OUSA is holding a Student General Meeting (SGM) after low turnout meant that its October referendum was invalid.
The meeting will be held at 12:30 p.m. in the Main Common Room, or outside if weather permits, on Thursday 21 March with the aim of “start[ing] our year off right,” said OUSA President James Heath.
It’s about “tidying up some hiccups from last year, raising some topics of discussion, and introducing to students some of our plans for 2019,” said James.
The aforementioned hiccup was that only 730 students voted in OUSA’s October referendum, which is well below the quorum of 5% of students. With approximately 20,000 students at University, a referendum needs at least 1000 votes to be valid.
OUSA President James Heath said he “cried himself to sleep,” when he received the result.
In comparison, only 0.5% of the student body, or 100 students, need to be present for a valid result at an SGM. Despite needing less student involvement, decisions made in SGMs are usually binding, whereas referendums tend to be non-binding. Just some nerdy OUSA facts for you.
We know this sounds very, very boring, but James assured Critic the SGM will be fun. He said the Exec members may be wearing morphsuits (is this fun?), and that there will be “dogs from the SPCA and Bonnie has offered to juggle some knives – a safe distance from the dogs”.
Critic is looking forward to the SGM being a disaster.