Go for Experience

Hi, I'm Jim, Vice-President for BLBE.

I could be writing about being a sabbatical officer and all the things that I want to do over the coming year, my goals and desires, but, you can find all that stuff here http://www.salfordstudents.com/content/11257/about_your_union/the_sabbatical_officers/ and in various other University of Salford Students’ Union literature. Plus it would read very similar to what Ricky and Joe have written. Instead I want to write about the excellence of experience.

I’m not writing about experience just because I’m the ‘old man’ of the sabb team, turning 27 today, because that is not old at all. Just ask anyone in the cricket team whom the sprightly young man is, that is fielding in the covers and they will point to me as the youthful and energetic whippersnapper throwing myself around like a salmon (no, not the tinned variety).

I’m only writing about this now because I have just graduated in my degree in military history with a few years at university behind me. My university experience has many great benefits to it, and I count not least the nostalgic value. Being able to look back and say to yourself ‘yeah, that was a truly great time’ is a very fine thing indeed. The chance to meet lots of amazing people from lots of different places, the chance to live in a different city, the chance to study a degree were all great. But more so, if I had not come to university, I probably would never had taken up ice climbing, or stood on top of Mont Blanc, or had the opportunity to spend so much time visiting and climbing in some of the most beautiful parts of this country, or the chance to study and live in the Czech Republic for a year, or become a student mentor for international students, or be on the committee and help run a couple of sports clubs. There is many a story to go with all this. I wont bore you with them now, but suffice to say, that they were brilliant times.

The other worth of experience is its advantage and benefit in bolstering your degree. Doing lots of things and getting involved with various activities and groups will really add value to the experience of your time at university and you might find it very useful once you have finished and are set loose in the big wide world. After all, coming to university should be about getting an education, not just a degree. That education should include all the other skills and things you learn outside of the lecture theatre. Various skills that come from a whole range of ventures and opportunities you can do at university.

A friend of mine was recently telling me in the pub, how he had adopted a new philosophy of not saying ‘no’ to any new adventure or opportunity. Perhaps never saying no is impossible, but can I suggest to you, whether you are a new student here or a returning student, that if you are sitting in your kitchen or bedroom one evening and a friend asks you if you want to pop down to the Ultimate Frisbee Club one night, or asks you to join the Ski and Snow Sports Team or the RAG society, or if you are thinking about writing for the newspaper, or want to be on the student radio, or if you are thinking about being a student rep, or given the opportunity to study abroad or go on a work placement, or any one of a number of things: Then really think about it before saying no. You wont regret it. Not only will you find yourself having a wonderful time at university, but also you will have developed a great wealth of experience.

Jim

Joe’s turn

I thought that since both Matt and Ricky had blogged that it is time I should give it ago. So here is my attempt. Since Matt has covered most of what we do and can do I shall just do a quick introduction about myself.

My name is Joe Kirwin, I’m the Vice President for Arts, Media and Social Sciences and I’m only 5”6 which makes me extra cute.




What I want to do.

This is the important bit, what I want to do in my term in office. At risk of over simplifying my objective I want politicise the Students. I want students to be actively involved in how their Union is ran, I want them to campaign on what they believe in and to vote in both General and Union elections. This may all seem a bit wishy washy, well that’s because it is. It is my job to deliver these end goals and ensure above all else that students enjoy themselves.

Top Priorities include building strong links with the local community, campaigning for a more environmentally friendly and fair trade University and Union, build relationships with relevant trade unions to provide our students greater opportunities outside the University.

If you ever see me around feel free to question me on anything I’ve said. I shall be keeping you updated right here on what we’ve done to make your life a little bit more fun.

Hello from Ricky

Posted by Ricky:

So I am currently sat on a train on the way down to Bristol and I though what better opportunity will there be to write my first blog post.

The new team came into office on the 1st of July, and we are;

Matt Webber – President
Joe Kirwin – VP for Arts, Media and Social Sciences.
Emily Godfry – VP for Computer, Science and Engineering
Jim Dale – VP for Business, Law and the BUILT Environment

And there is me, Ricky Chotai – VP for Health and Social Care.

This year is the first year, of the Students’ Union new structure where the vice presidents move from portfolio base roles into faculty based roles.

So why the change I hear you ask?

The new roles now ensure the primary aim is to represent students and this is done by the new vice presidents being the lead representative within each of the faculties.
It is quite an exciting time really, as we are one of the first students unions to go through this process and I feel very lucky that I am going to be part of it.

Ricky Chotai who is he then?

I am 21 years old and currently I live in a rented house with two of my friends in Salford. I studied Business and Management and graduated 2 weeks ago. :)
Originally I am from Morecambe which is situated on the North West Coast and it is about 20 minutes north of Preston.

Anyway that is enough about me you’re probably what I have been doing over the last 4 weeks.

During the first week we spend some time team bonding, but also finding how we would work as a team over the next year. During that process we produced a working agreement in which we detailed on what you can expect from us as a team.

Over the last few weeks my main task has been to introduce myself to staff that play an important part in your time here at Salford. This includes Admission tutors to Associate Heads of Teaching (who are responsible for teaching within the schools).
The other big thing that me and the team have been working on has been planning for Welcome Weeks, we have some fantastic things planned and keep checking back to www.salfordstudents.com/welcome as details of all the events will be added shortly. I think that this year will see the best welcome weeks that Salford has ever seen! :D


On that note I think its time to finish this blog post, however if you are still about in Salford over summer and you need some help or you have a great idea for something we should be doing over the welcome weeks then feel free to pop in. We are located in University House and all of the officers share an office on the 1st floor.
Keep checking back to this blog as all of the officers will post on here, and you can also follow me on twitter. @SalfordVPHSC

Ricky

Welcome to Your Union

Posted by Matt

Hi and welcome to your Sabbatical officers blog. Here you’ll find out what we’ve been up to, what we’re going to be doing and what fun things are going on whilst we’re all at the University of Salford.

Firstly I should introduce myself. I’m Matt Webber and I’m the President of the Students’ Union for the next year. I also study a part time Masters in Scriptwriting for Television and Radio. Part of my role is to make sure we deliver on supporting and improving both the fun and slightly more serious elements of University life, listening and representing your views and opinions.

I realise quite a few new students may end up reading this whilst trawling through the website for all the info about Salford before September, so for their benefit I’ll try to explain briefly (because otherwise I would write for ages) a few of the things we have on offer.

Welcome Week 09: One of the first things you’ll notice during ‘Welcome Week 09’ is that we have a Student Activity Fair. Here you can find out info and join up to various Student Activity groups of sport and societies (there’s about sixty to choose from!) We also do a lot of one off activities which are called ‘Give it a Go.’ Essentially you can try something like Yoga, and if you like it and want to come back great but if not you haven’t committed yourself to anything. There are also trips like Paintballing and Alton Towers, basically a chance to meet people at Salford or go with mates, usually making a cost saving because tickets have been bought in bulk.

Also during ‘Welcome Week 09’ we’ll be getting involved in a variety of workshops and events, hopefully offering something for everyone. Info on that is constantly being updated on the Union website so take a look there.

The Sabbs: The next one to know about is your sabb team. That’s us by the way in the picture below.



From left to right is Jim, Joe, Me, Emily and Ricky.

Jim, Joe, Emily and Ricky are all Vice President’s of one of the four faculties and work with other students and staff in their faculties. There faculties are:

Jim is Vice President Faculty of Business, Law and the Built Environment

Joe is Vice President Faculty of Arts, Media and Social Science

Emily is Vice President Faculty of Science, Engineering and Encironment

Ricky is Vice President Faculty of Health and Social Care

Advice & Representation: We also have an Advice Centre which deals with Academic, Financial and International student areas and as part of the Representation part of a Students’ Union we also have Student Reps (one per course, per year) across the University. Student Reps work with everyone on their course to discover what the key good and bad things are on their course and then work on resolving or celebrating them with their lecturers and the Students’ Union. It’s something I did in my first year of Uni and it taught me a lot and I would recommend it to anyone studying at Salford to volunteer for.

Student Direct: The Students' Union also has a weekly newspaper during term time, anyone can write for it and again it's a really cool way to get involved and have something you've written put into print. If you want to write for the paper then drop me or any of the sabbs an email (contact details at the bottom of the blog) or find out more during Welcome Week.

Commercial Outlets: We also have Yours Cafe and Bar as well as the Pavilion Nightclub, all of which will have fun events on throughout the year and shops across campus. Again there is more info on those on the website. One of my favourite experiences in the Pavillion was getting gunged for charity. As you can tell... I enjoyed it!



There’s plenty more that I could tell you about but I’m going to leave it at that for now because I don’t want to go into information overdrive. But some of the aspects I’ll write about in the future include our AGM and ‘You Decide’(they can be fun!), elections, future one off events, and campaigns.

If you got any questions or want to introduce yourself in the meantime then please do drop me an email, call on 0161 736 7811, email me at president-ussu@salford.ac.uk or come in to University House and have a chat.