Services on Tour…

The Regional Meetings, held annually, provide the perfect environment for delegates to meet and make sound, educated judgments on the strategy and purchasing recommendations for the entire membership.

Its Regional meetings week this week, and today we were in Leeds speaking to Students’ Union officers and staff members from across the North.

 I missed Strathclyde on Monday trying to save my Physics department, but I am told the Regional went well! We lost our fight to save Physics, but I thank everyone for understanding why I couldnt be at the Scotland Regional.

 Leeds went well today, it was great to meet some officers I hadnt met before and find out about their experiences with NUS Services, purchasing and decision making! I have two presentations all to myself, on the ongoing Company Plan for the year and NUS Extra, and I share Member Liasion with Tim. I think everything went well today, but we’re going to make the member session a lot more fun and banter-ful tomorrow (well, thats the hope anyway.)

 All of the briefing papers can be downloaded here.

 One of the great things about Regionals is that you get to go to Unions you never have been to before, and I got to see Leeds today, have a quick nose around their commerical services and have a quick look at their new governance structure.

Now in Loughborough ready for tomorrow morning!

A quickie

My beloved institution announced late on Thursday that they have reinvigorated plans to close the Physics department. I didnt find out about it through the University telling me, I read it on the frontpage of Guardian online! What annoys me even more than that is that only six months ago I sat in a meeting where we agreed that the University was commited to a strategic presence for the Physics department.

The meeting that will take the final decision will be on Monday 20th November, the same day as the first regional in Strathclyde. This blog is just a heads up about the potential clash and I’ll let you know via here what is happening – I obviously cant physically be in the same place at the same time – but there might be a solution with all these technological advances….

In other Services news, I’ll be at Finance and Resource Committee on Tuesday where we will have some operational updates on Extra, seeing the draft audited accounts and talking about the strategic financial interests for the company.

dave x

A newswire worth blogging

Newswires are always worth blogging, but I think this one deserves a special mention…

The catering industry is bracing itself for a large increase in the price of potatoes during the coming weeks as early harvest yields in Northern Europe are extremely poor.

In fact, growers and producers are predicting the most difficult potato harvest since 1976 with yields forecasted to be down 30percent year-on-year.  The poor harvest will hit Students’ Unions who, as a collective, purchase a large quantity of frozen chips every year.

Why is it so poor?

Early harvests take place in the first weeks of September. This year is one of the worst yields in 30 years. This is because of:

- Unusually hot and dry conditions in July

- A late main harvest in August due to extremely wet conditions.

This has resulted in a shortage of potatoes due to the gap between early & main crops.

Manufacturers, such as McCains, are having to purchase at spot prices which are 60-70percent higher than last year.  What about cheesy chips? Still as tasty as ever!

NUS Campaigns

As the name of our company suggests, we are linked to the NUS. We have four NUS representatives at Board level, staff within the company meet with NUS on a regular basis, we are helping roll out NUS Extra, but perhaps more importantly we share a common aim, one in which Students’ Unions are independent, competitive and strong.  

The reason for introducing that is just to say thank you to the NUS NEC for the invite to the Campaigns Launch in London yesterday evening, I had attended the previous day’s Launch in Birmingham in my Reading President capacity, but Thursday evening gave me the chance to reflect on the importance and relatitively of NUS campaigns not just for Students’ Unions but for any organisation that took an interest in student affairs.

You can find out more information about the NUS’ Admission Impossible Campaign and my thoughts (as Reading President) about the previous day’s events. 

dave x

Dave Lewis – Company Chair

update – Guardian Online Article 

What are the committees talking about?

My University is celebrating 80 years since it got its charter, so the Vice-Chancellor has giving everyone the day off – meaning I cant get into my office, so Im working from home. The latest round of Committee papers are out, and I thought it would be a good chance to tell you whats going on!

Each March/April shareholders meet in Liverpool to agree the Company Plan Vision for the forthcoming five years, including the yearly updated Company Operating Plan. To get to that stage there are three volunteer Committees which feed into the recommendations of the Board of Directors; Retail Trade (RT) Licensed Trade (LT) and Ethical & Enviromental (E&E).(Members’ Handbook for an outline of their remits.)

Every couple of months the Committees meet to discuss the latest developments, formulate strategy for the year and to report back on working groups. Heres a quick outline of whats happening when student volunteers meet on the 4th September.

Licensed Trade
Coffee bar deal – contract is out to tender with companies
Juice Bar development – Leeds Union will be flagship for Jason Vale Juice Bar
Beer deal update – beer deal project team respond to presentations

Retail Trade
International food – possible research project launch
Healthy agenda – promotion and work with the 5-a-day campaign

Ethical & Environmental
Sound Impacts Awards development – now working with The Ecologist
E&E Review and recommendations – detailed plans for embedding E&E
principles

The other Committee which isnt mentioned here is Finance & Resources C’ttee (F&R), which is next scheduled to meet at the start of October, where we will spend a great deal of time reviewing the Company’s finances, discussing health & safety issues, talking about administration stuff and making sure that the company is developing both commercially and technologically.

I hope that all makes sense, but if you do have any other questions or comments – please let me know!

dave x

Dave Lewis – Company Chair 

My first video…go easy!

I was going to use this post to tell you all about how great blogging, videocasting and communicating with Student Officers is, but instead, you can see the first ever videocast that NUS Services and I, have created.

[CLICK TO WATCH]

I cant wait to meet you at the November Regionals or at AGM. 

Dave Lewis - Company Chair

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Welcome to NUS NEC and Pete

The Board of Directors of NUS Services meet six times a year to discuss the Company Plan, develop organisation-wide strategy and to address ongoing issues. Membership of the Board reflects the stakeholders of the organisation, with a dominance of student Directors, four staff Directors, the NUS National Director and one external Director.

As the majority shareholder, NUS has four Directors on the Board, including the three chosen by the NUS NEC and the NUS National Director – Andy Grant. Following last week’s NUS NEC, we welcome Gemma Tumelty, Ama Uzuwuru and Stephen Brown to the Board. Its an exciting time for the relationship between NUS and NUS Services, and I look forward to working with them to deliver for Unions, officers and students.

They join Pete Robertson, Liverpool Guild Chief Executive, who was elected unopposed to the position of staff Director last week. Congratulations to him and all of those involved!

dave x

Dave Lewis

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Some welcome notes…

After an intensive day of procrastinating on myspace, facebook and emails – I felt it was about time to write my first blog entry for NUS Services!

How I got here today…

Since being elected as Attached Member Representative for Wantage Hall JCR in 2003 my life, and my interaction with the student community, has changed dramatically. Twelve months after my first ever election victory I was asked to lead the JCR through a time of immense pressure and great challenge, with the University threatening our culture, our traditions and the student experience. We had some significant victories and some damaging losses but I was left with the feeling that students could get a better deal out of the University, that my Union was irrelevant to me and those around me, and that the student experience needed to improve.

Why I stood

I stood in Febuary 2005 on a manifesto to deliver effective communications, to campaign against the ongoing University incursion into the Halls of Residence, to make the Union more responsive to the student community, to deliver a £1.8million Volunteer extension, to put Neighbours on at lunchtime and to change the student experience for the better.

After a year of success, a year where the Sabbatical team stood united, a year where we made the most important Governance changes in our 110yr history, in a year where so much had changed – I needed to stay for another year and finish the job.

Students at Reading agreed, and asked me to continue to campaign for them on a national level, to continue to work with local representatives, to deliver a new website, to campaign for a Neighbours omnibus and put Scalextric in the Union, to fight against the plans for en-suite self-catered accomodation and to continue to work hard for them day in, day out.

I promised to be…

A face, not just a name. I wanted every student to feel part of Reading University Students’ Union, I wanted to be as accountable in Student Council as I was when shopping in Co-Op, I wanted to be a socialising President who remained responsive to the student community whilist working hard and delivering for them.

Why did i get involved in NUS Services?

NUS Services is an amazing organisation, with an emphasis on volunteers and a reputation for delivering services for Unions. I wanted to be involved, as did the biggest ever number of volunteers who stood for election, and the results delivered a dynamic volunteer base which gives Tim a great chance to involve student officers in the organisation like they never have before.

The next twelve months promise to be extremely exciting for the Company, for students and for you. We have the national roll-out of one of the most exciting projects for years, there will be major discussions with the NUS about how we can work for the benefit of students, but most crucially, we will work hard on the Company Plan – delivering a great beer deal, tasty sandwiches and technological advances!

More about me and what I’ve been up to soon!

dave x

Dave Lewis – Company Chair (I also keep at President blog at blogspot)

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