Everything else besides Pritchattsbury!

So this is my final pre-Guild Council blog of my term in office, if you want to hear what I really think then make sure you turn up to Guild Council in the 15th May to hear my leaving speech and I'm just writing that now! Here's what I've been up to since my last blog, I have also been involved in the discussions surrounding Pritchattsbury which have taken up a large amount of time and I will blog in the next week explaining the situation...

*We saw the finalised version of the Student Development Review that was commissioned and I'm sure that will be circulated to the student body in due course for you to see so I won't say too much just yet.
*We also saw the results of the Guild's Market Research presentation which again will be circulated for anyone to see soon - but we finally know for certain what students think of us!
*I watched as Ed chaired his first Resexec as part of the handover process.
*Went to the Euroconference at City Hall and heard the European Commissioner speak while also being on More4 news!
*I did a presentation to the University about the SHAC and it was also presented at the most recent Guild Trustee Board meeting and passed by the board. We have now gone out to recruitment for the lettings management position and have been inundated with requests for application packs! I also spoke to a local letting agent - Purple Frog about how the SHAC can involve them.
*We began the planning for next year's RA training.
*I spoke with Hunter Court RA about their name change and we will be writing a letter to the CEO of Liberty Living to ask them to help preserve the identity of Hunters by keeping the name as it is.
*I will also be running a Fibchester roleplay for the incoming officers in July so I have begun planning for that, which is a large piece of work.
*And finally, later today I have set up a meeting for Victoria Hall RA and the mentor scheme to air their views about the many issues at Victoria Hall to the company's CEO John Ripley.

The Muirhead!

Just a quick update before Guild Council:

*The Sabbs had a tour of the Muirhead Tower - which was very interesting - lots of offices but little learning space although there was a lot of space ear-marked for Postgraduates something which many PGs sorely lack at the moment.

*At the Resexec immediately after my last blog funding for the Nightbus was agreed and the service will now be available next year - check out Hollie's blog for more details.

*I also did some student staff interviews for the Jobzone and then a few weeks later did some inductions for the new student staff!

*I attended the second Remuneration and HR committee and straight after hosted the quiz to find out who our University Challenge team would be this year.
*We also started to think about the Guild's communication strategy with regards to what we do in the community and etched out a preliminary plan.
*Finally I attended a conference in the Business School on friday about countering extremism on campuses across the West Midlands area hosted by West Midlands Police.

First week back

My last blog followed up to my 2 weeks holiday which were very enjoyable, especially with my birthday being at the end of the time off. It also coincided with a loss of email function for the Guild so I have spent much of my free time this past week following up emails, I'm only just catching myself up now after the volume of emails I received over Easter. So, apologies to anybody who has emailed recently and is still awaiting a reply.

Last week was a strangely quiet week, starting with a housekeeping day which uncovered some of the original plans for the student accommodation redevelopment here at Birmingham and the minutes of the planning group meetings 9 years ago. This was a really interesting read for a sad person like me to see what was originally planned for the Vale and what has still not happened including the priorities of different parties around the table. I also met with Lesley Stewart, Student Accommodation Manager, at the start of the week who I am hoping will be able to set up a meeting for the Victoria Hall RA and Mentor team with John Ripley, CEO of Victoria Halls, to discuss the recent issues on that site. Plans for Welcome Week in the Guild are now underway and the VPHC sits on the main co-ordination group for this operation, which I am now doing as these meetings have begun. And at the the weekend I had a wander round accommodation viewing day which seemed to go well for prospective students. I talked to numerous parents who were concerned about the cost of accommodation here at Birmingham and seemed attracted to some of the more affordable accommodation.

At the beginning of this week I kicked off the Guild's European Elections Register to Vote Drive - organised by Hollie - VPW. The sabbs will be around campus and in the Guild with forms and envelopes, encouraging people to register. We also finalised plans for the heats for the Birmingham University Challenge team, which I have been tasked with organising. If anybody is interested just turn up to the Guild Council Chambers on Thursday at 5pm.

Finally we just got word this morning that the Registrar and Secretary has agreed to extend the funding of the Community Warden Scheme. This is great news for students at the University of Birmingham and for a fantastic scheme that deserves to continue the phenomenal work it has started on behalf of students in the community. In the process of writing the bid to continue the funding we have found that the Warden scheme has had a significant impact on improving relations between the local community and students, bringing a more positive attitude towards students from certain figures who are traditionally hostile to the student community. The wardens deserve this funding and more recognition for doing a very unglamourous but fantastic job.

Easter

My last blog was before the last Guild Council so this is my rundown to Easter blog. The SHAC is continuing to progress nicely, after Easter I will be arranging meetings with Student Advice to talk through their thoughts on the SHAC. We are nearing a code of standards agreement with the help of Unipol who we have been consulting with throughout the setup with the Council now also wanting to be involved.

The community showcase has developed somewhat - we are not sure that a showcase of the nature I imagined would achieve the goal of raising awareness of students' activities in the community. People may attend, have a go on the bouncy castle and then leave without the message we want them to leave with. We are now currently looking at a more long term communication strategy for the close community. In the meantime, one of the goals of the showcase was to receive more national recognition for what the Guild and students at Birmingham do in the community, this will hopefully be reached somewhat by a Unipol conference which we will be privileged to host here at the Guild this year. Many students union officials from across the country attend the conference which centers around students in the community - there will be time to showcase the Wardens, our community volunteering and the fact that we are one of a handful of unions to have a community Sabb to unions from all over the country.

I attended the Guild Awards, which was a fantastic night thanks to the efforts of Rich and many others. Congratulations to all winners especially Jarratt Hall for their commendation and FOCSOC for winning best RA both committees as well as all RAs deserve this recognition for all the fantastic things that they do. I have also taken on University Challenge and with the help of Representation and Democracy I will be putting together a team for Birmingham, if you are interested in competing just email me at j.ogden@guild.bham.ac.uk

We have been having problems with our emails so if I have not emailed you back in the last few days it is not because I am ignoring you it is because I have not received your email yet. I am now off on annual leave so I will blog on my return on the 20th April, one day after my birthday!

Have a great Easter!

Since my last blog...

*RA Training - The training for the RAs elected in the by-election and the RAs who didn't manage to attend the training was held and was a good success but after the success of the second RA weekend away at the Raymond Priestley Centre in Coniston it will now be the case that the RA by-election training will take place in the Lake District.

*Preparations are now under way for the Community Showcase, which will take place at the end of the third term and you can see more about this on my video at Guild Council and on youtube.

*Continued to attend the meetings I am required to attend including chairing the first Remuneration and HR committee

*Met with Ask4 the new data service provider at the university about their continuing service to students.

*Finished the School Quality Review of the IAA that I have been involved in recently, this was a really enlightening experience peering into Tom's world and seeing some of the educational issues students have at a local level in the IAA.

*I sat on ballot stations throughout the week of voting in the Guild Officer Elections and also went out with Hannah and talked to students on campus encouraging them to vote.

*I had some annual leave!

*I started work on the SHAC's code of standards which should be ready to sit alongside Landlord Accreditation as a way of driving up standards in the private rented sector through the operation of the SHAC.

*And finally watched Jen nearly choke a goose at the Sabbs visit to Cannon Hill Park (accidentally of course and the goose is fine!)

The SHAC

The mission statement and the financial model has now been set and we are about to enter into writing the operating standards manual and developing a code of standards for landlords’ houses to ensure that the desire to drive up the quality of private housing in Selly Oak remains at the heart of the scheme. We will also now go out to shop designers and get an image of what the unit will look like, while also starting to think about the recruitment of a lettings manager. When all this is done I will make a comprehensive power-point display to Guild Council. Landlords will be allowed to advertise in the SHAC no matter what but it will be made VERY clear to students which landlords are accredited as people and which of their houses meet the code of standards. This will provide a clear incentive for landlords to improve themselves and their houses.

Money Flushed Away: Reduce Hall Fees

We finally decided to facilitate many students including RAs and other involved students to take direct action around hall fees. We helped them run a large cross campus campaign to show the university the strength of feeling from students on the issue. There was a period of door-knocking for two weeks followed by a day of action. There were many media outlets at the day of action and a petition was presented to the VC by Mark Harrop President of Aitken Wing and Victoria Barber President of Mason Hall. The petition had over 2000 names on it and we had around 150 people on the march to support the campaign. It was a massive success in terms of activism and we engaged many students in direct action, the likes of which, the Guild has not seen in many years.

The outcomes of this led the university to take the four demands on the petition more seriously. The Guild has held meetings with the university and we have received commitments on some of the demands. The decision about Chamberlain is too far away for us to influence any university decision on the matter but they will take our concerns into account when it comes. The point about nominations agreements and the key criteria being cost has proved slightly irrelevant because of the lack of realistic alternatives to Liberty Living halls. However we have had a commitment to a benchmarking exercise with the university to ascertain where the university in terms of price of halls of residence fees. When this shows the university towards the top of the pile they have committed to change the status quo as we asked and reduce hall fees. HAS have also committed to establishing some model of accommodation bursary to help students, which would be advertised at the time of application. We will continue to push hard on this issue into the future.