13/10/2019
No Voice Unheard.
It’s this time of the year when you see students wearing different colors of T-shirts and ask you to vote for them. These students are running for the annual UQU (University of Queensland Union) election.
You might be annoyed and think this is non of your business. Here’s why it is important for you to vote: Every year your student union gets allocated more than $3million to run campus events and support services for you. You deserve to have a say about how this huge amount of money is spent.
You may also feel that you can’t relate to many candidates because you rarely see faces of international students. That’s because for too many years, international students have been way too under-represented in our own student union UQU. While we international students make up 33% of UQ’s total student population, for too long, we have made up less than 5% of the UQ Union executive as well as the Union Council.
International Student Assembly is a group of international students from diverse cultural backgrounds and programs with proven experience in clubs & societies, volunteering, work experience and student representation to challenge the status quo.
We believe that UQU should be an INCLUSIVE union for all students, the representation on UQU student executive and council should reflect the diversity in our student body, an equal opportunity for any student who wants to make a positive change in student life instead of just for a few insider student politicians.
We aspire to be a strong voice by international students for international students.
If elected to UQU council, we will focus on the following key areas:
-Facilitate better transition to uni and Australian lifestyle;
-Advocate for stronger academic English support programs across all faculties as well as student-led English conversation sessions;
-Raise awareness about mental health, encourage early help-seeking behaviour and advocate for culturally appropriate mental health support services;
-Promote opportunities for more international students to participate in the UQU decision-making process and leadership positions;
-Nurture cultural competency through cross-cultural engagement activities.
For an INCLUSIVE UQU that will celebrate cultural diversity, your vote matters. Remember to vote [1] for International Student Assembly for Council from next Monday to Friday 14-18 Oct.
Authorised by Tiantian Zhao.
