Post 31 – 01/06/23 – Photocall Opportunity

You are invited to attend a Photocall on Saturday 17th June between 1230 and 1300 with your friends & family. Venue: Royal Holloway Main Entrance: Dress Code: Casual – Incognito Optional.

Why

After a drawn out couple of months, our request to meet RHUL’s new Principal, Julie Sanders, to discuss student ASB and RHUL’s impact on the community was refused. 

Though we are now in receipt of a reply to our latest follow up email (which we will share here next week) we have decided to run with this event. We have polled some of the Forum Group before making this decision and there is support to try something different. 

Many residents have expressed how frustrated they are with the problems caused by RHUL’s expansion and the lack of progress in delivering solutions. This is an opportunity for us to show that dissatisfaction. 

Goals

So this event is a dip our toes into the water kind of affair – for both RHUL and ourselves this is meant to be pretty low impact. These are the following goals:

• To highlight to RHUL’s senior management team that many residents are frustrated by the status quo.
• To post about the event on social media to encourage debate.
• To contact Surrey Live about the event to create further awareness about the issues.

Why Saturday 17th June? 

Saturday 17th is one of RHUL’s ‘Open Days’ – they have a couple of these each year. It is their big marketing event where prospective students come to have a look around the university to decide whether or not they would like to apply for a place. 

We do not intend to disrupt this event on this occasion but inevitably a few potential students and their families will see us muster for our photocall and may ask a question or two. In the future, depending on how we get on with getting the attention of RHUL’s senior management team, the format could be changed into an all day event with that as the focus.

Format/ Event Details

So please come along with your friends & family to arrive at 12:30. For many of us getting to the main entrance is a short walk and we encourage you to come by foot. If you are driving, the nearest parking is on Harvest Road/ South Road and there is a footbridge for you to cross to get to the main entrance. We will then muster for a couple of photos on the pavement outside the main entrance at 12:45. A couple of our local councillors will be joining the Photocall too and will be available afterwards to discuss the topic with you if you so wish.

For those of you that are camera shy, please do feel free to come along with suitable eyewear. (Emoji). Indeed you may fancy a facemask or indeed some other sort of disguise! (The shot promoted will be a long range, wide angle group shot with the Founder’s building in the background – we are wanting to emphasise the number of people that this issue affects. A couple of close ups will be taken too but consent will be requested first.) If you are particularly camera shy, you can reserve a back row space and we might be able to position a banner strategically in the set up too! (Yes, there will be a couple of signs and we will share more about the slogans in the coming days.)

That is it. To recap, this Photocall is meant to be easy for us to deliver and pretty harmless to the university. The key goal is to get the attention of the university. The more people that attend the better – please do come along and don’t leave it to the others. There are now 141 in this News Group. If 25 of us could attend that would be good, 50 would be better and 100 or more, fantastic.

More information will be shared here and in the Forum Group in the run to the event. For those that recently joined, welcome. (I hope this is not all too much for you!) You can catch up on the story so far with the catch up posts that have been shared below. There you will also find a link to the Forum Group mentioned that may be of interest. 

Look forward to meeting you all in a couple of Saturday’s time.

Best wishes,

We Need To Talk About Royal Holloway