Status: Complete
When voting for student reps I noticed some seemed to be more popular posts than others, some I assume are necessary for the union. I was suprised to see that a reps for wellbeing/ mental health were not prioritised as a necessary position. There seemed to be no one to do night line (esssential for some students) or for wellbeing, no one even put themselves forward. Should the union be doing more to put this forward over things like sports rep or head of the union. Many people struggle at university with or without mental health issues. I was dissapointed that this had not been addressed as a real problem. If i was at uni more I would definatley be involved in this issue. As a post grad I am at uni very little and feel my time would be too limited. Having said that i would like to be involved somehow.
Hi, thanks for your question. Mental health and supporting students’ wellbeing is a big priority for the whole Union, and something I’ve been working on this year. I’m really pleased that we’ve now filled the Nightline and Wellbeing Officer positions (you can find out the results of the elections at https://blogs.susu.org/officers/2016/05/12/summer-elections-the-results/#content), so these students will play a big role working alongside the Vice-President Welfare next year. We will always provide support services such as The Advice Centre, Nightline and Peer Support and run campaigns such as You Are More Than (unionsouthampton.org/youaremorethan) to support students in difficult times and to raise awareness of mental health through events such as University Mental Health Day. These are the responsibility of the VP Welfare and the Advice & Representation Department and will run whether or not there are people in the Student Leader positions – but having those officers does mean we can get so much more done with even more student input. Increasing the promotion of these is definitely something I will pass on to the VP Welfare next year. One of the things I’ve put in place this year is to create ‘Action Groups’ on things like wellbeing, equality & diversity, ethics & environment – who will be running events and campaigns on important issues next year. They are designed to be flexible in terms of time commitment, so if you’d like to be involved get in touch (vpwelfare@unionsouthampton.org) and we can have a chat!
Sam Bailey
Vice President Welfare
Friday 27th May 2016 10:39am
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Exception: Call to a member function isStudent() on bool
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