Hi.
If you’ve missed my signature weird and wonderful email autoreplies – I have been away in central Europe – across Hungary, Slovakia, Czechia, and Poland on a study trip with Wonkhe to learn all about how different SUs function, what they do well, and what practices we can frankly steal from them.
Look, I am going to be 1000% honest with you as I write this blog dear reader – I am exhausted. For good reason too – four countries, six cities, five days – my first international flight (keep in mind, I have only flown once before this, for an hour, and I got Quite Bad vertigo), and approximately 8 hours across those 5 days for all sightseeing and self-care. It is an absolute terror for a slow morning routine girlie like me, and yet I’m ultimately glad I went – because I learnt so much.
But, seeing I’m sleepy, and you’ve made your way through that rambling intro, let me give you just three things that stuck with me
ONE – Nothing about us without us
Something that kept popping up again and again across all these different unions was the sheer amount of student representation at all levels – it wasn’t rare to see high-level decision-making bodies like senate having 20% of their numbers being students at a minimum – whereas here in Bath, senate is three officers (Pres, Ed, and PG) alongside one (ONE!!!) nominated student.
(Senate - by the way, is like the second highest decision making body in the University after Council)
Excluding routine observers (that’s people who often turn up for their expertise or support but aren’t OFFICIALLY part of senate) theres about 40 members – meaning student representatives make up just 10% - half of the minimum we have been seeing all week. If you take into consideration that both Education and Pres tend to be students who have just finished their undergrad studies, it means that at any one time, students who are still in study (or at least, wrapping up their dissertation or final year project) sits at two – or 5% of the membership.
It kind of blows my mind – and I know theres a lot I need to consider alongside it – like the close contact officers and our senate rep have with other student leaders like our Academic Exec and SUmmit meaning we are by proxy representing so many more people, but there really is something about being in the room where it happened – right?
TWO – We are all struggling to make sure students know their rights, even when it is embedded in law
When we got to the University of Silesia in Katowice we were greeted with a glorious array of biscuits, cups of English Breakfast tea (you never realise how much you miss it until its gone) and an SU President specialising in law.
This is relevant, I swear. You see, in Polish law, all students must be fully informed of their rights – the stuff we are currently fighting for y’all to consistently have in your inductions via the Top 10. This means that all students are told in comprehensive detail how everything from extensions to appeals work – something that seems so basic but I would love to see embedded. This admittedly isn’t perfect – according to the Pres the average student wouldn’t necessarily remember it so many months later when they need it – but the resources are there, and that is a great start.
THREE – It is easy to get exhausted, and it is totally valid to want to just kinda -avoid it-, but we need to keep talking about student mental health
While we were travelling through Europe, we kept hearing stuff that made us just GROAN with disappointment at the UK system – tuition fees being mainly subsidised by the government, gaining points (and therefore money off tuition or towards living costs and scholarships) for getting involved with your community, and amazingly cheap accomodation which means fewer students are working alongside study – but one thing we seem to do better is mental health.
When asking about mental health, something that kept coming up was this concept of “it doesn’t exist, because we don’t talk about it”. It really just drove home the concept that by continuing to talk about it, to advocate, to spearhead all things mental health, this is where our strength lies. Now, I could dive into all the complexities of the mental and emotional load that comes with this, but seeing I promised I would keep this post short and sweet I will leave it here for now – with a reminder of how proud I am of y’all for continuing to fight the good fight.
Signs for this week – the countries we visited as part of the trip !
TTYL !
Amber x