Welcome Week
Amazing. Just amazing. It was a fantastic week, and great to be a part of. The societies did amazingly well and groups seemed to get a lot of interest which translated into membership. From the data collected so far, there were 90 Groups on Thursday and 110 Groups on Friday. There was a staggering 11,000 footfall over the two days, and from 103 groups data, over 10,000 interested students signed up, and 3,500 students became members on the day. From chatting to groups, there has been consistent sign up since then also….Good stuff! There will be another opportunity to attract more members at the Get Involved fair on Monday 26th January, followed by two weeks of introductory events and workshops - more details to follow!




















Student Group Meeting (Megaforum!!)
Thank you to all the groups that made it, I hope you found it really useful. It was a great opportunity for me to meet groups and to encourage groups to get in touch. There was a lot of information, and if anyone would like a copy of the slides, I can send you a reduced version. We discussed the various training opportunities that are coming up: Marketing and Sponsorship on Wednesday 18th, the CV workshops for committee members, Events drop in (Monday’s 11am-12pm – email vpsad@guild.bham.ac.uk to book), and Entrepreneurship workshops. We also touched on the Guild of Students website and how groups can get the most out of it. Please check here that your group details are up to date. If you would like your event to be placed on the ‘what’s on’ section, please email s.streatfield@guild.bham.ac.uk with your event details, and it will be forwarded to marketing and myself. Groups had a chance to ask me any questions (and Challenge me to a number of activities!!) and to communicate anything to other groups. I have collected in all the feedback, and I am working on all the issues raised. I will be blogging feedback to your comments – thank you very much for all your constructive comments!!

Fruit of the Loom
There have been a number of issues with this recently. Fruit of the Loom t-shirts are to be boycotted by the Guild and student groups following the ‘what’s disgusting? Union busting’ motion being approved in March. Please remember that you are not allowed to use Fruit of the Loom t-shirts, and when ordering with external clients, be sure to check which t-shirts they use.



Student Group Committee elections
The SGC is the Guild-Council sub-committee that recognises and derecognises student groups amongst other terms of reference, and is made up of 3 Sabbatical Officers, and 3 elected student representatives. The elections for this year will be held at the next Guild Council on 29th October.



Acorn Fun Run
A huge thank you to all the Sabbs and Guild staff that made it along to the Acorn charity fun run on Sunday!! We made £63 for Acorns and they had a great turn out on the day! A big thank you to Ed, who was extremely grumpy about the whole thing, but still managed to race off ahead as soon as the whistle went, and was even offered a goody bag as the staff mistook him for a child… :D Well done to Redbrick who did a fantastic live blog about the event, with a number of audio interviews and loads of photos. Click here and here for more!






Committee Training, Non-Sabb training
I’ve been along to a couple of committee training sessions (which all new committee’s have to attend) to meet some more of you, and see how the training session is run. I also helped to coordinate and deliver the non-Sabb training, they are a great bunch of passionate people, and I am really really looking forward to working with them this year.

Gilbert and Sullivan Society performing HMS Pinafore
Well done Gilbert and Sullivan, for their awesome performance of HMS Pinafore, which they rehearsed in a period of just 24hours! I was asked to introduce their first ever performance as a society, which was an absolute honour – thank you!

Societies and Challenge Emma!! Here’s a little shout out to the societies I have had meetings with in the last couple of weeks about various issues, support and advice…Burn FM, MethSoc, Ballroom and Latin, Navigators, Carnival RAG, BrumSurf, Friends of Palestine, EconSoc, RA welcome week debrief, GTV, Redbrick!! TrickSoc, Purple Mermaid, ArtSoc and BUDS have all challenged me...if you want to challenge me, then drop me an email at vpsad@guild.bham.ac.uk,