Students' Union wins award for its contribution to SOAS
Paul Uppal MP (top left) met (to his right): Nizam Uddin, Professor Paul Webley and (bottom row, l-r) Antonia Bright, NUS Vice President Vicki Baars, Peter Baran, Alex Fulton and Keiko Ono.
25 February 2013
The Students' Union of SOAS, University of London has been recognised for its valuable contribution to SOAS life.
Representatives from the Students' Union went to the Houses of Parliament last week to accept a bronze award under the Students Union Evaluation Initiative (SUEI).
The SUEI award is a national award, sponsored by Department of Business, Industry and Skills, to recognise the contributions made by Students' Unions to their higher education institutions.
To compete for the award, participating unions take part in a two-year process of assessment, which includes attending workshops and receiving on-going support to identify areas for improvement. At the end of two years, unions can decide to apply for the award.
The award was presented by the Paul Uppal MP, PPS to the Minister for Universities and Science David Willets, and NUS Vice-President Vicki Baars.
The SOAS Students' Union representatives included Co-president Sports & Societies Keiko Ono, Co-President Welfare & Education Alex Fulton, Representation Assistant Antonia Bright and General Manager Peter Baran. The director of SOAS, Professor Paul Webley, was also present, as was the alumnus and ex-SU sabbatical Nizam Uddin, who started the project in the Union.
Peter commented: “As a small Union, with a very small permanent staff compliment, SUEI was extremely challenging. However we used this challenge to rethink how we approach everything we do, and to use it as a catalyst for real effective organisational change to make SOAS Union more relevant and more approachable to our diverse student body.”
A spokesperson from NUS connected added: “This is the culmination of many hours of work over a number of years and represents a really significant achievement. Well done to everyone who contributed to this success."
