Student Rep Staff Booklet

STAFF BOOKLET 2012 - 2013

Version 0.1 17/09/12

Meet The Team Murray Simpson, Vice President of Education I am elected by the students at BU to be the point of contact for all Student Reps. I represent students on education matters to the University, and work alongside the Student Reps to get the student voice heard. Feel free to come up to the SUBU office above Dylan’s bar anytime, or simply drop me an email at suvpeducation@bournemouth.ac.uk.

Joff Cooke, Head of Student Engagement: I lead the staff team at SUBU supporting the work of Student Reps at Bournemouth University. My principal role in relation to the Rep system at BU is to help the Vice President Education achieve his goals for the year, and to move our representation towards being the best in the world by 2016.

Jane De Vekey, Research and Information Manager: I am the person who is responsible for the development of the surveys, analysis of the results, and the production of reports for reps to provide to frameworks, schools, and the university on issues that arise from our research with students.

Gillie Lewis, Learning & Representation Administrator: As the Learning and Representation Administrator for SUBU, I help to organise training, meetings and campaigns. I also administer and present the ‘You’re Brilliant Awards’. Go to: www.yourebrilliantawards.com to find out more about them.

Representation and Democracy Manager SUBU is currently recruiting this post to increase our support for Student Reps. Their principal role is in getting out and about supporting Reps in doing their job. They have particular responsibility for developing the training, support and recognition for Student Reps.

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Meet The Team Sophie Dadd, Learning and Representation Coordinator Currently on maternity leave, Sophie will be creating a brand new training programme for SUBU in 2013.

Joanna Stass, Research Intern Joanna will be joining the Rep team on 24th September to assist the Research and Information manager with her work.

Partnership Coordinator SUBU is currently recruiting this post to ensure that our Partnership institution have support from SUBU for representation and student involvement.

Rep Roles Representation is developing again!

This year in SUBU Rep Services we are giving the Student Reps clearer roles and responsibilities to carry out throughout the year, so you will know more about what to expect.

Student Reps

Information on who the elected reps are should be uploaded onto UNITe as soon after the election as possible.

Reps are elected by the students on their programme. How they are elected depends on what’s easiest for the Schools and programmes. This year we are asking for 1 rep for every 20 students to ensure there is enough representation for all students across the university.

Once elected, please print off the ‘A quick message to all student reps' PDF attached to this booklet. It would really help if you could reinforce the message that they must book onto a session, not simply turn up, as all sessions may be full on the day.

To ensure a democratic decision, Reps should be voted in by one of the following methods:

Student Reps must attend one of the training sessions below:

• Secret Ballot • Show of hands with candidates not present • E-mail election (for distant learners) Where there is more than one candidate, some time should be given to each candidate (up to a minute is fine) to address these students on why they want to be a Student Rep. Where there is only one candidate for the election, it would be good practice to allow some show of support for the candidate such as a quick show of hands.

We will be providing you with a short video which will inform students as to why they should become a rep. We ask that you show this video and hold elections between the 1st and 5th October.

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Saturday 13 October, for experienced Reps (ie those who have been to Rep training last year) Wednesday 17 October, afternoon, mainly for Lansdowne based Reps Saturday 20 October, for new Reps Session times will be emailed to reps once they have registered with SUBU.

What do student reps do?

• Attend the Student Experience Forums • Work closely with the year reps (where they exist) and School Reps to distribute the Student Opinion Survey for their course and gain feedback from students.

• Feed information back to students following Student Experience Forums and Framework/Programme Team Meetings.

School Reps School Reps (1 per framework) The School Rep position is the highest level of Student rep. There should be 1 School Rep for each framework, and they should be elected by the Student Reps at the Student Experience Forum between the 20th and 25th of October, after Essential Rep Training.

Dates and times of these meetings will be organised with Academic admin managers and sent to: suvpeducation@bournemouth.ac.uk

Responsibilities: • A point of contact for all student reps under the framework.

• Responsible for Year Reps, ensuring they are distributing the surveys and gaining feedback.

School Reps sit on the SUBU School Rep Council with the SU VP Education – adding up to a widely representative body of student reps across the University.

• Making a Facebook/forum group for all the reps in their framework, with the Year Reps as admins.

The School Champion, in consultation with SUBU Rep Services will oversee the election.

• Working with SUBU to produce and present the School Synoptic Reports for School Academic Board.

Tasks: • Attend the School Rep Council to discuss education matters.

• Attend the School Academic Board with the SU VP Education.

SCHOOL REPS

• Where appropriate, chair the Student Experience Forums, and attend the Framework Team Meetings.

• Ensure the distribution of the Student Opinion Survey to all students via the year reps and Student Reps in their framework.

• Take part in and help run Speak Week, and a range of National education campaigns throughout the year with the SU VP Education and SU VP Campaigns.

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Year Reps Year Reps - (2 per level) Year reps, where needed for a large cohort, need to be elected from within the Student Reps at the Student Experience Forum between the 20th and 25th October. They will need to be voted in by the other reps voting.

To ensure a democratic decision, we would ask that reps to be voted in by similar methods outlined above.

What do Year Reps do?

• Year Reps are responsible for their cohort of representatives (all the reps that level on the framework).

• Communicating the feedback of their year group to the School Rep. • Communicating issues at year level back to Student Reps within their cohort.

Tasks: • Attend the Student Experience Forums and gain information from the reps in their level.

• Ensure that Student Reps have distributed the Student Opinion Survey to the Reps in their cohort.

• Attend the Framework Team Meetings and represent the views of their level.

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Student Opinion Surveys Last year the rep system gained 13.2% of student feedback through our Rep surveys. We are now more determined than ever to increase this number in order to hear the students' voice. And we need your help!

This year each survey for each programme/framework will be created by SUBU and given to the School Reps and Student Reps to distribute to all students.

Each survey uses a template which means the results can easily be combined across programmes to get a clear picture of students’ views across the university.

There are qualitative and quantitative elements to all the surveys. The qualitative elements adopt a ‘keep, stop and start’ approach. This means the surveys are a way of voicing what is working, what’s not working, and offering constructive feedback on improvements that the university can take on board.

This was the most comprehensive and useful student feedback I’ve ever heard by miles. World class. It kinda exposes us warts and all to the world, but I can take a hit.

Dan Hogan Senior Lecturer

There will be different surveys run this year.

Each will follow a different theme.

The first survey is for course matters and issues relating to your academic experience.

The second survey is an evaluation of the whole student experience for the year.

These findings will then feed into the School Academic Board, ensuring high responses of student feedback at these meetings.

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Key Dates Saturday 13th October

We must stress that Student Reps cannot simply ‘drop in’ on the training sessions ad hoc, and emphasise that once elected they MUST firstly email SUBU in order to receive official email confirmation that they are booked on to a training session.

Returning Student Reps Training – EBC – session times to be confirmed.

@ reptraining@bournemouth.ac.uk

We have designated the following dates for Student Rep training:

Wednesday 17th October Afternoon – Essential Student Reps Training for new Reps – Bournemouth House – session times to be confirmed.

Saturday 20th October Essential Student Reps Training for new Reps – EBC – 4 session times to be confirmed.

Monday 22nd October – Friday 26th October School Rep and Year Rep Elections – held in the Student Experience Forums.

Please note that any Student Reps who turn up without having been booked on to training, may not be able to be accommodated on the day, and we want to do our best to avoid any disappointment. It is important that this is conveyed to your Student Reps as last year a lot of Reps didn’t book on.

We will send you further communications about Student Rep training over the coming weeks.

Thank you for supporting SUBU, in representing the student experience at BU and helping us work towards being the best in the world at student representation If you have any queries about rep training, feel free to contact Murray Simpson VP Education at SUBU, or anyone in the Representation Services Team who will be happy to help you.

Murray Simpson VP Education –

☎ Ext 65775 @ suvpeducation@ bournemouth.ac.uk

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Rep Development Scheme Feedback from BU staff last year indicated reps would disengage and have poor attendance to meetings. Following that feedback we have focussed on improving the retention of reps by introducing the Rep Development Scheme.

The first workshops are currently booked for the: • 5th of December • 12th of December • 19th of December.

This will allow reps to gain points for every Student Experience Forum, Framework Team Meeting, and School Academic Board they attend.

At the end of the year, Reps who have achieved enough points will earn either a Bronze, Silver, or Gold Rep Award and certificate.

Reps will need to provide evidence of their work, but it would help if we have this information from the minutes of each meeting, please e-mail these to: reps@bournemouth.ac.uk so the reps don’t miss out on any points!

These will outline key transferable skills they have learnt throughout the year, which looks fantastic on their CV and will enable them to stand out to employers.

Reps enrolled onto the scheme will also have the option of attending additional workshops once a term to further develop their skills as a representative.

This scheme has been designed to complement the BU Award, but is obviously open to far lower numbers than can be accommodated on the BU Award at the moment.

We will be in touch throughout the year to inform you of more dates for the 2nd term!

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You're Brilliant Awards The ‘You’re Brilliant’ Awards were introduced by SUBU in 2011.

There are 2 types of You’re Brilliants – You’re Brilliant Awards for Student Reps, and You’re Brilliant Awards for BU Staff.

The ‘You’re Brilliant’ Awards allow students and staff to nominate Student Reps, and members of staff who have been brilliant.

The beauty of these awards lies in their simplicity. There are no complicated categories for the nominations other than the reps and staff that have been simply brilliant in some way.

So if at any point in the year, you think there is a brilliant rep, then log on to www.yourebrilliantawards.com – to make your nomination, and tell that special rep just how brilliant they are.

You may also receive an award yourself!

Staff award winners are also shortlisted, and depending on why and how many students nominated them, they may win the Golden You’re Brilliant Award, presented at the Vice Chancellor Awards!

It was great to receive an award to make me feel that the extra work that I had been doing at uni was being recognised!

Media School Student Rep

I was totally shocked, pleasantly! I did not expect this Award at all as I feel that it is my duty, pleasure and pride to promote innovative teaching any way BU Staff

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Thank You From The Rep Services Team!

A huge thank you to the Deans, Champions, Deputy Deans of Education, Academic Administrators, Programme Leaders, Programme Administrators, and other members of staff here at BU. The partnership SUBU and BU has is something we are so proud of, and it couldn’t happen without the passion, commitment and co-operation of the staff! It’s thanks to this partnership that we are so confident to achieve our vision of being "The best in the world at student representation by 2016".

We look forward to working with you over the next year, if you have any questions or suggestions then please e-mail Murray Simpson at: suvpeducation@bournemouth.ac.uk Thank you!

The SUBU Rep Services Team

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STAFF BOOKLET 2012 - 2013

We look forward to working with you...