So I am on a train on the way back from Liverpool having spent the last 2 days at the NUS Welfare Zone Conference. The conference is a gathering of welfare, equality, diversity and of course Wellbeing sabbs and staff from round the country, there to debate the issues facing students and start the ball rolling in terms of how this could be turned into policy in time for national conference later in the year.
Also at this conference the national committee for welfare is elected for the following year. I sat on this committee last year, and had a great time working on a national level with the full time officers of NUS and with many officers from around the country. However I made a big decision, to be honest only 4 hours before the nomination closed, that I wasn't going to run again.
There were many reasons for this decision and I wanted, in my own way to express some of them...
I think the first point is that my life at the moment is a bit hectic, what with a full time job, a part time masters,
raising money to climb Kilimanjaro, playing hockey and actually living my life with those I love! This has been in the back of my mind for a long time, and if I'm honest I think this shows that I'm growing up a bit and actually learning to say no! In order to prioritise other things in my life.
Another reason is a bit more critical, and that is that even though I have been on the committee for a year, I don't really know what it's role within the national movement really is! Is sounds silly, but I really think it's not clearly defined enough because many different areas are mentioned, and yet not really supported through the work. Is the committee there to hold the national officer to account? Is the committee there to set the direction for national welfare work? Is the negational committee there to implement some of the changes called for in national policy? These are all things I have heard and I'm not sure about any of them really!
I think capacity is another issue with the job role as well, I spent much of my time on the committee looking at the work NUS does around Health and how this could be expanded and move beyond the normal areas that are always perpetrated sexual health and alcohol awareness. I want NUS to expand and look at other areas of Wellbeing like social, environmental, spiritual and mental health. A lot of this comes from the work I have been doing at Brighton, taking the widest definitions of these areas and looking at the holistic approach to student Wellbeing and therefore their student experience, now I'm not saying that I know this is the right move for all or any SU's with the current changes happening in higher education, however it would be nice to know that the National Union of Students would support a new approach and see if there was milage in it, in terms of improving the student experience. From my experience however there are capacity issues stopping this from happening and therefore if an issue, which may even have policy from national conference backing it, may not get backing if it is not a priority for the national officer, who has very difficult decisions to make in terms of what their priorities are in the first place.
I think the zonal system of NUS is an interesting point of discussion as well. At brighton we also run a zonal system and I believe both NUS and Brighton suffer from the same problem with this, that of people only working within their silo. The idea of cross zonal work only seems to raise it's head in relation to priority campaigns, and the other place I think it is strong is with FE and other zones such as welfare, soc and cit and union development. However these later 3 seem to continually work within their silos not willing to register that if you talk about alcohol consumption it is worth engaging the activities officers from around the country and publicising the positives as well as the negatives! Another good example is when talking about money in students pockets, in the context of welfare, and then being told that extra curricular activities are not part of the remit of welfare, and yet without discussion on this, an area where students want to have money to develop themselves a massive area of the arguments are left out.
In terms of Welfare I think there is an additional challenge, that other zones, especially HE, doesn't seem to face and that is the one size fits all issues, coupled with partnerships with external bodies. I was talking to some members of the HE zone committee, who were saying they didn't feel some of the issues I have experienced, and as we talked on I realised how much there were working with other organisations on issues that affect all unions from HE, not dependants on size, or city/campus etc... For example if the issues is related to quality, the QAA are available for support and are recognised across the sector as the people to talk to! However the piecemeal way in which welfare services are provided across the country and lack of some national bodies, for example housing accreditation (I know one has just been set up) leads to a lack of these potential working relationships.
Another personal reason why I decided not to rerun was that having realised some of these over the past year and trying to deal with some of them, it kinda felt like I was banging my head against a brick wall, and to put it bluntly I have enough of those in Brighton and don't need to travel to do it at a national level. I think in reality I also realised that although I had a really good year last year doing the role and gained a lot of information gathering about all sort of subjects, I could not see what more I would gain from doing it for another year, and this ultimately is important, as to put time and effort into something without getting a perceived return, whether personal or for the students I represent then it didn't seem worth the time and effort.
Now I realise this may come across very negative and this was not the intention, as I say I had a great year and the information and experience I gained will undoubtedly help me gain wins on behalf of Brighton students. I also think that this is an area that NUS should be looking to further develop and harness the obvious potential from officers and students up and down the country, with 16 standing for the welfare committee alone this year. I also believe the committee we voted for this year will do amazing work, lead by a great VP and an amazing NEC member in Pete and Steph and wish them all the best in whichever areas of work within the welfare zone that they wish to work in this year.
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Location:Clay Hill Ln,,United Kingdom
