Hi there, 

Welcome to the December edition of our Student Voice Bulletin! Each month, we’ll share key student insights and feedback, aiming to improve how we communicate and work together to enhance the student experience at Royal Holloway. In this bulletin, you'll find:

• Priority 8 Updates
• Academic Representation Updates
• SSO Executive Minutes 
• Upcoming January Campaigns 
• Cost-of-Living Benchmarking Notes

We hope you find this useful!

Student Voice Team @ RHSU

Sabbatical Officer Updates on Priority 8

The Sabbatical Officers have continued to work hard on their priorities, and they all recently published blogs to share their progress with students at the end of Term One. You can read about their work below.

VP Education, Matthew, ran two paid, in-person focus groups in mid-November to gain insight into the student experience around deadline stacking. Students across a variety of year groups, departments and from different Royal Holloway communities participated. We have shared anonymised minutes from the focus groups below and a proposed list of recommendations Matthew will take to the University in Term Two to further work on this priority with an aim to expand these recommendations and actions further.

If you want to learn more about current actions for Priority 8, please take a look at our website. Each of the individual priorities has an action plan tracker, and we will continue to keep you updated on the work implementing these actions throughout the year.

Finally, our Leadership Elections are just around the corner! Election nominations will open mid-January so keep an eye out for the nominate a student form and get thinking about any students you think would make a good Sabbatical Officer candidate!

Academic Rep Updates and Upcoming Events

December Rep of the Month - Wania Ahmed

Wania Ahmed, Senior Course Rep for Psychology, has gone above and beyond to support her peers, from actively contributing to SSAMs to creating spaces for reps to share feedback and support one another. Her work is helping strengthen student voice across the department. Read more about Wania’s impact below.

Nomination Form for Rep of the Month

Staff and students can nominate an Academic Rep for Rep of the Month on our website. There is a student number section on the form, but staff do not need to input a student number if they do not know it and can simply put zeroes down to complete it. Thank you!

Term One Rep Impact!

This term Psychology has had two ‘Rep of the Month' nominations!

Read Poppy and Wania’s blogs to find out what they have been doing to represent students' academic interests. Within the department, Reps have been working on improving the feedback loop, encouraging Reps to use social media to inform students how their feedback is being implemented. Reps have also requested more example essays to be explained during seminars.  

Over in Classics, the department has continued to offer ‘Co-working sessions’ which give students the opportunity to work in a quiet space alongside other students, fostering productive and supportive learning environments.  

PGT English Students are working on building more community within their cohort. Department staff will be looking into options for developing the PGT study room to make the space more welcoming.  

Computer Science Academic Reps have asked for a Module Fair to be held to help them understand the module choices for third year. Reps also agreed that third-year students should be at the fair to answer questions from current second-year students.  

School Reps have been busy with a range of projects, but to highlight a few:

• Josh from LSS has been working alongside Matthew on deadline stacking and helping to resolve student queries.
• Dominika from LSE has been working on staff and students guides to foster engagement in the School. 
• They have all been busy holding town halls and meeting with their Reps to discuss department wide issues.  

We will be reopening recruitment at the beginning of next term.

Changes to School Reps

There have been a lot of questions recently about what is going to happen to School Reps with the change to Faculties. Our byelaws currently require us to have School Reps, but we will be changing those in time to mirror the new Faculty system. School Reps will not be elected in the March Leadership Elections, and we will share more details of the new system next term. If you have any questions about the future of School Reps, please send an email to voice@su.rhul.ac.uk.

Upcoming January Campaigns and Events

We will update our Term Two campaigns on our website when we return in January. All campaigns for the 2025-26 academic year can be found on our Campaigns Hub. 

Stressbusters

Stressbusters returns in January. This campaign is led by the Students' Union Advice Centre. They will be holding a variety of events throughout assessment week to help students through the challenges that the coming days and weeks will bring as they resume their studies. All events and activities will be shared on our website in January. 

Estranged Students Community Social & Support

On 13 January, the Advice and Voice Team are hosting an event at Tommy's Lounge as a part of Stressbusters to support estranged students during assessment week. The event will run from 15:00-17:00 and host a range of activities for students. 

Mature Students Community Mingle

On 22 January, James, the Mature Students Community Officer, is hosting his very first event in the Windsor Building Student Lounge to welcome and meet new mature students at Royal Holloway. The event will run from 14:00-16:30 and will provide refreshments and activities. 

Term One SSO Executive Minutes and Ratifications 

Our Executives are committees of student representatives responsible for the development, scrutiny and maintenance of policy and plans in their area, identifying where work should be undertaken. Each Executive is chaired by a full-time Sabbatical Officer, supported by student representatives from student groups, student communities and our Academic Reps.  

Societies, Sports & Opportunities Executive, 19 November 2025

• Officers shared progress on Priority 8, including campaigning for more student-friendly timetables and expanding affordable and free SU events.
• Members provided feedback on Freshers’ Fair, core events, training and communications, raising issues around accessibility, transparency, and consideration of religious dates.
• The Executive agreed key outcomes, including approving Ballroom & Latin’s move to a Sports Group, retaining May ratifications, and progressing the EDI Action Plan alongside improved support for student groups.

Read the minutes in full here on our website.

Ratification Results November 2025

In early-December, members of the Societies, Sports & Opportunities Executive voted on ratifying new student groups and 19 new student groups were successfully ratified. Check out our blog on our website to learn more about the process and see which student groups were successfully ratified. 

Coming up in January: The Big Executive

The Big Executive is returning for the second time on 19 January where we will bring student leaders, along with the wider student body, into a space with our Sabbatical Officers, Students' Union and University staff to discuss a wide range of topics. From NSS to our democratic processes, this meeting will be an opportunity for students to learn about, and contribute to, the Union’s work and shape the direction of what we do, including a final sign off for the new Priority 20 which students will vote on in the 2026 Leadership Elections.

Cost-of-Living Survey Update and UCAS Benchmarking Exercise

Cost-of-Living Survey Update

In November, the Students’ Union launched a Cost-of-Living survey to gain a better understanding about how the cost-of-living crisis has impacted current students at Royal Holloway. The survey covered an array of topics about the student experience at Royal Holloway with an aim to implement positive change for current and prospective students through our Priority 8 work.

The survey ran for a two-week period from 7 November until 23 November, and coincided with two financial support campaigns run by the University and the Students’ Union. The survey was incentivised with cash prizes of £425 which were awarded to ten students while the survey was live and after it closed. All winners were picked anonymously through provided student numbers. The Cost-of-Living survey had a total response rate of 846 student respondents.

We are currently analysing the results of the survey and will share full notes, a summary and headlines in the January Student Voice Bulletin. 

UCAS cost-of-living benchmarking exercise

In Term One, our Student Research Assistant undertook a lengthy cost-of living benchmarking exercise with our list of UCAS core competitors and their Students' Unions. The aim of the project was to compare Royal Holloway's provision of support and highlight good practice within our core competitor list. Below is a breakdown of some areas we think the University and the Students' Union could improve to further support students at Royal Holloway during the cost-of-living crisis: 

Communication around support: 

• University websites are difficult to navigate due to mixed signposting and contradictory information about funding and the Study Support Grant. The University should review all pages around financial support and make the pathways clearer for students. 
• The University should consider including an annual cost breakdown of expenses for current and prospective Royal Holloway students. Many of our UCAS competitors include information about the following expenses on their websites for undergraduates and postgraduates: accommodation costs (Halls and private rental), utilities, food, travel and other miscellaneous costs. Sharing these breakdowns could help students budget while studying. University of Sussex, Oxford Brookes, University of Birmingham, Brunel and University of Westminster all do this. 
• The Students' Union should improve the accessibility and content of the Financial Support Page to make it more student friendly. The Students' Union should also update the Cost-of-Living Hub to include new initiatives and remove outdated information. 
• The University and Students' Union should collaborate on a student-friendly cost-of-living guide or leaflet which summarizes the information on both websites, highlighting support services, available grants and useful information on navigating the cost-of-living crisis. 

The Study Support Grant

• Clearer guidelines on eligibility would help with the application process and better inform students about the grant and how to apply. There is some confusion from students in our survey about whether they are eligible if they receive other grants due to socioeconomic status.
• Some of our UCAS competitors list different award amounts for certain communities on their website (e.g. part-time/full-time students, families, couples, undergraduate and postgraduate amounts). 

Formal recommendations around ways we can improve the provision of support and activities during the cost-of-living crisis will be shared when analysis of the survey is complete. 

Term One in Review

From the excitement of Freshers' Week to the end of Term 1, we've been hard at work to make sure students' voices are heard and their experience is the best it can be. Here's a quick round up of what we've been working on and what we've achieved for students this term.

If you would like to see more stats head over to our Instagram.