Liverpool Guild of Students

The winner of the Student Opportunities Award is Liverpool Guild of Students

Student Opportunities Award

1.What new initiatives, projects, clubs or societies have been set up as a result of students’ wishes?

We have around £20k available for societies’ each year. As a result of our governance review, we implemented a new Participatory Budgeting system.

We hold four sessions of ‘Spend It’ throughout the academic year, where any society can submit a proposal outlining their project, how it will benefit the student community and costs. All societies can send one member of their committee to represent their society.

During the meeting Societies discuss the needs of their individual societies and the wider Guild community. The aim is for students to move from their own individual interests to the interests of the wider community and student body. Those who have submitted projects are given the opportunity to present their projects. Following a deliberation phase, bids can be amended e.g. similar projects can combine or the bid amount amended. The projects with the most votes are awarded their funding until all of the funds available are allocated.

As a result of this we believe that we have improved;
• Transparency of our block grant and democratic systems
• Accountability of the grant account
• Understanding of our budgets and the societies’ budgets
• Our understanding of the priorities that our societies have
• Societies’ knowledge of other societies and opened up avenues for collaboration
• Student engagement with the Guild and with other societies.
This year, we had 74 bids to ‘Spend It’ totalling £66,000, with 39 of these bids being approved and spending our £20,000 budget for the year.

‘It was a great opportunity to talk to members of the many other societies and learn more about the events they were running. However, what I really enjoyed was the sense of responsibility societies were given, as we could all work together to decide what things the money would be used for’.

2. How has the students’ union made sure the members feel able to participate in activities and how have these increased the opportunities available for students?

Training Cycle

We have amended the level of training that our society committee members can access in order to increase their confidence in participating. This includes training before the summer, in October and Refreshers training in February. We also hold an annual ‘Committee Catch Up’ to check that the societies are meeting their goals and to identify any training needs – 110 out of 150 eligible societies attended this year. We have also held a series of Master classes, from script-writing to a social media guide to Education for Sustainable Development to increase the number, range and quality of opportunities available. Society memberships have increased by 2000 this year alone.

Give it a Go

The development of our Give it a Go programme ensures that there are continual opportunities for our members to ‘try’, including trips around the UK, society and volunteering taster sessions and skills sessions, including language courses and classes in calligraphy. We work with the University to offer discounted Halls tickets up to 75% off the standard cost. The aim of this is to build communities in halls and encourage participation in activity outside of the learning environment. Over 800 tickets have been sold this year and 95% of those in attendance have said that they would recommend a GiaG trip to a friend.
Volunteering

Volunteering at the Guild has undergone huge redevelopment this year as part of the NUS Digital Volunteering Platform pilot. We now have over 200 organisations/projects registered and over 800 applications to volunteer registered from our 514 registered volunteers. This is significantly larger than any other pilot organisations with the platform. We continue to work closely with other Liverpool Union’s to attract the best volunteer opportunities for all Liverpool Students. We also believe our Student Volunteering Week which included our Volunteering Fair, with over 80 local charities in attendance, has greatly contributed to these exciting figures.

3. How have activities and opportunities benefited the student population or the wider community and what changes have been made as a result?

Leave Liverpool Tidy

We have run our “reduce-reuse-recycle” waste management scheme for five years; over 3.9 tonnes was collected and recycled last year. Following a review it became clear the scheme had plateaued, a more efficient, targeted message was required to have maximum impact on the student population. Working in partnership with the Merseyside Textile Forum, we now have six clothing banks at Halls. Students have received a bag and marketing material to encourage them to use their nearest bank and we believe that we will see a significant reduce in waste on campus and within the wider community; local banks and charity shops have been mapped and circulated in the wider community to encourage them to join the scheme.

Widening Participation

We work closely with the University’s Educational Opportunities Team to deliver Societies in Schools and Science in Schools. Science in Schools aims to dispel negative perceptions of science among primary school children and encourage pupils to think about higher education. Members spend an afternoon with a class (Year 5 or 6) delivering a presentation about science in all its forms. This includes exercises to get pupils to think about how science plays a role in so many things, as well as several experiments. Societies in Schools put societies’ talents into practice and shows them off to young people. We’ve had sessions on calligraphy, making rubber band racing cars and teaching pupils about sexism in the media. Volunteers receive lesson-plan and safeguarding training and our main changes have been in the developing relationships with partner schools to ensure consistent and high-quality volunteering projects for our members.

Big Officer Conversation

We held our first BOC this year, encouraging our Halls’ Student Committee members to develop the representative sides of their role and fight to make positive change within their community. Facilitated by staff and officers, our HSCs brought their feedback from those they represent, which was then submitted to the University. This has led to a review in to Wifi and social space provision as well as a commitment to survey all halls’ residents and facilitate focus groups.

Nominated by James Coe, Students’ Union Officer

What the judges said…

“I loved the huge redevelopment of volunteering at the guild and that they have engaged so many volunteers and organisations in their work. Fantastic community and school engagement. Really great to read about how their transforming their approach.” Charlotte Hill, Step Up To Serve

“The work to develop volunteering within the Guild has produced excellent results, and I particularly liked the ‘Give it a Go’ project to provide taster sessions for members to volunteer and take part in activities. The range of impacts is impressive, ranging from major recycling schemes, to partnerships with schools to encourage young people to think about higher education, to strengthening student voices.” Justin Davis-Smith, NCVO