Poor turnout has been reported at training sessions for new class representatives since the start of this trimester, allegedly due to a lack of advertising and “poor organisation.”
The training system for new class representatives is coordinated largely by Education Vice-President Joel Cosgrove. While in the past around 20-30 students have attended each training session, this trimester, almost 100 people have attended 13 different sessions, a substantial decline.
On the Te Aro campus, class reps for design students were unaware of sessions being run.
The low turnout at the training sessions can largely be blamed on a lack of advertising. Dates and times of training sessions were omitted from the class rep handbooks, and posters were only put up the week the sessions began.
While Cosgrove concedes that there were “mix-ups”, he reportedly initially told the VUWSA Executive that he was unable to fulfill his duties due to a lack of support from staff.
Other sources have suggested that Cosgrove has had “too much on his plate”, struggling to fulfill his own role as well as acting as Activities Officer.
Cosgrove dismisses these claims, saying such criticism regarding his post is due to his “[inability to] say no”, a “weakness” he is working on.
However, one source says that he is “seriously trying to put it right,” and that the attendance for the last week of training sessions has been higher than previous weeks.