2020 General Meeting

Date: 12th March 2020 (2020-03-12)

Agenda

Hustings for organisational vice-president, following motion to create the role

Minutes

There are loads of people!! Yay!! 

Cerian explains what will happen - it’s a co-option, anyone can vote by handing in a paper vote before 7pm.

There are three candidates - Gwen, Natalina and Millie. 

Everyone gives an introductory speech. 

Gwen - she really enjoyed freshers week and wants to make sure everyone who comes to Balliol does too. She wants to rework the details of some workshops, strengthen the role of welfare and recruit a freshers week committee to help out. She thinks the vps and entz should be peer support trained, as they’re the most visible contacts for freshers, and we want freshers to feel safe and comfortable with them. 

Natalina - she’s passionate about changing attitudes around sex and sexual assault, she thinks a lot of people are more likely to talk about these issues with their friends so wants to produce a pamphlet so people know what should be done, she’s also passionate about mental health, it can be a particular issue at Oxford, she thinks it’s important to have a safe space for women via the women’s reps but it’s more normalised for women to be emotionally open, so would like to look into setting up a men’s health group too 

Millie - she thinks the main aspect of the role is organising freshers week and being an approachable, friendly face. She wants to make the transition into freshers week smoother, possibly by putting committee officers in contact with freshers as another type of parent. She’d also like to look into putting on events with other colleges on Broad Street, to give more opportunities to make friends. Alongside freshers week, she’d like to set up jcr wide charity initiatives, perhaps a reverse advent calendar for example. 

Rory asks what new event they would most like to put on, if they could put any event on. 

Natalina - she’d do a fashion show, it’s popular at other unis, fun, creative, can be used to highlight diverse models and bodies, can promote charity shopping. Practically, it gives an insight into textiles, business, event management. We could also include other societies. 

Millie - she’d do a charity comedy night, a lot of people are funny and we should make the most of it. It could include monologues, skits, almost like a talent show. It could bond the jcr with incoming freshers well. 

Gwen - she’d do an inter-college music festival, it could promote musical talent in college. It could also include a poetry contest focused on a particular issue e.g. mental health. It could involve the Lindsay bar too, yay save the bar. 

Rory says that for freshers week, there’ll be a lot of work over the summer, liaising with him, college staff, welfare sub-committee etc. - what experience do they have in organising stuff?

Millie - she was on the senior leadership team in sixth form, they ran conferences. They did a mental health happiness day, this involved inviting and looking after speakers, organising rooms, and setting up events. They also ran a clever clogs conference, encouraging girls to go into academia. She enjoys organising things and would be willing to put the work in. 

Natalina - she was co-editor of her school’s magazine. This involved communicating with a lot of people, making sure everything was completed to the right standard, making sure everything ran smoothly. She’s also co-president of the su campaign it happens here, this involves organising events and running social media. 

Gwen - she was head girl of her school, she co-wrote a welfare policy - the skills and objectives of this are similar to what would be needed for vp. She also ran a women in engineering conference, an action group on sustainability, and helped organise a three peaks challenge to raise money for girl’s education in Africa. 

Dhruv asked Francis Barnett if he had any questions - turns out he has three. Cerian and Rory think these are the exact same questions he asked them in their hustings. 

Francis via Dhruv asks if they’ll commit to peer support training at least one member of each sports team. 

Natalina - she thinks this is crucial, people bond a lot via sport, you go through a lot together, locker room talk can be emotional. She thinks people bond more through activities than their subjects. But she thinks some groups will be small, it could be logistically hard to ensure someone is trained on every team - she thinks maybe all teams above a certain size - 10? 

Millie - she thinks it’s a really good idea, sports team can be tight knit groups, and this could provide someone to reach out to. But she also thinks a lot of people aren’t into sport, so doesn’t think we should just focus on sport - for example, a lot of people are involved in choir. She thinks a more diverse range of people should be trained, more people would always be better. 

Gwen - she thinks there should be a rep from each team, especially in men’s groups, she thinks there’s already a culture of women being more open to talking about their feelings. She thinks the good lad scheme is a good idea, it encourages people to call out problematic behaviour as well as not doing it themselves. 

Millie - she thinks doing a good lad workshop in freshers might be good, it would set good boundaries going forward. 

David asks how much free time each has to commit to the role, and what other extracurriculars they do. 

Natalina - she thinks it’s not all about quantity, you can spend a lot of time on something without achieving much. She’d put in as much effort as possible and as needed. She thinks her, Gwen and Millie all have the same mindset on the role. 

Millie - she’s got free time not taken up by work, she’d enjoy doing the role and would make the time if needed for it. 

Gwen - she spends a lot of time in pantry, this is jcr orientated and fits well with the role of vp

Conor asks what they think could be improved about freshers week

Natalina - she thinks it can be daunting to walk into a room full of strangers, especially for more introverted people, being shoved together won’t work for everyone. She’d try to set up some activities in smaller groups, maybe staircase teas or subject teas earlier in the week. She also thinks some sort of pairing system before freshers arrive could help ease any worries. 

Gwen - she thinks the consent workshop was important, but as the first workshop it was quite daunting. She’d like to do some initial icebreaker sessions and games to introduce freshers to each other. She’d also like to promote bystander training to ease the pressure on angels on nights out. She’d like to do a women’s workshop with the women’s officers to bond the girls, create some solidarity. She’d also like to hold some events in the bar where people could get to know each other and where we could save the bar yay. 

Millie - she thinks there should be more contact between the jcr committee and freshers before they come to balliol. She’d also like to hold some events outside college/with other colleges, it adds variation and increases the opportunities for people to make friends. She thinks holding charity events where people can bond would also be good. She also noticed it was mainly girls that spoke in the consent workshop - she doesn’t think this should be split, but thinks a workshop like the good lad workshops to encourage boys to speak up too would be good. 

Meg says they all have good ideas, but asks what they’d do about people who might not be reached by normal welfare events, who stay in their rooms a lot for example. 

Natalina - she’d promote online resources, emphasising anonymity, and would also signpost the junior deans and the peer supporters. Ultimately she thinks there’s only so much that can be done if people don’t want to be helped though. 

Millie - she thinks the welfare emails this term have been really good, consistent engagement with welfare subcommittee helps build their profile. She’d like to make a welfare board in the jcr. She thinks welfare teas are a good idea, it’s company without that much pressure. 

Cerian says there’ll be welfare teas every day in trinity (or there would’ve been - i for one will miss the tesco snacks, just cannot recreate in dudley :( )

Gwen - she thinks it depends on why people are staying in their rooms. She thinks the communal presentations in freshers are a good way to signal what is available to people. She also thinks some people won’t leave their rooms because there’s nothing they’re really interested in. She thinks getting reps to take charge of different activities could be a good idea, we want people to find others like them. 

Millie - she thinks having a catch up later in freshers week/term could be good, maybe with college parents, to get everyone involved in something. 

Francis via Dhruv asks what they’d do about the transition from state schools to oxford, and if they think there are any specific worries people from state schools will have. 

Gwen - she doesn’t think it’s a good idea to state everyone’s differences from the start, people should start from a blank state. But she also thinks it’s important everyone recognises their own privilege. 

Natalina - she thinks state school students suffer from imposter syndrome a lot. She thinks the difference workshop should be reviewed e.g. asking for something you found hard about transition made differences really, really stark. She thinks a more inclusive environment would be better. 

Millie - she thinks drop in workshops or sessions for people struggling could be good, there’s already a lot to process in freshers week. She thinks one workshop won’t destroy all class barriers forever, so people should be able to vent their issues and work through. 

Gwen - she thinks state schools vary, some are better than others, so not a clear divide between state and private school pupils. 

Rory asks how they’d work proactively with committee officers not on welfare subcommittee.

Millie - she thinks events like a comedy night in the bar involve entz, the lindsay, and will help them by getting people into the bar. She’d also like to work with the charities officers to set up a jcr wide charity initiative e.g. getting one thing extra in your weekly shop on a staircase (and somehow also in second year accommodation). She wants charity to be present throughout the year. 

Natalina - she’d work with the women’s reps to make sure people can have fun in a safe space, and produce a pamphlet on relevant info. She’d also work with the charities officers to put on fun events, maybe cake sales, fashions shows.

Gwen - she’d work with entz to put on non-alcoholic events as well as bops and club nights, like the ice skating in freshers week. This would take time out of the day instead of cutting down on people’s sleep. She’d work with the charities officers to promote and support homelessness charities in oxford. 

Conor says fresher’s week workshops are meant to be confidential, but rumours go round about dodgy things said in them, even if it might just be miscommunication, or someone missing the point of the workshop and treating it like a debate (i blame ppe for this one (i do ppe)). How would they deal with this? 

Millie - she thinks this is a tricky thing to deal with, people don’t know each other yet so there’s no loyalty or trust. She thinks it’s down to the authority of the people running the workshops, they need to be confident and this will reduce gossip. Also if one person can be identified, this could be talked through with them, but this could be too intimidating - it’s a very hard issue. 

Natalina - she agrees it’s hard, gossip can be bonding but will really harm some people’s reputations and make it harder to make friends. She thinks if there is a rumour, it should be discussed with whoever it’s about and get their side of the story, check how true it is. She also thinks it’s important to not cause any confrontation, and minimise the hurt of the rumour. 

Gwen - she’d make sure confidentiality is really emphasised in the workshops and if something problematic is said in the workshops it should be talked through right there. Then, if gossip does get out, there’s no underlying issues and everything will have been clarified already. 

Millie - she thinks if the problem grows, we can gather people in the jcr (from experience, tricky) and stamp out the rumour once and for all - we have authority as committee. 

Dhruv attempts to ask Francis’ third question (give one reason why your opponents would be better suited to the job), but nobody cares anymore and it’s largely ignored. 

Everybody votes. 

Gwen is elected.