I wrote the article for the StudentVoice – hooray. Affectionately titled The Welfare Manifesto, here it be:
The Welfare Department of BHASVIC, you may be surprised to hear, is not merely an excuse to give out free condoms. It is working towards improving your welfare and the welfare of others, be that sexual health, physical or mental health, financial issues, home problems or, indeed, anything that affects your general wellbeing. If you are an avid Student Planner reader, as no doubt we all are, then you may also believe that the Welfare Department is run by Su Adams – more up to date informants will tell you that in fact Lauren Shukru now holds this post, and waits in her office for the call of a student in need of help. Although it’s probably easier to knock upon her door – the Welfare Office is next to the Careers Suite (just turn left at the top of the stairs) and Lauren’s doors are open all college hours – if she’s not there then there’s always someone on hand who’s willing to listen to you.
The Welfare Department have been busy of late – not only with the World Aids Day event, which was covered in the last issue of Student Voice, and the frequent appearances of the Mobile Information Bus, but also with plans for things to come. A Healthy Eating Day is in the works, which, we hope, shall be more interesting than the usual ‘5 fruit and veg a day’, but less full-on than the words of Sue White from Green Wing – ‘You can’t eat that, you’re far too fat!’. As well as this fun filled, food filled day, we’re working on plans for a celebration of Non-Smoking Day, observed nationally on the 12th of March and, in BHASVIC, on the 14th. Clara, the Smoking Cessation Nurse who took up residence in the hall last time she visited, will be returning, and, weather permitting, Gordon is hoping to display a smoking machine outside (as, due to the new smoking ban, even a smoking machine can’t cough out a few clouds beneath the ceilings of BHASVIC’s classrooms). So with machines that smoke, food that tastes good and some good old fashioned clean air about the place, we’re well on our way to a fun few days.
Of course, the Welfare Department do take a break from this tomfoolery to listen to your problems – in the words of Lauren Shukru, Welfare is a ‘signpost and liaison point’. We can tell you where to go, who to talk to and what actions to take to help you through the struggle of student life, especially if you need help with finance, have questions about travel, discounts and subsidies, or want info on smoking, alcohol, drugs, sexual health or being a young carer. The Young Carers Project, a charity funded primarily by Comic Relief in fact, has formed ties with BHASVIC and is ready and willing to help out anyone who is struggling to care for another on their own – Lauren in Welfare, as ever, has the details (She’s lovely, so don’t worry).
And, of course, though the Welfare department is not merely an excuse to give out free condoms, there is a sexual health clinic up and running in College House on Tuesdays, 12 until 3. Irene is the woman to speak to, and she’ll be in room 145 to give out emergency contraception, pregnancy tests, condoms, info on diseases and, most importantly, advice.
So with several great women to talk to, lots of information to gather and absorb, a couple of rooms to find, some events to look forward to and the exciting idea of Gordon with a smoke machine, I leave you with this message: the Welfare Department is not just about free condoms. It’s not just about fundraisers. It’s not even about the college as a whole. It’s about you, and your life as students at BHASVIC. You are the ones that matter, and it is for you, and you alone, that we are here.
Suitably cheesy and college paper pretentious-y? Yeah, I reckon so. Although whether they’ll find the image of Mr No-smiles Gordon with a smoke machine as hilarious as I did, who knows…
And as I’m here – have you heard the new Laura Marling album? It’s actually really good =] This is my favorite song, called Ghosts:
He walked down a busy street
Staring solely at his feet
Clutching pictures of past lovers at his side
Stood at the table where she sat
And removed his hat
In respect of her presence
Presents her with the pictures and says
These are just ghosts that broke my heart before I met you.
He opened up his little heart
Unlocked the lock that kept it dark
And read a written warning
Saying Im still mourning
Over ghosts
Over ghosts
Over ghosts
Over ghosts that broke my heart before I met you
Lover, please do not
Fall to your knees
Its not
Like I believe in
Everlasting love
So he went crazy at nineteen
Said he’d lost all his self esteem
And couldn’t understand why he was crying…
He would stare at empty chairs
Think of the ghosts who once sat there
The ghosts that broke his heart.
oh the ghosts that broke my heart[…]
The ghosts that broke my heart before I met you
Lover, please do not
Fall to your knees
Its not
Like I believe in
Everlasting love
He says I’m so lost,
Not at all well
Do as done there is nothing left to be
Turned out I’d been following him and he’d been following me
Do as done after it was over
We were just two lovers crying on each others shoulders
Lover, please do not
Fall to your knees
Its not
Like I believe in
Everlasting love
And on that note – adieu!
11 comments
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February 26, 2008 at 10:47 am
Jacob Ward
Well I’m pretty sure the BHASVIC welfare department’s not just about condoms now, thanks for that 😛
I think the Sue White method is the only way to go personally 🙂
February 26, 2008 at 3:15 pm
sexual health » Blog Archive » And now, the third of my let’s waste time instead of sleeping blogs…
[…] Read the rest of this great post here […]
February 26, 2008 at 9:22 pm
Caitlin
I LOVE her. With all my being.
In fact, I’m going to find the actress, marry her and…ok, I went too far. It’s the character that I love…mostly.
Fav Sue White clip may well be the one when Mac and Boyce (I think) are competing to pile up sweets and she just knocks them all down. That woman is HARD CORE.
And yes, well done. The Welfare Dept is way more than free condoms – which is lucky for me, or I’d be in a rather strange position in the student union =]
February 26, 2008 at 10:04 pm
Jacob Ward
I wouldn’t imagine Sean would be too pleased if you married Sue White 😛
Personally I’d never use free condoms anyway. I’m a Durex man, as I’m sure you were just dying to know 😛
Oh yeah, and the need for condoms is somewhat lacking atm, lol.
Sharing is caring
February 26, 2008 at 10:21 pm
Caitlin
I reckon right now we’re sharing a bit more info than necessary 😛
Oh but…it’s SUE WHITE! *love, respect, adoration etc etc…*
February 26, 2008 at 11:23 pm
Jacob Ward
Nah, just shows how much we care 😛
March 3, 2008 at 10:13 pm
Matt Gates
Good word use: tomfoolery
Wow, I can now said i’ve read something in student voice – only a handful of people on the planet can say that!
March 3, 2008 at 10:20 pm
Caitlin
Hooray for the patronising, self-important Student Voice. It’s such a bad representation of the voice of the students…but still, it’s good for BHASVIC to have a student paper, right? And chavbis is clearly on hold, so it’ll have to do!
March 4, 2008 at 11:19 pm
Matt Gates
In it’s defence- it’s not like the SU are a fair representation of the voice of the students as most of them (except of a core of exceptionally talented, high spirited, good looking crusaders of brilliant-ness) fail to do jack.
Is it good for BHASVIC to have a student newspaper even if the readership extends to just the OLC staff? (even though they are in a library and frankly have a ample supply of actually good reading material) I dunno really- perhaps an unmoderated forum on the VLE, run by the SU, would be more useful to raise issues?
March 5, 2008 at 12:00 pm
Jacob Ward
I think it’s a good idea, as long as it’s the students who control it. Student papers were banned at Priory (because my brother took objection to after school detentions) so all we got was a once termly pile of shit which was basically an opportunity to pat the senior management team on the back. Occasionally student articles were included (Caitlin once wrote a piece) when the staff couldn’t be arsed, but you could never write anything that was a real issue. There’s no paper at Downs, which is a shame as I’d like to contribute an article or two. It doesn’t really matter if only a few people read it, it’s just nice to have an outlet for one’s views. I personally feel like no one gives a fuck about what I think at Downs, which is rather frustrating.
Oh well, it’s not even my college.
March 6, 2008 at 3:18 pm
Caitlin
You can still have a say Jakey, lol. I think that having a student-run college paper is a good idea, yes. Even if it’s not perfect at the mo, it has the potential to voice the real issues of students in future years, when it has new people editing etc.
I agree with Jake that “It doesn’t really matter if only a few people read it, it’s just nice to have an outlet for one’s views”. But I also see there are a fair few arguments against the Student Voice paper, in that while it is student run it is funded by the student union and must therefore be run past a teacher before going to print (as did CHAVBIS). Also, those writing it, as with those in the SU, aren’t a great representation of the students of BHASVIC.
Still, though, they are the only ones who are willing to write for the paper, so props to them. The issue I have with the S V paper is that they have regular writers in it and as far as I’m aware it’s pretty rare for someone not on their crew to write something for it. Would be an interesting experiment, actually, for one or two of us to write an article and send it to them…