This week students finally elected a Vice-President of Societies & Media after the original election was postponed and eventually resulted in nominations being re-opened.
There were candidates for three roles in this election, including the VP Societies & Media, International Students’ Officer, and Union Assembly Delegates.
Yashaswi Manjarekar has been elected unopposed as the next International Students’ Officer with 277 votes. Manjarekar’s manifesto promises to organise activities for international students, hold workshops to help international students adjust to life in Lancaster, and keep an updated list of all necessary resources needed for international students to manage daily life in the UK.
The Societies & Media election saw Danny Goodwin win with 246 votes, and Marc Greenway came in second place with 173.
Among Goodwin’s manifesto promises are the creation of Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion champions for societies who can “identify discrimination within the university community” and “ensure student groups are as inclusive as possible”; launching a societies review to increase the £5000 that is currently allocated to societies; creating accessible ‘how to’ guides for societies on topics such as reaffiliation and organising events; hosting weekly drop-ins; responding to all emails within two-to-three working days; updating the LUSU website; and ensuring the editorial freedom of student media.
Goodwin also promises to overhaul and simplify the reaffiliation process by ensuring that training is “presented in a way that’s much more enjoyable and productive.” This will come as a relief to society execs unfortunate enough to have endured the endless array of Moodle quizzes and admin that comprise the current reaffiliation process.
The Union Assembly Delegates will be Amy Stanning, Éabha Lynn, Harry Wrench, Joshua Heald, Rebecca Knott, and Thomas Cross.
With this election over with, the incoming FTO team for the next academic year will consist of India Ellis (President), Megan Homburg (Sports), Vic Phillips (Welfare), Noah Katz (Education), Callum Slater (Union Development), and the newly-elected Danny Goodwin (Societies & Media).
The incoming Liberation & Campaign Officer team will consist of Rehmat Ullah (Postgraduate and Mature Students’ Officer), Cerys Evans (Students with Disabilities’ Officer), Josh Newsham & Raen Nelson (LGBTQ+ Students’ Officers), and now Yashaswi Manjarekar (International Students’ Officer).
However, the LCO positions of Racial & Ethnic Minority Officer and Women+ Officer remain vacant.
