I hate March. I never used to until I joined NUS. Thankfully my month wasn’t derailed by the run-up to Annual Conference but it certainly makes life much more difficult!

NUS Scotland Conference – Saturday 3rd / Sunday 4th March

One of my favourite NUS conferences due to the people and the karaoke, this year was no exception! I also find the Scottish Higher Education policy landscape really interesting and James Alexander has been doing some ground breaking and excellent work around quality in Scotland.

Plymouth AGM – Tuesday 6th

After a morning in the office I got the train down to Plymouth to chair their AGM, following in the footsteps of Veronica King who chaired it the year before. I had to stay over in Plymouth as it seems there are no trains to anywhere after dark!!!

This meant I spent the next morning on the train back to London bright and early. Unfortunately my diary hasn’t recorded what meeting I was attending but I know it was important as I was up at stupid o’clock to make it!

Burgess Steering Group – Thursday 8th

The last full meeting of the Burgess Steering Group on measuring and recording student achievement before the final report is published. As ever you don’t get everything you want but I was glad of the progress made.

Conference Charing Training in NUS HQ – Friday 9th

Friday was spent in the office and also undertaking training to chair annual conference, which I was very excited about.

Dignity! Period. – ACTSA Rally in Trafalgar Square – Saturday 10th

A great rally in Trafalgar Square for the Dignity campaign that Kat Stark has been running this year with Action for Southern Africa and Amicus. The day included two great speeches by Kat Stark and Ruqayyah Collector and lots of familiar faces in the crowds.

Compositing for Annual Conference – Sunday 11th

One of my favourite days in the NUS calendar. No seriously. I love it. It’s the sadist in me.

Office day – Monday 12th /Tuesday 13th

Catching up and preparing for some events that week.

Presentation to the QAA Board – Wednesday 14th

On Wednesday I delivered a presentation to the QAA Board on the student representation project I have commissioned, led by Duncan Cockburn from SPARQS in Scotland. I set out the major principles underpinning the project and some key strategic themes for quality assurance and enhancement. We had good feedback from the board, which is important if the project is to succeed.

I then attended the QAA’s 10th Anniversary Reception at the top of the Gherkin in the City of London, which was amazing. Lord Dearing gave the address, which was really insightful.

Office day – Thursday 15th

Improvement Board Meeting – Friday 16th

The first meeting of the Improvement Board established as part of the process for turning around NUS’ finances. Myself, Gemma Tumelty and Stephen Brown sit on the Board from the Senior Management Team.

Socialist Students’ Conference – Sunday 18th

Spent Sunday speaking as part of a panel on campaigning to defeat fees. Wasn’t as bad as I thought I might be, given our political differences. There was actually a lot of consensus.

Senior Management Team – Monday 19th

More regular and more important than usual given the current state of the finances.

Meeting with Anthony McLaren UCAS Chief Exec – Tuesday 20th

Tuesday was spent in the office, followed by a meeting with the Chief Executive of UCAS, Anthony McLaren, to discuss a number of political and operational issues of common interest to UCAS and NUS.

Great Fees Debate and HE Academy Conference – Wednesday 21st

The Great Fees Debate passed with great success, bringing together a variety of speakers to address a number of key issues around HE funding, including Bill Rammell, David Willetts, Sarah Teather and a range of big figures from around the sector.

In addition to chairing parts of the day, I also had to duck out to deliver the keynote address to the Higher Education Academy’s ‘Students Supporting Students in Assessment’ event nearby at the New Connaught Rooms in London. It went down very well and in line with NUS policy I should declare that I received £25 in book tokens as a thank you for speaking at the event.

Office day – Thursday 22nd

OIA Board Meeting, Reading – Friday 23rd

An important meeting of the board of the Office of the Independent Adjudicator for Higher Education. I took concerns from student union advice centre staff and student officers about some of the recent media comments by Baroness Deech within and without her remit and also reported on a survey we’re developing with RAWS to review student union advice centre experience of working with the OIA.

Annual Conference – Tuesday 27th – Thursday 29th

I think this requires a whole new blog, which I may or may not get round to writing. In short, thank you so much to all those who voted to re-elect me for a second term.

I’ve also got to thank all those people who slogged their guts out campaigning for Rich, Katie, Be and I and I was pleased that Katie and Be polled so well in the Block election. Of course not every election ends the way you’d like. I couldn’t go without a special mention for Richard Angell, who is the most hard working person I have ever had the pleasure of working with. Sometimes trying to keep up with Richard is exhausting – as his excellent record as a campaigning at BUGS and lately for NUS suggests! He has given so much to the student movement during his years of involvement, often putting helping others before his own health and happiness. Richard: NUS is poorer without you, but I suspect that you’ll be healthier, happier and richer outside NUS if the experience of other ex-NEC members is anything to go by!

Congratulations to the rest of the NEC-elect (or re-elect)!

Aldwych Group meeting, Liverpool

I’m not sure how I managed it, but I attended a meeting of the Aldwych Group in Liverpool on the Friday, which was good fun and useful from my perspective.

I then spent the weekend recovering – slightly zombiefied - in Edinburgh.

Wes

VP Ed 06-08

wes.streeting@nus.org.uk

07738 477 353

The Blogs on this site represent the individual views of their authors and do not necessarily reflect the policies or practices of the National Union of Students.

All links in blogs will open in a new browser window.

The permanent URL for this specific blog entry is: http://www.officeronline.co.uk/blogs/wesstreeting/274512.aspx