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VPSA blog: Where has the year gone?

TLDRoffon

As well as pondering this Jono Smith, Vice President Student Activities, shares an update which includes This Girl Can and ISOC's Month of Giving. Over to you, Jono...

I can't quite believe how quickly this year is going and for all the right reasons! Student groups are flourishing and it's so amazing to see. Thanks to our fantastic student groups, our students have plenty of choice when it comes to taking part in activities outside of their studies. Keep it up and let's continue to make this year special!

In this blog I'm going to highlight the This Girl Can campaign that ran in November and ISOC's Month of Giving. But keep reading to the end to see some key stats and events from the year so far.

This Girl Can

Let's start by looking at This Girl Can week which ran from Monday 19th November until Sunday 25th November.

This Girl Can is a national campaign that encourages women and girls of all abilities, backgrounds, shapes and sizes to get active. As part of the campaign, there was a calendar of events that took place throughout the week. Ranging from our Badminton club holding female only sessions, to Women's Hockey hosting a dodgeball tournament. This Girl Can highlighted the fantastic opportunities our female students have at Greenwich Students' Union.

Alongside the events, I asked a few of our sportswomen questions about themselves and their journey through sport. Please do check out their This Girl Can profiles.

isoc month of giving
ISOC are nearing the end of their Month of Giving which started on the 16th November and runs until the 16th December.  I spoke with Nikmal, a third year Psychology with Counselling student and ISOC president, about the month and this is what he said.

We had stalls throughout the week. We had cakes, cookies, fruit, sweets and drinks for sale. We also had the Mt. Snowdon Trek, 5-mile walk, movies and games nights as well as a charity dinner and auction.

I think it's fair to say that they've been incredibly busy and it's great to know they've been receiving plenty of donations both physically and online. If you'd like to get involved, you can help by raising awareness of their campaign or by donating online.

Some key stats for 2018/19 so far:

  • Total number of memberships signed up – 9561 (including auto-enrolment), 6857 (excluding auto-enrolment) 
  • Number of new societies started up – 31
  • Number of meet and greets – 57 (excluding Societies that have started up post-Welcome)
  • Number of groups at each welcome fair – booked in, we had Avery Hill (43), Dreadnought (74), International (3)
  • Number of groups regularly using the lower deck space for sessions – 3 (Pole Fitness, Hispanic, K-Soc)

List of sports/society takeovers in lower deck:

  • We Are Techno: Team Greenwich Takeover
  • Bollywood Night
  • Snow Sports Takeover: Team Greenwich Wednesday
  • Hockey Carnival Takeover Night
  • Criminal Behaviour, Latitude Radio Takeover
  • LGBT Launch Night/ Glitterbomb

Let's not forget some of the amazing events/fundraising our student groups are doing:

  • Bar crawl with Hockey, LGBT+ and FemSoc
  • Cheerleading's Bros for Bows 
  • SHAG week which involved FemSoc, LGBTQ+, Mind, Society, ISOC and Dance
  • Women's football raising money for the Brain Tumour Charity
  • Rugby's Thomas Mulquin memorial match raising funds for the Wooden Spoon charity
  • And many many more!!

Hope you've enjoyed reading this blog. Have a wonderful winter break and see you in January!

Happy Holidays GSU