This year’s freshers’ fair will be “hugely restricted” physically due to mandatory public health and college guidelines and much of it may be moved online, the Central Societies Committee (CSC) has said.
In an email to societies today, Chair of the CSC Lee Campbell said that the committee was “still trying to work out how we might hold some kind of physical Fair over a three-day period”, adding that the news that freshers’ week would overlap with the first teaching week had presented a number of new obstacles to this.
“One aspect of trying to reframe the Fair was our looking at how it might be run online, in case we can’t hold it physically or in the event that some students can’t make it to the Fair”, he said.
The CSC, he said, is looking at moving freshers’ fair online in case it cannot be held “physically or in the event that some students can’t make it to the Fair”.
“We are working with our partners in PassKit on a new, improved digital society card platform, and on developing a centralised place where students can sign-up to societies online”, Campbell said.
The CSC is also working towards getting slots in freshers’ orientation timetables for society’s members to pitch their society. Orientation will largely take place online.
Campbell added that “online and hybrid events will be an extremely important part of society activity next year as restrictions on attendance, travel (for speakers) etc. are inevitable. In any case, it will be wise to have online contingency plans should a sudden change to public health guidelines necessitate it”.
The committee will also be expanding its Zoom license capacity “adding other options to our portfolio to assist” societies in running online and hybrid events. Campbell added that the CSC is “also working on the installation of live streaming facilities on campus to maximise the options available to you next term”.
Campbell also said that Estates and Facilities had indicated that societies will be able to begin bookings from late August or early September. However, events will have to run with “significantly reduced capacity”, and it is “highly unlikely” that societies will be able to host overseas speakers during the first term.
Officer training will be held online in early September, and will include workshops ran by specialists on topics such as the arts online, “COVID-19 and your society”, building a community online, technology for holding online events and about online platforms such as Zoom.
