In trying to find a cool and catchy title for this I waded through dozens of 4th of July puns, the best of which is ‘not everyone has the day off for the fourth of July, fire works.”. That is my adoration for you dear reader. There is also an amazing amount of things to catch you up on, so let me break it into the classic three categories: the good, the bad, and the ugly.
The Good
Access and Participation Plan
First and foremost- the Access and Participation Plan (APP). The APP rolls around every four years and being able to see everything done here to help our students out is always amazing. On a personal note too, seeing what I was able to access in the past and now help out with a student was oddly nostalgic; being able to pick out a programme and go ‘Hey ! That’s where I first met my friend years ago!’ is truly a blessing.
Meet the Officers !
On a more universally fun note, making the Friends themed ‘Meet The Officers’ video was so amazingly incredibly fun – can you imagine trying to explain to your parents that yes, I swear I have a job and also that yes, this does include falling off a sofa by the lake? Absolutely no more spoilers for this though, go check it out on the SU Instagram – the Marketing team did an amazing job and I cannot give them enough praise.
Hanging out with you!
Of course, it has also been amazing to hang out with some of you who are still on campus over a doctoral lunch and seeing everyone else decked out for graduations! As this covers only the first half of July, only one day of graduations gets to sneak into this post, but it has been amazing to see how optimistic everybody was despite the horrific weather. Also, as cheesy as it sounds, being able to stand in front of a crowd and congratulate you all on building such a lovely community has been a true highlight – everything you do is seen and we are so proud of you for it.
The Bad
This is totally a cop-out for the bad but beginning to narrow down on what should be in the SU Top 10 has been harrowing. Seeing I had about a dozen points on my manifesto, knowing that these obviously cannot all be in the list is nerve-wracking. This does not mean that these won’t be acted upon, and plenty of projects can be done that fall outside of the Top 10, but the united front of the list is something truly awesome, and so obviously I wanted my points to be on there!
Despite this, there are a lot of points we are all passionate about, and others that the proposer is so passionate about you just can’t help but be drawn in. Although the list won’t be finalised for a while, I am already so excited about being able to tell you all the great, sweeping stories behind them.
The Ugly
You knew it was going to be in here, I knew it was going to be in here, and if you want to skip to the end of the blog to watch the Friends video and ignore this section, I would not blame you one bit. The boycott.
For the boycott, I have three very different ‘hats’.
On one hand, as an affected student, I am upset. Plain and simple. I am lucky enough to be in a position where I have employment, and know what my final classification will most likely be, but not being able to leave the Abbey with something final to show my parents who are visiting this beautiful city for the first (and probably only) time just for this is harrowing. Seeing how it has also affected my peers, I can understand the feeling of powerlessness, and I want you to know that I am here with you, I empathise, and I hope we can all get through it together as a community.
On the other hand, as your Education Officer, I have been on the other side of the fence, especially alongside Jura, our Postgraduate Officer. We have been meeting weekly with high-up staff, including Julian, the Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Education and asking all the things you wish you could, representing you the best we can, and making sure the student voice is heard. We have also been working to signpost as much as possible – every academic representative has been reached out to, and I have signposted or passed on questions for every single person who has filled out our feedback form. Here in the SU, we are here for you. We want to know what is on your mind – and if you can tell us, we can tell the University.
Finally, as a governor, I have to face this strange, almost cognitive dissonance-esque view of ‘wait, we have actually done okay’. As this is a national strike, breaking independently can massively affect our staff, as seen with Queen’s University Belfast, who reached a local arrangement, and as a result have been suspended from their union for three years. As well as this, students have kept the integrity of their degrees and marking – Bath is sticking to your units being marked in the normal way, by your teacher or their PhD students. Finally, the academic registry team has been working behind the scenes to solve problems I didn’t know could even exist – take for example the use of interim marks – something I have, and though it caused me brief panic when I opened my email, students who don’t have these marks risk having to leave the very country they are studying in.
It is all, ultimately, so incredibly messy, and to hold these three points of view at once is jarring. So ‘the ugly’ fits just about right.
Despite that rather sombre final note, I hope you are all enjoying the improving weather and I am looking forward to seeing as many of you as possible dressed up to the nines at your graduations!
TTYL !
Amber xx
Plain text links
Friends themed ‘Meet The Officers’
https://www.instagram.com/p/CuzUrVfglu6/?hl=en
Marking boycott feedback form
https://forms.microsoft.com/e/uCn53is3gq
Queen’s University Belfast suspended from their union for three years
https://twitter.com/QUBelfast/status/1678801562473312257
Student fears having to quit UK over uni marking boycott
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-66163344