students union – The Orbital

RHSU ‘No Platform for Hate Speech on Campus’ Policy Passes

8Nov

By Alex JonesNo Comments

News

RHSU ‘No Platform for Hate Speech on Campus’ Policy Passes

It was announced three weeks ago that infamous journalist and broadcaster Katie Hopkins had been invited on to campus by Debating Society to take part in a debate with students. This was cancelled by the Students' Union on the grounds of security and logistical concerns. Despite the reasons cited by the Students' Union, less than 24 hours later, they announced a referendum on a policy to allow them greater control over who is allowed to speak at a Union venue or at an event organised by an Union affiliated group. This led to fierce debate both on campus and online with both sides being equally passionate in their reasoning. The engagement across the student body was reflected in the turnout for the referendum with 1018 students voting. This is possibly the largest ever turnout in an ...

10Mar

By Annie MooreNo Comments

Opinion

Too Little Too Late?

The Students' Union's campaign, Let’s Talk About Sex, replaced the much loved Sexual Health Advice and Guidance (SHAG) Week that we have seen run previously. Vice President Welfare and Diversity, Willow Wong’s, new initiative was meant to make our sexual awareness weeks more inclusive of all orientations on our campus. Whilst the week was certainly more applicable to a wider range of sexual preferences, it failed to adequately deal with the elephant in the room – our closed sexual health clinic. In the summer of last year, our sexual health clinic closed due to a restructuring and privatisation of the branch of the NHS that served our campus. Subsequently, students requiring STI and HIV testing or post assault support now must travel miles off campus for such services. The college have ...

BREAKING: The Packhorse gets 2/5 in government Food Hygiene Rating Scheme.

27Oct

By Louise JonesNo Comments

News

BREAKING: The Packhorse gets 2/5 in government Food Hygiene Rating Scheme.

The Packhorse which opened to the general public in May of this year, received its first routine inspection on 25 September. The report given to The Packhorse, which Orbital Magazine has seen, detailed that there were ‘poor standards of cleanliness’ and that such standards ‘will not be tolerated’. Using the most recent food hygiene ratings available on the food.gov website, The Packhorse is now within the lowest 7 of the 126 businesses in Egham that are accountable under the scheme. Whilst it is now law for businesses within Wales and Northern Ireland to display their food hygiene ratings, this is yet to become mandatory in England. The Packhorse is currently not showing their rating of 2 (‘needs improvement’). The report from the Senior Environmental Health Officer for Runnyme...

7Jun

By Beth CarrNo Comments

News

Final year facts on council tax

Beth Carr explores the practicalities for those who have to pay council tax and what the SU are doing about it. Term is drawing to a close and amongst the pizza menus and estate agent brochures, final year students are receiving another form of unwanted mail: council tax bills. However, unlike your usual junk mail, these bills are serious and they must be paid. What is Council Tax and who has to pay? Council Tax pays for services provided by the council, such as libraries, schools and the emergency services. Every householder has to pay this, and with multiple occupants each person is liable, jointly and severally - this means that they all are responsible for the bill together but are also individually responsible for paying. Full-time students are exempt from payi...

Coffee House Sessions brings free live music to Tommy’s Kitchen

25Oct

By Beth CarrNo Comments

Culture & Literature, Music

Coffee House Sessions brings free live music to Tommy’s Kitchen

A revived, rebranded SU seems like the perfect place to kick off the brand new season of Coffee House Sessions, and, ignoring the lack of coffee house status, Tommy’s Kitchen provided a near perfect setting for the first of these. Sharing a name with our founder (and therefore the venue), Tom Walker stepped naturally into his second show of the day and performed a stunning original set - the audience may have arrived hungry for a Colossus burger but I certainly left with a hunger for more of Walker’s original songs. The set was fresh but full of cultural references, including Katy Perry, the Fresh Prince of Bel Air and Spotify: it provided something to relate to even though you were hearing completely new content. We sat down with Tom Walker before the set to discover more about his ba...

Bears Night: £2000 Raised for Sports and Societies

20Oct

By No Comments

Sports & Socs

Bears Night: £2000 Raised for Sports and Societies

‘Bears Night’, a fundraising night ran by the SU, was back for the second year running this October, and this time it was bigger than ever before. With 1000 of you through the door on the night, meaning over 1000 bears t-shirts sold and worn, 2016 has started off promising for clubs and societies, where over £2000 was raised through tickets sales to be directly invested back into the numerous sports and societies on campus. Vice-President Sports and Development, Steff Milne said of the event: “This is an amazing thing to have achieved and it’s all down to you guys! We smashed last year in terms of sales of tickets and the general event”. As well as being a key fundraising event, the night acted as a launch for the Royal Holloway Bears branding, which covers sports, fitness and act...

Over 300 students queue for half price Summer Ball tickets

24Mar

By Beth CarrNo Comments

News

Over 300 students queue for half price Summer Ball tickets

Beth Carr reports on the Summer Ball launch. 6am on campus is often a quiet place with few people, if any, having the unfortunate opportunity to experience the sunrise. However the morning of 24th March saw a very different story, with hundreds of students seeing in the day outside the Students' Union in the hope of getting hold of one of the 300 £35 tickets for this year's Summer Ball. While those at the front of the queue had reportedly been there since 10pm on Wednesday night, the queue only started getting busy by around 3am, with some students joining straight from the paint party and others rocking up at close with blankets, coats, and electronic devices. With essay deadlines in sight, it is not surprising that many people brought their laptops and finished work sat outside the...

9Feb

By Laura DenhamNo Comments

News

Penrose residents compensated

Residents of Royal Holloway's Penrose halls of residents are to be compensated following a series on ongoing problems in the accomodate block this academic year. The Students' Union announced in February that alongside the College, they had collaboratively secured compensation for students who had experience continual problems with heating and water pressure in Penrose. It has been agreed that the students affected, of whom there are almost 200, will receive £250 of compensation paid directly to their College card. The £250 covers approximately two weeks rent for a student living in Penrose. The Students’ Union commented that they "Hope that these students feel that this is sufficient to cover the issues that have affected them while in their accommodation. "We feel that it’s impo...

26Nov

By No Comments

News

Meet the SU by-election Winners

Our News Editor caught up with some of the newly elected representatives to see what they have in store for the coming year: Amy Timmins - RAG Chair What is your main goal as RAG chair this year? Firstly I want to raise awareness of what RAG is, which if people reading this don't know, is raising and giving money for charity! Then once lots of people are aware of RAG, I would love to encourage as many people to get involved and get them as passionate as me about raising money for charity. Which RAG events can we look forward to this year? I am full of ideas but also very open to everyone's suggestions (so please let me know!!) Some of my ideas so far are Jailbreak (get sponsored to get as far away from campus as possible without any money), a colour run (a sponsored run around campus ...