University of Southampton Students' Union
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| Established | 1903 |
|---|---|
| Institution | University of Southampton |
| President | Ben Rogers |
| Other Sabbatical Officers | Phil Webb - Vice President (Media and Communications)
Chris Whittaker - Vice President (Education and Representation) Toby Kushner - Vice President (Welfare and Societies) Issy Gross - AU President Dan Hemsley - Winchester President |
| Location | Building 42, University Road, Highfield, Southampton, Hampshire, England |
| Members | c. 20,000 |
| Affiliated to | Aldwych Group, National Postgraduate Committee, British Universities Sports Association |
| Homepage | www.susu.org |
The Southampton University Students' Union (SUSU), is the representative body of all the 20,000 students at the University of Southampton, England. It has a good reputation among other UK university student's unions for its facilities, services and organization and is part of the Aldywch Group of Students' Unions. It is situated on, and is the hub of, the main Highfield Campus and consists of three main buildings facing each other in a rough triangle close to the Hartley Library.
The first, dating back to the 1930s in a red brick style complements the Hartley Library opposite and contains a variety of offices for the union staff as well as a media resource centre for students' use. The building’s main use though is the ‘Stag’s Head’ – the union's main bar, and the adjoining ‘Garden Court’ (an old refectory now used as a gig venue for relatively well known bands).
The second building, which was built in the 1950s in the Basil Spence masterplan, is the main union building. The building was extended with new nightclub and cinema facilities in 2002 and now boasts some of the best facilities for a students’ union in the UK. The union nightclub is known as 'The Cube' and has a capacity of 1700 and consists of three bars, and a dance floor area. The venue hosts a variety of club-nights, the including ‘Kinki’ on a Friday night. 'Generator' on Thursday features live indie and alternative music and DJs. Famous bands, guest DJs, and celebrities appear intermittently throughout the year to provide further entertainment. The cinema has a capacity of nearly 400 and shows films nightly Sunday through Wednesday at £2.00 each, although showings are a few months later than the original release date. This building also contains the Bridge Bar, which is slightly more up-market venue than the Stag’s Head. Various events take place across these two venues including regular karaoke, live jazz and poker nights, all of which are either free or very cheap. On other levels there is the SUSU Café along with more union offices, squash courts and an indoor sports hall. There is also as the brand new studio for the University’s Radio Station, ‘Surge’ which broadcasts throughout the year on the 1287AM and the internet and annually on FM.
The third building which makes up ‘SUSU’ contains a convenience shop, hair dressers and student travel centre.
As well as offering many entertainment facilities and events the union also provides social and welfare services. There are over a 100 student societies and over sixty sports clubs funded by the union. Due to its location water-sports are a particular strong point. A host of welfare advice is provided free by SUAIC (Students' Union Advice and Information Centre).
In May 2002 (after several attempts going back several years), the union chose to disaffiliate itself from the NUS, whom SUSU believed to be 'political time-wasters', 'bureaucratic' and not providing value for the £86,000 / year affiliation fee. Other unions have since either followed suit or have started to question the value of the NUS.
The student newspaper is the Wessex Scene and comes out every three weeks.
The union, like most other student's unions in the UK, is run by a team of students: 6 paid full-time sabbatical officers and 6 part-time unpaid ‘executive’ students, all of whom are elected in a cross-campus ballot in either February or March of each year.
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[edit] Criticisms of the Union
A number of criticisms have been made of the Union in recent years:
- Despite being a democratic institution, few students actually take part in the democratic process. As such, the Union has been considered out-of-touch although southampton has one of the largest turnouts in elections and hardly ever talks about issue that do not directly affect students.
- The day-to-day operation of the union is managed by permanent, unelected employees, and the democratic structures of the union (such as union council) are banned from discussing any individual employee. Sabbatical officers, the only people capable of dismissing these employees, are trained by the very employees they oversee; this has been criticised as making dismissal near-impossible.
- Sabbatical officers, who notionally oversee the running of the union, are elected from the student body; few have experience managing a large commercial operation.
- Some consider communication between the Union and its members to be poor. Union officers point to the Union website and media outlets as an example of its communication, although it is unclear how many students look at it regularly.
[edit] Interesting Facts and Figures
- The union has an annual turnover of £6 million.
- In the 1970’s there was a live sex show in the union.
- The Union has over 300 Staff.
- In the early 80’s, on returning from a dinner in town the Hockey Club used paint they had stolen to paint a zebra crossing on the road so they could cross it.
- The Union gets an annual block grant from the university of £1.6 million
- Both John Denham and Alan Whitehead, both local Southampton MPs, were once Presidents of the Students’ Union.
- The Wessex Scene Used to feature Page 3 Students (Boys & Girls).
- The Engineers Ball was once famous for having topless waitresses.
- One of our porters was so convinced that the Union was haunted he refused to do certain patrols at night alone.
- The union has a dark room & a digital video editing suite.
- Dire Straits, Led Zeppelin,U2, Cream (band), Divine Comedy, Granddaddy, Terrorvision, Republica, Space, Paul Oakenfold, Judge Jules, Dave Pearce, Athlete, The Thrills, Feeder, The Bravery and Razorlight have all played at SUSU.
- The Cube used to be a debating chamber.
- The Union President gets to sit on the committee to choose the Vice-Chancellor.
- One of our university Challenge Teams poured a glass of water over the edge of the desk to see if it would drip on the team ‘below’ (they then got disqualified).
- We run English language courses for the partners of International students.
- The Union helps to fund over 75 clubs and 110 societies.
- The Students’ Union used to pay £70,000 to be part of the NUS.
- RAG once let the QE2 loose from its moorings as a stunt.
- Dominic Mohan (The Sun) , John Inverdale (BBC) , Paul Newman (The Independent), David Charter (The Times), Fiona Cowood (Bella) & Alex Doak (QP Magazine) used to work on the Wessex Scene.
- Jon Sopel, Union President 1981-82 is a BBC television political correspondent and presents the politics show.
[edit] Past Presidents
1923-1924 S H Wiltshire
1924-1925 L J Russell
1925-1926 G A F Grindle
1926-1927 J A Smith
1927-1928 L A Poole
1928-1929 L H Shave
1929-1930 L Nichols
1930-1931 E Palmer
1931-1932 F Knibbs
1932-1933 S V Ward (Resigned), F W K Brumby
1933-1934 D Miller
1934-1935 G G Whitebread
1935-1936 J Goss
1936-1937 A R Brown
1937-1938 P G Wickens
1938-1939 J Counsell
1939-1940 L M Moore
1940-1941 A G Derbyshire
1941-1942 A Smith
1942-1943 S Fletcher
1943-1944 B Warner
1944-1945 J A Attwood (Resigned), F Stillwell
1945-1946 J A Attwood
1946-1947 Alan (Chas) Dean
1947-1948 Jack F Archard (Resigned), Ron Hewish
1948-1949 Michael Holland
1949-1950 Jeffrey W Wilkinson
1950-1951 Frank Bird
1951-1952 John Dascombe
1952-1953 R J Barry
1953-1954 Stuart S Bampton
1954-1955 Peter H May
1955-1956 Peter R G Hornsby
1956-1957 Derek A Schofield
1957-1958 J E Ffowkes Williams
1958-1959 Anthony J Gardner
1959-1960 H Denys Barron
1960-1961 R (Balch) Barden
1961-1962 R C Smith
1962-1963 J E MacFarlane
1963-1964 M J Durham
1964-1965 W Stuart Humby
1965-1966 P E Moorman
1966-1967 J Royle
1967-1968 K I Kirby
1968-1969 J R Alexander
1969-1970 David F Walker
1970-1971 Glyn Davies
1971-1972 Alan Whitehead
1972-1973 M Unwin
1973-1974 S Evett (Recalled), G Strong
1974-1975 C Rushton
1975-1976 David Hughes
1976-1977 John Denham
1977-1978 David M P Page
1978-1979 Jon L Craig
1979-1980 P K Emery
1980-1981 J K Dent
1981-1982 Jon B Sopel
1982-1983 Stuart J Maister
1983-1984 S J Williams
1984-1985 D Taylor-Smith
1985-1986 M Parchment
1986-1987 Ian Geddes
1987-1988 Joceline K Tran
1988-1989 Richard J P G Chavasse
1989-1990 E Grant
1990-1991 Steve Lathrope
1991-1992 A Wootton
1992-1993 Stephen Knight
1993-1994 Kevin Craig
1994-1995 Hannah Barton
1995-1996 Nigel Impey
1996-1997 Simon Coningsby
1997-1998 Matt Mowlem
1998-1999 Alex Bols
1999-2000 Graham Poole
2000-2001 Marie Heracleous
2001-2002 Stephen Edwards
2002-2003 Tim Rowlandson
2003-2004 Ben Hudson
2004-2005 Andy Wilson
2005-2006 Andy Wilson
2006-2007 Ben Rogers
[edit] External links
- University of Southampton Students' Union website
- SURGE (student radio station’s website)
- Wessex Scene (student newspaper’s website)
