SU President Blog

A Key Guarantor Scheme Win

Mon, 16 Mar 2026 16:29:15 Z

A New University Run Guarantor Scheme for Students Who Need It Most

Hi everyone its your favourite Officer Trio Sanya, Benji and Izzy here to give you even more amazing news!

We’re really pleased to share an update that will make a big difference for many Students navigating the housing market and put money back into Students pockets when they need it the most. Thanks to our Lobbying inside and outside University meetings, The University will be introducing a new University-run Guarantor Scheme for students who often face barriers when trying to secure private accommodation. This scheme will support International students, student carers, Widening Participation Students, and estranged students; groups who often struggle securing a UK-based guarantors. Without one, students can end up paying huge upfront costs or paying 600£ on average to use a third party guarantor scheme.

Under this new University scheme, eligible students will be able to use the University as their guarantor for Bath based lettings. This scheme will only cost an administration fee of 75£ which will on average, put 525£ back into Students' pockets!

It’s a practical step that removes a financial barrier and makes renting in Bath that bit more accessible. We know how stressful the housing process can be, so anything that reduces cost and uncertainty is a win.

The SU and The University will share more details soon about how students can apply and who’s eligible. For now, we just wanted to let you know this is coming and that it’s a direct result of feedback we’ve heard from students over the past year (It was a Top 10 issue back in 2015!).

If you’ve got questions or experiences you want to share, come chat to us.

Your Favourite Officers,

Izzy, Sanya and Benji x

Meeting with WECA 101

Tue, 17 Feb 2026 09:43:30 Z

On Thursday 8 January, Izzy and I sat down with Helen Godwin, the Mayor of the West of England Combined Authority (WECA). It was our first proper opportunity to speak with her since she took office, and we wanted to make sure students’ voices were firmly on her radar. We began by asking about her plans for the region and how she sees them affecting students directly. As you might expect, the answers were quite broad and unspecific but it’s opened the door for us to continue raising issues directly with her.

One of the biggest frustrations we highlighted was WECA’s long-standing reluctance to fund student-specific transport schemes. Despite the fact that students make up a huge portion of bus users, WECA has historically avoided supporting routes or subsidies designed with students in mind. We pushed this point hard. After the meeting I followed up with an email directly to Helen laying out the case for WECA funding for the U4 route so it can continue running regularly next year, rather than slipping back to an hourly timetable, which would be a disaster for students who rely on it (UPDATE: I am happy to announce that U4 has secured funding until next year).

Izzy also brought up the proposed changes in the local plan around three-bedroom HMOs. Students are understandably worried about how these changes could restrict housing options and drive up costs. Helen told us she would speak personally to Kevin Guy, the leader of the local council and Deputy Mayor of WECA, about the issue. It’s not a promise of action yet, but it’s a direct line to someone who can influence the policy, and that’s a start. So although we don’t have any direct immediate change, it’s great that we’re starting to build these important relationships and we will continue to push on the big issues that really affect you!

Watch this space for further updates!

The Future of 6WS

Wed, 12 Nov 2025 16:38:46 Z

Hey again!

It's Benji and Izzy your SU President and Community Officer / Your favourite officer duo! Since we match our fits almost everyday we thought we’d bring you another collab.

We’ve been asked by the University to consult students on the future of 6 West South. If you’ve ever walked through it, you’ll know it’s not exactly the most inviting space. It’s underused, a bit awkward, and doesn’t really reflect what students need or want from a shared campus space.

So, we’re starting a conversation. We want to turn 6WS into something better, a space that works for you. Somewhere you can chill, collaborate, meet friends, or just take a breather between lectures.

Fresh off our trip to Irish SUs, we have brought back so many new ideas and inspiration we want to see here at Bath. Their third spaces particularly stood out to us. What is a third space you might be asking? Not home, not lecture halls, but something in between. These are student-led, flexible, and genuinely useful. That’s the kind of thinking we want to bring to campus. Student owned spaces.

We don’t want to guess what you want. We’re here to listen. Over the next few days, we’ll be gathering feedback through Instagram polls, in person feedback at Happy Hour on Friday and via email. Whether you care about design, accessibility, sustainability, or just want a better sofa, we want your input.

This is your space. Let’s shape it together!

We have attached below some pictures (It is an open plan squared room approx 15m x 15m, several windows with natural lighting)

- Your favourite Officers Izzy and Benji <3

Benji’s Bath Bus Breakdown

Thu, 18 Sep 2025 15:50:34 +0100

Hey everyone! Its everyone's favourite Bus enthusiast here to tell you about all the changes to the Bus routes this year. Last year I got elected on a platform that prioritised Buses as the number 1 issue facing students. After a year of meeting with stakeholders within the Uni and First Bus I am delighted to update on on all the changes to University buses in Bath this year, so here’s a quick rundown of what’s new, what’s gone, and what that means for you.

U3 – The new kid on the block
This is now the main link between Bath Spa and Uni of Bath. Think of it as a Frankenstein monster that combines both the U1 and U5

U4 – Southdown’s hottest new ride
The U4 is now a supped up new 22 that runs twice as regularly and now goes beyond Southdown, through Whiteway and Twerton, all the way to Bath Spa. Connecting the South of Bus up to campus

The Old Favourites (With some compromise)

U2 – Oldfield Park
As with all great changes, it does come with a cost. If you’re living around Brougham Hayes or Lower Oldfield Park, you might be annoyed to hear the U2 doesn’t stop there anymore. Instead, your nearest stop is now St James Cemetery

TL;DR

U3 = new big route, with double-deckers.

U4 = replaces 22, runs through Southdown → Whiteway → Twerton → Bath Spa.

U2 = no longer serving parts of Oldfield Park.

U1 = still the backbone, but timetable tweaks.

As with all change there will innevitably be issues that pop up, please email me at SUPresident@bath.ac.uk so I can continue working on these issues for you!

Please keep up to date on University of Bath (Bath Unibus) | First Bus

Handover 101

Fri, 27 Jun 2025 16:22:13 +0100

After 3 intense weeks, the handover period has ended and the fresh team are now officially your Officers!

I went through handover this year with a different perspective this time around having been your Community Officer. It was truly quite a surreal experience knowing that a year had already flown by since I started. It genuinely felt like it was only yesterday, I was entering the Norwood-esque SU meeting room for the first time (2 hours early). With sessions ranging from SU Finance to EDI and Trustee training, it truly is a brain dump for all the new Officers. However we are grateful for having such helpful staff, and outgoing Officers spreading their wisdom (even if it at sometimes, questionable). Ensuring that the new team felt supported along every step of the way.

People ask me all the time "What does Officer Handover look like" and "What should I know before starting the role" and to be completely honest with you (I hope this doesn't shatter the illusion) but not much. Handover is designed to take any student who has engaged in SU Activity whether that be through Sport, Art or even working behind the beloved SU Bar, into a well-rounded SU Officer that is looking out for the needs and interests of all students. That does not however mean it is easy, or doesn't take effort, but rest assured with the right motivation and drive any student can become an Officer.

Getting to work and spend time with the new team has been an absolute delight throughout the past 3 weeks. Helen is as bubbly as ever, Sanya has mentioned dancing more times than I can count, Angus has already started the construction of his new 20,000 capacity sport stadium, Sam has said Hej enough times to make me think I was in an IKEA and Izzy is already demanding that Volleyball gets preferential treatment (Angus assures us they won't). Passion and motivation radiates from all the new Officers through their questions and willingness to get stuck in.

I am really privileged to be leading such an energetic and motivated team, I truly can't wait to see all the meaningful change they make within the SU and wider Uni.

- Your new SU President Benji

The last one

Wed, 18 Jun 2025 11:23:59 +0100

And just like that, two years, and 43 blog posts later, my time as president has come to an end.

I just want to spend my parting lines saying a few things...

First, I want to update you on handover briefly. The incoming officer team has been busy with loads of different sessions that we specifically designed to set them up for success in their year ahead. Some of the sessions have been: effective leadership, power and influence, a rundown of the demographics of our student body, advice and support and how to signpost people, the governance and finance structure of the SU, public speaking, and plenty of group and individual handover sessions so they can take over where we left off. Their brains have officially melted. Starting on Monday, they’ll be ready to smash it and I’m sure they’ll continue to make the SU at Bath the best one in the country – and soon, the world.

Second thing I wanted to do was give you a short update on all the things I’ve been up to as I get ready to leave Bath (and I mean on top of selling all my stuff and moving to London).

Wrapping up the top 10, with the officers, and with PVC for Student Experience, Cassie Wilson. Here’s our joint blog on it: https://blogs.bath.ac.uk/pvc-student-experience/2025/06/10/progress-through-partnership-reflections-on-the-su-top-ten-2024-25/

Organising, running and looking after all things handover. And my, what a task that has been!

Had my final meetings with different university departments and staff members – including people in university council – about how to continue SU-Uni links beyond my time. All ready for Benji to take over!

There’s been other bits and bobs, but I think these are the main ones.

Third and finally, I wanted to thank you all for the best two years of my life. They were challenging and very tough days, but this role made me grow infinitely as a person and as a professional. I will always treasure my memories working at the SU Bath. I will also, forever be grateful for the trust you all put in me when you elected me back in 2023, and for the vote of confidence in my work that you gave me when you re-elected me in 2024. Serving Bath students has been the biggest honour and privilege of my life. I can only hope to make you all proud in the future. I hope these posts were useful insight into the officer life and work.

With nothing else to say, I’ll leave it here – this time for good. Please do reach out through LinkedIn if I can ever be of any service to any of you. Have a lovely summer. Stay (forever) blue and gold and be kind to one another.

Much love always,

Jiji x

The one with 'the State of the Union'

Fri, 06 Jun 2025 10:53:16 +0100

As promised, this one is just the speech I will make for the first ever 'State of the Union' address to university and SU staff.

Hope you find it an interesting read.

Good morning.

Let me begin by welcoming you all. Welcome to our university staff, council colleagues, SU staff, students, and colleagues from B&NES and the SCP. I am delighted to have you here with us.

Let me also spend a minute thanking the thousands of student leaders and SU staff who make events like this possible... It is them who share with me the vision of student life at Bath that I stand before you to share.

During the next few minutes, I’m hoping to take you on a journey.

I don’t mean a journey of emotions, or a rollercoaster of narrative and abstract ideas.

When I invite you to join me on a journey, I mean one of reflection, understanding, and finally, envisioning, of the student experience at the University of Bath.

In 1965, when the Bristol College of Science and Technology moved to Bath, and eventually received its royal charter as the Bath University of Technology in 1966, there was already a Students’ Union president working in the background – to gain recognition for the student movement, gain spaces on the newly built campus for student activity, and even give officers a sabbatical year to dedicate themselves to pursuing the student agenda. All these things were achieved in the 1960s and 70s, and from there the SU’s space, its mission, and its relationship with the university have continued to evolve.

From the opening of our first shop in 1975, our evolution as a union and our ability to support and represent students has been enabled by the university’s belief and respect for student voice in shaping our own experience. By 1989, the SU was running a complete week dedicated to induction: freshers’ week. In 1991, during the university’s 25th anniversary, the students’ union had its first female president. In 1993, the vice-chancellor agreed to give the union the space and permission to run a bar and nightclub on campus.

Step by step, brick by brick, the collaboration between the University and the SU built one of the strongest foundations on which we’ve rested our emblem as an institution: a fantastic student experience. This line of success can be attributed to hundreds, if not thousands, of small moments and decisions. Now, I will do my best to highlight a few we can be especially proud of.

The top 10, the university’s yearly commitment to empowering student voice and allocating senior level staff resource to our student agenda sends an essential message to the student body: we care about what you have to say, and we want to turn your voice into actions. Year on year, the top 10 is a success for us all, and I thank the University administration for their ongoing committment. The top 10 is not only the envy of the SU

sector, but it’s also the most powerful influencing tool known to us from the whole student movement in the country.

The addition of pronouns on library cards, the building of the 3G pitch, and the trialling of an international student early arrival programme are just a few examples where the top 10 has resulted in clear wins for students.

The univesity’s response to the pandemic, also allowed NSS scores to remain significantly above the sector’s benchmark in the student experience space. On more than one occasion, the university committed to financial reparations and rebates for students when the offer by the university had not been what was originally promised. Students recognized that the University made decisions in good faith, placed a tangible value on the student experience, and did not shy away from taking hard decisions. Those bold actions are reflected in how the university has done in national rankings. Consistently within the national top 10 for the last seven years or so in a field driven by reputational capitol more than anything else. Bath’s reputation and clear value proposition is what attracts talented home and international students every year.

Students which contribute to the campus community, add perspectives and back-stories that enhance the educational experience.

Now that we’ve set the scene, let me guide you on the next stage of this journey.

I am deeply aware of how tough times are for the higher education sector. I know all the pressure that we are all under to deliver on budget, find savings where possible, and give students and staff the same offer with decreasing resources. It can be daunting to think of the challenges on the horizon where larger societal factors are effecting campus and student life, such as the cost of living crisis, housing shortfalls, and the tenor of the discussion around immigration.

I also know the value that we have increasingly put on international rankings and our global reputation. As the vice-chancellor and the executive team in the university have eloquently portrayed, remaining globally competitive and improving our links to different organisations, governments, and countries is what will support us in achieving our other strategic aims: foundations for the future, and building on our strengths.

It is that final strategic aim that inspired me to address you today: we cannot sacrifice the power, the value, and the impact of our student experience at the expense of any of our other aims.

Global rankings based on research, citations per faculty member, academic reputation, the faculty to student ratio, and the reputation of an institution as an employer are all enticing and certainly worth pursuing. But isn’t something missing?

Think about word of mouth, and how prospective students decide which university to attend and in which country? What do we want them to hear?

What is more inspiring? Our students and alumni saying, “it was the most enriching time of my life, socially, academically, and morally” or seeing that QS and THE ranked us in the top 100 group rather than the top 150?

All this is not to say the pursuit of a higher ranking is not worth while. It is. But to be clear: our strength, by definition, on which we should build all others, is our student experience.

Our university’s motto – generatim discite cultus, “Learn the culture proper to each after its kind” - I think sends a beautiful message. Understand and appreciate the role that each of us play in our environment; in making this community, this space, and our world, the best it can be. It has shaped our mission as a union: to empower students to change the communities they’re a part of for the better.

In protecting the strength of our student experience, recognising our roles is at the centre of our success.

The SU can and will continue to be the hub for student voice. We pledge to remain devoted to pushing the student agenda while reasonably considering the university’s constraints and opportunities. We pledge to be the blunt voice in the room. We pledge to mediate, where necessary, between students and the institution. We pledge to recognise injustice, speak up when necessary, and to suggest a better way forward.

But for us to be able to do all these things, we need to continue to be recognised as the only stakeholder that can represent students, as is not only recognised by this university’s culture, but dictated by the law.

Together We Shape Tomorrow is a massive success in this space. After almost a year of collecting data, we came up with the six core ambitions that could enable us to become the best student experience in the world. We have the strong conviction that this can be true, if the university decides to make its own pledges.

Today, university colleagues, I invite you to pledge to look after student experience as the thing that identifies Bath as what it is. I invite you to pledge that, under the significant pressures of the sector, you’ll continue to look at our student experience scores, be proud of where we’ve gotten to, and strive to be even better. I invite you to pledge to make that satisfaction with life at Bath universal – so no student from underrepresented backgrounds, students that are distant learners, or students that are here to do their research, will look at Bath as anything other than their home.

And, if you let us, the Union and all the students we represent will take the lead in areas where the University cannot. I invite you to join us, to work collaboratively, and at every

step of the process, we’ll support you where we can and expect the same in return. Together, we’re not powerless to confront the challenges facing higher education today. On Immigration, the cost of living, and housing shortfalls – the broader conditions of society which effect recruitment and student persistence to degree completion – we should have a unified and cohesive approach centred on student experience, and we should be actively engaging the local council and area MPs. Let us continue to show to the world that we’re leaders in this moment.

I appreciate that, despite my saying that I was not attempting to pull at your heartstrings this morning, I’ve been carried away by the possibilities of the partnership – and, what’s even more important, the possibilities of student life at Bath.

Let me pull myself back again and land this in concrete terms. How do we turn these heartwarming sentiments into practical change?

The first step is appropriate resource. And no, this is not a cry for more money (though we would certainly never reject any). Instead, this is an invitation to get you all to properly look at our areas of work, look at your areas of work, and ask yourself the question – are we replicating efforts? Are we attempting to do things that could be better achieved by students? Whenever the answer to this question is yes, we’ll happily support you in empowering students to achieve things for themselves.

The second step is recognising what things need to stop. Where initiatives and services aren’t effective, we want to encourage you to come ask us, the students, what can be done to improve them, change them, or perhaps stop them. We will be honest and say when we think this, too, should be run by students. This step, admittedly, is significantly harder to achieve. A partnership built on trust can enable this change in culture to naturally emerge.

The third step is recognition of our realities. Collectively, we don’t excel in every space. We do get representation wrong for some of our communities, and we haven’t gotten it right when it comes to the offer that we give them and the way we ask them to engage. The continued belief in the SU-university partnership is, in my opinion, the only way to tackle this problem. When we speak to each other, share resource, and respect each other’s ability to influence, we’ll improve our offer.

I’m sure everyone can think of more steps and perhaps better ways to continue this journey.

In this, my final address to you as president of the Union, I can only encourage you to keep this conversation going.

My five years at Bath have been of complete self-development and transformation, constant challenge to myself and to others, and of the emergence of an overwhelming conviction that Bath, under the right leadership and with well-reasoned decisions, will be recognised globally as the best student experience in the world. And wow, what a reputation that will be.

Thank you all for your time, for your support during these two years, and for everything you have done for students in this university. Please do stay in touch past my time in Bath.

If anyone has any further questions, we’ll linger around the stage for a few more minutes.

Thank you.

See you at the end of handover, for one last dance.

In the meantime, stay tanned and be kind to one another.

Much love,

Jiji x

The one where 'Jiji smashes 13.1 miles' and the king shakes her hand

Wed, 21 May 2025 16:04:26 +0100

And just like that, the last month as officers is upon us...

This past fortnight has been madness:

We spent four days up in the North visiting Sheffield, York, Salford, Manchester Metropolitan, and University of Manchester’s Students’ Unions. We learned loads from all the visits – especially around using spaces for students, empowering different groups and societies to run more effectively and without so much policing, and representation systems within the unions. On the next couple weeks, the officer team will get together and put a presentation and action plan on all the lessons so they’re all picked up either by incoming officers or SU staff, and so we can present to the university what is done well in other places.

That same Sunday (11 May), I ran my first Half Marathon in Bristol! It was honestly, the hardest thing I’ve ever done. But I’m really happy I did it and I’ve actually already signed up for the waiting list for the Manchester Half in October (so another win from the trip – I found out about a next race I want to be part of). Big shout out to my friends, including other officers, came to Bristol to support me and then buy me infinite pints in celebration. Here’s a photo of the support crew. I hope you enjoy their signs as much as I did!

We decided to set up the ‘State of the Union’ for the first time. This is a new yearly event where the president summarises the year around one specific theme or something they hope will continued to be worked on past their time. Though the organising has been going on in the past two weeks, the actual event is on the morning of June 4. Keep an eye on the website for more info. I will submit the speech as a blog post in case you want to see it.

I got to attend a Royal Garden Party! The Royal Family organised a party to celebrate those working in education and skills, and the university, very kindly, submitted my name to the list of potential guests. It was obviously approved, and I brought Amber as my guest. It was the most surreal afternoon of my life, but a great one to add to my ‘two truths, one lie’ repertoire: I shook the king’s hand! A photo of Amber and I at the Garden party below.

On the next blog post, I’ll give you the speech of the State of the Union. But, after that, we only have one blog left together! There, I’ll give you an update on officer handover and address some of the concerns you might have about the handover period or projects that you’d like to see continued. So, if you have anything you’d want me to add, please send me an email or comment on this post.

Before I start crying, I’ll say goodbye. See you on the other side of handover – and summer ball! In the meantime, stay tanned and be kind to one another.

Much love,

Jiji x

Bristol Half support crew:

Royal Garden Party:

The one with the Waddling Duck

Tue, 06 May 2025 14:25:13 +0100

Here are two big numbers for you...

This is my 40th blog post!

And there’s 45 days left in our officer term!

In terms of the first number, I think all that proves is that I’ve remained committed to this blog through all the hardship that it comes with – aka, few readers but also, a highly hectic calendar all year around. I’m not expecting any congratulations or anything of the sort, but rather just to – for whatever reason – justify why other officers have not been as consistent with their updates.

In terms of the 45 days left in office, the number scares me more than it does you, for sure. I’m lucky enough to already know my next step: I’ll be doing a master's in public policy at UCL starting in September. That said, I still think I’ll have an existential crisis when I don’t call myself an SU officer anymore, and much more when I don’t live in my beloved Bath any longer. I’m sure all you final year students know the feeling.

It any case, there’s a lot going on in the Union this fortnight. We’ve officially survived awards season. So that’s Education Awards, SU Awards, and Blues Awards all in the spare of like four weeks. They were all lovely evenings; I loved being able to share the evening with all attendees and especially see the winners get their so deserved recognition. I can safely say that I’ve run out of smart outfits. So, when you see me at Summer Ball with a dress you recognise from the SU social media, don’t comment on it, there’s only so many outfits a small Quads wardrobe can hold...

Last Friday, I was also honoured to be invited to a Gold Scholars’ dinner in the Apex Hotel. The evening was wonderful, and I got to meet a lot of first year scholars that I hadn’t had a chance to meet yet. I tried to convince them all to run for SU officer. We’ll see if I did a good job in about two- or three-years' time, when those freshers must make life choices! The only slight downside from the evening was having to leave Weekend Warmup by the lake earlier than I would’ve wanted. But it’s never easy to leave the Waddling Duck bar behind, since that bar has been my dream since my first day as an officer. It's literally a dream come true to finally have it!

Finally, there is the much waited for officer trip to the North! Tomorrow, all six officers will aboard a train to the North, where we will spend three full days of meeting with other SUs and getting to know all about their way of doing things. You see, there is always a lot of useful collaboration between SUs in the Southwest, and we have benefitted greatly from the successes and learning opportunities of other unions around us. We never, however, get the chance to share knowledge and best practice with unions that are a bit further away. So, we decided to change that. We’re visiting Sheffield, York, Manchester, Manchester Met, and Salford SUs this week. More on this and the lessons of this trip later. For now, all say a non-denominational prayer for Amber, who’ll have to share a room with me and my snores...

I’ll bring you more updates on that as soon as I have them. In the meantime, stay tanned and be kind to one another.

Much love,

Jiji x

The one before the Easter transatlantic flight

Thu, 10 Apr 2025 09:51:54 +0100

71 days to go. The countdown continues!

In terms of ticking things off my list before I leave, this fortnight has been a busy one.

As some of you will recall from my first campaign and first year in office, the housing crisis in Bath is one of the key issues I wanted to make some progress on during my time. I won’t spend lines on explaining what the housing crisis is, because I’m sure you know what I’m on about (if for whatever reason you’re not, drop me a line as a comment or send me an email and I’ll explain!). These are the different things I spent my time doing (and now Benji is leading on):

Leading a top 10 on housing, which pushed the university to write a housing strategy for students after first year, in collaboration with the SU and the local council. This happened last year and, because we weren’t too happy with progress on a finalised written document, we put it on the top 10 again this year – which Benji is leading on now. Progress this year has been more promising, and we are expecting to have a finalised document relatively soon.
Bringing up housing as a necessary area of investment at all relevant university meetings. This has happened in meetings with the director of campus services (who looks after accommodation on campus and in the city, as well as Student Pad); the university’s chief operating officer, and even meetings with university council members and the vice-chancellor. I am confident that they are all a lot more aware of the issue students face, and this for me is a key step in lobbying the university to invest in this area.
Bringing up housing with politicians: this has been through the Student Community Partnership’s housing group, with local council members (and, just a couple weeks ago, I actually went to an all council meeting to plea the council to invest further in local housing standards and the policing of this), and even our Bath MP, Wera Hobhouse.
Started thinking about the future of housing advice within the SU. One of the things I want to do before I leave is build a business case to give to the university on why we need more funding to provide good housing advice. More on this later.

This list might not seem too long or impressive, but I promise you it’s taken a good chunk of my time and energy in the last two years. If you have any questions about it, reach out! I’m going home for Easter this evening (yes, home in Venezuela!), so I might not get back to you until after the break. Until then, enjoy the sun and be kind to one another.

Much love,

Jiji x

P.S. Good luck with dissertations and final year projects for all you final years cramming in the work before the April deadline!

The one (with the) hundred last days

Fri, 14 Mar 2025 15:57:45 Z

You often hear politicians and governments speak about the first hundred days. There’s always a lot of pressure on those first three months, and critics of the elected person will sing praise of predict a downfall based on those 100 days. But little do people ever talk about the last 100 days, and what that ought to look like.

So here goes my brief of what I want my last 100 days to look like. I will work backwards, because that’s how my brain works.

By the 20th of June (AKA dooms day, when I have to face the reality of leaving Bath and my role as president which has, as you’ll know, become somewhat of my main personality trait in the last 2 years): I want to have given Benji specifically, but the wider officer team, the best handover ever made and have really set them all up for success. Handover starts on the 9th of June, so that’s when that bit will begin. We are already planning the group sessions, and I have started writing my own handover to Benji in the last couple of weeks.

The week of the 2nd of June is when our last senate meeting is. Part of my work left in that space is about a proper handover to Benji, Sanya, and Helen (the three officers that will sit in senate), but also about working with the incoming deputy vice-chancellor on consistency across the faculties – looking at how we can make sure that, no matter in which one you’re a student, you’ll have the same level of opportunities. On the 3rd of June we have our closure of the Top 10 meeting with university leadership.

May is always a slightly quieter month for us, since all you guys are mostly doing exams. This means we will hopefully be focusing on getting our part-time community organisers scheme off the ground. What this is, is an opportunity to have more students participate in the campaigns and projects of the SU. The first organiser will be working on cost-of-living and continuing some of the projects that we launched last year like the SU food pantry (as well as looking at what else we could be doing to support students through challenging financial times). Also, from the 7th until the 9th of May, your officers will visit some Students’ Unions of the North, to learn about how they do things – more on this later.

April is always the craziest month. We have Blues Awards, Education Awards, SU Group Awards, and Varsity, all in the same three weeks. April is very much about thanking our student leaders. I also want to use this time to gather feedback from them on what we should be doing better, which I will collect on the last SUmmit meeting of the year (on April 22nd). In the finance side of things, one of the things I want to sort out before leaving is a plan to reinvest some of our free reserves (so the income that isn’t directly tied to necessary spending, and that’s above our essential reserves numbers) into student facing activities. This can look a lot of different ways, but I’m particularly keen on investing in student spaces and looking at storage space improvement for our clubs and societies.

The last couple of weeks of March are crazy busy! Next week I’ll be visiting UCL with the senior SU team to learn about their representation models; spend Tuesday in a conference about students and all the areas we should be looking at; and then attending different meetings like the Student Experience Advisory Board and a local council meeting to speak about the condition of student housing in Bath.

Hopefully, this looks like a good list of goals for my last three months in office. As always, I’m more than happy to be challenged on any of this. I look forward to hearing back from you. In the meantime, pray for sunshine and be kind to one another!

Much love,

Jiji x

The one with the 30% voter turnout dream

Wed, 26 Feb 2025 14:32:00 Z

And the election madness has begun!

I’m sure I don’t have to tell you this, as the dozens of banners and posters on campus probably tipped you off (as well as the emails from us, the social media requests form candidates, and the crazy costumes the different teams have put on to try and get votes).

This week is extremely exciting for us in the Students’ Union. There are several reasons for this. First, because we are a student-led organisation, this is the week when we elect the six students who will, in fact, lead the organisation for twelve months starting in June this year. These six people will not only decide a lot for the SU – about events, about our offer in commercial terms, and the priorities for us as a charity – but they will also be the voice of students. Being a student representative is about a lot more than just having your face on the wall as you walk into the SU building. It means going to meetings with all different kind of stakeholders – from university staff to local politicians, to members of parliament, to actual royalty – and making sure that students’ interests are looked after here at Bath.

It’s a big job.

Having the right person in it can make a massive difference.

The people who get to decide who gets the job are you and your fellow students! So please, engage with the elections. I cannot emphasise this enough. You should care about who leads your union. The ways to engage can be a lot of different ones, as long as they end in your voting. But some of the useful information can be:

Watching candidates’ 1-minute manifesto on our SU YouTube channel, link here: https://www.youtube.com/@TheSUBath

Watching the different roles ‘Questions to Candidates’ (our version of Hustings), also on our YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TheSUBath

Read the candidates profiles and manifestos, on our website: https://www.thesubath.com/elections/runforsuofficer/candidates/

Go follow their social media and see what their campaigns are about (I won’t try and link them all here, as there are 27 candidates in total).

Speak to them on the Parade, where they’ll be with their campaign team throughout the week to answer any questions.

Voting closes tomorrow at 5:00 PM, so don’t miss your chance to have a say!

My personal goal is to reach 30% voter turnout in the election. As I write this, we’re on 17.5%. Go help make this politics nerd’s dreams come true!

I’m around if you have any questions about any of this. If not, I’ll catch you during my next update. In the meantime, be democratically active and be kind to one another.

Much love,

Jiji x

The (extra) one with the housing update

Wed, 19 Feb 2025 13:58:22 Z

This week we dive into housing – an extra blog post for you all!

The reason for it is that we have exciting news to announce. As of this year, for the first time after literal years of lobbying for improvement in this space, the university has taken a first step in the right direction around support for students renting in the private market.

The vice-chancellor of the university has approved funding to support estranged students and students that are care leavers in paying for the premium fee that guarantor scheme services charge. This means that these groups of students will not see additional financial constraints as a result for being unable to come up with a UK based guarantor. These are fantastic news!

If you’re wondering about the rest of our student community that can’t access UK based guarantors, we’re still working on achieving more wins in that space. The university does currently suggest a few guarantor schemes that might be slightly more affordable than the ones out in the market. So, if you’re looking at a guarantor scheme, I would recommend you use one of the ones in this link: https://www.bath.ac.uk/guides/guarantor-schemes-for-private-accommodation/.

The final bit is to just show you how long we’ve had accommodation related issues on the top 10.

· 2010/2011: We will strive to increase the support and information available to students on housing issues.

· 2011/2012: housing was one of the ten themes on the list.

· 2014/2015: Develop a housing guarantor scheme for international students.

· 2015/2016: Lobby for improved housing standard.

· 2016/2017: Campaign for sustainable student recruitment policies in relation to housing availability.

· 2023/2024: Develop a housing strategy covering both University managed and private accommodation.

· 2024/2025: Develop a student-friendly approach to private housing, protecting student rights as tenants; and develop a housing strategy and action plan which covers both university managed and private accommodation.

Hopefully, this shows how hard we work to get student issues in front of the university and, though sometimes slow, progress is usually achieved with the things we put on the Top 10. Let me know if you have any other questions or concerns on this or any of the other Top 10.

See you for another update next week, right in the middle of the election madness. In the meantime, stay warm and be kind to one another!

Much love,

Jiji x

The one before the Hunger Games (iykyk)

Wed, 12 Feb 2025 16:14:38 Z

And just like that, another fortnight gone!

This blog will hopefully be a bit more exciting than others...

Because Officer elections are just a week and a day away!!!

Now, most of you will know that I’m on my second term as president, which means I survived not one but two campaign weeks. This is, dear reader, no small feat, and it takes a lot to put yourself forward and out there for this.

So, my first invitation to you during this blog is to be nice to all the candidates that talk to you – I can promise you they’re building up a lot of courage to constantly be out there and talk to all the students they see. How many candidates there are, we still don’t know. How many different costumes we’ll see on the Parade, only the last week of February will tell. How many Instagram requests you’ll get from candidates, you’ll know soon enough. But all in all, this is the most exciting time for us over in the SU and we’re thrilled to have people running for the officer roles.

I guess there’s a few things you can expect from us in the next couple of weeks, so here I go with summarising the timelines for you:

- By the 20th of February at midday, you’ll know who the candidates are. This means online campaigning is in full swing and candidates will start sending out emails, posting on social media, and trying to get those society endorsements. During this time, you won’t see any of them doing in-person campaigning.

- By the 23rd of February at midday, banners and campaign posters are allowed to go up on campus. I can already tell you that this looks like having hundreds of campaign team members trying to secure the good spots, and a whole bunch of colourful sheets will suddenly go up in a matter of seconds. I can’t wait to see what all the different campaign slogans will be.

- On the 24th, in-person campaign starts. Now this Monday will be key, because all the questions to candidates sessions will take place. This means that throughout the day, we’ll be hosting a version of a debate (or hustings) with all the candidates (sessions divided by the roles).

- On Tuesday the 25th, voting opens at 9:00 AM. This is when the fun really starts. You can see how many people have voted on the SU website, seeing from what societies and departments (but never the individual details of voters), and this is where the candidates alongside their teams will really step up their game. The next few days will be very intense for them, so do treat them kindly if you come across any of them.

- On Thursday the 27th, voting closes at 5:00 PM. After this, normally candidates go to get a pint together in the Plug – if campaign week has been a healthy competition one – and they can finally get some rest.

- Friday at 4:00 PM (Yes, during Happy Hour) results will be announced in the bar. And so another round of officer elections will have concluded. You’ll now know how your six officers are for the 2025-2026 academic year.

Your current officers will be in office until the 20th of June, so I’m afraid you’ll still have to put up with us for a while longer! Just thought you would all would appreciate a bit of a run-through of what’s going down in the next couple of weeks.

If anything wasn’t clear or if you have any questions about any of this! I’ll see you in a couple of weeks, right amid the election madness. In the meantime, stay warm and be kind to one another.

Much love,

Jiji x

The one with 8 cities in 5 days

Tue, 28 Jan 2025 09:31:27 Z

I’ll start by admitting that writing my first post back during ISB wasn’t too strategic...

But here it goes anyway!

After flying straight from holiday with my family to Budapest for a very hectic week in Central Europe, visiting SUs and universities, I landed straight back into the madness.

I know you’re more interested in in the Europe trip over anything else, but I’m going to save both of us some time and just give you the link to the Bath Time article I wrote on it: https://unibathtime.co.uk/2025/01/27/why-was-i-in-central-europe-and-why-should-you-care/.

As usual, I’m more than happy to discuss any of these points in more detail or explain a bit more the rationale behind us going on the trip. Hopefully, by now you know how to find me! (1E 3.13 A is my office and supresident@bath.ac.uk is my email).

Right.

After the trip, the first week back was a combination of interviews for our head of Student Voice, and a new SU post, titled Strategic Project Manager, which is a fixed-term, 18-month role designed to support the senior team in implementing projects related to the strategy. These roles are beneficial to students for different reasons. The head of Voice is a role we’ve always had, and it’s the person that looks after everything related to representation and campaigns, and all the subdivisions of that (so stuff like education, EDI, international students, and a lot more). This is definitely a non-exhaustive description of it, so please do ask more if you need to. But essentially, this is a person that supports your officers in every turn, so it was essential that we found a good person for it (and we did! More on this soon). The strategic project one is important to you because it is a person that will make the SU run more efficiently, help us focus our resources better, and alleviate capacity for existing staff. So perhaps a bit more indirectly, but it will certainly improve your experience on the ground.

After these interviews (both the roles took a whole day of interviews), I was in town for a whole day attending graduation ceremonies and speaking at some of them. The Friday after was mostly spent catching up on literally hundreds of emails and planning ahead to the next semester.

The whole week after was mostly recurring meetings, catch ups with people, and nominations committee (which is the sub-committee for the university council that looks after allocating people to senior places). The main bit last and this week is about our Together We Shape Tomorrow work – which though I’ve mentioned in here at some other point, I’ll still give a link for you to familiarise yourself with what it is: https://www.thesubath.com/twst/.

We presented it at University Executive Board (UEB) last week, and we’ve had a few follow-up meetings after to look at how to get the ball rolling. The next big step is a launch for university staff on Wednesday this week. After that, we’ll do an online launch for students. But at any point before or after that we’re happy to answer questions about it. I will also be publishing a blog on Wonkhe about it, to make other SUs and universities hear about it too!

I will probably have more to say on this very soon, so I’ll leave the update here for now. Hope ISB is going well and that you’re thrilled to be starting the second semester of the year already. In the meantime, stay warm and be kind to one another.

Much love,

Jiji x

The one with the trans-Atlantic flight

Wed, 11 Dec 2024 16:59:52 Z

And the holiday season is upon us!

I am writing this last update of 2024 in a bit of a hurry, as I fly off for Christmas tomorrow evening (off to Miami to meet my new nephew!), and won’t be back at work until the 6th of January. 2025! Crazy!

I wanted to spend my last few lines of 2024 preparing you for the next semester and some of the things you might expect from it.

If you’re a fresher, you’re entering your first ever exam and assessment period. I know it sounds incredibly scary and that you’re probably very stressed out about it. Don’t worry! First of all, the fact that you’re a student at Bath means that you’re a good student and have all you need to succeed at assessments. Make sure to plan out your study sessions, have breaks, and most importantly – reach out for help if you need it! Our SU advice and Support team is always happy to jump on a call, and the university’s student support team are also fantastic at helping students through rough times.

While your assessments are ongoing, Amber and I will be busy traveling to the Visegrad group of countries for a SU and university tour organised by WonkHE, a national Higher Education policy debate group. Here’s the link to the trip and what we’ll be up to if you’re curious about it at all: https://wonkhe.com/blogs-sus/an-opportunity-to-engage-learn-and-develop-our-european-study-tours-in-2024/.

Shortly after that comes the inter-semester break (ISB, for the cool kids), and that hopefully means some rest for you, and preparing yourself for the second semester. Straight after that we will be hosting Refresh week, which, as the name implies, it’s another go at welcoming students back to Bath. It’s a smaller scale version of Freshers’ Week, and there are a lot of things to get involved in, so make sure to keep an eye on our website to know all about events and opportunities going on.

On February 10th, nominations will close to run to be an SU officer. As someone who’s done the job twice, I can promise you, this opportunity is worth it!!! I have a blog in WonkHE about rerunning to be an officer and about some of positives and negatives of the role. I would encourage you to have a read if you’re interested: https://wonkhe.com/blogs-sus/why-did-i-re-stand-as-su-president/. If you’re even remotely interested in any of the roles, let me or any of the current officers know, and we’d be happy to have a chat. Here’s a link to the website for you to find out more: https://www.thesubath.com/elections/runforsuofficer/.

By the first week of March, you’ll have gone through elections week and will know who your new SU officers will be. So, if you see us leaving officers a bit sad, that’s why! We’ve all loved it so much it’ll be hard to leave. March will also see our third SUmmit meeting.

April will give you another break, and if you’re writing a dissertation, you don’t need me to remind you that that’s probably when you will hand it in. After that we will have the final SUmmit meeting of the year, Varsity, and all the exciting award evenings (Group Awards, Education Awards, and a few other smaller events).

I will leave the update until there, because what comes after is my departure from this role and I’m still in denial about it...

I will come back in January with a summary of the WonkHE trip and our lessons learned. Before then, I wish you happy holidays, a restful break, and a warm winter, wherever you might spend it. Stay cosy and be kind to one another!

Much love,

Jiji x

The one with the 39 students in the fancy board room

Fri, 29 Nov 2024 11:07:14 Z

And the time is finally here!

Thew much awaited, much acclaimed, report for SUmmit...

Picture the university’s council chambers, filled to capacity with students from different backgrounds, clubs, and societies.

Picture our chair, dressed in his usual smart fashion, calling the room to order.

Picture me, sitting next to him, with a grin as broad as a five-year-old's on Christmas morning when opening her first present.

If you can see all these things in your head, the rest of this post basically tells itself.

On the 19th of November, we had our first SUmmit meeting. From 5:00 PM until 8:00 PM, we had 39 members present at the university’s council chambers (photos below) and at the ground floor of the Student Centre, discussing how to best use our time together, the merits of the attendance and engagement monitoring debate, and enjoying a slice or two of pizza and Plug fries.

The format of the meeting went like this: first, Jackson (the chair) welcomed everyone, did some housekeeping, and passed it over to the officers for our updates. For the next twenty minutes or so, students got to ask us anything they wanted about the role, our updates (which we submitted and sent around to SUmmit members in advance), or anything else they found relevant. A lot of people wanted to ask about buses (shocker, I know); some had questions about renters’ reform bill, and the topic of PGT experience also came up.

Next, Jackson welcomed Ben Goose (a university’s policy and programmes manager in education and student experience). Ben spoke to us about attendance and engagement monitoring (NOT to be conflated, but also NOT to be explained by me... give Amber a call, maybe) and the consideration that the university is giving this to see if we implement it. Disclosure: since COVID, we already do it a bit! The debate is about whether we should be more consistent across the board, and whether we can use it as a tool to monitor students’ engagement with their academic life for wellbeing purposes. Ben then responded to questions from SUmmit members and finally left the room to let us debate.

Amber then had five minutes to explain why she had submitted a statement of issue (SoI) about this subject. Briefly, a SoI is a 300-word document that SUmmit members submit prior to a meeting when they want to discuss a topic and have SUmmit generate a standpoint (our policy briefs that have a call for action) with the rest of the committee. The conversation then went on for a while. I dare say the contentious bit was not the SoI in itself, but rather the confusion about the topic in general. After much debate and clarification, SUmmit had a standpoint proposal that we were relatively at peace with. The first voting round, on whether or not we were ready and happy to vote on the standpoint, passed. Mind you, the necessary majority in SUmmit is two thirds of the room, so this is not as easy as it sounds.

The vote on the standpoint itself also passed. SUmmit agreed on the standpoint with four subsequent actions:

The organisation of a Q&A session with students and University leaders on Engagement Monitoring and the plans moving forward (to be done by officers).
The Education Officer to ask the University for clear definitions of attendance and engagement, and to differentiate between the two.
Once next steps have been proposed, The SU is to organise ongoing events for students to provide feedback.
The Education Officer to request a clear list from the University about what data will be collected and how this will be used.

With the new format, we will have to update SUmmit on our progress on these actions at the next meeting (on December 2nd). We will then see how the format works entirely, as there will be an accountability space for standpoints created under this format. I am very excited about seeing the whole process through. I am also incredibly happy with how the first meeting went and the attendance that we got. I cannot wait to tell you all about our progress and what we achieve as a group. But with nothing else to add at the moment, I will see you next time. In the meantime, stay warm and be kind to one another.

Much love,

Jiji x

Photos:

The one with the 30 blog posts

Tue, 19 Nov 2024 10:26:04 Z

And just like that, we’ve made it to 30 blogs together!

Can you believe it? This means that there have been 30 times where I’ve sat at this very chair in my office and typed away, trying my best to keep you up to date with everything going on in the SU officers’ lives. This post is not an exception!

I must begin by submitting a redaction: I said I would update you all on the first SUmmit meeting on this blog, but it will be on the next one, as the SUmmit meeting is tomorrow. I know what you’re thinking... Jiji, you could’ve just held off and written this on Wednesday so you could tell us about SUmmit. The answer, dear reader, is no I couldn’t have. Two reasons, one, this week is insanely busy (feel free to have a look at my outlook calendar if you think I’m exaggerating); and two, I’m already a couple of days late on submitting this as I was ill on Friday – when this post was originally due. So, apologies to my whole blog fan base (which I’m sure is a total number of about five people, and one of them is Amber).

Now on to business.

Last week was MANIC.

Monday was mostly about setting up for the rest of the week, as Liv, David, Amber, and I headed to London for a conference organised by WonkHE – which ran for all of Tuesday and Wednesday. The conference in question is any Higher Education (HE) policy nerd’s dream. The name encapsulates that nicely. Are you ready for it?

The name is...

The FESTIVAL of Higher Education.

Oh yeah. That neeky.

And we had as much fun as one could possibly do when discussing HE policy and best practice across the UK. Add in there a mix of all different HE stakeholders: university reps, SUs, private consultancies, British Council, OfS, DfE, and other national and international bodies; and you get the perfect recipe for me to melt my brain trying to keep all the information in. Why should you care that we went to this? Because all sessions were incredibly informative on what other places are doing to tackle some of the issues we face at Bath: widening participation and its subsequent attainment gaps; assessment feedback; housing; international networks; and there was even a session on Labour’s mission on opportunity for all. We also got to network and meet fascinating people which might prove to be useful to know in the future if we have any questions about anything coming up in the sector.

I rushed back to Bath on Wednesday night in hopes of making it to Score with the football girls. I didn’t make it.

I did however, make it to Thursday’s university strategy planning away day. And yes, I just recently told you about one of those. This is the second one they’ve organised. Similarly to the last one, it was a great opportunity to keep students considered during the conversation of the next university strategy. Not much else I can say on this yet, but I will as soon as possible.

Friday officially took me out. I called in sick. I think my body could only manage so much excitement on one week.

And today, here I am sat telling you about all these things, after having spent my lunch meeting all the Olympic athletes that were in Paris this Summer and have some sort of connection to the university. That’s 30 athletes. Crazy, right? You can imagine how much we fangirled when we got to just mingle with them.

I’ll leave there for now.

I do promise to come back with an actual summary of SUmmit next time. Until then, stay warm and be kind to one another.

Much love,

Jiji x

The one with the new national role

Fri, 01 Nov 2024 14:34:41 Z

And it’s that time of the fortnight again!

As the leaves fall and the days get shorter, I have been busy getting used to the during semester pace of the job, while also trying to stay warm and keep energy levels up.

One exciting piece of work I’ve been doing is “a student’s guide to influencing”. I am currently mapping all the different ways a student can influence the SU as well as the university on anything related to the student's experience. I’m dividing this guide into four categories: operational changes; university influence; representational change; and SU related proposals. I won’t go into too much detail about each of these now but watch this space! Hopefully, this should be ready to share before you all go away for the Winter break.

I also got appointed as the Quality Assurance Agency’s board of trustees, as their independent student member! This is great news for a number of reasons. One, the QAA is a national (and international) body in charge of looking after quality and standards of Higher Education Institutions (HEIs), so us having a seat at that table is great exposure for us as a union, giving us great insight as to what is coming up in the sector. Secondly, it will allow me to build more connections with relevant people in the sector. Finally, it is a great professional opportunity for me! If you’re curious about the QAA’s work and what this post means for us as a union, do let me know and we can have a chat about it.

I was also involved in the recruitment of the deputy director for major projects in the campus infrastructure department at the university. Long big job title! But essentially, this is the person that will look after the biggest infrastructure projects on our campus, whether that is fixing existing buildings or developing new ones. So, naturally, me being able to look after this person caring about the student experience was a well-received invitation! We still have one more candidate to see, so I can’t comment on the candidates or who’ll be appointed.

Black History Month is now over! I had the chance to participate in a couple of events, including the launch of the month and the closure of it. I thought it was fascinating, with the whole month focusing on reclaiming narratives in all kinds of aspects, but mostly around histories and – in a university setting – the academic resources we offer our students. This was all incredibly interesting and educational. Shoutout to Benji for all the work he put into supporting our student groups and the university in moving this forward.

We also had our training session for SUmmit members. I have spoken about SUmmit A LOT in my blog posts, but here’s the link to it if you’re still not sure what it’s about: https://www.thesubath.com/voice/summit/ . Our first meeting for this year will be on 19 November, and don’t worry, my next blog WILL include a lot more info on it.

There’s a few more bits and bobs going on, but I’ll leave it here for now. As usual, let me know if there’s anything that isn’t clear or that you’d like more information on. In the meantime, stay warm and be kind to one another.

Much love,

Jiji x

The one with the manifesto master plan

Fri, 18 Oct 2024 14:53:56 +0100

Hello hello!

Another fortnight has gone by, and there’s another blog to prove how quickly time is whizzing by...

On this lovely October Friday, I want to dedicate my blog post to my manifesto! As you’ll all be aware, candidates for SU officer positions write a 500-word manifesto explaining what they think the SU’s priorities should be and what they, if elected, would focus on over the year. Admittedly, it sometimes happens that after getting elected, the business as usual of the Union and the reactive work that we do in response to different events or student requests means that our manifestos get a little forgotten. This year, to avoid our original ideas fading into oblivion, we’ve done things a bit differently. Each of the officers sat down with staff to turn our manifestos into an action plan and to do list for the year, in hopes that we’ll be better able to incorporate the manifesto work into our day-to-day, and that we’ll actually work on the things we said we would (and that got us the votes that elected us back in March!).

For the purpose of transparency, here’s my to do list in its entirety:

1	Improving students' sense of belonging and ownership of SU spaces	Improving the main SU building to ensure it is relevant and accessible to students.
		Move Officer offices closer to students
		Ensuring the first floor of the Edge is a useful space for student leaders through consultation and implementation of recommendations
		Increasing the offer of space and activities in the city through SU renovation of ground floor Virgil building
		Design and facilitate a community building mechanism (i.e. boiler suits) to build pride & belonging in student participation in SU activities
2	Students are enabled to shape their SU at all levels of student leadership.	Produce simplified guidance to guide students on how to affect change in their union and university
		Implement and evaluate changes to Summitt to ensure students are influencing their SU and university
		Lead a review of the officer leadership structure that is responsive to student needs
3	Improve the standard and offer of housing for Bath students	Ensure more student tenants are protected through student pad by seeking to increase the properties available which meet appropriate standards.
		Influencing and ensuring student rights are protected in any future plans regarding a Uni lettings agency.
		Monitor potential impact of renters' reform bill and ensure students are protected.
		Propose business case for increased SU capacity to provide housing advice (new staff member)
4	Supporting students to meet their basic needs through improving student employment and needs based infrastructure	Ensure student staff contracts start from the beginning of the academic year
		Develop a sustainable delivery and funding model for extension of a Student Pantry - seeking University delivery
5	Improve the support, culture and approach to international students across the university community.	Evaluate the pilot and increase the capacity of the early arrival programme for 2025.
		Produce guidance on international student inclusion and practice to improve the culture and approach to international students across the university staffing community.
6	Bath Students meaningfully influence local and national spheres.	Ensure a consistent SU appoach to attending and influencing local council meetings, enabling the wider student body to influence
		Secure student dedicated surgeries with local councillors
		Ensure NUS campaigns benefit Bath students by building strong regional influencing networks
		Improve the working relationship with local MP to enable parliamentary influence.
7	Establish a positive relationship and smooth transition with new University leadership	Ensure 1 on 1's continue and build a constructive relationship with the new VC
		Secure student voice as an ongoing influencing mechanism to key university decisions and projects (i.e. student data and presence in meetings)

Now, this definitely doesn’t mean that these are the only things I will work on over the year. It also doesn’t mean that I’ll be able to achieve them all. What it does mean is that I’m giving each of these time on my calendar, bringing them up in meetings, and coming up with specific actions to achieve as much progress as I cand during the year. At the end of it, you can be the best judges on whether or not I delivered. And if I didn’t, my commitment is to leave them all in the best possible place so I can hand them over to whoever my successor is.

As usual, please feel free to reach out with any questions on these. For no good reason except as a bonus feel good Friday item, here’s a picture of Amber and I feeding ducks on our 1:1 meeting this week. Hope it made you smile!

Have a lovely rest of your week, and hope to see some of you at Weekend Warm Up later. In the meantime, I hope you’re layering up and being kind to one another!

Much love,

Jiji x