Student Life Zone (2nd March 2016)

The committee agreed to approve the minutes of the previous meeting via email, as they have not been submitted to the website yet.

Nightline Officer:

• 14 applications received for new volunteers.
• No nominations received for Nightline Officer in Spring Elections, but has found two people who want to run in the Summer by-election.
• ‘Academic issues’ remains the most frequently occurring topic of calls to Nightline.
• So far this year, two thirds of contact have been via phone and one third via IM. Nightline have received over 600 calls totalling 192 hours.
• Successfully ran a monthly training session last week.

Housing Officer:

• Wants to end the year by creating information materials for incoming freshers regarding private rented accommodation, including how to find housemates.

VP Welfare:

• Attended a meeting with the Police Crime Commissioner and representatives from other local universities.

Sam informed the committee that University Mental Health Day is on Thursday 3^rd March and that Student Minds will be holding a forum theatre event and a meditation taster session.

Sam informed the committee that a date has not yet been decided, as we are trying to avoid clashing with the Student Communities Zone culture week.  Sam’s main questions to the committee were on how broad the content of the week should be and how it should be advertised to students.

The following ideas were suggested:

• Collaboration with Sexpression, a sub-group of MedSoc.
• STI testing on site, or self-testing kits to take away.
• Submit anonymous questions to a sexual health professional.
• Life drawing classes to promote body confidence – this would involve WSA.
• ‘Am I normal?’ photo wall.
• Using the over-arching theme of ‘good decisions’ and empowering students to make their own choices.
• Everything you weren’t taught about sex at school.
• Going out to clubs with an information stand and free items.
• Evening talks on issues relevant or interesting to students, such as sex work.
• Performances by Caravan Theatre.

Expect Respect project:

Sam explained to the committee that the Soton Speaks Up campaign on tackling sexual harassment is being developed into a long-term project which will be called Expect Respect.  One of the objectives of the project will be to incorporate the phrase Expect Respect into other relevant Union marketing.  George added that another core aim of the project is to ensure that all staff are trained to respond to a disclosure of harassment from a student.  We also aim to closely involve sports teams in the project.

Louise recommended a video campaign on reporting incidents of harassment which has just been launched by Transport for London and suggested that SUSUtv could make its own version for our students.  Louise also suggested that the project should include creating guidance for students who are worried about their friends.

The Vent About Your Rent survey will be deployed again this year, but it has not been decided exactly when this will happen or how long the survey should be open for.  The period before exams start in May was suggested.

The following suggestions were made for improvements to the survey:

• Add a question on how much students are spending on household bills.
• Add an opportunity to state if the property is SASSH accredited.
• Incentivise more people to complete the survey by having tiered prizes.
• Reduce the number of questions on the survey, as it is very long.
• Add questions specific to students at WSA.
• Add a question asking if they would recommend their landlord to SUSU Lettings.

Louise added on a separate note that it would be good to have a branch of SUSU Lettings at WSA.  Sam confirmed that this idea has been discussed before and that it would be beneficial, but that it is not currently a priority.

The University is considering the possibility of students automatically being contacted to ask about their welfare if they miss a certain number of contact points with the University, such as lectures, tutorials or assessment hand-ins.

The committee queried how this could practically be implemented on a large scale.  The committee felt strongly that it must be immediately clear to students receiving the messages that they are in the interest of welfare, not chasing students or checking up on them.  The messages should contain signposting to sources of support.

Louise queried if there was a mechanism for academic staff to raise a concern about one of their students.

Louise suggested that we replicate an initiative which she has seen at another university called Enhancement Week, a variation of a reading week where students have the week off lectures so are free to attend extra skills sessions and workshops, such as one managing stress and writing CVs.

Sam pointed out that these services are already offered by the Academic Skills Hub, the Careers Service and Enabling Service’s Wednesday Workshops, so the Union should just promote these rather than trying to replicate them.