Hi everyone!

It gives me great pleasure to kick off the first Exec Blog of the year as the President of Huddersfield Students’ Union.

For those of you who are returning to university after the summer break, welcome back!

Hope you had a well-earned break and are looking forward to a new year, and of course, another Freshers’.

And for those of you who are coming to the university for the first time, welcome to Huddersfield. You’ve got a lot to look forward to. Including your first ever Freshers’!

And what a Freshers’ it’s going to be.

There’s more variety than ever before, meaning there’s hopefully something for everyone. Clichéd but true. With both evening and daytime events too, you shouldn’t have to worry about missing out on anything. Freshers’ Festival is all day every day for a whole week.

Freshers’ aside, there’s so much more to look forward to this year.

We have our ‘100 Things to Do in Huddersfield Week’, where we’ll be encouraging you to complete as many of our 100 things list as possible. From getting a selfie with the Harold Wilson statue, to going to a Huddersfield Town match, to even doing things on campus like setting up your own club or society, there’s so much to do!

As a Students’ Union, of course we’re political, so we have our SU elections in both October and March, where you can stand to become a student representative of your course, your school, or perhaps a particular type of student group. The March elections are your chance to stand to become an Exec Officer like myself and the Vice Presidents.

In addition to that, this academic year is the year of a general election, something which happens only every 5 years. Here we’ll be running a campaign to encourage you to register to vote, and subsequently to have your say on who runs the next government.

Wellbeing

We’ll be running several wellbeing weeks too, two in the first term, one on settling in to university life, and the other on looking after your mates. Our Advice Centre will play an important role in these campaigns, and if you ever feel the need to talk to someone, don’t hesitate to visit our Advice Centre on floor 5 of Student Central.

In addition we’ll be running Refreshers’ Week in January (in case you just couldn’t get enough of Freshers’ in September). There will be loads of campaigns and volunteering projects too, with our very own volunteering week where you can try your hand at a range of different opportunities, our Give-it-a-Go programme, where you can try out new societies or sports clubs; and linking on to that we have a home Varsity this year to look forward to.

Varsity is where we take on Bradford University in a range of sports and activities – and we need to win back our trophy after an off-year last time round!

So whether you’re a first year or returning student, you’ve got a lot to look forward to this year, and the Students’ Union have been working hard to ensure this year offers the most enriching and fun student experience possible.

Don’t hold back in getting involved in activities, campaigns, volunteering projects, student media, visiting our Advice Centre, the list goes on.

The next 12 months promises to be an amazing 12 months, and it all kicks off soon with our biggest Freshers’ yet – I hope you’re excited!

Josh Elderfield

President