Sports Development Zone (26th January 2015)

James Topping and Matthew Plant from Sport & Wellbeing was also in attendance.

Katie (KL) explained that Sports Zone has slightly overspent for zone budget for student groups; pressure to make sure the activities are staying safe, balancing with getting to matches. This is different to the other zones, for example, DCI can fund 100% travel, unlike the 50% Sports Development can fund for travel to matches and competitions. KL will be asking to re-jig the budget next week.

Sports Zone has no more to spend for the rest of the year (at capacity), but may be able to get extra from the other zones. This is partly because of the Insurance and BUCS entry increasing in price, which has had to be absorbed into the zone.

4.1. AU – KL explained that David (DL) had only just started his post so she would just run through what is happening with AU at the moment.

Coaches Forum discussed; KL asked Emma (EP) to provide more information – EP explained when the forum was (Thursday 29^th Jan at 6pm) and who was attending so far (9 people) with another email invitation sent out that morning for any others to attend. Matt (MP) said not many responded; KL understands now that it was the wrong approach to contact coaches through their clubs and would be improving on this next time so that we can correspond directly with coaches. Understands that it is the first Coaches Forum so will be working on that next time. KL said MP & James Topping (JT) very welcome. EP to email MP & JT invite to the evening.

JT advises that interacting with coaches is a large part of their role in S&W as development in sport as part of their agreement and important to show they are doing so for the Football Foundation and Eastleigh. JT advises shame not many field sports attending.

KL explained that teas and coffees will be provided, that it will be a chance to update coaches on where SUSU sees the sports strategy going and how it will benefit the coaches and how to improve. KL does not want to focus on the negatives but allow coaches to provide feedback for improvement.

JT advises that Ultimate Frisbee and Baseball have good coaching links. JT advises that Baseball want to start academy but also interested with coaching students (next step up from youth) so have a vested interest in the coaching opportunities. Overlap relationship between external and internal club – clarify the relationship – coaches seem to be the link.

DL suggested posters – may be a bit late to put these up, especially as we are not concentrating our marketing on the student population, but on the external coaches that provide their services. KL suggested that we may be able to do a quick poster for start of AU fixtures.

4.2. IM – Jamie (JW) advises that IM feedback form has been sent out to all participants, with 93 responses so far. Highlights points we can work on and improve.

Matches have started again (from 24^th/25^th Jan) – couple that need to be rescheduled as teams couldn’t field teams so soon after exams.

Matt (MP) asked if matches would be finished by the end of term or would run over – JW explained that it will be touch and go but should finish everything within the allocated IM time as long as there is no weather disruption. Weekend leagues – no weather weekends left, Wednesday do a couple of mini leagues to finish it off. Manage within space of time. JW explained that we have requested an extra half an hour for two Wednesdays in order to support a couple of mini tournaments.

4.3. Sports Participation – see section 5.1.

5. Sports Strategy – KL has created the Sports Strategy survey and it will be sent out this week – did not want to overlap with the IM feedback form. This will then provide a vision for sports strategy/experience board afterwards.

5.1. Charity Event – KL explained that Fight Night has turned into Fight Day, which will be incorporated into Varsity so will no longer be using this mass participation event as a Charity event.

KL brought discussion to the table – any ideas of mass participation event?

MP suggested 5k park run, from discussion with Scott McCarthy; JW suggested getting Surge Radio Station out as well. Could get involvement in Run or Dye event (suggested by RH); KL said could look into where this will be held and when. MP said it’s something everyone can attend or tie in with the weekly Common run (suggested by JW) which wouldn’t need as much organising. Just run round with buckets and integrate with the community. JW said that Touch Rugby attend the Common run.

KL said that she could work with Christie Matthews (Sports Participation Officer) to discuss further and work out potential ideas.

MP said that Laura O’Lochlan (works in Student Services) does park run; MP can get her to contact KL directly.

MP suggested mass boot camp/circuit – not so much around running, like Insanity. KL suggested it could be done at Wide Lane to encourage people to go to the facility and be aware of its being there. It could be a way to signpost Wide Lane to those who don’t usually use the facility. JW suggested we could get RAG involved as they could provide volunteers.

JT said that they used to have the Park Run at Wide Lane – if the mass participation event was held at the end of term, it wouldn’t matter if the ‘field was trashed’ because it gets re-seeded afterwards. Park Run would otherwise destroy the ground. Not everyone wants to be involved in just running, so would apply to more people.

MP suggested he can get in touch with Robin (instructor for Insanity)

KL thinks Christie would be leading it, so will look into options before the next meeting.

Team Southampton – bid for Team Southampton signage boards throughout the facilities. The University board liked this idea, but they are not funding until more support has been received from the different departments within the university – KL needs to get University Facilities and University Marketing involved. Will invite JT along as he has contact with the Facilities department. Board liked idea overall and KL said that Alex Neil (Pro-Vice Chancellor Education) especially liked the idea of Sporting Identity.

Shop space – half filled with Team Southampton kit and half for the Enterprise venture. Under Armour is sending over free stuff to assist in the opening of the Shop on Top. There will be a big order for a launch, so more people getting stash (recently there have been a lot more orders). It will be opening at the beginning of March and KL will have a large order at the start to boost the identity.

Teams are not all wearing kit for games, they may think that it is just for Varsity rather than whenever they represent the University. KL said that she needs to monitor and see who wears the kit and who doesn’t. KL suggested it could be something DL works on. DL agrees and said that there was no pressure or information at the beginning when kit was given to explain that kit had to be worn whenever representing the university.

Website – Under Armour will be providing the online shop, will be a kit store. It would be extremely expensive for us to do these ourselves. KL isn’t sure if we can put extra features on the website; i.e. timetables of matches’ etc. but she isn’t sure yet if this is possible as Under Armour are creating it primarily as a kit store. KL met with Director of Under Armour last week and they were very excited to work on the Team Southampton identity and website with us.

7.1. AU Ball – date set for 1^st May; invites to be sent shortly. Still need to arrange and sort awards. KL will be going through this with DL.

7.2. Sports Zone are currently preparing for IM Varsity and the IM Awards Evening (working out where and when). Need to discuss invites and VIPs. JW will be talking about this in the next IMC.

7.3. Varsity – Need to decide on final design of t-shirts happening currently and will be ordering just over 1,100 shirts. Evan Whyte (previous AU Sabb) advised that previous feedback given said that the t-shirts were too similar year on year and needed some distinction. KL will need to decide what to do with this over the next few days. Coaches are sorted but need to book them.

The tickets are £10 (up from last year), which includes t-shirt, transport, and night out afterwards. KL informed group that last year it was compulsory for competitors to purchase shirts but then could still go to event without getting a ticket. RH said from Portsmouth has to have t-shirt to get into venue, so we will have to as well if Portsmouth is that strict. We couldn’t do this last year as Wide Lane cannot be controlled in this way. Need to monitor this, KL to discuss with Portsmouth. JW said is t-shirt ticket to bus, but will they be able to get into venue – could make their own way. KL will need to inform everyone that the t-shirt is the ticket for everything.

Not reserved date for Varsity – set on Portsmouth. Absolutely fine, if Pompey can’t do it, it would be too much effort for us to arrange without the prior organisation.

7.4. Alumni Day – 25^th April; want it to be bigger than previous years. KL said that she is looking into opening the bar but will need to talk to Tony. Will be discussing options for the older generation alumni members within the SUSU buildings so that there is something for everyone (maybe something for families as well).

Alumni have always provided the t-shirts out of their budget, but could supply them with Team Southampton logo to make them feel part of the brand, and perhaps for the students to be able to purchase as well. JW suggested gold colour for Alumni as third colour of the Team Southampton logo – still part of the brand. KL suggested that it is white for monetary reasons and alumni pay for it out of their budget, but can imagine that the participants will pay £2-3 towards a nicer t-shirt subsidised by alumni funds.

Performance Sports – American Football wanted performance monitoring funding. KL explained that she couldn’t fund it then as had other priorities in the zone, but looked into the Hudl that they were describing. It is an American app that you can film matches and practice sessions on smart phone and then assess and analyse the strengths and weaknesses of the team and how to improve when uploaded onto computer. American Football uses this facility really well and is looking into funding from other sources.

KL explained wants to use the Hudl as a whole AU, and found that once we have bought enough for five sports they can monitor an unlimited amount of sports. It is £9,000 to start for all five sports for one year. KL is looking into crowdfunding through the University, who encourage Alumni to fund the project after 21% of the overall cost has been raised. KL would look to do the unlimited sports for a three year period (£27,000), primarily focusing on the Focus Sports and then opening out to involve others that are keen to be involved in.

The Focus Sports are currently working well and they are trying to make it more professional – getting proper feedback from coaches etc. They are putting together a report for monitoring attendance and performance throughout the year, of which Jack Beckett is leading (AU Development Officer). Update provided after first term complete. Current feedback from clubs is good. There is currently one or two attendance issues as KL initially offered clubs flexibility of time to use the facilities, but they weren’t given the right days to work around timetables.

Initiations – Last one written in 2003; in 2012 this was brought to Union Council to update but nothing was done. The rules are currently not strict enough and nowhere does it say that initiations in sport should be banned. KL will be taking a lead on re-writing policy to take to the next Union Council. DL to clarify situation – as he doesn’t think clubs will pay attention; but KL would like to tackle the drinking and ‘lad’ culture. Need to have a stance on it.

JT informed group that Rowing have a good model and that it is very formalised, could do a review into what clubs do and how to work the policy into realistic aims. KL suggests we need to make the AGM’s more formalised rather than them being held in Jesters etc.

RH asked when next IMC and AUC are – JW said he would be confirming date soon, but options are currently Thurs 29^th Jan and Fri 30^th Jan. Will be confirming when got confirmation from all committee members.

AUC to be organised – KL will be discussing what needs to be done with DL after the meeting so that he knows what to do.