Taking a seat at the community table

UAL always has so many awesome events, and on Monday 11th of May I visited the Community Table at Chelsea College of Arts. This was a gathering of different communities at the university for us all to connect and learn more about different things happening at UAL.

Halls Life hosted a fun manifestation game where students could plant a seed in a pot with an intention for manifesting something specific. As their plant grows their manifestation comes to life. Halls Life always organise fun events for students in UAL halls.

Careers and employability offered support to students wanting to start their life beyond UAL. They offer internship opportunities, mentorship from established professionals in your field, and entrepreneurial support for students to launch their own business. It was interesting to learn that they can even pair students who are starting their own business with free paid interns to support them.

Arts SU had a cool spin wheel and wherever the wheel landed had a question you could ask about the Student Union to understand more about what they offer to students. The SU provides a voice for students at university. It is actually an external organisation to UAL itself and helps students in a variety of ways including sports and societies for community, careers support, and wellbeing. Because I run the Persian Arts Society I was able to meet some of the newer staff who I hadn’t met face to face with yet. Its always good to meet with the people who are always supporting our student community.

Library services offered a fun game where you opened a book to a random page and choose a line to read about your future. If you didn’t know library services offer a service where you can order a book from another campus to collect at your campus by shuttle (if a book is at LCF, they will deliver it to CSM within the week). They also have a variety of services for students to be able to view rare collections and archives if you ask.

I spoke to Allan Atlee, Pro Vice Chancellor of Education and Students at UAL, who was very friendly and told me about how they are working on education strategy to provide a new way for students to be accredited for the work they do outside their course. They are looking for ways students can gain official recognition for skills they acquire in part time jobs or other projects not directly linked with their degree.

I then spoke to the Neuro Inclusivity Play Collective, a Post-Grad research group that meets weekly to hold space for the neurodivergent community to be together and design through play. UAL’s counselling team were also there with a bracelet crafting workshop for students to have a chat and learn about some of the services they offer.

I also managed to have a brief chat with some students who were selling their artwork. They had some really cool products on display. So if you fancy checking out some of their talented work, here are their Instagrams: @redtide404_arts_ @onepie_001 @shivaasaemeow @pixyiarts @xijia_zhao @zqi____tatt_ @tianyao.space @mon_for_moon @katka.dsgn

It was a great day to meet new people, learn more about our university, and afterwards I visited Tate Britain which is my favourite gallery opposite Chelsea College of Arts. Can’t wait for the next one!