Hard to Reach Students and City Councillors

Hard to Reach Students and City Councillors 


Today wasn't such an exciting one unfortunately. Solid meetings from 9 until 6. The highlights of the day included discussing Kent Union's new strategy around 'hard to reach students.' Although I'm not sure I'm happy with the title I think this will be a significant step forward for Kent Union in terms of reaching out to students who might not be catered for by some of the more traditional activities that we organise. This can range from nights out in the 'Venue' and other bar nights, to the time and location groups hold their meetings. People who might fit into the groups of 'hard to reach students' might include mature students, students with dependants, international students, ethnic minorities and many more.

I'm particularly excited about the new Mature and Postgraduate society which is being set up. The first meeting of the group will be held at Dolche Vita at 10:00am on Wednesday 9th of May and anyone is free to attend whether you consider yourself a mature student or not. It will be a chance to meet your Mature students officer who represents you here at Kent as well as a chance to set the objectives of the society as an social group but also potentially a support network. I personally believe that higher education is becoming an increasingly attractive proposition for non-traditional (18-21) year-olds as many take a career break or seek a career change and return to education or perhaps to study for their second or postgraduate degree. This is why I believe this group is so important and needed at Kent. If you have any questions please drop me an e-mail. You can follow the society on twitter @KentMature or join the facebook group here.

Stage Spiders Do Great work with kids 
in the Canterbury community and beyond

www.stagespiderscanterbury.webs.com

  

The other thing of note today was a meeting with local Head of Canterbury City Council John Gilbey where we discussed a range of issues including the 70,000+Volunteering hours that have been logged by Kent Students so far this year (if you haven't logged your hours its still not too late go to www.kentunionvolunteering.co.uk before May 10th) and the Community Spirit Award won by CSR at the 'I love Student Radio' awards. As well as all the fantastic work that many of our societies and student led volunteer groups are doing in the local community with special reference to stage spiders.

That's all for now, here's hoping that the weather cheers up a bit and that I don't get stuck in meetings for the rest of the week!