Last Week / This Week

Welcome to your weekly round-up of who your elected officers have been meeting and what they have been doing to promote, defend and extend the rights of students.

The information below mainly focuses on meetings that your officers are attending with the University and external stakeholders.  If you are interested in finding out more about what they are working on check out their blogs or the Student Voice section of the website. You can also keep up to date by following UBU on twitter: @ubunews and #ubumeets.

For the next two weeks, the officers will be focussed on planning for and promoting the 2012 Annual General Meeting (AGM), which is set for Thursday 9th February from 2-5pm in the Anson Rooms at the Students' Union.  Come along and be the boss!

• Dom Oliver held a ‘fight night’ meeting to set the wheels in motion for the big Varsity event on March 9th 2012.

• Dom Oliver met with John Wilford (the new Healthy Lifestyle Manager at Sport, Exercise & Health) to discuss how they and UBU can work together to promote healthy lifestyles.
• Chris Ruff had a Mental Wealth meeting with University Support Services about where a student-led support group for mental health issues would fit in.

• Sophie Bennett also met with John Wilford from SEH to discuss working together on future projects including Mental Wellbeing Week (20-24 February).
• Chris Ruff attended a Queens Road Building project board to sign off on Tranche 1 of the plans (the University parts of the building and the foyer area) and discussed the name-change for the building - QRB officially rejected!

• Sophie Bennett met with Tracy Brunnock (University Development Manager for Diversity) to set the University's student focused equality objectives. Sophie also secured funding to support disabled students to participate in student activities – email ubu-welfare@bristol.ac.uk for more information.

• Dom Oliver held a meeting about the potential of a new weightlifting club. Dom also met with members of the Badminton to discuss new approach on the campaign for flexible sports passes. Email Dom for more details – ubu-sport@bristol.ac.uk.
• Chris Ruff attended a Block Grant negotiation meeting with the University finance department about increasing their levels of funding to UBU and emphasising our important role to student life.

• National Student Survey is now open!  Josh Alford is working with Student Reps and departments to promote the survey of final year students, which is used to inform campaigns by UBU officers and by both the Union and University to improve the educational experience of students at UoB. Find out who your rep is through the student portal.
• Chris Ruff attended a Health and Safety Consultative Committee.

• Max Wakefield had a tour of the Little Theatre at 33 Colston St to explore possibilities for redevelopment as a centrally located student activity space.
• Chris Ruff held a societies in schools meeting - interested? email ubu-activities@bristol.ac.uk

• Josh Alford and Student Rep Coordinator James Houston visited the trainee Vets at Langford to train their Student Reps and promote the UBU AGM.
• Max Wakefield met with Philippa Bayley at the Cabot Institute to discuss how they can work better with students.

• All the officers will be at the UBU AGM. Everyone should come along to have their say on how the Union is run and what the Union should be working on in the coming year.
• Max Wakefield will be attending the Engaged University Steering Group, this is the group that set the public strategy of the University.

• Sophie Bennett, Josh Alford and Gus Baker will attend University Council (the Trustee Board of UoB) to scrutinise major University decisions and the University's accounts
• Starting Friday (running through until Saturday) UBU hosts the Aldwych group - the Presidents and Education Officers from the Russell Group universities. The group will meet with UoB Vice-Chancellor Eric Thomas to discuss how Universities UK (of which he is president) consider the views of Russell Group students. The Group will also meet NUS representatives, share best practice and discuss common issues that are occurring locally and nationally.
• Dom Oliver will be holding further meetings around the upcoming Varsity Series. The first fixture kicks off this weekend with American Football at Beggars Bush Lane.
   

• 16-20 January // 23-27 January