YUSU has announced a new Neighbourhood Representative Scheme and Community Rag Fund, aimed at improving relations between students and the local community.
The new plans hope to tackle common misconceptions about the student community by highlighting the positive role University of York students can play locally.
Both schemes have sprung from aims outlined in YUSU’s Community Strategy, a collaborative plan developed by YUSU and York St. John’s Student Union (YSJSU), and draw on similar initiatives from Warwick, Leeds and Manchester Student’s Unions.
Josh Allen, Chair of the focus group, said: “A mixture of myths and the speed of change in certain parts of the city have soured relations with the local community.” This has contributed towards ‘the implementation by City of York Council of an Article 4 Directive to ‘control the spread of students’ and fight ‘crime’, ‘house price rises’ and ‘takeaways’.
Allen commented: “The Community Reps role will therefore help dispel negative myths about students in the wider community, promoting the good work that students do (in volunteering, for example) at neighbourhood and community residents’ meetings.”
The nine reps appointed will work in teams of two or three, and seek to provide information about the local area, including advice on housing, crime prevention and how to deal with troublesome or abusive neighbors.
They will meet informally with each other to talk over issues affecting off-campus students and attend the Community Assembly as Delegate Members (where they will receive two votes each) to make a report on their progress.
Launching recruitment for the scheme, YUSU President Tim Ellis said: “Our students bring a huge range of benefits to the local community, including countless hours of volunteering time and a huge boost to the local economy. Our Community Reps Scheme will make sure that students are a visible and active part of every community.”
The RAG Community Fund aims to localise 10% of RAG’s current fundraising ‘pot’, and in the third term of each year reward this to the local charities who will bid to receives small grants, ranging from around £200-£1000 in size.
RAG co-Chair Becky Mursell states that the inspiration for the Fund was “the unprecedented financial difficulties that small local charities and residential groups are facing as the City Council, following the budget cuts from Central Government, have greatly reduced the amount of discretionary funding available.”
Fellow co-Chair Erin Cork, in her proposal to Student Assembly, wrote that “by creating a formal bidding and grant allocation process which heavily involves students, we would be providing an excellent opportunity for personal development of employability skills.”
The proposal in its current form will be put forward to the Student Development Assembly, later this term. An information workshop about the Neighbourhood Rep Scheme is set to be held at The Lounge in the Roger Kirk Centre at 2pm Wednesday Week 7, with the application deadline ending Friday Week 8.
Copycats.