What is the Candidate Approval Committee?
Being a representative of all students is a big responsibility and as a result the process that we use to confirm candidates and put them forward for election has to be robust. This is to ensure that the winning candidate would have the skills to be able to undertake the role properly. The Candidate approval committee is a committee which is made up of ten individuals, each selected to represent one or more of the major demographics of the students at UWS. They will judge each prospective candidate against the elections criteria and decide whether or not they will be able to stand.
There are two criterial that every candidate needs to meet to be able to stand:
- That the candidate has sufficient experience within the Union (or relevant external experience) to be able to stand for the position. Candidates must have been involved with our Union, or have relevant prior experience with Unions to be able to stand.
- The Candidate must be able to represent all students within their faculty in a range of settings.
The Candidate Approval Committee meets with every student online that wishes to stand in our elections that has not already faced them in a past election.
Meeting the Criteria - Experience
Examples of some of the questions that the CAC will ask for this category would be:
- “How have you been involved in the Union”
- “What activities have you done to benefit the students in your cohort” or
- “What experience do you have that you think makes you perfect for the role?”
Student Unions and Universities have many strands of activity and having a baseline understanding of how everything works is essential for the roles to be successful. Key activities which would contribute to meeting this criteria include:
- Being a student rep of any kind
- Being a volunteer,
- Being a society member, or society leader
- Being any of the above in a previous institution
If you haven’t already done so and think that you would be interested in standing in the future, we would recommend that you get involved in our activities.
Meeting the Criteria – Being Representative
Examples of some of the questions that the CAC would ask in this category would be:
- “Can you tell me what actions you have taken to improve the lives of the students on your campus/course/programme”
- “Can you tell me about a time when you represented a group of students to help them create a positive change to their University experience”
- “What interactions have you had with students outside your own peer group”
There are students from over 100 countries at UWS and we need to ensure that our candidates are capable of representing such a diverse group. Key activities which would contribute to meeting this criteria include:
- Demonstrating that you have helped students, who are not in your immediate peer group, to improve their student experience.
- Examples of where you have lead groups of people to create change
- Being able to identify the challenges associated with representing diverse groups and have mechanism to deal with them.
If you have any questions about this criteria, please get in touch with the Depute Returning Officers.
We will be recruiting for members of the Candidate Approval Committee for this election. Members of the CAC are students who are paid by the Union to assess the candidates in the election according to our criteria. By being on the CAC, they confirm that they will not stand in the election that they are reviewing the candidates for and that they will be publicly neutral in the elections process. They also receive mandatory training from the Union on how to keep their decision making impartial.