Located on King's Walk in the heart of the campus the large, red-bricked union building is the focal point of the university and your student experience. The union building is home to shops, bars, eating places, entertainment venues and various student support services.

The 1967 extension (the large green building that runs above the Kings Road Building) houses most of the administration space for the union along with the Job Shop and the Activities Centre

Second Floor

For Hot Food, Global on the top floor of the union is the place to go, with snacks starting from a low price. The burgers are really good and the food of a pretty decent quality.

In the 1967 Extension, offices for various staff are located including entertainments and the General Office

First Floor

It also contains the Student Advice Centre, UNCLE (University of Newcastle Childrens Equipment) and SCAN (Student Community Action Newcastle). The corridor also contains the offices for the President, Student Support Officer and the Education Officer. The Function Suite, located above the Mens Bar is used for union council meetings The 1967 extension contains the Job Shop, one committee room and the Activities Centre, the one stop shop for clubs and societies. It contains the offices for the Activities Officer and the AU officer. The First Floor is the location of the NSR Studio.

Ground Floor

Cochrane Lounge now sells cold food including freshly prepared sandwiches. The Courier Office is located opposite the Cochrane Lounge. This is the place to meet if you want to get involved in the Courier. A smoothie bar called Rijos now offers smoothies and on selected nights, offers cocktails.

The Mens Bar is the most popular bar in the union. It is set out as a modern bar with some seating areas and makes an ideal prebar to many pub crawls. As a result it can get very full during special events. The name comes from the union motto ''Mens Agitat Molem'', which means mind over matter

Lower Ground Floor

Shop and Post Office provides services and facilities to students. It sells a variety of things including university branded gear, newspapers from 30p and stationary.

Box Office and Cloakroom, sells tickets during the day and acts as a cloakroom during major events like solution

Endsleigh Insurance is located opposite the Box Office.

Basement

Basement and Basement2 provide large areas of events such as Solution and the large number of gigs that occur in the union. Book tickets for these gigs by visiting the box office or reception.

Webcam

Have a look at one of the bars in the union. This is the Mens Bar (the name comes from the union motto Mens Agitat Molem, which means Mind over Matter). The best time to have a look is Fridays when Solution is on, or Wednesday which is AU Night in the union.

Mens Bar Cam

Services

Student Advice Centre

If you have any worries ranging from health to accommodation through to well anything, come to the Student Advice Centre. It is the place where you can be given informed advice on all sorts of things. The SAC tries to run several campaigns every year on issues important to student health and wellbeing including the very successful SHAG week (Sexual Health Awareness and Guidance)

The Job Shop

The Job Shop is located in the union building. Go past the Cochrane lounge, up the stairs, through the door, turn right and its on your left on the corridor leading to the Activities Office. They also put vacancies that are available on their website.

Student Community Action Newcastle (SCAN)

The voluntary bureau for helping out across the community. SCAN also gives you an opportunity to work towards various volunteering certificates that will add your CV.

Nightline

A Listening service for students at Newcastle that runs from 8pm to 8am. They can offer you all sorts of information from taxi and takeaway numbers, to a friendly ear when it becomes just too much. Call into the Student Advice Centre or read their posters that are dotted around the university and student accommodation.

Union Nightbus

The union operates buses Monday - Friday. It runs from the union, sports centre and library to anywhere within a reasonable distance for just 50p. Timetables are available in reception

Volunteer Module

If you are involved in anything such as societies, clubs, SCAN, etc, this module can get it down as official and get you a lovely qualification to boot

NCL+

This is a collaboration between various parties including the university and the union. It is now recognised that employers want more than just a degree and that to students, university has a social aspect too, so check out their website to see how you can boost your potential and add to your CV.

Solution

Solution is the big night in the union. Held on a Friday night and running until 2:30 in the morning, it is a cheap night and an easy way of meeting people who are on your course or in your accommodation. It is held across a number of bars, with music to suit every taste. Solution is a great night and pictures taken at Solution can be found here.

Arcane

Arcane is the big end of term night, which offers music to pretty well every taste. It starts at 10pm on Saturday and finishes at 5pm the following morning. It is open to everyone and attracts an amazing crowd.

Clubs and societies

There are well over 100 societies at Newcastle and students are encouraged to set their own up. Every subject has its own society. There are thousands of clubs and society memberships.

To find more out about societies and clubs, go to the Freshers Fayre which is held during Freshers week. It is a great opportunity to find something to do and allows you to ask questions.

To join a society, you need to pay a membership fee through the societies website (you can only do this after you have got your membersgip card.

Union Website

Blogs

Following a union council motion in December 2007, Sabbs and Union Officers have to produce blogs on a regular basis. Read them here

Sabbatical Officers

Officers Pages

Commonly known as Sabbs or Union Society Officers, these people run the main parts of the union. They are full time positions elected in March and run from mid July for a 12 month term in most cases. They are paid positions.

Most of the people who occupy these positions are recent graduates of the university.

The people with Elect by their name are the people who were elected in the elections in March and May, and will fill their positions in July 2008.

Here is a picture of the six sabbaticals for 2008/9 below

Left to Right - Peter Mercer (Student Support Officer), William Richens (President), Charlotte Ellis (The Education Officer), Sam Parker (Editor of the Courier), Imogen Davies (Activities Officer (yeah!)) and Jimmy Greene (Athletic Union Officer).

President

Will Richens

Doing Presidential things. Liases with the University.

Student Support Officer

Peter Mercer

Helps with a lot of the student support and welfare services available to students through the union and the university. Rosie is involved with WAC (Welfare and Campaigns)

Editor of the Courier

Sam Parker

Resposible for Media produced at the university, especially the Courier Newspaper.

Education Officer

Charlotte Ellis

Managing Campaigns, overseeing elections, the one stop shop if you are having problems with the delivery of your degree.

Activities Officer

Imogen Davis

Manages the societies, balls, events, etc.

AU President

Jimmy Greene

President of the Athletic Union, making sure that we retain an amazing AU

Part Time Officers

The Positions below are for part time officers. They are not paid and are usually occupied by students at the university. The majority are also elected in March apart from the Freshers Week Organisers and PGMS Officer, who are elected in November.

The people with Elect by their name are the people who were elected in the elections in March and will fill their positions in September.

RAG Officer

RAG Rave - E Budges and M Riches

The main force behind RAG week held in February. This job is usually a job share.

LGBT Officer

Chris McCallion

Represents the interests of Lesbian, Gay, Bi and Trans students. This job is usually a job share.

International Officer

Eliza Browne and Marie-Claire Wilmot

Represents the interests of International students

Students with Disabilities Officer

Matthew Riggall

Represents students with disabilities

Ethics and Environment Officers

Rosie Glencross & Alexander Henderson

Promotes ethical conduct to the union, students and the university. They are also expected to promote the environment as well. They are the main force behind Ethics and Environment week, which runs late February, early March.

Chair of Union Council

Position Vacant

Keeps them all under control at union council meetings. The Iron Fist.

Convenor of Debates

Michael Dallaway

Part of the debating Society. Ensures that Newcastle remains a major player on the debating circuit.

Convenor of Disciplinary

Sarah Hoddinott

Runs the disciplinary committee. They decide any punishments to be handed out to people who have done something wrong in the union. For example violence or vandalism.

Freshers Week Organisers

Ignition

Executive Officer without Portfolio

Jack Adams

This position is open to anyone who wants to achieve something in the union. This year Becky was elected on a campaign to improve involvement in the union and elections

Campaigns Officer

Katie Carter

Helps with many of the campaigns at the union

Post Graduate and Mature Students Officer

George

Represent the interests of Post Graduate and Mature Students at Newcastle. This position is decided in November elections.

Racial Equality Officer

Sara Hasanain

Encourages equality between people of different racial backgrounds.

Gender Equality Officer

Eva Elks

Encourages equality between the genders.

Community Officer

Gina Workman

Loves looking after your houses.
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Next Years Sabbs and Part Time Officers will be found around the students union during Freshers Week wearing T Shirts that are not the same colour as Freshers Week Crew. They will be found publicising the union and how they can help you.

Media Services

The Courier

The Courier is a free newspaper, released at around midday Monday. It contains around 30 pages, including an insert called The Pulp. It provides news on various subjects going on around the university and affecting students.

The main Newspaper. Its run by the editor, which is a full time sabbatical officer position. The newspaper is divided into sections (News, Sport, etc), which are managed by sub editors. If you want to write or contribute to the courier (for example the person who runs this site submits photos), each section has a meeting during the week (usually Monday/Tuesday, around lunchtime). Contact the editor or read the newspaper for further details.

Newcastle Student Radio

NSR has been relaunched and is currently awaiting for a major launch in September 2008. You can get involved in various ways with the radio station always requiring presenters and technical staff. You can view their website here

Freshers Week

Newcastle runs the best Freshers week in the country. The union is unusual in the fact that the position for organising it is a separate officers position shared between four people.

To find out more and apply for Freshers Week, visit www.newcastlefreshersweek.com

RAG Week

Hosted early in semester two, RAG (raising and giving) week allows students to raise lots of money for charities through fun events like abseiling and bungee jumping. Like freshers week, the RAG organiser requires a crew to do all of this charity work such as RAG Raids (sending a bus load of RAG crew to another city), parties and abseiling and bungee jumping.

Ethics and Environment Week

Ethics and Environment week usually happens in late February. It is a week when general awareness is made into various ethical dilemmas across the world such as Darfur and Global Warming. It also pushes the various issues that students can get involved in such as protests, energy improvement and minimising the impact on the environment

Union Council

Union politics can be very interesting. Union Council passes policy on various aspects of the union including campaigns and the running of it. It is also the place to hold the union to account to prevent the sabbs and PTO's setting up a dictatorship and building statues of themselves on the front lawn instead of funding NSR.

There are a number of ways to get involved. You can be a school rep, rep of a committee (for example the author of this website is on Societies Executive). It is a great addition to your CV and also shows you some of the less well known aspects of the union. I have personally joined several committees since joining Union Council. Send an email to the chair of union council to find out more on how you can join and contribute to this.

Links

These links provide a link to the official sites.

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