Menswear - The Founder

The Founder | Wednesday 23 February 2011
Sabbatical Officers 2011-2012
7
Sarah Honeycombe
Vice President Communications and Campaigns
dreams lie?
Thomas Shore
Editor
It must feel good to win, how has
the week been since?
It feels amazing. It took me twentyfive
minutes to walk from the front
gate to the hub the day after I won
because, I kept getting stopped by
people congratulating me.
Do you think more people got interested
in these elections more than
previous years?
Well last year’s turnout was over a
hundred people higher. It was 1200
in 2010 so I think maybe online
voting got people angrier.
Does online voting work?
It’s too early too tell. I do like online
voting because it saves the union
quite a bit of money, but I think the
problems with registration were
a real pain. The fact that so many
people tried to register on the last
day and the system struggled is
quite depressing, but that won’t
happen again.
What do you think gave you the
edge over everyone else?
I have no idea. Ben and Claudia
were both really strong candidates
and I think it was such a close election
for a reason. Maybe my experience
with Insanity and the Orbital
might have just pushed it ahead. I
got some really positive feedback
after candidate’s question time so
maybe that.
How do you think your experience
with Insanity will help you next
year?
I think it’s going to be brilliant. One
third of the job is student media
and I’ve been one of the section editors
of the orbital and I’m currently
one station managers of insanity so
there is perhaps less of a handover
to do there as I’m fairly well versed
in how it all works. I also know
how tough it can get and how time
consuming it gets for the assistant
managers so I should be able to
help out there.
What about the other two thirds?
I’m really looking forward to it. In
the Ethics and environment side
I’m really looking forward to talking
to Ed Resek, “Go Green week”
was a massive success, and today we
found of we have been nominated
for an ecologist award which is really
cool, so there is a good foundation
to work from there. The union
has some really good campaigns it’s
just about getting the word out.
How do you get the word out?
Oh wow. Facebook, twitter, the SU
website. I cannot wait to get my
hands on that sodding website.
Are you going to personally do it or
is the union going to hire someone
to do it again?
I’m going to try and get the computer
science department to help
me. They offered last year and were
turned down, one of the students
who offered is the guy who created
the insanity website and I think
that website is brilliant. So if I can
get people like that involved it will
hopefully save a lot of money and
make the website easier to use.
How does The Founder fit in next
year?
I really like The Founder, I’ve contributed
to The Founder. I think the
union and The Founder’s relationship
could be better and I’m hoping
that maybe I can push that along. I
think The Founder is a really good
newspaper and a source of news
and if the union can talk about
things through The Founder that’s a
really good idea.
What about The Orbital?
It’s fairly upsetting. As a former
contributor and editor the fact that
it’s not out as much anymore is
quite depressing. It’s about looking
at money and working out a way to
get more issues out more quickly
and keeping the online presence up
to date. The Orbital turns twenty
five next year there is no way it’s not
going to be huge. I actually took the
first issue to candidate’s question
time.
Beyond Holloway where do your
I put off a masters degree to take
this job so I am going on to do a
masters in history the year after.
You said you wanted to use electronic
media to communicate, does
this mean that general meetings
and others forms are not being
utilised enough at the moment?
It’s almost defiantly not being used
to its maximum. It is being used
and that’s a really good thing but
at the General Meetings you get a
turnout of thirty, I know because
I go to every single bloody one of
them and while it’s three hours of
cutting through red tape you cant
really expect more people to get
actively involved unless they have
a reason to or unless they have
another way to get involved. The
union will be utilising a lot of electronic
media next year I will make
sure of it because I think more
people want to get involved but
don’t know how. One of the major
things of my campaign is that there
are so many opportunities being
given that students just don’t know
about and you can’t expect students
to take up these if they don’t know
what they are
Any particular campaigns your really
keen on?
I think it’s about time we opened
up campaigns to the students. I’ve
never been consulted on them. I
know what they are because they
are on the wall planner but I’ve
never been asked what campaigns I
think the union should get involved
with. And the sabbatical jobs are
representative roles so I would feel
a bit weird if I was to decide on
campaigns on my own. Obviously
SHAG week will stay because it’s
exceptionally popular and “Go
Green Week”, they had a guy making
smoothies with a bike during
the campaign, they were great!
If there were one thing you could
change during your year, what
would it be?
Insanity getting its FM licence, if
it kills me. Though admittedly we
should be having that soon.