Creative Industries Zone (9th May 2014)

Apologies as above.

Previous meeting minutes were checked and approved by the committee.

Katie explained about pre-sessional students and explained how they wanted to get more people involved with summer jobs and clubs or societies. She explained how they would like more societies to be around over the summer so that pre-sessional students can get more of an idea of what is available at the University as well as giving them the opportunity to continue with any societies over the summer period. Katie asked for volunteers or project helpers who would be willing to stay and do scheduled slots in this area. She explained that there will be a welcome magazine for pre-sessional students of a similar layout to the Freshers magazine, she handed out a sheet with ideas on content for the magazine – including a guide to Southampton part which would involve sending out a survey to current students so they can gather statistics to include saying which areas students like best.

 

JB asked about pod casts, Katie agreed. CD said she was around over summer and offered to help provide information on shows that would be available for people to either watch or go along to get involved with. Katie also explained about final parties in September and asked if anyone was around then to help with those. SE said he is also around for most of summer and offered his help. JB asked for a brief explaining what she wanted and what opportunities were available to get involved so that he could post it in the Surge group so that Surge would know about it and have an opportunity to volunteer if they want to get involved. Katie said she will sort out a brief and distribute it generally so that groups can pass the information along to their members.

Action: Committee members to contact Katie about getting involved with pre-sessionals.

Action: Committee members to distribute pre-sessional brief (when supplied) to their respective departments to encourage involvement.

Katie left the meeting.

Performing Arts:

LE spoke about feedback. She said the awards might be changed as they go as it’s the first year of them being held. LE said the AGM went well apart from having a lot of people leave half way through, she also said they are holding a meet and greet next Wednesday.

Student Led Media:

JB said SLM has been voted one of the best departments which proves they’ve had a good year. He said the AGM was held yesterday, 8th May, and went well with all positions being filled except for…

Student Led Film Production and Cinema:

CD said SUSUtv has been doing well having won three awards and a great Media Ball. She said the AGM had been held and all positions were filled except for tech. She said they will be electing and executive next Wednesday which should result in at least one person for everything. CD mentioned the ETAs last night and said the SUSU AGM was currently being organised but they have a crew ready to cover it.

Visual Arts:

CG said he thinks all the AGMs have now been held and so far seem to have gone well, as did the exhibition. CG said regarding the exhibition he has a lot of information to pass on to JH and that the events team have got a greater reach.

Written Arts:

SE said Wessex Scene went on the BBC again for covering the explosion at halls, he also said they went to SPA and although they didn’t win anything it was worth going so they could learn what the criteria were for next year’s awards. SE said they held their AGM which went well and he is confident next year’s team will work well.

DM corrected the agenda typo for this section, should read ‘Summer and Freshers Event’ not ‘Freshers Event’. DM said the summer event on the 6th June will be a Union Films outdoor screening but said he would like to get some local bands and musicians involved during the day as there is an end of exams event planned for the afternoon and the UF screening. SE asked about having a battle of the bands type event. DM said this event is still being organised.

 

DM said the Freshers event request came for Claire Gilbert and asks for ideas on what events each department would like to run during Freshers. NT said outdoor screening and a Freshers fair stand are important. DM reiterated they don’t need concrete plans yet, just an idea of possible events. JB said they would like to keep a presence around University with Pod Casts being  useful for people who either don’t want to go out or are ill during Freshers week. JB also suggested something similar to the Summer event, with an outdoor screening and live music but admitted this might be a bit ambitious but equally could be a good exhibition of what they do anyway.

 

CC asked about the activities showcase, specifically asking JB if it would be ok to have an area next to their stage for the bands to use, explaining that their performance would need to be amplified via the university equipment. JB said he was fine with that but that he would no longer be in charge by that point so he would pass it along to Hannah.

 

SE said there could be an opportunity to put issues of Wessex Scene in the Freshers packs. CD bought up the point that Winchester bunfight might be during our bunfight week but was not sure.

 

LE said about keeping up in the queue but said it’s hard as there are a lot of societies with various taster sessions, she gave the example that the Theatre group might want to put on a show, and said she would like to leave it to the PA groups to decide individually what they want to do. LE also said she would like to have a PA branded committee there with booklets of upcoming shows and performances but that that would be a PA committee thing.

DM introduced the next point on the agenda and explained he wanted feedback on what went well and what can be improved upon from the training week, he also mentioned that CC will be involved with future training although she was not for their training week.

 

CD said she had wanted to hold a committee meeting straight after the week but had to wait. She said the plant thing didn’t help at all and suggested not running that event next time as well as drawing people inside and outside. CD said more time training to set up live would have been of more benefit; she also suggested that having a couple of days during the week to do their own thing would also have been good – i.e. for them it would have been a couple of days setting up live as a departments and having joint socials with the other departments in the evenings.

Points to consider: Individual committee training days.

 

JB agreed with the ideas CD suggested, also highlighting that he would have preferred more time to do training within departments rather than all training across departments. JB said he liked that the week was broken down into sections but said that the finance section was not relevant to everyone and that there were probably other sections this was true for. JB said that publicity training might have been better as that is relevant to all departments, he suggested more tailoring during the week for individual departments as at times the week felt like the training was too generic.

Point to consider: More tailoring of training to the individual departments.

 

LE said she didn’t feel the PA fit in at the training week in terms of what they do; she said it felt like a lot of the training was dedicated to Presidents of societies where PA is separate from that. LE said she would like for presidents and heads of the committees to be trained but that the training week needs to be split into days – for example a bonding session for the CIZ committee members on one of the days without having the individual committees within that being involved as well. LE agreed there needed to be more tailoring of training, she also suggested having separate sessions i.e. President Sessions, Treasurer Sessions etc.

Point to consider: Consider separate training sessions for Presidents, Treasurers etc.

 

NT said shorter would have been better and suggested giving a day for the committee training meeting. He asked why it was just them and suggested including other committees in the training week. DM said they have to draw a line because of time and costs, LE suggested inviting all the presidents of committees rather than all committee members.

Point to consider: Shorter training times.

 

SE suggested moving more towards a conference structure with specific training on how to do various things; he suggested having a day dedicated to seminars and making more of an event of the evening socials as they felt too side-lined this year. LM said her committee said they liked the week as a whole but didn’t find it very helpful. JB suggested having the first day as an individual committee bonding and training day and work up to having broader training later in the week so that by the end of the week everyone is brought together for joint training. JB also said more focus is needed on individual groups before building up to collaborations.

Points to consider: More emphasis on joint evening socials, and implement individual committee training days.

 

NT mentioned that timings need to be considered, explaining that during Freshers a solid week of 9-5 days would be a bit much. CG said different groups would benefit from different forms of training with some groups not being interested at all and others sending just their President and Treasurer. CG suggested adding some compulsory training to the week so that it gets it out of the way before term starts and introduces them to the idea of having to think about areas such as Health and Safety.

Points to consider: Change the timings and add some compulsory training events.

 

CG also mentioned timings, suggesting that on days following a social night out the training could be pushed back so there was a later start time the following day but also a later finish to compensate. LE said a conference style training where some seminars are compulsory and others are optional would be a better format. SE said it needs to be stressed that the training won’t be optional and that if people are signed up for it they should be there for all of it, or as much of it as possible, as there is a reason for holding the training week.

Points to consider: Start times after social night outs, possible conference style training. Emphasise training is not optional if you are signed up to attend.

CC asked for any feedback on the format, she suggested starting with the process and implementation and stressed that it is important to review this and say whether there is anything they wanted to do but couldn’t to be passed on to their successor.

 

CD said she used it but didn’t complete it. She said she thought they were useful but elections interfered with her plan, she said it needs someone to ask to review the plans after elections. DM suggested plans within elections as having its own category.

 

NT said it would be useful to do the plans after exams on a one-to-one basis with their successor rather than half way through the year so that they can get a good idea of what to take forwards.

 

JB said the plans were useful but that he hadn’t considered degree work, holidays and deadline limitations when making the plan; he suggested making people aware of these limitations when making their plans and gave the example of incorporating the rough guidelines for exams and deadlines etc.

 

LE said she had hers early and was glad of it as the entire PA committee discussed what should go onto it which worked well. She said it would have been useful to distinguish between long and short term aims and suggested having either another page or a separate form for long term aims.

 

CG said for him this should be something to come through group committees rather than the CIZ as he found the most effective ones were those with a group (for example Student Groups Committee) next to their name.

 

CD said it would be nice to have one looking back at what they have actually accomplished, LE said it would be worth handing over to the new representative what they had managed to do and what ideas they wanted to do but weren’t able to achieve.

DM said that some group attendance was good while others showed weaker attendance. LE said as a whole it was a good idea. CD said March was a good month but the end of March was lots of deadlines so suggested rescheduling this for a different month. JH suggested moving it to during Freshers and just before elections when people have less commitments and more free time.

 

DM said the first welcome would be good to have graduates and alumni from each area present. CD said it would be good to have a drinks and mingling session, she said one-to-ones with people running the sessions would be helpful and suggested being able to book slots of five minutes with the person who had given the talk to gain CV or show reel feedback. CD also mentioned that freelance finances were touched upon but not explained and said it would have been nicer to have it spelled out in more detail. LE agreed involving graduates is a good idea but suggested having experienced people with a variety of stories first. LM also said the CV session was very popular with everyone who went.

 

CC said she had gone through the timings and that the publishing panel was well attended but they had received feedback that the mix on the panel could have been better, LM said she had been told it was a bit short. CC said the mix might have been too broad, SE said the mix was not too broad but it could have been more focused with a direct line of questioning directed to each candidate. CC suggested having a clearer introduction to explain why each panel member was there, she also suggested moving it to just after elections although that didn’t mean it would be good for advertising it.

 

DM said it was good for the first year running it but that there was lots to improve upon for future events. CC said she will be getting next year’s committee to think about it a lot quicker and forward names to her faster so it can be better planned. DM agreed and specified the importance of forwarding contacts, for example Surge contacts, to CC quicker so it would be easier to book them for it. JB said having more time to plan would help them prepare for it better. CC said it might also be worth coinciding it with NASDA to come during the panel. DM explained that although it occurs within a season the events are sporadic.

Action: Look at moving the Creative Industries Careers Season to earlier in the year.

DM said with regards to one-to-one handovers he will be sending out messages in the next few weeks to arrange to discuss how they felt the year has gone and if the handovers being successful.

Action: DM to contact other committee member to arrange one-to-one reviews.

 

CD requested moving the SUSU AGM away from exams in future as getting people to do 8-5 days of work on a live show two days before exams is hard to organise. DM agreed. CD suggested holding the AGM straight after Easter as people are back and more willing to help.

Action: To look into moving the date of SUSU AGM closer to Easter and further from exams.

 

CC said to SE that they are struggling with storage space. SE made a note to sort it out.

Action: SE to contact CC regarding storage space.