Christ Church Students' Union held a referendum this week (4-8 December 2017) asking students "Do you support the proposed changes to the Presidential roles?" and we're happy to say that the motion has been passed with over 90% of respondents voting for the motion.
According to our By-laws and Articles of Association (essentially our constitution) a minimum of 250 students had to engage to reach quoracy and we're happy to say that 354 took part with 320 voting for the motion and 34 against.
What was the motion about?
Over the past two years students have asked for these roles to be reviewed to meet their current needs and so between September and December 2017 we have asked students to help us shape the sabbatical officer remits. This was conducted through two rounds of consultation and this referendum allowed the student body to vote whether to accept the new Sabbatical Officer roles of:
- Union President
- President (Wellbeing)
- President (Sport and Engagement)
- President (Development).
The major changes are:
- the Wellbeing and Education remits have been split.
- the President role remains the University governor, however it has been assigned to have a specific academic experience remit.
- the Student Activities remit has been enhanced with the specific objective of student development, whilst groups of societies have been spread across the roles depending on their representational need, to ensure better and more targeted representation.
- the Sport role has been enhanced to support all sporting activity.
A 'No' vote would have resulted in keeping the current Sabbatical Officer roles structure of: Union President, President (Education and Wellbeing), President (Sport) and President (Student Activities).
When will these changes happen?
These changed will be implemented for the academic year 2018/19 and will be reflected in the Student Elections taking place early 2018 with nominations for the newly-titled roles open Monday 22nd January 2018.
