-Initial idea was to have a student-led support group and 1-1 sessions but it was then decided after discussion that an

online forum would initially be more appropriate due to the sensitive nature of what could be discussed.

-This support network is something that would start this year and then be more long-term.

-I plan to work with No-Going Back to support this and to direct students to that need advice. I have already met with

Stuart from No-Going Back and he confirmed that this would be good and that they want to engage more with

international students and make them aware of their services.

Progress on Mandates from Student Council

I have updated and resubmitted to Council, the following policies:

-Go Stop & Search Yourself: No to Racial Profiling

-For a Child-Friendly Union

-Supporting Disabled Students

The whole team will be ensuring that resolutions and mandates from Council are completed in good time this year.

Any other business

Black History Month- October

Disability History Month- November 22nd- December 22nd

My Queer Culture event on October 30th

Report 5

Officer Reports: Harry Walters (VP Activities)

General Update from Officer

Objectives

Over the course of residential, I finalised my objectives for the year, they are as follows:

To increase the perception and engagement of students within Be Media

To organise joint activities between societies, RAG and Volunteering

To develop an in house SU accreditation scheme, awarding people who get involved with, course reps, student council,

volunteering, societies, Be Media.

Varsity

Working with Hugo Smith, course leader from Broadcast Media technology, I coordinated the recruitment of a team to

cover the rugby match for varsity. The team was made up of Broadcast media tech students, Be Media members and

Photography society. The week prior to the event I attended a media walk around to represent our team and discuss our

requirements in order to film the event. The match was live streamed on YouTube, however this was not known to the

venue as the rights to live stream from the stadium are reserved for their team and Sky. I have been in talks with Lisa

McCormick and she has agreed to not take this issue further. I will have a debrief with Hugo Smith about the night as

discuss how we can improve our coverage for next year and see if we can live stream in the future.

GOATing

During the course of both Freshers fair Jay and I filmed a number of students asking them about free Wednesdays for

extracurricular activity i.e. societies, volunteering, sports etc… And if they knew who their exec team are. As of yet the

footage is waiting to be compiled and edited together to be presented. However having looked at these it is clear that

students would like the opportunity to have Wednesdays freed up for activities and are largely unaware of the officer

team in terms of who they are and what they do.

Progress on Objectives

Inter-Society nights

The inter-society are back on once again. The first event was hosted by Rock Society with Hungry Hungry Humans. The

attendance was good with around 50 people turning up and getting involved. Other societies that have put themselves

forward to host are; film, international, RAG, computer, veg, fem, Harry Potter, Outdoor. The next inter-society night will

be on the 28th hosted by International society.

Be Media

Be Media had a record number of signups for Freshers fair, there was a scheduled welcome meeting on the 14th

October. At the time of writing this report that meeting has not happened yet but the outcome of the session is

available for discussion. The meeting is used to welcome in the new sign ups to Be Media. To tell them, in greater detail,

what can be done within the group and to open up elections for the committee roles available.

BeRadio

The new software for BeRadio has been installed and is in the radio room. However to date the system has not been

implemented, it needs to be told how to operate. I’ve spoken with Hugo Smith who has put me in contact with someone

who is brought in the help with Broadcast Media Technology who may be able to get this set up. I will also be getting in

contact with a member of staff, Anthony Walker, to get involved with this issue too. They’re attached to the journalism

course and can help get things moving.

Progress on Mandates from Student Council

Any other business