Lucrezia Gentili.

Candidate for VP Wellbeing & Diversity

My name is Lucrezia and I am a third-year Politics and International Relations student.

The values the SU is built on made me apply for the Bar and Catering team in my first year. Being involved with the work of the organisation first hand, I experienced the pre and post-pandemic student life and saw the changes and challenges the organisation has faced.

I decided to apply for the role of VP of Wellbeing and Diversity for two main reasons.

Firstly, I would love to give back to a community that has made me feel at home, by representing students' interests and providing them with the best experience possible.

Second of all I want to ensure that past issues and shortcomings are overcome.

After 2 years since the start of the pandemic, the well-being of students needs to be prioritised more than ever. Many international students have been forced to remain on campus during the holidays. As a foreign student, I strongly believe more support should be provided in this situation. I plan on organising more social events and provide support to students off-term.

Current second-year students could not experience their first year normally, therefore I think I would like to work with the departments and halls to hold more social events.

To ensure that students know where and what kind of support is available for them on campus, I plan on organising regular fairs with the house advice and wellbeing teams, alongside careers fairs.

To improve the Wellbeing's response times and ensure that every student has access to prompt mental support, I would like to establish a body of student or staff member volunteers to help the well-being center with the high volume of requests.

Working with the student groups and collectives will be a key focus for me to ensure their voice is heard and that changes are implemented throughout the year.

I'll support and organise a wide range of awareness and liberation campaigns and history months to celebrate diversity in all its forms.

To best represent the interests of students, I'll conduct regular surveys and feedback sessions, to then report the findings during staff meetings and work to implement the changes proposed.

One of the things I like the most about Royal Holloway is the high degree of diversity among students on campus and by coming together to celebrate it, we can contribute to everyone's wellbeing.