We want to update you all on some important changes to the way that the Students’ Union (SU) will be operating in Farnham, and difficult decisions we’ve had to make about the bar in The Canteen used for Glasshouse events and our shop.
We want to update you all on some important changes to the way that the Students’ Union (SU) will be operating in Farnham, and difficult decisions we’ve had to make about the bar in The Canteen used for Glasshouse events and our shop.
The UK Higher Education sector is experiencing a period of considerable financial challenge, and the University for the Creative Arts isn’t untouched by this, nor is the SU.
Despite this, the University’s support for our core funding has not changed. We are grateful to the University for providing us with seed funding over the last two years to develop our commercial services (including the bar and shop), however this funding was always agreed to be time-limited and has now expired.
Rising operating costs and the cost of living crisis have made it increasingly difficult for SU’s to run commercial services, and ours have been making a financial loss.
We’ve therefore had to review the viability of these services and make some difficult decisions. Without action, the losses from our commercial services risk our ability, as a charity, to deliver our core purpose as an SU: representation and support for UCA students.
This has led to the following changes:
1. In Farnham, we will be stopping SU operation of the bar in The Canteen used for Glasshouse events with immediate effect.
We know how important the bar has been and how disappointing this news will be to many students, including the student staff who were employed to help run the bar.
The Glasshouse will remain open as a venue for events and activities, although in a slightly different capacity. We will be speaking with students over the next few weeks on how we can continue to utilise the Glasshouse without its bar, including the continued running of student-led events and society events.
2. In Farnham, we will be closing our shop, The Workshop.
We know this will be extremely disappointing for users of the shop. Unfortunately, whilst the shop has provided a useful service to many students, the income has not been sufficient to cover its costs going forward.
As a result, we will be closing the Farnham shop as of Monday 31st August. We will then be exploring opportunities for this to become a student-led space.
In both cases, these are not decisions that we have taken lightly; however, these were necessary steps to protect the SU’s ongoing ability to deliver essential representation and support for UCA students.
We appreciate that these announcements will come as a disappointment to many of you.
We have been speaking separately to the staff affected by these changes, including the student staff previously employed by the SU in Farnham, and will continue to do so.
We will also be hosting a series of Q&A events on Teams to discuss these changes with you. The dates and times for these are:
• Monday 24th August, 11am–12pm - Teams link to join the meeting here
• Thursday 27th August, 4–5pm - Teams link to join the meeting here
• Monday 7th September, 11am–12pm - Teams link to join the meeting here
Links to these Teams meetings are accessible above and will be shared on our Instagram stories in advance.
In the meantime, if you have any questions or concerns as a result of this update, please email us at union@uca.ac.uk.