For VP For Welfare

'Fair Welfare For All'

I am Len and I am running of the VP of welfare,

Last year I ran for gender equality officer after learning that nearly all my female friends had been harassed in their time at Roehampton. One year on I am still just as passionate in the fight against this, over the year I have:

• Sat on the universities sexual harassment working group
• Been the president of the feminist society
• Acted as a personal advocate for fellow students
• Pushed for consistent policy on harassment both within the RSU and the university
• And helped fellow students come forward about their experiences of harassment

This year having heard the stories of racial discrimination of lecturers against students, the lack of any representatives being sent to the NUS BAME conference and a general absence of advocacy for BAME students experiencing discrimination, I am adamant something needs to be done.

• Increase BAME Involvement and Address Differential Race Attainment

  • Form a BAME student working group- to produce initiatives that will improve the experience of BAME students.
  • Support BAME students who are the victims of racialised discrimination- be it by lecturers or senior members of staff.
  • Work with the RAFA 2 project- to deliver increased involvement and thus attainment within the BAME community.
  • Introduce a BAME attainment fund- A pot of money committed to assisting the education of BAME students.
  • Diversifying the syllabus- having minorities on the reading list will show our students that they have a place in academia.
  • Create an Anti-Islamophobia campaign

• Eliminate Sexual Harassment

  • Introduce crisis points- emergency buttons in high-risk places in and around campus that provide a hotline to security.
  • Reform Our policy on harassment
  • Implement the tell us once policy- reporting a sexual assault can be very traumatic so victims shouldn’t be expected to retell their story multiple times.
  • Advocate for a separate harassment disciplinary process- currently a victim must sit face to face with their potential abuser, this is traumatic and should be avoidable.
  • Form a student working group for tacking harassment
  • Lobby the university to inform the RSU of registered sex offenders - so they may be prevented from attending events with children and vulnerable individuals

• Other policies include

  • A complete rewrite of the RSU constitution
  • Reintroducing food based grants for societies – bring back the pizza
  • Improve the selection of nondrinking events
  • Create Roehampton Pride
  • Ensure all RSU rooms have sufficient disabled access
  • Demand shorter waiting times for counsellors
  • Commit to an open-door policy
  • Invest in a stock of sanitary products to ease the financial Burdon of womanhood

I am committed to my very core on these issues and have spent much of my time in the preceding year talking to women and BAME students on campus about their experience and believe that I can help Increase BAME Involvement and eliminate sexual harassment and I can do it all wearing a hat!