Student Engagement and Community Building

8. Student Engagement and Community Building

Our student experience is only as strong as our sense of community. This pillar prioritizes building our community on campus through initiatives and student engagement. We are dedicated to improving the quality, accessibility, and awareness of the USC’s digital and physical presence. The USC will improve our on-campus community relations through focusing on elections policy, club support and feedback from ethnocultural clubs. Community building also extends to the City of London where we will connect our advocacy efforts and relationships issues such as intra-city transit and student housing. We strive to build a better community digitally, on-campus, and within the London community.

Executive Lead: Callista Ryan, Vice President Communications and Public Affairs

Initiative	Executive Lead	Updates	Status
Collaboration with the London Chamber of Commerce	Eunice Oladejo	President has established a relationship with the Chamber of Commerce CEO and has worked with VPEA to renew our membership. VPEA now sit on the Chamber of Commerce’s Government Affairs Committee and Strategic Planning Committee. Some Executives attended the Business Achievement Awards with the CEO of the Chamber of Commerce. USCPresident has invited the CEO to participate in SDN programming in October.	Ongoing
Elections reform	Nathan Szierer	Elections policies and procedures have been updated, with specific amendments made to keep elections in line with the EDI and Sustainability goals of the USC. A New EGC Balloting Procedure has been created, pending ratification by Council. VPGF has been working with the VPCPA’s team to communicate changes to the elections season.	Complete
Investments in Affordable Intra and Inter-City Transit	Eunice Oladejo	VPEA has lobbied many transit companies for improved accessibility in their announcements of expanded transit into London. GO Transit has not extended its services to London from Toronto. VPEA has met with MP Fragiskatos to discuss updates to the Liberal promise to explore expansion of High Frequency Rail to Southwestern Ontario. VPEA is re-writing the USC’s Transit & Pedestrian Safety policy paper.	Ongoing
Improve InfoSource	Zamir Fakirani and Nathan Szierer	InfoSource has reopened with its new layout and reallocated staff in the former Purple Store location.	Ongoing
Improve USC Social Media Accessibility	Callista Ryan	VPCPA’s team is working on getting our accounts verified to legitimize our presence. President and VPCPA have reinstated the Student Engagement Committee of the USC! Student Engagement Committee has solidified goals and metrics to support long term engagement analysis which will help give direction to improving social media accessibility in the future.	Ongoing
Improving Clubs Support and Training	Nathan Szierer	Club feedback on this year’s training and Club’s Week has been collected and processed. The strong majority (over 90%) of respondents found training useful in preparing for their club duties, but there is always room for improvement. Clubs also expressed a lack of engagement with virtual Clubs Week, but saw very strong engagement in person. Club consultations will begin this month to learn specifically what could improve next year’s training and Clubs Week.	Ongoing
Publicly-Available Councillor Attendance & Voting	Callista Ryan andNathan Szierer	Motion to publish attendance and voting records passed at the July 2021 Council Meeting and this information can be found	Complete
UCC Branding	Zamir Fakirani, Callista Ryan, and Nathan Szierer	President and VPGF are working with the Commercial Operations Working Group to improve the USC’s presence in the UCC. New banners were ordered and are not in the atrium!	Ongoing
Visual Identity	Callista Ryan	VPCPA’s focus on visual identity has been on updating all the USC affiliated logos (which are almost complete for all portfolios!). The Communications team has also been working on updating and creating aesthetic document styles for USC policy papers and documents to improve readability.	Ongoing
VPEA on leadership positions at OUSA and UCRU	Eunice Oladejo	VPEA was elected President at OUSA and Secretary Treasurer at UCRU.	Complete
Website Improvements	Callista Ryan	Website has seen some big updates on the main page and the about us page. We will also be launching pages for many of our portfolios so there’s more consistency year to year. A huge focus has been creating the USC’s first in-detail and publicly accessible Executive Roadmap (which is this!).	Ongoing

Additional Executive Initiatives

The Executive Roadmap plans out how the executive will structure their programs, plans, and portfolios for the year under organized priority areas. However, when new opportunities or issues arise, they may implement additional programs. See below for updates on these additional initiatives.

Get out the Vote

VPEA, developed an educational Get out the vote campaign for UCRU
VPEA met with Western administrators and Elections Canada to advocate for polls on campus for students in residence
VPEA conducted a voter registration information booth during Orientation Week
VPEA met with Western administrators to advocate for bus shuttles to polling locations and also established a USC shuttle on voting day
President and the Student Development Network have planned and executed a GOTV campaign
VPEA has started preliminary conversations at OUSA regarding the provincial election

Partnership with The Great Canadian Coach

VPEA and VPSSP continue to meet with the Great Canadian Coach to solidify this partnership
VPEA and COACH are currently discussing a new area for partnership as many companies have filled the gap of intercity transit
VPSSP partnered with The Great Canadian Coach to bring students to Niagara Falls for our reading week programming, geared towards international students

Stakeholder meetings

VPEA and President have had introductory meetings with almost all major and relevant municipal, provincial, and federal stakeholders. We are excited to continue building these valuable relationships.
VPEA has had stakeholder check-ins throughout the month of August and is reaching out to municipal stakeholders to strengthen relationships.
VPEA and President met with Mayor Ed Holder prior to Homecoming
VPEA continues to maintain relationships with Councillors, MPs, MPPs, and community organizations, especially after the start of the school year.
VPEA has met with a number of our provincial stakeholders through OUSA’s lobby week and will be meeting with federal MP’s throughout the weeks leading up to the winter break.

USC Foundation

President has continued to work with the USC Foundation and has secured a donation of $50K to support ASGBV; mental health; and professional development-related programming. Thanks to this donation, we have been able to offer 140 student leaders ASIST training free of charge!
President has overseen the rebranding of the Foundation, with the support of the Communications team
President is working on a year-long Foundation strategy and outreach guide, with the USC’s COO.
President is working with the Foundation to ensure the USC’s ASGBV advocacy is properly funded and supported by our passionate alumni
President is working with the Foundation to host a fundraising event for the Foundation so they are able to continue supporting our initiatives
President and VPCPA are working with the Foundation on improving branding.
President has been working with the Board to plan a fundraising event for January

Contact

communications@westernusc.ca