Joshua Yewman.

Candidate for VP Education

#YesYewmanCan

Hi there! I'm Josh! Over the past year, I have been working as a school rep. I have seen the problems students face, and I have a good idea of what is and isn't working. I work closely with our current VP Ed, and I think I can build on their recent work and make your academic life a whole lot better.

Moving on from COVID: With the world hopefully returning to "normal", it's been years since students experienced a normal education. I will lobby the college to provide support for each degree program to ensure every student is fully supported during the transition. No one deserves to feel like they are at a disadvantage because of the move back to in-person learning, and I try to ensure no student does.

Attendance: Tired of our current attendance system? So am I. I will lobby the college to improve this cumbersome system. (With an app)

Remembering the forgotten: The college and SU have neglected some student groups, for example, foundation year, joint-honours and London campus students. I will begin to include all these groups within the student voice system and ensure all students feel they have academic representation at Royal Holloway. Every student has a voice no matter where you are or what you're studying.

Building on student surveys: The college asks you to complete a questionnaire at the end of modules. This is a good start, but if you have an issue with your module, it's already been and gone.

I will begin short college-wide questionnaires for each module as you take them. This will give you an excellent opportunity to voice your opinions. Your course and department reps can then take the results directly to your module leaders and have issues solved during your module, not after you've finished it.

Transparency and efficiency: We have approximately 1300 course reps. With so many representatives over so many courses, the SU has no standard way of communication, and it isn't easy to know who to talk to.

I will streamline communications between you and your academic reps and provide better transparency, so you know your issues will never be lost or forgotten. When you email any organization with lots of staff, it gets logged. You get a precise response from the right person and quickly resolve your issue. I plan to make this work for you and your academic representatives.