Just like that, 2 updates in one week!

This definitely doesn’t mean I’m less busy than usual, but I owed you one, so here goes my attempt of keeping the blog up to date...

I think there’s been 4 major highlights since the last time we had a proper chat (without counting the finance and governance structure explanations, which I’m sure were real [digital] page turners for you).

First – I was re-elected as president! Officer elections seem a lifetime away now. I’m sure you saw the madness on campus – the banners, the speakers, the mascots each candidate had (I’ll stand by my statement that my campaign manager wearing a Santa Costume asking about people’s wishes was the best one). We had 19 candidates this year, a bit lower than last year’s 24. However, we did surpass the total number of votes (4626 last year versus 4885 this year), which added up to 22.58% of our student population. It might not sound like much, but that’s well above the sector’s average. So, thank you for participating! I hope you’ve been inspired to perhaps run for officer yourself or come engage with the SU more. I know all six of your current officers as well as the three new members of the team joining us in June would be more than happy to hear you out. Must add that doing my second year with David and Amber still around makes it all that much more fun.

Second – Hanna and I went to a meeting in parliament! We went to an NUS organised event with an All-Party Parliament Group (APPG) on students, which hosted a discussion on housing titled ‘A bed for every student’. It was a great chance to be involved in the national conversation and ask MPs to consider the implications of the housing sector as well as the Renters’ reform bill on student lives. I have not much more to add on this, unfortunately. It’s a ‘watch this space’ kinda update. We also got to meet Ben Palmer (who was community officer a few years back) who now works in parliament. He gave us a tour and got us into the house of commons debate on Gaza. For a politics graduate, you can imagine how interesting I found that.

Third – Hanna and I (again) had a meeting with local council! Many things were on the agenda. I actually wrote an article on Bath Time for it, so I’d recommend you read that for more details. But it was very interesting, useful, and most importantly, concrete actions followed from it. We happen to have a follow up meeting on Friday to speak logistics about the council facilitating student voter registration – this is especially important in the context of a general election year.

Fourth and final – I went to WonkHE’s event ‘The Secret Life of Students’ and actually got a chance to speak on stage! Find a picture of me giving my student story at the bottom. Essentially, I was there to tell my personal story as a representation on what international students go through. It was fantastic! Several people from different HE institutions, SUs and universities came up to me after to thank me about giving them perspective on international students.

That is all for now! Trying to go back to the bearable and readable updates, so tried to keep this one brief.

With Spring fast approaching my usual signature seems out of date. I’ll be trialling a few different ones in the next couple of updates. So, until next time, stay hydrated (?) and be kind to one another!

Much love,

Jiji x