Hey everyone, welcome back. I hope you have had a great midterm break.
I know I did, but it wasn’t all fun and games—power never sleeps and VUWSA has been hard at work while you deservedly partied all night and slept all day. In between gag-worthy Royal Wedding stories, devouring season two of Gossip Girl, and seeing (and enjoying) Never Say Never 3D, I represented VUWSA at the City Council’s ANZAC Day ceremony and was hard at work with the Education Team as we continue to develop the Student Charter.
Also during the break the Academic Board approved the terms of reference for the Review of Undergraduate Education at Victoria. This is part of the University’s Learning and Teaching Strategy, specifically the objectives that aim to ‘establish a distinctive vision for education and the student experience at Victoria’.
This review, although it sounds kind of boring, is actually really important. It will help shape Victoria’s response to changes in government policy. The review will help Victoria to figure out a way to deal with the constraints that all universities in New Zealand must operate within—including pressures like ‘real value’ funding decreases, the growing emphasis on course completion rates, and global developments in education. This review will provide a crucial opportunity for Victoria to clarify its vision for education and the advantages it can gain for students studying here.
VUWSA supports this review and its terms of reference. We believe that it will help alleviate some of the confusion students have around programmes or other issues students often face when entering tertiary study. VUWSA hopes that the review will also lead to a better overall educational experience at Victoria. Keep your eyes peeled and your ears cocked for more information on the review and its eventual recommendations.
The Learning and Teaching Strategy wasn’t the only exciting bureaucratic machine to get its wheels turning over in the mid-trimester break. Victoria has also extended the closing date for consultation on the Student Experience Survey so it can get as many responses as possible. If you have completed the survey, you will now go into the draw to win one of ten $100 vicbooks vouchers (Yay! Incentives!). If you have not done so already, I encourage you to take this opportunity to give the University a piece of your mind on what is working well for you and what needs to be improved. There are loads of things we could make better about our study time here at Vic and the feedback you and other students give will directly influence changes the University makes in improving our student experience.
Finally, to ‘James the BA Student’ who wrote to Salient wishing the old Meeting Room Two in the Student Union Building be returned to its former cavernous glory—never say never. It is currently being returned to the pool of bookable student spaces and will be ready as soon as it is cleaned up and given a new paint job. This will hopefully help alleviate the current demand for bookable club spaces, and provide clubs and groups with greater a greater range of venue sizes that suit their needs. And to ‘Ulysses ft. Mista Bear literate of kittens’ who suggested someone needs to give me a hug—I’m not the ‘hugging’ type (you usually have to buy me drinks) but thanks for the thought.
To every other student who didn’t write me a letter, don’t worry, I’m not upset. And welcome back, there’s not much longer left to go. Before you know it, this trimester will be over faster than Rodney Hide’s leadership.
Love you,
Seamus Brady