Thursday 04-07-2019 - 16:16

It’s been a busy year for Assembly, the body where student representatives come together to decide the issues they want your Student Officers to focus on. Around 28 items were submitted to Assembly over the year with four of these being taken to National Conference.

Your SU Reps have been busy representing your interests and tweeting weirder and weirder GIFs as the year went on. Your Student Officers have applied a variety of different decorative techniques to their update slides. This year’s Chair, Ted Lavis Coward, has kept proceedings running smoothly and has consistently encouraged use of the hashtag #SUAssembly (we’ll go viral one day Ted). But what are the main things SU Assembly has achieved this year?

In Michaelmas 2018, a motion was passed to affiliate Durham SU with Tyne & Wear Citizens. We’ve since successfully become affiliated with Tyne & Wear Citizens, and your Opportunities Officer, Charlie, has been making use of the network to hold a ‘listening day’ to gather evidence from University staff members about pay and conditions.

With another rise in Durham’s accommodation fees announced last October, Assembly passed a motion to support direct action against rising accommodation fees. Since the motion passed, the SU has been researching the practicalities of a rent strike in Durham, including seeking legal advice.

More recently, Assembly passed a motion to lobby for a freeze in international tuition fees. International tuition fees are incredibly high at Durham, and they will soon have to be paid by both non-EU international students, as well as EU students following Brexit. The motion asks the SU to work with the International Students’ Association to achieve a five-year freeze in the fees.

Another motion asked the SU to help train student leaders in colleges. We’re currently in the process of hiring a Leadership Development Coordinator, who will be responsible for coordinating and delivering training for student leaders, which will help progress towards achieving this policy!

This year SU Assembly has also introduced core policy positions, which are overarching positions that provide a clear understanding of what the SU believes on the fundamental parts of student life and education in Durham. So far, Assembly has passed eight core positions, including positions on sexual violence, value for money, and good quality student housing. We hope more will be passed in the next year, so do let us know if you have any ideas about the big topics you think your SU needs a position on!

Finally, a big thank you from everyone at Durham SU to all those who has been involved in Assembly this year!

And if you’re interested in getting involved in Assembly next year, we still have the following positions open:

• Assembly Chair
• Assembly Open Place
• Assembly Open Place (woman/carer position)
• Places on Governance and Grants Committee

Please just drop us an email at dsu.governance@durham.ac.uk for more information about the roles. Even if you’re not sure what they involve, we’d love to hear from you, and can help you understand more about what it would be like to be part of Assembly!