Sperm donation: annonymity vs autonomy

The Guild has been approached by the Medical School here at the University to ask us to consider the possbility of allowing them the advertise sperm and egg donation for fertility purposes in the Guild of Students. The Guild has advertised sperm donation fro research purposes for a number of years through the jobzone. This process does involve receiving a set amount of money (approx £20-£25) per donation following a screening process.

The medical school would now like to advertise for sperm and egg donation for fertility purposes, unlike donation for research there is no monetary incentive provided for this kind of donation (although expenses for travel or loss of earnings can be claimed) and as such would mean that this kind of donation would not be advertised in the jobzone.

The concenrs the Guild have lie in the fact that the law recently changed to mean that any child created through the donation process can get your contact details once they reach the age of 18. Even though they can get your contact details the donor is not classed as the legal parent and cannot be asked to give support to the chil monetary or otherwise. Despite this there is still a potential for big disruption to future personal and family life and is clearly something any person should not undertake likely.

In order to donate there is a very rigourous process that must be gone through including medical screening, counselling and a full explanation of any future ramifications through lack of anonymity. Approximately only 5-10% of those who apply to become donors actually do donate at the fertility centre for which we would be advertising.

The question therfore is should the Guild allow advertising for this particular centre with its very rigorous process and in the name of personal autonomy or are the future implications so big that the Guild should not allow any sort of advertising?

please comment and give me your thoughts!

multi-cultural, satellite sites and sperm donation.

Hello all!

I blog to you today from my 'sick bed' and no it isn't man flu but I should be back fighting fit in the next day or two!

So last week things finally began to settle down after welcome week and my sights along with the rest of the sabbs turned towards the next term and what we plan to do.

• working on finalising plans for student parent coffee morning.
• ammended the terms of reference (the membership and aims) for the Equality and diversity committee that will go to the next guild council along with the election of 4 student representatives

working on plans for world aids day on the 1st December - some big ideas coming out of this but if anyone has any more suggestions on what we can do let me know.

• I also started thinking about this years multi-cultural festival. Myself and Fabian will be taking the lead on this event this year and had the opportunity to meet with the International Students Office (ISO) at the University to ensure that we were both on the same page with this and that we can move forward together in making sure this will be a great event. Provisional plans are now drafted and we are planning to run this event in Februrary so watch this space.
  

• This week I also attended a pre mediation meeting to represent a student, along with Appeals and and Misconduct cases the Offcer team can also offer support to students who are making a complaint to the University. If you are going through this process and would like some support please pop into the ARC anytime between 10-4 weekdays.

• I also took part in the final interviews for the ARC advisors this week and we all beleive we have found some great candidates that will hopefully be starting very soon

• Thursday saw me visit our Sattelite Site the Ironbridge institute, this was a great opportunity to meet the students we have over there, introduce the Guild and our services to them, and find out what we can do to make sure the Guild or at least the services that it provides are relevant to them. The institute is absolutely beautiful and the time that I spent over there was really productive in terms of some small changes that we can make that could make a big difference. We are also going to be looking at how we can make better provision for satellite students on our website. I can't wait to go back and visit again soon.

• Friday was a busy day with the Guild hosting the end of Mental Health Week Lunch. The disability support team and in particular the mental health adivsors at the University have run a packed week of events that tackled mental health isues and its stigma straight on! There was a lot of positive discussion that came from this and I am hoping to work a lot more closely during the next campaign which is being planned for March next year.

• Finally, I rounded off the week with a discussion about whether the Guild will allow the Medical School to advertise for Sperm and Egg donation in the Guild for fertility purposes. There is quite a lot to talk about with this so will blog seperately.
  
  

drink spiking concerns

Following allegations of drink spiking at the Guild during welcome week, the Guild of Students has contacted the Police who have confirmed that no cases of drink spiking have been reported to them.I would like to emphasie however that all reports confirmed or otherwise are taken seriously and we are dealing with this issue of concern to personal safety.

The action we have taken includes briefing our Venues staff, RA’s and the Freshers Fest crew on drink spiking. A personal safety campaign for Student Mentors is also forthcoming. The Freshers Fest crew accompany anyone involved in an incident that is a concern to their health or wellbeing in taxis, ambulances or at a hospital. During Freshers Fest activities, 10,000 spikeys were distributed, which are placed in the top of bottles to prevent drinks from being spiked as well as for the first time this year creating a Chill Out zone which is manned by our trained staff at all times. Students are also encouraged to know their limits and thousands of drink unit calculators have also been given out to reiterate this message.

If you or a student you are in contact with has any concerns about drink spiking, please advise them to report the incident to the Police, contact their student mentor or contact the ARC at the Guild of Students.

In addition please feel free to contact myself through the details on the right sidebar of this page.

Please visit the Safer Students section of the West Midlands Police website for more information: http://www.west-midlands.police.uk/saferstudents/product_detail.php?PID=437

my welcome week diary

apologies for the delay in this blog, now things are settling down once again I will make sure I am back in regular blooging form.

Here is a run down of my Welcome Week Diary

Saturday: Was out and about at all the halls of residence making sure that everything was running smoothly and that the mentors and the RA's were all happy people.

Sunday: Again on duty at all the halls of residence. Ended up serving behind the bar in joes until the early hours of monday morning after bar one of the vale had to close, interesting to see it from the other side of the bar!

Monday: Welcome week begins properly, 11,000 students rock up through our doors, the free pizza in the commerical fair went down a treat as usual, I was also lending a hand on our welcome stalls and giving lecture presentations about the Guild to lots of freshers in their induction lectures. I also spent my evening at the Guild UV rave party welcoming the Freshers and giving them an all singing all dancing welcome to the Guild and the officer team.

Tuesday: this was myself and Katie's Wellbeing Zone, away from the hustle and bustle of the main fair's this was the opportunity to reflect on your personal well being, from nutrition to a full body pit stop, sexual health to drug and alcohol awareness. With over 500 people through the doors I beleive it was a real sucess! I spent my third night in a row in the Guild, again welcoming freshers to the second night of the UV rave.

Wednesday: This was my day to be day champion *fanfare plays in the background* this means that I was wired up to a walkie talkie and was offical problem solver for the day, mainly escorting pesky promoters from the grounds who hadn't paid nor been approved to be there.

Thursday: We kicked Thursday off with the Socieities and Volunteering Fair, with over 6000 people coming through the doors again the officers were manning there Guild stall, this promoted everytrhing from the SHAC to support services, Nightbus to Guild Council. We also had the opportunity to talk to students who came to our deomcracy talks in the Guild Council Chambers. This was follwed up by a night out at Gatecrasher, I donned the chill out bear costume to show some love to the Freshers in the GC queue and got masses of love (perhaps too much) back in return.

Friday: This day saw the return of the National Blood Service to campus, in what can only be described as a huge sucess, with all appointments filled before Friday there was unfortunately no slots free to donate on the day but it just shows how popular the service is. They will be back and bigger than before in the very near future. Friday night I got all dressed up and yes came back to the Guild for the Freshers ball...big thumbs up to the silent disco!

I then spent the weekend sleeping....this is the end of my welcome week diary!

Night Bus @ Freshers Fest!

As you will know from my previous blogs the Nightbus will be back up and running at all our major club nights from next week, but the big hole that this didn't cover was Freshers Fest. With 4000 tickets available this year for Freshers Fest, more so than ever before, both myself and the Freshers Fest committee felt it was essential that transport home was provided for our students, something that wasn't planned for.

With this in mind I discussed the reasons for not providing transport home this year with the Guild and discovered that a lack of numbers until closing time when everyone decided to leave was the reason behind it, essentially it just wasn't a worthwhile use of money to hire coaches which were only 25% full.

So instead I cam up with the idea of using Castle Cars and essentially providing additional Night Busses to all our Freshers Fest Venues. This compromise has proved to be a financially viable option and so I am very happy that we booked these extra Night Busses yesterday! This provides an essential Welfare service home to students who are in a new city, don't yet know where they are going and are susceptible to being ripped off by dodgy taxi drivers. But it also helps to promote the Night Bus brand and get our new students in the habit straight away of using the Night Bus to get home....two birds one stone?

In addition to these additional Night Busses I have also spoke to Castle Cars about providing taxi ranks at all of our Freshers Fest Venues to ensure that if they cannot get in the Night Bus they can still use our accredited taxi's which come equipped with our emergency fare scheme (use your student card to pay if you have no money, then come pay the fare and collect your id card at the Guild the next day). There will also be official stewards outside each venue to point students in the right direction.

So if you are going on Freshers Fest next week, make sure you are safe getting home...use the Night Bus!