Apologies are to be submitted to Jack Tellyn, JCR Chair, at [email protected] or to the Exec Mailbox by the Dining Hall before 12 noon on the day of the meeting.
1. The minutes of the last meeting
These are available on the JCR Website.
2. Matters Arising
There are no matters arising.
3. JCR Announcements
Sam Martin and Chloe Blakesley
Durham Does Strictly on Saturday, 10 Dec 2016 at the DSU, tickets are £7 please come along to support! Message them to get tickets, or you can just go on Facebook.
Tom Harwood
NUS. Voting from Tuesday to Friday, husting taking place on Wednesday. All candidates have their details on Facebook. Go vote.
Ramya BT
Food and house committee meeting happening soon, please fill in Google document on Facebook Freshers group with about comments and feedback. Suggestions are welcome. Other options would be to email or message Ramya.
WAM
12 days of consent. The idea of the 12 days was discussion instead of throwing information at people. If you have any questions, post it on FB, or message anyone in WAM.
Ella Bramwell and Henry Meech
Masquerade ball. Thank you everyone for tree decoration. Peter Panto coming up next week, live lounge after 2nd formal. Message/email Henry for roles in the Masquerade Ball committee, plenty of roles to apply for, as much/little time as you want. Please get involved.
4. Motions
There are no motions to discuss.
5. Questions of Officers
These should be written down and put in the Exec Mailbox addressed to the JCR Chair by 6pm on the day before the meeting. Questions must be signed, although this does not mean your name will be read out in the meeting if you would like to remain anonymous.
6. Elections, Hustings and Interviews
I. Mature Students’ Rep
Tanya Demyanchuk
Proposed by: Ingrid Høegh
Seconded by: Jenny Avdoi
Was not present and sent in no speech.
II. Shop Manager
Catherine Bryant
Proposed by: Zoe Taylor
Seconded by: Jenny Avdoi
- Started working in the shop since first year.
- Keep up the vending machine.
- Talk face-to -face, using polls and suggestion box in the shop à to find out what people want to be stocked.
- Find ways to source economical stock.
- Continue with popular stock (eg. Fresh milk).
- Priority – ensure shop remains relevant to Mary’s.
- Raise profile of shop further, make sure people know where it is, when the opening time is and what the shop sells.
- Improve advertising, make sure people know when there are offers/competitions.
- Shop to be present and providing snacks at as many college events as possible (eg. Drama performances and balls)
- Worked in charity shops –
- served customers, improved displays, taking and ordering stock, and handling cash.
- Know how a shop runs and how to make a profit.
- Insight to what will and won’t work when making improvements.
- Want to get staff more involved – regular staff meetings throughout the year, members can get to know each other and can discuss problems.
- Organised, love to plan, very friendly.
- Involved with MMV, Ball Decoration Committees, want to be involved in college life again upon return to Durham.
- Want the shop to be of benefit to everyone, even if it means changes to products/opening hours, or running a stall during rainy Mary’s Day.
III. Toastie Bar Manager
Lewis Robinson
Proposed by: Caitlin Rich
Seconded by: Matthew Rossetter
Reason to run for position:
- Ensure the toastie bar is for everyone
- Sick of the lack of cheese at the beginning of shifts
- Like toasties
Qualifications/relevant experience:
- Have worked in the toastie bar since Freshers’ week, and been interim manager since last JCR meeting. Know what to do.
- Good with money so I can maximise profits to help pay back the JCR while keeping prices as low as possible for everyone.
- Background in restaurant industry – well equipped to ensure health and safety standards.
- Committed to running the toastie bar. Will be as hands on as the past few weeks doing regular delivery runs (4 this week) whenever anything runs out despite personal inconvenience. Willing and able to do shifts whenever needed to.
Plans:
- Ensure the toastie bar is well stocked with cheese.
- Continue to improve and refine the menu so it best reflects what everyone wants.
- Support DUCK with the introduction of a DUCK toastie.
- Buy an additional toastie machine for veggies and vegans and attempt to start serving gluten free.
- Introduce a delivery service for all Marys buildings so it is easier for Williamson and Teikyo to get their toastie fill.
Havishyan Thakral
Proposed by: Samuel Tribe
Seconded by: Sadie Harriott
Plans:
- Ensure workers’ satisfaction.
- To ensure that the Toastie bar is always stocked with all ingredients, especially cheese and bread.
- Maintain hygiene.
- Introduce half toasties, new ingredients etc.
- Start toastie bar deliveries to all of Mary’s – increase the convenience for all of you
- Aim to produce more toasties, reducing the waiting time per toasties
- Acquire another toastie maker
Qualifications/relevant experience:
- Course representative for Geography – responsible, organised, communicate well and fully committed.
- Mary’s Frisbee, Badminton, and Table Tennis team – committed to trainings and hard work.
- Always eager for a challenge, confident of ability to provide toasties at demand’s beck and call.
Questions:
- Popularity decreases in 2nd and 3rd term, plans to increase popularity during this period?
- Havi: hours outside of 10.30, shifts outside of these hours – midnight toasties
- Lewis: delivery. Special toasties of the week, cheese of the week.
- What’s your favourite toastie:
- Lewis: Christmas Toastie
- Havi: Meat Feast
- Delivery communication method?
- Havi: Whatsapp, emails don’t really work.
- Lewis: Will look into Google Form or Doodle poll
IV. Head Visit Day Rep
Jack Leyland
Seconded by: Pip Orchard
Proposed by: Elliot Fox
- Went to one 2 years ago as a year 13 student, made an impression.
- Was an open day rep last year (15-16).
- Restructure evening activities, eg. Replacing Mary’s challenge with the Murder Mystery from Fresher’s this year.
- Pub Quiz, with ‘which rep did what’ – important to get applicants interacting with each other.
- Sport taster sessions for when people arrive.
- Post timetable on visit day page the week before, so people can plan ahead.
- Fresher’s rep this year – communication, organisation and teamwork.
- Worked successfully with people whom never worked with previously.
- Transition from open day rep and fresher’s rep to head visit day rep would be smooth.
- Mary’s B team football captain – leadership, teamwork à directly transferrable to head visit day rep.
- Have the awareness of how each individual is coping with their role within the team – useful when assigning each rep to their main responsibility.
- Will make application system fair and anonymous as it is important to have a variety of types of people to represent the college. Need to be fair to people whose first college involvement is the Open Day.
Lydia Harrold
Proposed by: Elspeth Summerfield
Seconded by: Gillian Scott
- Second year studying History, Politics and International Relations.
Qualifications/Relevant experience:
- Experience with a lot of college involvement, love Mary’s. Involved with football, lacrosse, hockey, CU, designed the new college scarf, on the informal ball and Mary’s Day committees, assistant treasurer, and been a pre-application and post-offer open day rep.
- Organised and hardworking, use timetables, colour coding, keep clear records (eg. Still keep last year’s open days’ timetables in folder.)
- Experience with post-offer open day with last year’s involvement – know importance of being organised, and happen to be good at it.
- Have a desire to always do a good job.
- Love open days. Ran open days for school, have experience in this area.
- Ensured 200 girls were signed up, had a rota for tours/demonstrations, which route to take, and their roles.
- As a result, advanced leadership and communication skills.
- Commitment – did the boring stuff like fire-proofing, and missed lunch break to get on with college tours.
Plans/ideas:
- Increase interactivity of JCR Options – games like Human Snakes and Ladders, Twister, Charades, chocolate fountain.
- Update Mary’s Challenge – give pre-fresh a more Mary’s related experience through doing things like a fancy dress race stall, or Mary’s guess who/where.
- Start early to do a proper video to give pre-fresh a look into Mary’s life throughout the year.
- Willing to listen to your ideas, more ideas on bogsheet.
Questions:
How would you motivate your team if they’re flagging?
- Lydia: if team is ill then need to work around that. If it’s just tired, an hour/30 minutes to recharge.
- Jack: Welfare of reps as important as applicants. Prioritize looking after them. Keep up nap rooms.
How would you keep applications anonymous if it’s emailed in?
- Jack: emails sent to someone else (maybe to Esther)
- Lydia: forward it to someone else.
Biggest challenge?
- Lydia: love doing tours, but need to take a step back and need to be more available in case other areas need attention.
- Jack: Last year there was a trouble of a lot of people arriving at once, which resulted in each rep having five things to do at one time. Would try to put up a timetable in advance to stagger arrival
Open day is directly after 2nd term which is a busy term, how would you manage work load and organizing Open Day?
- Jack: Can plan ahead as they will know in advance.
- Lydia: only 3 modules, 8 contact hours, really organized, timetable everything, do work in advance.
Plans for pre-fresh who prefer theatre and music instead of sport? Taster session possibly?
- Lydia: indoor activities, games like charades (eg. Acting), people stationed in JCR, mini script.
- Jack: Murder mystery – dramatic element. Use this to advertise the creative element, get people who are involved in drama, audience participation. Let them know that opportunities do exist.
How would you deal with prefresh drinking (underage)?
- Jack: underage drinking is priority, serious about clamping down. ID people as they come in. Coloured wristband depending on their age. If chance upon underage pre-fresh drinking, pull them to one side, give them a warning, not publicly embarrass them.
- Lydia: wristbands, one warning privately. Second time, direct to the JCR where there is no alcohol.
Parents and their involvement?
- Lydia: teas and coffees with parents and Simon. Minimize parent involvement because parents are not in university with children.
- Jack: option to 1 or 2 hours, but try to get the applicants to be independent. Might be okay to stay overnight cause might have to but try to minimize this
7. AOB
None.