Student Hubs

31/01/2025

Today we are saying goodbye to Student Hubs in advance of our organisational closure on 31 January 2025. Please see our final blog which shares where to find our resources, information about where our current staff team are heading to, and how you can keep in touch as an alumni.

From our team, it's been an absolute privilege to be part of Student Hubs and our legacy of 16 years of student social action. Thank you for all your support, engagement and enthusiasm for tackling social and environmental issues in your communities and we'll miss being a part of it. Take care, and remember active citizenship is a behaviour for life and that your Hub community is out there waiting for you 🧡

Hub love, Sim, Sophie and Fiona 🍊

ID: an orange sign on a white and yellow background. Text on the sign reads 'Student Hubs is closed' with the black text below 'Thank you for all your support and goodbye'. The Student Hubs logo is visible below. A series of images including the Student Hubs staff team; a volunteer and young person who is raising his hand; a table with students discussing around it; children and volunteers painting a sign which says 'Branch Up'; a student presenting at a showcase; a volunteer and children smiling around a table at Libraries Plus; a panel event with students watching; a young person lighting a fire with a volunteer; and volunteers posing for the camera with a graphic which says 'Goodbye from' and the Student Hubs logo.]

30/01/2025

We wanted to highlight the final blogs that have been shared on our website 📣

These include blogs from our team about our decision to close and the final six months wrapping up the organisation; thanking our funders and partners; announcing legacy donations to organisations which we have provided as part of our closure; and our final goodbye blog which shares information about our resources and where our team are onto next.

We're proud to share these updates and particularly to recognise the fantastic organisations which we have donated funding to as part of our closure, which include Jacari, Student Action for Refugees (STAR), the Young Trustees Movement and UK Town and Gown Association. See our blog to read more: https://www.studenthubs.org/blog/

[ID: The backgrounds of the five images are orange, yellow and charcoal and include wavy shapes. The first image says 'SHARING OUR FINAL BLOGS FROM STUDENT HUBS' in white text, with a megaphone pictured and the Student Hubs logo on the left. The second image has a photo of a volunteering display board, with the text: '‘On the Decision to Close and Delivering On It', 'Our CEO Simran Dhanjal-Field reflects on our decision to close and how our team have found the past six months as we wrap up Student Hubs.' The third image has a picture of students discussing around a round table, with the black text: '‘Thanking our Funding and Strategic Partners’, 'CEO Sim and Partnerships and Development Director Fiona thank, recognise and look back at our funding partners throughout our history as an organisation.' The fourth image has a picture of students holding up signs of the Student Hubs values. The black text says: '‘Announcing Our Legacy Donations’, 'Our Trustee Board and Management Team share an update about which organisations Student Hubs will be donating our legacy funds to and why.'. The fifth image shows the Student Hubs team with black text above and below which says '‘Our Resources, Goodbye and Where to Find Us’, 'An update about where to access our legacy resources, sharing our final goodbyes and where our team are off to next.'

20/01/2025

As part of our closure at the end of January, we will be no longer monitoring our social media channels, including removing the ability to comment on Instagram and no longer posting in our alumni groups on Facebook and LinkedIn. However, we're pleased to announce alumni can still stay in touch via our Google Group, which Sophie Payne will be moderating in her capacity as an alumni.

You can join the group if you want to join our post-closure community, see the link here or access the link through our LinkTree: https://groups.google.com/u/0/g/student-hubs-alumni

[ID: A white speech bubble against a background of yellow, orange and black stylised shapes. An orange box has black text which reads 'REMINDER FOR ALUMNI'. Below in black text says 'Join our Google Group to keep in touch'. The Student Hubs logo is in the bottom right corner.]

16/01/2025

Today on the blog we have shared another speech from our Closure Event in November, with this speech providing a trustee and higher education perspective by Alice Wilby. Alice Wilby is a Higher Education professional, incoming Pro Vice-Chancellor (Education and Student Experience) at the University of Northampton and the Vice-Chair of the Student Hubs Trustee Board.

This is our final speech from our closure event, and you can read Alice's speech on our website, along with our speeches from CEO Sim and student alumni Oana.

ID: The background is light yellow colour with yellow and orange squiggles in the corners. There is a grey circle in the bottom left corner. In the centre there is a yellow text box, in which text reads "Speeches from our Closure Event. A Higher Education Perspective by Alice Wilby". The Student Hubs logo is visible in the bottom right corner. The background design is the same for the next three images with the inclusion of an orange speech mark on the left hand side, and the text reads: "I would argue that fostering and developing social action should be essential to our conception of universities. We usually think of social action as being about volunteering, and that can be an important part of it, but really it’s about people and organisations giving their time for the common good, as active citizens." "Meaningful teaching and research doesn’t take place in a vacuum. If we use the lens of social action to engage with our communities, taking the role of a co-participant, rather than a leader, doing with, rather than doing to, seeing the university itself as an active citizen in the world, that’s where we have the opportunity to make positive change happen." "If we can enthuse more [universities] to adopt [Student Hubs’] model of co-created social action with students, not simply for the good of the individuals involved, but as the best way to fulfil their wider strategic goals and purpose, it would be a fitting legacy to Student Hubs’ excellent work."

08/01/2025

Today on the blog we have shared another speech from our Closure Event in November, with this speech providing a student and alumni perspective by Oana Lazar. Oana was part of Southampton Hub whilst studying at the University of Southampton from 2017 to 2022, and at our closure event Oana shared her reflections as a Hub alumni. You can read the speech now on our website, along with our CEO Sim's speech from the event.

This will be a series of speeches we are releasing, with more speeches to come this month from our Closure Event.

ID: The background is light yellow colour with yellow and orange squiggles in the corners. There is a grey circle in the bottom left corner. In the centre there is a yellow text box, in which text reads "Speeches from our Closure Event. An Alumni Perspective by Oana Lazar". The Student Hubs logo is visible in the bottom right corner. The background design is the same for the next three images with the inclusion of an orange speech mark on the left hand side, and the text reads: "I have found Student Hubs to be the best way of forming lasting connections at university. Student Hubs’ different branches connect university students to their local communities, encouraging us to step out of our “student bubble” and actively participate within the communities where we live." "Student Hubs also fosters ... lifelong friendships with students from different backgrounds. What makes these connections especially powerful is that they are with people who care about the same social issues, and whose understanding of these issues is enhanced through sharing personal experiences and volunteering journeys." "There may be many similar programmes out there ... but what makes Student Hubs truly special is the staff. They find and organise the opportunities, supporting administrative tasks which would have probably taken up all the volunteers’ available time otherwise. Student Hubs allows student leaders to focus on what truly matters."

19/12/2024

We wish you all a happy holidays and hope you have a restful break over the winter holidays. Our team will be on leave from 20 December and back in the office on 6 January 2025, to enter our final month before we close Student Hubs.

Take care and may your New Year celebrations be merry and bright!

[ID: A yellow background with festive decorations around the outside including leaves, stars and snowflakes in grey, orange and black. The grey text in the centre reads: 'Hubby Holidays! We are out of the office for the winter break and will return on 6 January']

16/12/2024

Last week we went to Bath to celebrate the end of the autumn term as a team and have our Christmas Party 🥳 We saw the Bath Christmas Market and had a delicious Vietnamese meal. Hubby Holidays from the Student Hubs team! 🍊

11/12/2024

We are pleased to share you can now find an adapted version of our CEO Sim's speech on our blog from our Closure Event, titled 'The Magic of Student Hubs'. We encourage you to read the whole speech, and join us in her final call to action where she says: 'My final call to action for you as the CEO of Student Hubs is this: on your journey home tonight, I would like you to have a think about what the magic of Student Hubs is for you. I’d like you to hold onto that, tomorrow, a week from now or five years from now and keep sharing that message to keep Student Hubs alive. The only way we are going to make the world a better place is by actively participating in it, by being an active citizen.'

This will be a series of speeches we are releasing, with speeches to come in the new year from our Closure Event.

ID: The background is light yellow with yellow and orange squiggles in the corners. There is a grey circle in the bottom left corner, in the centre there is a yellow text box, in which text reads "Speeches from our Closure Event. 'The Magic of Student Hubs’ by Simran Dhanjal-Field." The Student Hubs logo is visible in the bottom right corner. The background design is the same for the next three images but the text reads: "But as I entered the room ... she gave me the biggest smile I think I’ve ever seen or received in my life ... That was my first interaction with Southampton Hub and I think that sums up the welcoming, open nature that has continued through the 10 years that I have been a part of the organisation." and "It was at that point I realised that although Psychology is great I actually wanted to keep spending time with other people in the community, doing things that helped people live better lives ... It was so heartwarming, helpful, thrilling, engaging and empowering to realise through the Hub that I could help people who are like me." and "It does not matter if you fail, a failure is just an opportunity to learn and try again. The most important thing you can do is to try. What we need in this world is people who are unafraid to try and make it better. We only lose hope when there are no people left to try. That to me is the magic of Student Hubs."

04/12/2024

In January, we will be launching our next toolkit on Delivering High Quality Student Social Action, with our webinar on 15th January 2025.

Our Delivering High Quality Student Social Action toolkit and webinar launch aims to share our expertise in delivering social action programmes with university students, including how to design these programmes to be accessible, inclusive and socially impactful in partnership with students and communities.

We hope to see you there, and you can sign up for your free ticket at our website: https://www.studenthubs.org/january-webinar/

27/11/2024

On 21 November, we were joined by Student Hubs alumni, former staff members, partners and funders to celebrate 16 years of student social action in recognition of our planned closure for January 2025 at Cecil Sharp Hall in London.

You can see more about our closure event in London at our latest blog post (and our Instagram story highlights!) but we want to thank the many friends of Student Hubs who came along to hear our speakers of Oana, Alice, Adam and Sim talk about the legacy of Student Hubs, and to share in the happy memories of their experience with Student Hubs over the past 16 years 🧡

27/11/2024

One of our Vice Chancellor's Social Impact Award winners is featured in the latest edition of the University of Cambridge's Department of Engineering news - take a look on page 11!

Just landed - the Autumn 2024 edition of our Department News 💫 On the cover is alumnus Alex Kendall - the autonomous vehicle pioneer. Alex is the co-founder and CEO of Wayve - read more about him on page 9.

Online version:https://www.eng.cam.ac.uk/uploads/pages/files/engineering-newsletter-34-autumn-2024.pdf

cc. Institute for Manufacturing, University of Cambridge | University of Cambridge

22/11/2024

It's Week, and there is no better time for us to launch our Active Citizen Report today on our website 🎉

The report is the culmination of our alumni survey and in-depth case studies which we have conducted over the last few months with our alumni as part of our closure legacy work, and we are thrilled to be able to share our alumni's stories and the impact which Student Hubs has had on them. Thank you to all the alumni who contributed to our survey and case studies 🧡

You can read the report via our Linktree to our blog, or at the link here: https://www.studenthubs.org/blog/2024/11/active-citizen-report/

[ID 1: An orange squiggle behind a yellow box which says in black text: '“Meeting other people who shared the same passion about the challenges that we face as a society, and the urgency for change, was a really key driver for me ... I was able to get in such a huge amount of career experience in a relatively short amount of time at a very young age.” Francis Wight, Student and Staff Alumni'.]

[ID 2: A blue squiggle behind three yellow boxes. The boxes have a circle graphic on the left, and say in black text: 94% of alumni agreed their time at Student Hubs; 96% of alumni agreed that they developed leadership skills, and 95% agreed that they developed resilience improved their employability; 79% of alumni agreed their time at Student Hubs increased their engagement with their community.']

[ID 3: A yellow squiggle behind an orange box which says in black text: “[The Social Innovation Programme] was about using those [skills] for a problem that was going to be socially beneficial. I realised it was going to be important to make a social impact in my career going forward. SIP was the first step for me in ... realising what I really wanted to get out of my future.” Lucy, Cambridge Hub Student Alumni'.]

[ID 4: An orange squiggle behind three yellow boxes. The boxes have a circle graphic on the left, and say in black text: 98% of alumni agreed that they can make change in the world; 88% of alumni shared that they are making a positive social impact through their career; 72% of alumni agreed their time at Student Hubs increased their sense of belonging in the local community.']