James Shield for Director of Representation

[James Shield]

Hello Sinners!

My name is James, and I'm one of your four candidates for Director of Representation. If you read this website regularly you've probably heard a bit about what I've done in the Students' Association over the past year. I'm now looking to expand my role, applying my way of approaching things to the whole representational spectrum, and I hope you'll think that this would be a good thing.

I'm happy to answer any questions you have here, though my website should answer most of them:

http://www.james-shield.co.uk

I'll be launching a full plan of action after the hecklings tomorrow evening - DoR candidates will be speaking from around 11.30pm, so do make the effort to come along if you're interested in how we compare.

James

[Bizarre Atheist]

"Representation is the least sexy thing we do." - Tom d'Ardenne, local magician.

Discuss.

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[James Shield]

Ooh. Way to destroy my degree, Mr Atheist, by picking a question deserving of an essay! I’ll try to keep this short.

Let’s start by addressing what Tom was talking about when he said that; apathy. Are students apathetic? They certainly don’t seem to get involved with representational matters, but I’m not sure I would call that apathy per se.

There’s something about our generation (yes, I’m going to get a bit deep here) that seems different from previous ones. I’d argue that among intelligent young people, it’s certainly not the case that they don’t care. We all have strong opinions about wire-tapping, ID cards, health care, education, the environment and Boris Johnson, to pick just a few contemporary issues. But how many of us will join a political party, even if its policies are in line with our views? Very few.

Equally, I suspect the vast majority of us care very deeply in one way or another about the cost of education, for example. Approximately one third of students at St Andrews are Scottish (I was surprised too), yet only a handful made the effort to attend the graduate endowment demonstration in Edinburgh the other week.

What am I getting at? Well, there’s a saying I’ve heard, though I’m not sure who said it – “withdrawal in disgust is not the same as apathy”. And while I’d hardly call students’ opinion of the Union ‘disgust’, there certainly does seem to be a general feeling that involvement with the Students’ Association as an organization is not something that will ultimately lead to anything being changed or improved.

The biggest part of the problem is communication. It’s all well and good to meet with ministers and discuss higher education funding, and it’s fantastic that our national body, CHESS (Coalition of Higher Education Students in Scotland), is fast becoming the leading student voice on educational matters through its participation in the Scottish Parliament’s Future Thinking Taskforce. But the trouble is that the average student has no idea that these things go on – literally no idea. Who among us can say what Tom d’Ardenne or Steve Savage actually do each day? Again, very few. And it’s a shame, because they both work extraordinarily hard and contribute a great deal.

So, the number one problem is this perception of the representational side of the Union as impotent, powerless and pointless. Luckily for us, those words do not, for the most part, apply – it is primarily a perceptual shift that is needed. Even better, the solutions are really quite simple.

As I said in my AGM report – and I think this is a statement that sums up my whole attitude to this question – “The primary reason for any student’s apathy … is that the SRC is often negligent in informing students of the purpose it serves and the actions it takes. […] [C]ommunication with students is equal in importance to the representation we undertake on their behalf.”

We need to tell people what we’re doing on a regular basis. We need to show them our successes and prove that there are things they can achieve if they get involved. We need to campaign on things that genuinely matter to them, and do our best not to get bogged down in bureaucracy and constitutional changes. And when we’ve done all of those, we need to make it simple and easy for people to get involved if they want to – I’m talking about simple things here, like not using made up Latin phrases in SRC motions (which I’ve been vigorously stripping out of these documents since I began), advertising regular meeting times, and ensuring openness and transparency in everything we do. For more details, you may want to take a look at the motion I proposed and passed through SRC in November:

http://james-shield.weebly.com/openness ... ation.html

Well then, so much for keeping this short and congratulations if you’ve made it this far! If you want to talk about this more, you can grab me tomorrow at the hecklings from around 11.30pm or email me through the website:

http://www.james-shield.co.uk

[LK Today]

Question to all DoR candidates...

Engaging with students is a two way process. Discuss.

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http://standrews.facebook.com/profile.php?id=37102636

[James Shield]

Oh dear, another essay question! Can the next one at least have a question mark?

You’re right though, Lee, it’s a two-way thing, but I really think that in our strategy to increase engagement, it should be seen more as a progression from one to the other.

The Union needs to make the first step. This, in many ways, ties into what I said above about improving communication:

We need to tell people what we’re doing on a regular basis. We need to show them our successes and prove that there are things they can achieve if they get involved. We need to campaign on things that genuinely matter to them, and do our best not to get bogged down in bureaucracy and constitutional changes. And when we’ve done all of those, we need to make it simple and easy for people to get involved if they want to.

People are only going to get involved if they know and can see that we do things which are important to them. Obviously, we have to make sure we don’t waste time on pointless things – messing around with boring documents, spending too long deciding policies, running ineffectual awareness campaigns, etc (although not all awareness campaigns are pointless, many are; especially when they’re the only action taken on any given issue), but by and large this is not currently the case.

Things like the How To Rent guide, local elections guide and How To Rent survey are great examples. Huge participation, large-scale advertising and real, useful information. The advocacy services we offer (both education and accommodation) are also excellent examples of non-commercial services provided by the Union, if not by the SRC. I’ve always thought that treating the Union primarily as a service provider was a good way of proving its worth, acting as a springboard to proper representation, which is why my committee has done so many of these things over the past year.

So, these ‘services’ show people that the Union “does stuff”, as the infamous slogan goes, which then allows us to show them who’s doing it. Planning and accountability are important here, and I’m afraid to say that, well, we don’t really have much of either of these at the moment. Representatives elected to the SRC are by and large left to their own devices, with both positive and negative outcomes. Some people really take the initiative and think up some fantastic campaigns to run; others just turn up to meetings, say nothing and go home.

But this isn’t because they’re the lazy CV-polishers some would have them labeled as (though unfortunately and undeniably, some of them are). It’s largely because they feel they have no coherent and structured way of working towards their aims, and that there are no measures for recourse if they don’t fulfill them.

First thing to do – planning. As DoR, I would ensure every member of every committee had at least some plan as to how to go about taking actions on the things they feel strongly about. SRC members need training on the structure of the Union and University, the relationship between the two, and how to use the system to their advantage.

Second thing – reporting. Even if SRC members were obligated to write a quick 100 words on their actions so far and plans for the future once a month, it would give any interested students the opportunity to find out what these people actually do without having to attend big scary meetings. We should also have job description-style remits for members (I’ve already started to develop these with Steve Savage) which would outline the minimum requirements of any given member.

Here’s an example:
http://james-shield.weebly.com/job-descriptions.html

Any member not fulfilling their remit would be subject to the usual measures for dealing with such matters.

A quick summary of the above:
- Do things that are relevant to the majority of the student body;
- Tell people about them;
- Make it easy to find out who’s behind them;
- Ensure these representatives have proper planning and reporting procedures;
- Ensure minimum standards and measures for recourse.

Once all that is done, the Students’ Association will have done its part in the process. The second part is for the student body to do (I told you it was a two-step progression!). For them to do this, we need to make sure we (a) consult widely and (b) make it easy for them to get involved if they want to.

(a) Consulting widely. The question time event in the motion I wrote in November is a good example, as would be arranging for SRC Officers to hold regular meeting times and “office hours” (e.g. one hour each week in the bar).

(b) Making it easy to get involved. Again, regular meeting times are a good idea – we should make it clear that you don’t have to sit on SRC to be a part of what it does (Sarah’s Environment & Ethics committee does a pretty good job of this so far). Helping them solve their own problems helps too – I’m thinking here of the guide I’m currently writing for hall committees, outlining the entire complaints procedure. Once students are fixing things for themselves, they may well feel like fixing things for each other.

I really believe we’re in a good situation with regard to making both of these big steps (the Union doing its part and students doing theirs). We have a Students’ Association with an ever more obvious drive towards better communication, and we have a student body that is engaged with the issues, if not the system. So yes, it’s a two-way process, but it will only be like this if we act first.

[Mr Comedy]

Ok. As former Student Support Officer (which I believe might now be called something different, like Equal Opportunities & Welfare) and a DoR runner in years gone by:

- What do you think are the major issues impacting access to learning for physical and learning disabled students?
- What do you intend to do about these issues?
- How will you work in conjunction with Student Support Services?

I think this is one of the biggest areas that needs impacting, as far as my understanding goes. What do you intend to do about it?

Dave Vinton
Nominated for Milk Monitor at School

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"I am in no way interested in immortality, but only in the taste of tea. " -Lu Tung