University of Manchester Students' Union
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The University of Manchester Students' Union (UMSU) is the representative body of students at the University of Manchester, England, and is the UK's second largest students' union. It was formed out of the merger between UMIST Students' Association (USA) and University of Manchester Union (UMU) when the parent organisations (UMIST and The Victoria University of Manchester) merged on the 1 October 2004.
Unlike many other Students' Unions in the UK, it does not have a president, but is instead run a by a 14 member executive team (8 sabbatical, 6 non-sabbatical) who share joint responsibility.
UMSU has a long tradition of strong campaigning and active politics and has seen many members go on to political paths both within and outwith the student movement.
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[edit] Student Activities
There are many student run activities which involve thousands of students in various roles including media, community volunteering fundraising for charity and over 150 societies.
[edit] Student Direct
Student Direct is the UMSU's student newspaper and is shared with University of Salford Students' Union and University of Bolton Students' Union. A large team of volunteers writes the paper with the editor being one of the sabbatical officers on the Union Executive.
The paper has a print-run of 22,000 and goes out every week of term-time.
Additionally, UMSU produces GRIP Magazine. This was formerly produced monthly by USA, but since the formation of the new union, only one issue has been produced.
[edit] Student Action
Student Action is a community volunteering project that sends student volunteers out to work in the local community. In the year 2004-2005 there were over 300 active volunteers working anything from 20-300 hours over the year.
[edit] Manchester Rag
Manchester Rag is a charitable fundraising group in UMSU. It runs many events over the year. Some are specific sponsored events while others involved simply collecting money on the street. The fundraising is conducted by hundreds of student volunteers. Hundreds of thousands of pounds are raised every year and all of this goes to external charities.
[edit] Fuse FM
Fuse FM is the radio station. For the past four years this has broadcast twice per year for one month on both FM radio and as an internet stream.
[edit] Societies
There are over 150 societies the operate out of UMSU. These cover a variety of activities ranging from campaigning to sport to music to culture. Any student can become a member of a society. The largest non-religious society is currently the Pirate Society. Societies are provided with venues, equipment and publicity to facilitate their own activities.
[edit] Wikispectus
In 2006, a "wikispectus" was created by the UMSU. It's main goal is to "truly reflect the facts (or fiction) about living and studying in Manchester as experienced by the students." Anyone can contribute to it at the moment and it is starting to fill up with information about all aspects of student life. See Wikispectus.
[edit] Governance
The Union is controlled by three levels of government. The sovereign body is the general meeting that sets policy may be attended by any student. It has a quorum of 300 students for ordinary meetings. The Union Council has approximately 65 members elected annually. They meet every three weeks in term-time. The Union Executive runs the union on a day-to-day basis and also sits on, and is elected concurrently with, the Council.
UMSU is also affiliated to the NUS.
[edit] Executive
The current UMSU executive contains 14 positions of which eight are full-time, paid sabbaticals and six are unpaid non-sabbaticals. The table below first lists sabbatical and then non-sabbatical officers. All have their own areas of responsibility, but share joint responsibility as trustees of the Union and directors of Materialise Ltd, the Union's external trading company. Non-sabbatical officers may not, however, hold budgets.
The positions on the executive are significantly different from those of UMU and USA. Faculty Officers did not exist in either organisation, nor did the full-time Campaigns Officer.
[edit] Elections
Elections to the Council and Executive take place in March for the following year, with a by-election in October to fill any vacancies. All students are free to stand and to vote on production of their university library card.
The elections are organised by the Returning Officer, who must be nominated by executive from among the sabbatical officers. They must then remain impartial in the outcome of the election. However, much power rests in the hands of the returning officer, who can disqualify candidates and rule on anything where the Election Regulations remain silent[1] (archive link, was dead; history). Consequently, a number of highly contentious decisions have been made in the past, some of which have been overturned on appeal or by an independent third party.
[edit] Famous Connections
Anna Ford was the first female President of UMU in 1966-67 and, on recommendation of the Students' Union became Chancellor of The Victoria University of Manchester on 16 December 2001. Upon the merger with UMIST she became the co-chancellor of the new University of Manchester.
[edit] Services
[edit] Bars
UMSU has four bars that open regularly. In the Steve Biko Building is Solem Bar and the newly refurbished Club Academy. In the Burlington Rooms is the Burlington Bar. Next to Grosvenor Court is Korumba, which holds many exciting theme nights, as well as two quiz nights on Sunday and Monday nights. And in the Barnes Wallis building is Harry's Bar.
In addition to these there are the other bars within specific venues that operate as required.
[edit] Manchester Academy
Manchester Academy hosts bands from across the world most nights. It is actually 4 different venues ranging from about 250-1800 capacity.
[edit] Shops
There is a shop in the Steve Biko Building and another in the Barnes Wallis Building. The Union print shop, u-print.com, is located in the Barnes Wallis Building.
