May: Goodbye Portacabin

The end of the portacabin: This month it closed its doors for the last time

May has been a strange old month for me. In-between the Bank Holidays and my endless stream of job applications, I have been getting quite a bit of work done too. Though as you'll see above, my office in Cardiff is no longer open and I will be based pretty much full time out of Treforest in June until my sabbatical year is up. You can still get hold of me though by email. vicepresident.cardiff@southwales.ac.uk. I'm very happy to do callouts to Cardiff if you've got any issues with your final submissions or anything else you might want to discuss.

Here's what I've been up to...

• Gathered a list of names of people who are interested in hosting events during Freshers week at the new SU. Will be passing on this info to our commercial team and new VP Cardiff for them to take forward.
• Had our last Course Rep Council meeting of the year in Cardiff. Issues raised included timetabling and technology. SVRs had a chance to explain what they'd been up to and how they were helping with these issues.
• Met with the Dean Gill Sandford along with the new VP Cardiff Roz to discuss issues brought up in Course Rep Council. We also discussed opening hours in which the Dean said next year they will continue to open the ATRiuM on weekdays between 8am and 10pm and weekends between 9am and 5pm. Additional hours throughout the year will be discussed with the new VP. Also some Health and Safety issues were raised concerning the extended opening hours in Cromwell and Atlantic House.
• Met with Mary Hulford and Chris Laity to discuss the student submission to the QAA that the SU will be submitting next year. This will also have direct input in from Royal Welsh College SU.
• Represented students on Academic Misconduct cases. Students in Atlantic House had their initial meeting in Treforest. Raised this with the panel as this is against University regulations as students are supposed to be invited to a meeting at their campus. Panel assured me it was an admin error and would not happen in future.
• Gave advice on complaints procedures to students.
• Had another Trustee Board meeting where we discussed the Students' Union review with the University. Hopefully more concrete information will be released on that in the coming months when a decision has been made.
• It was the last day in the current ATRiuM SU on May 23rd. Moved out all my stuff, sorted it out and sent some things back to Treforest to make sure resources would be available for the new VP.
• Helped promote the STAR awards that look to praise the achievements of students and staff at the University over the last year.

A bit of news before I go. The new bridge by Liberty Bridge (Ty Pont) is coming along nicely and is due to open next month. It'll make it a lot easier and quicker for students to access Atlantic House from the Atrium. Also building work on Atrium 2A is going very well so it's very much on schedule to open in September.

That's all from me for May. Just one month to go now.

Rich