News

T he first OUSA Executive meeting for the year kicked off with OUSA President Paul Hunt laying down the law for 2015. Executive members were instructed to raise their hand if they want to say their piece during the meeting. Additionally, it was clarified that if an executive member misses three consecutive meetings without an apology, then they have vacated their position.

The first point of discussion was the need to promote Empire of the Sun tickets during Orientation week. Hunt said that although Super Pass sales were “going well”, there needed to be a “significantly more sales” in order to “get a substantial return”. Admin Vice President Isaac Yu asked what was currently being done to promote the band, to which Hunt replied “not much”.

Education Officer Greer Mahoney suggested the team “jam it out everywhere,” playing Empire of the Sun’s music around campus or on four wheels through town. She emphasised the executives should suggest purchasing tickets to students: “be, like, get the music pass instead” or state “this song is mean”. She pointed out that Sticky Fingers tickets were selling well. Welfare Officer Payal Ramritu wanted to “target sixth formers and seventh formers”. Mahoney agreed, as “they’re more likely to have more money.” Hunt pointed out that the concert was on a school night and there would be alcohol present, so the idea was quickly shut down. The team decided that they would start playing videos of the band in the Main Common Room.

The Executive then discussed whether they agreed with the decision made by the 2014 executives to pull out of NZUSA. Hunt said current executive members were being contacted by NZUSA via Twitter and Facebook, lobbying for them to rejoin. All members agreed that the $45,000 cost of a membership was not justifiable due to “serious structural ineffectiveness”. The Executive also decided that NZUSA could not have a stall at OUSA’s Tent City during Ori Week. Paul said it was not a club or society, nor would it have any benefit to students and the event was “already oversubscribed”.

The Executive went into committee of the whole, due to privacy reasons, and discussed the importance of adding two new members to the Planet Media Dunedin Limited Board. Associate Professor Jessica Palmer and 2014 Education Officer Laura Harris were appointed and the whole conversation was said in code of “that thing we’ve discussed earlier”.

The precious last 20 minutes were spent selecting which executives would be added to a Code of Conduct Committee. After a round of Rock-Paper-Scissors, a potential coin toss and an eventual online random number generator, Finance Officer Nina Harrap was appointed. Rock-Paper-Scissors and the coin toss failed to work once the Executive realised one of the members was in the meeting via a phone line.