Queen’s Belfast Students’ Union (QUBSU) has worked to proactively embed a culture of transparency, responsiveness and engagement amongst sabbaticals, students and staff. This cultural realignment is well advanced and we believe that significant, verifiable improvement has been achieved, resulting in campaigns, activities and services being genuinely attuned to members’ wishes.
Following consultation with students, elected representatives and staff, QUBSU’s agreed vision is:
- To become one of the premier students’ unions in the UK and Ireland.
Extensive member research has informed our Strategic Plan 2012-15; its objectives derive from verifiable feedback. Independent student research has been commissioned on an annual basis at Queen’s since 2006. We are an ‘impact driven’ organisation proactively seeking member feedback, implementing their views and communicating values, mission, vision and activities. We have appointed a new Marketing Team and are redesigning branding, website and online presence; these actions have enhanced communications with our membership.
Working in partnership with the University, we promoted engagement with the National Student Survey (NSS), resulting in a 76% response rate and a ‘question 23’ satisfaction rating of 82%, sixth highest in the UK.
Online polling is embedded within our democratic culture; turnout for sabbatical elections has increased from an average of 1,800 (prior to 2006) to consistent turnouts of over 4,000 (since 2007). For the first time, over 2,000 voted to elect our Students’ Union Council, whilst 1,857 students participated in our most recent national union affiliation referendum – over ten hours’ polling – in October 2012.
QUBSU was an early adopter of the Enterprise and Employability agenda and, via our Enterprise SU unit, based in the Union, we support student members with commercial business, social enterprise or community-based project ideas. Key programmes include the ‘QUB Apprentice’ competition and ‘Innovateher’ (business training for prospective female entrepreneurs). Enterprise SU has two full-time staff members and paid student interns.
Work to enhance community relations is largely driven by the elected VP Community. The ‘Living in the Community Strategy’, approved by the Students’ Union Council, outlines the benefits of working with key stakeholders towards common goals. In order to best coordinate positive student impact in the community, QUBSU has launched a Volunteering Academy in order to promote the benefits of volunteering to the membership and to ‘match’ students with the opportunities that are best suited to them. We host an annual Volunteering Fair and stage Volunteering Excellency Awards to recognise students’ work in this area.
We acknowledge that we are living in an age of austerity and the above activities are central to the Union’s aim to proactively encourage student members to develop transferrable skills that will best prepare them for the workplace and to ensure that students are able to demonstrate and articulate the benefits that they have accrued via their participation in Clubs and Societies, representative roles, enterprise activities or volunteering.
Our recent academic campaign wins include:
(i) Introduction of 10% contribution for first year.
(ii) Students receiving access to examination scripts.
(iii) Introduction of set periods for assessment returns.
(iv) Agreement in principle that sabbaticals will sit on internal review panels, based upon QUBSU’s written QAA submission.
Academic-related successes include:
(i) Five-day extension for submission granted to students.
(ii) Increased library opening hours.
(iii) School Representative and Peer mentoring scheme extended.
(iv) ‘Degree Plus’ accreditation has been extended.
Some other recent highlights are outlined below:
Following a £15,000 award by the NUSSL Business Enterprise Committee, the Union’s ‘SU Lets’ initiative was opened, letting properties of a top standard and ensuring that high quality student housing remains a priority.
The Union has fully implemented the recommendations of its Clubs and Societies Review. We deliver enhanced training for student organisations and we have a full-time Coordinator to provide expert support.
Our keynote campaign of the year (entitled ‘Are Ye Well’) has delivered a range of physical and mental wellbeing initiatives to students, including health checks carried out by student nurses and engagement with library users between 10.00 p.m. and 12.00 midnight each night during examinations.
The Union has implemented the findings of a major Review into SSCCs (course representative systems) and the fruits of this work are now apparent with better working relationships between staff and students within their Schools. In addition, we secured funding from the University to create a new full-time Course Representation Support Officer post to support students in this role.
QUBSU has ongoing and significant input into the University’s Corporate Plan, Higher Education Strategy, Culture and Arts Strategy, Internationalisation Strategy and Educational Enhancement Review, as well as responding to Home Office Consultations, Student Tuition Fee Consultation, NI Higher Education Strategy Consultation, Minimum Alcohol Pricing Consultation and other governmental documents.
Our bars, entertainments and commercial services are regarded as representing best practice within the sector, whilst we offer 250+ student jobs.
We believe that extremely significant and verifiable improvement has taken place in our Union in recent years. We await assessment to upgrade our current SUEI accreditation and have attained Gold Green Impact accreditation in successive years.
The Students’ Union, famed as a leading light in the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Movement, continues to provide a voice for students from all walks of life. QUBSU operates within a community that is still emerging from a sustained period of civil strife, where most of our students are local and where there remain some underlying tensions. However, in recent years, equality has become enshrined at the heart of our Constitution and this process has been enhanced by the creation of a full-time Equality and Diversity sabbatical post and the creation of a formal Policy in this area.
We believe that we can justifiably claim to be one of the top-ranked students’ unions. Within the last six months, we have implemented a new staffing structure introducing six brand new staff posts within our Membership and Democratic Services Team. These new appointees will support elected student officers to deliver even greater outcomes for our membership and we strive to be the premier students’ union in these islands in the near future.
