Hi! 

Thanks for your YMC. 

I fully appreciate your concern and frustration with this. I was running 2 societies last year, so I do understand the workload and appreciate that its not the best timing. I'd like to walk you through my reasonings for the current timing.

1) As it is the first time we have done this, and we have had multiple reports of a similar nature to some of the topics in the training, we felt some urgency that this needed to be addressed. As current committees still have 6 months left, we wanted to ensure they are adequately prepared and informed for the next 6 months. This coincided with the next funding round and was the only time we could jump on before it was too late and we would have had to wait until the new committees were elected. 

2) Because its the first time we have done this, I also wanted to get as much feedback as possible on the training so that when we improve it for the next committee, it is up to speed. 

3) The overall timing of the training WILL be from Easter going forward, when the committees have been elected, and they will have most of the summer before the first grant funding round has opened to complete it as well. 

I hope this is clear enough and explains my reasons for this. I wrote in multiple emails and promotion as well to say that if people need more time, we can come to an arrangement, and that includes things like extra stress, etc. 

If you would like to arrange this with me, please send me an email at welfare@soton.ac.uk! 

Thanks,

Laura Barr 

VP Welfare and Community 

15/11/2019