Freya Rowley - Activities and Opportunities Officer

It’s been a busy and productive week. On Monday, I met with Hash from Gloucester Feed the Hungry to explore ways we can improve food bank access across our campuses and provide more affordable food options for students. From Tuesday to Thursday, I attended the National Union of Students, Lead and Change Conference alongside other SU officers. It was a thought-provoking experience, especially given the ongoing tensions between students and the NUS around the conflict in Palestine. I took the opportunity to educate myself further on the issue while also attending insightful sessions on leadership and social media. I also had the chance to meet and connect with incredible officers from across the country, who I’ll be staying in touch with throughout the year. To round off the week, I had an exciting meeting with an external partner interested in supporting one of the projects I’m developing for student leaders as well as joining a Movember working group with other sports officers from around the UK.

Bianca Holland - Education and Community Officer

I started this week with attending a meeting all about the personal tutor scheme and the student driven changes that are coming to it. Most excitingly, this week as officers we all went to NUS lead and change conference in Birmingham. It was a wonderful experience; I spent majority of my time talking with other officers from all around the UK about student issues and how each of our student unions plans to address them. This gave me so many ideas that we can implement to make the student experience here at UOG better!

Iffat Jahan - Welfare and Diversity Officer

I attended the NUS Lead and Change workshops alongside other student officers, which was a valuable experience despite some unfortunate accidental circumstances that affected the flow of the sessions. The event didn’t go as smoothly as expected, but it still offered meaningful insights. I had the opportunity to connect with officers from other universities, learning about their campaigns and understanding how they approach student voice and representation. Hearing different perspectives helped me reflect on how we can strengthen our own efforts to support students. It was a reminder that even imperfect experiences can bring learning and inspire new ideas.