Image from flickr: Felice de Sena Micheli
‘Are Students’ Union recession proof?’ that was muttered by our chief executive during a meeting the other day. He’s not the only one wondering. We’ve kicked off a discussion over on The Charity Place about how Students’ Union’s can respond to the challenges that are potentially ahead. So here’s my key points about how Union’s can respond to the threat of a recession, some are specific to UCLan but some could go for the sector as a whole.
1. Make sure no one can question our legitimacy. This means showing what we do, how we do it and why we’re important. This makes it harder for people to take things away if we are shown to be doing an excellent job. Also, as Union’s officially become charities it’ll be important to consider our impacts as an organisation and be able to measure them. The days of just giving money to said club and society and saying ‘that’s involvement’ is going to be harder to justify, or running said campaign because someone sitting in an office thinks ‘it’d look good wouldn’t it?’ are dead.
2. Get smart with technology. We’re looking at investing in technologies which will allow us to use students data to increase loyalty to student services, get smarter with how we communicate with students and ensure that destination events are promoted effectively. Poster/flyer blindness is rife and especially for us being a city campus we’ve got to compete for every single penny to ensure we are still the ‘gatekeepers’ of the student market and student pound.
3. Customer service. Ensure that commercial outlets are 100% switched on and ready to please every single customer who comes through the door. Students are going to be thinking twice about spending, and we need to make sure that when they do spend that tenner they are very happy with what they’ve got – not just the product but everything that comes with it.
4. Don’t rush into things. Just because there is a recession looming (or already here) doesn’t mean we should just retreat into the trenches. There are umpteen opportunities for Students’ Union’s to partner up with loads of different organisations and work with them to deliver services, create a market, deliver information and much more. This is especially relevant if there is going to be a big government splurge in spending, as some of that might be up for grabs for new projects or promotions.
5. Innovate. Be a leader, take the odd risk or two but make sure you’ve backed it up with resources. Not easy in a recession, but if you spot an opportunity to expand then make sure you’ve got the support behind it and do it properly.
6. Engage the membership. They after all are in charge, go out to the membership and ask them how they think things can be improved, get them onboard, get them working with you, for you, feeding back to you and most of all being loyal to you.
7. Develop niches. Ensure that while you’re appealing to the 18-22 student pound market that you’re developing niche products/services/communications that satisfy a particular demographic of the student body. We know that the demographics of students are changing to include international, mature, part-time, commuting and a whole host of other ‘groups’ – identify them and develop strands to appeal to them and bring them into the mix.
What do you think? Are Students’ Union’s actually recession proof? Or is that bullshit? Will some go out of business? How can they survive?
Ed Walker 
I don’t think that they are recession proof Ed.
The consequences of this forthcoming recession are that student numbers will decline due in part to changes in the funding model for higher education,and thsi will lead to a massive demographic realignment of student proflies.
Unions will nly survive if they except that the days of an 18 year old coming to university with a pocket full of grant/loan have gone.
Instead they will have to cater for shorter degrees,more part time students and a higher age profile.
8. Don’t put an apostrophe in the word ‘unions’.
“Instead they will have to cater for shorter degrees,more part time students and a higher age profile.” – what sort of services would appeal to these types of students?
“The consequences of this forthcoming recession are that student numbers will decline due in part to changes in the funding model for higher education,and thsi will lead to a massive demographic realignment of student proflies…”
I’d agree broadly with Nigel’s sentiments and look forward to declining student numbers overall, UCLan, for one is particularly oversubscribed and even have a knock-on effect of diluting the job market and media industries with innumerable grads who’ve completed beer degrees?
“Instead they will have to cater for shorter degrees,more part time students and a higher age profile.”
Which is excellent, with students (ideally) reading for 40 hours a week one needs all the time there is, in addition to all the admin to deal with and hoops that students increasingly have to jump through since fees were introduced. The bonus with part-time is of course, “you don’t have to pay any fees” according to my student services advisor (your mileage may vary of course).