The Blend - Autumn Edition 2010

FREE

BlendThe

NOVEMBERl2010lAUTUMN/WINTER EDITION

UBSU.CO.UK

UoB STUDENTS TO MARCH AGAINST CUTSTO EDUCATION

by Jay Chinnasamy

Education:

Is it a Commodity?Is it a Business?Is it for making Money?If you answer no to any of the above then

read on - it is not! Alternatively, if you be-lieve the answer is yes - it is, then I would say you can ignore this article and enjoy the rest of the paper. So, whether you say no or yes to the above questions it doesn’t matter because ‘education is a process of living and not a preparation for future living’ as stated by John Dewey in 1897. Education affects everyone’s life because it is part of their life.

Education not only broadens the behav-

iour and understanding of people at uni-versity and further education, but also sus-tains the intellectual foundation of a popu-lation and helps that country to remain or push to be a global leader in research and development. Educated people, on aver-age, pay back more than what they have been offered through the educational sys-tem. The government should view edu-cational spending as an investment rath-er as expenditure. Where the global mar-ket is developing radically through the ad-vancements of technology, it is crucial that countries invest more on young people. If the government fails to do so, the gap be-tween the rich and poor expands and the poor won’t be able to afford to get any for-mal education which in turn leads to other problems due lack of education. Although students and young people can borrow to pay for their future, the level of debt will add significant pressure on them.

Continued on page 2

STOP EDUCATIONAL CUTS AND FUND OUR FUTURE

EDITORIALWe welcome any content in the form of

pictures, letters and articles, however we re-serve the right to edit everything that is sub-mitted. If there are any issues with the con-tent please take this directly to the Editor Yinka Adeniyan

Yinka AdeniyanUBSU - Campus Centre

Park Square, LutonLU1 3JU

[email protected] 479 368

Contributors

EditorYinka Adeniyan

WritersJames Spiro, Izzy Ahmed

Victoria Bolaji, Dami Oloni,Lousie Tadiar, Jon Stanley,

Ajay Gowda, Leanne Thompson, Rhys Waul, Lucinda Rodrigues,Ariel McPherson, Louise Dous,

Deimante Kaupaite, Becky Heard,Dishon Arivanandham,Max Keens,Sarah Badcock, Michael Everett,Chioma Anichebe, Yinka Ayinde,Ciaran O’Brien, Jay Chinnasamy,

Sophia Mead, Maria Udu,John Arinaitwe, Rebecca Jones,

Rhiannon Baxendell, Matt Hobbs,Leigham Stone, Lyndsay Murphy,Paula Mayes, Evi Earle, Rob SearleBen Cottee, Vlonstov Tarasov,

Georgina AlexandraDobocan

Design LayoutYinka Adeniyan

A SPECIAL THANKS TO THE ENTIRE UBSU TEAM FOR THEIR CONTRIBUTION TO THIS PAPER.

NewsBThe

UNIVERSITY OF BEDFORDSHIRE STUDENTS TO MARCH AGAINST CUTS TO EDUCATION

Continued from front page

In the UK, the recent compre-hensive spending review (CSR) has seen education under the spotlight both at home and over-seas. The Browne review, which was published last month (Octo-ber) has been condemned by stu-dents and the NUS as it suggests (and was passed in the budget) removing the current cap on the fees and allowing the universities to charge up to £9000 per year. Universities will have no other op-tion than charging higher fees to cover the removal of government funding for teaching which was announced in the budget. Thus the review has targeted both the students and the universities, which is an absolute catastrophe for students and parents. The re-view also states that demand for education will increase, but a re-cord number of people are drop-ping out or not taking up their places in the universities, which highlights that though the stu-dents wish to go for higher edu-cation they are being stopped.

I would like to ask these politi-cians who are proposing the cuts, would it have been possible for them to have gone to university if they haven’t got a free educa-tion, and secondly if they couldn’t have afforded to go, would they have got their current jobs with-out a going to university?

The review also states that it

will support, through loans and bursaries, ways of supporting stu-dents in their studies. However, loans, which would form the ba-sis of the support, will add more debt on the students. There is no guarantee that additional spend-ing would gain additional knowl-edge or quality of education from the universities.

No one has talked about the job market. How, if at all, will it be improved? And what are the con-sequences for the many gradu-ates who will be unemployed un-til the job market picks up? The Brown review has put forward a repayment plan; however, this may lead some people not pay-ing their debts through out their life if they earn less than a certain

level. This clearly shows that even the increase in fees will not guar-antee a good job for the grad-uates, and there are chances of earning less the £21,000 thresh-old. The new tuition fee level has been introduced under the ban-ner of improving the quality, but did standards improve when fees were trebled a few years back? I would argue that there wasn’t, so what is the guarantee that further

increase would bring increased quality?

Hence, the educational cuts and removal of cap on student fees would result in an increased burden for the students to go to college and higher education, an increased burden for parents and family members, an increased burden for staff and teaching professionals, an increased bur-den for students losing places at the universities and an increased debt burden for many for their entire working life. This would be massive disaster for the ed-ucational sector and the coun-try. Come let us join together the fight against the cuts and the tu-ition fee increase. As UCU states “Granddad stood for love and peace, we will stand up for Edu-cation.”

Aaron Porter, President of the NUS added:

“This is a devastating blow to higher and further education that puts the future of colleges and universities at risk and will have repercussions for the future prospects of students and learn-ers. This is a spending review that looks an entire generation in the eye and says ‘you’re on your own.’”

“Government ministers from both parties keep telling us that the deficit must be reduced to avoid passing a poisoned legacy to the next generation, but now they are proposing to eliminate almost all funding for university education whilst simultaneous-ly transferring the debt onto stu-

dents.“Ministers who themselves re-

ceived their university education for free are now saying that the next generation will have to do

without.”I would like to add: ‘Stop Edu-

cational Cuts and Fund our Fu-ture! The consequence of not do-ing this will be to stop the growth of the country, which will lead to other Social Issues.

I would like to encourage all the students and staff of Univer-sity of Bedfordshire to unite to-gether and take part in the Na-tional Demonstration on 10th No-vember 2010 to Stop Educational Cuts and Fund our Future.

We Will March 10-11-10.by Jay Chinnasamy

Multi-million pound Campus Centre opens its doors Students and staff at the University of Bedfordshire are celebrat-

ing the opening of the brand new £34m Campus Centre at Luton.The new building is located in

the heart of the campus, next to the historic St Mary’s Church. It links Park Square and The Busi-ness School for the first time through walkways on the first, second and third floors, meaning everyone can now travel around the majority of the University without having to step outside.

The Vice Chancellor, Profes-sor Les Ebdon CBE, said: “This is a university which puts students at the heart of university life and I am delighted to say the new Campus Centre will do just that. All the things which matter to students, including the Students’ Union, are now based here under one roof.

“It is part of the University’s massive £134m investment in its

campuses which is also seeing brand new halls of residence be-ing built in Luton ready for 2011-12.”

Designed with both students and staff in mind, the Campus Centre boasts a 240-seat lecture theatre, various teaching spac-es and an exhibition area for dis-playing student work.

It is a one-stop shop for all stu-dent services with the new Stu-dent Information Desk (SiD) and the Careers and Employment Service now based there. It also incorporates relaxed learning zones where students and staff can take advantage of Wi-Fi ac-cess.

There are also plans to link the ground floor restaurant to an out-door landscaped pedestrian area.

All Students’ Union servic-es and offices at Luton are now based there and President Lynd-say Murphy is delighted with the new surroundings.

She said: “We’re really excited to be in the new building and it should be a great year for us. It’s really modern and a great place for our students to study and so-cialise. There is something for everyone here.”

The Students’ Union has a cafe serving Fairtrade refreshments, University merchandise shop, an advice centre and is the co-ordi-nating centre for student sports and societies.

Its mezzanine bar lounge is offering Sky television, pok-er nights, comedy nights and acoustic live music / spoken word

events, and is available for private hire on Saturdays. Further details from [email protected]

“a university which puts students at the heart of university life”

The Students’ Union is working in partnership with a local char-ity, Luton Foyer, throughout the year as part of its Raise and Give (RaG) campaign. The charity of-fers a number of free services in-cluding helping homeless people in the town.

“a devastating blow to higher & further education that puts the future of colleges and universities at risk”

3SMALL CHANGES

There are a few things that have changed in the past year, so for returning students this is a good way to keep up to date with everything.

1) Booking Rehearsal Space: There has been some confusion surround-ing how to book space to rehearse. This is normally used for rehearsing performanc-es, however it can also be used by any stu-dent (within reason). So, there is now a new system in place where students now need to book space through estates (H Block). You’re given a form to fill in, check the timetable to see if there is room, have your tutor sign the form then hand it back into the staff in H Block. This way they know exactly when a space is being used, by who, and for how long a time.

2) New Assignment System: Another change in systems is the way in which students now have to enter their completed assignments through a scan-ning system. It works by scanning your work in and then producing a receipt as proof. Although this system isn’t in place yet, it should be by the end of the year.

These changes are the most up to date that we could source, however if you know more, please don’t hesitate to contact The Blend staff via the UBSU website www.ubsu.co.uk

By Rhiannon Baxendell

LEA HALLS-UNCOVERED!The Good, The Bad & The Annoying!

By Izzy Ahmed

The University of Bedfordshire, Luton Campus, has 7 main halls. The largest of which is Lea Halls, which accommodates 453 stu-dents. The University’s website describes the hall as being a “very popular residence located in the centre of town.”

The standard features that are given are with this accommoda-tion are that: bills are included (so you do not have to pay separately for water and electricity), 24 hour surveillance, internet access, laun-dry facilities and finally the best bit, weekly cleaning of the com-munal areas! There have been a lot of positive reviews regard-ing the Internet connections. The cleaners are also said to be “funny” and “friendly.”

However, all is not as perfect as it seems on the University’s web-

site. Many of the students are complaining about issues that re-late from the hotness of water to the strictness of the security. First year student Nigel Haydon com-mented on the halls with: “The rooms are nice and big. The kitch-ens do however need a bit of a make-over. Internet connection is good as well. The only annoy-ing fact is the fire alarms! They are pretty sensitive, but i guess that’s the best way as you are never sure what is going to happen.” Haydon then went on to finish with: “What people need to understand is that it is an old building, so not every-thing is going to be perfect.”

Iain Wilson, Operations Man-ager, commented with: “Lea Halls is incredibly big. It is based right next to the station, which is bound to attract trouble.” The gates were put up two years ago for our own security and protection. Wilson agreed that it was not so much the residents that were causing the trouble, but instead friends and relatives of the students. Wil-son also mentioned that he “en-joys” his job, and that he and the rest of the security do not want to be seen as the “Party Police”. Wil-son finally added that: “Lea Halls is the most secure out of all of the campuses.”

On a negative note some stu-dents have described the gates as “Prison like” and have also said that they “feel trapped from the outside world.” Many students are

having problems swiping their cards to get in and out of the premises. A member of the securi-ty team has commented by saying that the problem: “Is nothing to do with security and be dealt with by the Accommodation team.”

Third year student, explained how Lea Halls had progressed a lot throughout the years. The un-named student agreed that the Hall is quite “strict”, and later went on to say: “Some people found it a lot of hassle, but rules are rules and everyone should abide by them. I think the general mix of people they have there now is a lot more balanced, which caus-es less confrontations and a lot less late-night noise!” When ques-tioned about the security, his re-sponse was: “At the end of the day, they are just doing their jobs! We should actually thank them with everything they put up with!” He concluded with: “Better to be safe than sorry!”

Some students have mentioned that there should be more than one exit. Especially for Barlow and Deeley residents the walk from town can be quite long, consid-ering that they have to walk right to the back of the halls. A mem-ber of security has commented with: “Another gate was discussed a couple of years ago, but unfor-tunately the plans did not go any further. The best option is only the one gate. This is the best way as then we know who we are letting in and out of the premises.”

And finally I can confirm that the long awaited new common room should be open on the 2nd of November! Hooray! As well as having a brand new plasma screen with Internet television, the stu-dents are also privileged to have a Wii Console with games as well

as a state-of-the-art Blu-ray DVD player. An exciting new Austral-ian Company have recently tak-en over the management of the Universitiy’s existing accommo-dation. “Live Learn Grow”, is their philosophy. Rob Johnston, Gener-al Manager of “Residential Life Pro-gramme” exclaimed that the main aim of the company is to “help stu-dents who have left home” and to show them that they “don’t need to get stuck in the water!” Pro-gramme and events will include cooking lessons, market days, film nights, run clubs, sports, art com-petitions, cocktail/dinner parties and much more! Keep an eye out for them as their events are due to start in November. Sounds like fun :)

Undergraduates from Septem-ber 2011 will be happy to know that the new Luton Campus, Fitz-roy Court, should be completed by then. The £40m campus is cur-rently under construction, but will have 579 bedrooms, and a fur-ther 274 in 2012. Prepare to be stunned when you check out the artists impressions on the Univer-sity’s website, www.beds.ac.uk.

COURSE REP CONFERENCE

The University of Bedfordshire Students’ Union jointly with the University is organising a Course Rep Conference this year. The Dep-uty Vice Chancellor (Academic) will be launching this conference to engage with the Course Reps and also the UBSU is glad to enrich the student experience through the Course Rep System. This confer-ence is planned for the 23rd of No-vember 2010 and will take place at the Putteridge Bury Campus.

The Course Representative Sys-tem allows the students to have a champion from their course, who can address the students’ issues at the first instance to the Universi-ty. They play a major role in help-ing their colleagues and informing the University about issues faced by students. They take the views of their friends and colleagues to the University and fill the gap between the University and Students. I be-lieve that this conference will give more exposure and understanding of the role of Course Reps and their importance in enhancing the stu-dent experience. There will be dif-ferent speakers to the conference from NUS, University and also from students. I wish to see you all at the Course Reps in the conference. Best Wishes!

If you have any queries regard-ing the conference mail to:

[email protected] or [email protected]

by Ajay Gowda

THE CANDIDATES ARE: STUDENT OFF ICER POS IT IONS LUTON:

CAMPAIGNS OFFICERVIGNESH MURALI

ANDY WANG

MINORITY OFFICERMOHAMED ABDUL HAI

ADNAN SHARIF

DISABILITY OFFICERRAM VINOJ RAJA

NEWSPAPER EDITOR

SARAH BADCOCKLAUREN MOORE

MICHAEL TAYLOR

STUDENT OFFICER POSITIONS BEDFORD:

MATURE STUDENTS OFFICERKOFI BRACE

NEWSPAPER EDITOR

RHIANNON BAXENDALE

BOTH CAMPUSES:

TRUSTEE POSITIONROOPA NAGARAJU

NUS DELEGATE POSITIONSDISHON ARIVANANDHAM

JAY CHINNASAMY

CATS UG FACULTY REPSARAH BADCOCK

B U S I N E S S S C H O O L PG FA C U LT Y R E P

ADNAN SHARIF

By-Electionsby Becky Heard

The Students’ Union seeks to be a democratic, member led organisation, and thus we have an election process which gives every student the chance to vote for the officers who will represent the student body for a year. All elected students are there to represent you, the student and your needs and views.

Voting will take place on Monday 8th, Tuesday

9th, Wednesday 10th November 10am-5pm and Thursday 11th November 10am-2pm in the Hub in Bedford and the SU Mezzanine bar in the new campus centre in Luton. Please pop into your SU to read the manifesto’s or watch the online videos atwww.ubsu.co.uk for more information about the candidates who want to represent you!

NewsBThe

Did you know there are many types of feedback?

Feedback doesn’t always have to be written it can come in many forms:

• Verbal• Written

• Group feedback in seminars

• From peers • Constructive criticism

• Conversations with tutors

Even your grade is a form of feedback. If you feel you are not

getting feedback go and speak to your tutor about your work and they

will be happy to give you the feedback you require.

The Silsoe Experience.There has been much pub-

licity surrounding The Glob-al Village, notably the travel to the University, but hope-fully this article can answer many questions, and give students and staff who do not live there an insight to the living conditions and at-mosphere surrounding The Global Village.

Living in The Global Vil-lage has defiantly been a rollercoaster ride, with many ups, but regrettably many downs. The Village lies around 10 miles north of the Luton Campus, and around 10 miles south of the Bed-ford campus, and accom-modates over 200 students from both campuses.

There are strong points to The Global Village, includ-ing the sports facilities, and the Village Bar called the ‘Stumble Inn’. Both of these give students a place to ei-ther chill out, or give stu-dents a chance to bond with each other, playing sports such as Football, Basketball or Squash. However, both have problems, including no licence in the bar, and no refurbished gym at the present time. The best part of the Global Village is the community. Everyone gets along so well, and you feel comfortable to just knock on someone’s door and chat about anything, and even ask a favour from anyone. With us being 10 miles from

the town centre, we all have to make our own entertain-ment and bonding becomes so much easier.

However, with all those highs, disappointingly there are some lows. A notable one would be the houses. When we got here, many houses, if not all were missing many major household applianc-es, including washing ma-chines, TVs, micro-waves, sofa’s and even ovens. This became a major problem for us students couldn’t eat properly and couldn’t wash their clothes. We got prom-ised it would be dealt with very soon, but many hous-es are still missing appli-ances, which goes against the contract we signed. The most important appliance we haven’t been supplied with in our accommodation is the internet. Homework and assignments become very hard to finish when you have to go to the bar to do it, and this doesn’t seem to be concluding very soon. Com-plaints have been made, but five weeks of university have passed and still we have no internet to show for it. Trav-elling has been another ma-jor disappointment living in Silsoe. Travelling to both University and into town has been tough and some-times very expensive. It is being sorted out, but it has

still halted our experience being a student. Being a first year student, going out is a major part of our experi-ence, and the problems with travelling has meant that we have missed out on so much fun, especially during fresh-ers’ week, which is supposed to be the best week of our lives. The final disappoint-ments to living in Silsoe are the weekends. Of course we will have work to finish, but we still need to enjoy our-selves. Organising events using the sports facilities or the bar would make week-ends so much more enjoya-ble, but none have been or-ganised so far, and many are opting to go home for the weekend.

The potential The Glob-al Village has is great, but it just seems that the work-load they have given them-selves is too much, and the lack of appliances and lack of care by the staff at some points is disappointing us. We came here with the ex-pectations of standard liv-ing conditions, and a home fit with everything in the brochure, but so far we have been frustrated. Things are on the up, and slowly but surely we will have what we got told we would get, but for myself and for many oth-er students living in Silsoe, the experience has been a hugely frustrating one, and one that can only get better.

By Max Keens.

Olympic Games Summer 2012 The end… sooner than predicted ? “London was chosen to

host the Olympic Games 2012” chimed newspapers last year. Less than two years from now, the major sport event will be held in the Capital. So, how do Londoners feel about it so far, proud? Worried? For months now there has been a sigh of relief from our neigh-bour’s across the channel and terms like: “At least we will be safe!” So, French people - bad losers or aware of the threat that comes with hosting the 2012 Olympic Games? Olym-pic organisers are likely to be conscious of the poisoned terrorism arrow and will have prepared consequent securi-ty measures to ensure every-thing runs safely and smooth-ly.

Why would the Olympic Games be targeted by terror-ists? The Olympic Games is a symbol of global unity, and gathers athletes and sports fans from all over the world. Targeting such a major event would cause a huge amount of fear amongst London-ers and gain global recogni-tion. Over the last decade, the threat and actions of terror-

ist activities have been acute-ly aware to both developed and developing countries, the risks cannot be ignored. Let us look back with an eye to the future. Forty years ago, the Munich Olympics Game 1972, Germany: this date will mainly be remembered be-cause of the “Munich Massa-cre” where members of the Is-raeli Olympic team were tak-en hostage and executed by the terrorist group Black Sep-tember.

The UK government classi-fies the event as a major ter-rorism target and the organ-isers of the Olympic Games are prepared for something to happen, but they think the major threat will come from cyber terrorism, like Beijing suffered. The Beijing Olym-pics suffered from 12m cyber attacks a day during the 2008 games. About £500m will be spent on increased cyber se-curity. The new National Se-curity Strategy identifies oth-er major risks such as an inter-national military crisis or an attack by another state... Ter-rorists could then exploit this instability to threaten the UK.

How do you feel about it? “I’m excited for the London Games, but I’m worried be-cause I heard that London might be bombed by terror-ists… I might take a break out of London in summer 2012!” says Eleanor Skillen, art con-sultant in Canary Wharf.

So why are people so afraid of terrorism? There are wars around the world which could arguably described as cruel-er? The big difference stands in the purpose of the peo-ple leading them. This might sound incredible, but wars have got “laws” whereas ter-rorism has none. Basically, people who are involved in wars, like soldiers, are put in harm’s way and try to reduce the risk to a country’s popula-tion. To the contrary, the aim of terrorism is to touch non-involved populations and cre-ate a big emotional shock. “Terrorism can happen any-where, at anytime”.

Maud Tazir

KINDLE WINNERStudents can now follow the Careers and

Employment Service on social networking site Twitter. This is the latest service offered by the University to help students find out what’s available through the Careers and Em-ployment Service.

Keep yourself updated about:• Employer events on and off campus• Careers workshops at Bedford and Luton• Part-time job vacancies• Details of graduate recruitment schemes• Volunteering opportunities• Careers information, tips and advice

You can also use the Student Information Desks (SiD), BREO, the University’s website www.beds.ac.uk/careers to find out more or just drop in to one of the careers centres at Bedford or Luton.

The careers service ran a competition for students at the Freshers’ Fayres that recently took place in Bedford and Luton.

Students signed up to follow the careers service on Twitter and then were put into a prize draw for the opportunity to win an e-book reader and two runner-up awards from outer space.

The winner of the star prize, an Amazon Kindle worth more than £100, was Damo-la Eniola who is studying Business Manage-ment at the Bedford campus.

Damola from South London, who is staying in the Liberty Park student accommodation, said: “I’m happy to have won it as it saves me carrying lots of heavy books about!”

Two runners-up each won an ‘acre of the moon’. They were Tom Higgins, also from the Bedford campus, and Tahj Gbao from the Lu-ton campus.

Winner Damola Eniola is presented with his Amazon Kindle by careers adviser Christine Smith

5AN INSIGHT INTO ISLAM

The University of Bedfordshire is proud to be rich in cultural and religious diversi-ty. To celebrate this, each month the Blend will be looking at a different religion to help us learn more about each other. This month we take just a brief look at Islam.

Islam is the monotheistic religion artic-ulated by the Qur’an, a text considered by its adherents to be the verbatim word of God (Allah), and by the teachings and nor-mative example of Muhammad, the last Prophet of Islam. The word ‘Islam’ means

‘Submission (to God)’, and an adherent of Islam is called Muslim.

Muslims believe that God is one and in-comparable and that the purpose of life is to worship God. Muslims also believe that Islam is the completed and universal ver-sion of a primordial, monotheistic faith re-vealed at many times and places before, in-cluding notably, to the prophets Abraham, Moses and Jesus, and that previous mes-sages and revelations have been changed and distorted over time. Religious practices include the Five Pillars of Islam, which are five obligatory acts of worship, and Islam-ic law, which touches on virtually every as-pect of life and society, encompassing eve-rything from banking and welfare, to war-fare and the environment.

The majority of Muslims belong to one of two denominations, Sunni and Shi’a. Large numbers of Muslims live in Indone-sia, South Asia, the Middle East, Central Asia, South East Asia and Sub-saharan Af-rica. Sizable communities are also found in China and Russia, and parts of the Caribbe-an. Converts and immigrant communities are found in almost every part of the world. With about 1.57 billion Muslims comprising about 23% of the world’s population, Islam is the second-largest religion and one of the fastest-growing religions in the world.

Basic Articles of Faith

Muslims have six main beliefs:(1) a belief in Allah as the one and only

God, (2) a belief in angels, (3) a belief in the holy books, (4) belief in the Prophets - Adam, Ibrahim

(Abraham), Musa (Moses), Dawud (David), Isa (Jesus) and Muhammad (peace be upon him) is the final prophet,

(5) Belief in the Day of Judgement (the day when the life of every human being will

be assessed to decide whether they go to heaven or hell, and

(6) Belief in Predestination (that Allah has the knowledge of all that will happen). Muslims believe that this doesn’t stop hu-man beings making free choices.

AllahAllah is the name Muslims use for the su-

preme and unique God, who created and rules everything. The heart of faith for all Muslims is obedience to Allah’s will. Allah is eternal, omniscient, and omnipotent. Al-lah has always existed and will always exist, knows everything that can be known, and can do anything that can be done.

Allah has no shape or form, can’t be seen, can’t be heard, and is neither male nor fe-male. Allah is just. Allah rewards and pun-ishes fairly, but Allah is also merciful. A be-liever can approach Allah by praying, and by reciting the Qur’an. Muslims worship only Allah because only Allah is worthy of worship.

MosqueMuslims worship in a building called a

mosque. An alternative word for mosque, from the original Arabic, is masjid, mean-ing place of prostration. Outside eve-ry mosque, or just inside the entrance, is a place where worshippers can remove and leave their shoes. There is also a place where they can carry out the ritual washing required before prayer.

The main hall of a mosque is a bare room largely devoid of furniture. There are no pictures or statues. Muslims believe these are blasphemous, since there can be no image of Allah, who is wholly spirit. Every-one sits on the floor and everywhere in the mosque is equal in status. A niche in one of the walls, called a mihrab, shows the direc-tion that the worshippers should face in or-der to face Mecca.

Many mosques have a minaret which is a tall thin tower. A muezzin stands at the top of the tower and calls Muslims to prayer at the five ritual times of the day. Not all mosques in the UK have a minaret.

Women can attend the mosque and when they do they sit separately from the men. This is out of modesty and to prevent any distraction. It is more usual for women to pray at home.

By Ciaran O’Brien

Gold’s Gym Bedford Student Offer

Only £25.00 per month

NO JOINING FEE AND ONE MONTH FREE

Come along for your FREE session today!

It’s right round the corner from Bedford University!

Change Your Body Change Your Life.

11 Shuttleworth Road, Bedford, MK41 0EP. 01234 345696

www.goldsgym.com/bedforduk

W H A T is the p r i c e of an EDUCATION t h e s e days?

As i am sure many of you willhave heard from in news over the last few days that uni-versities as from 2012 will be able to charge tuition fees of up to £9000 a year. The gov-ernment has decided that fees will rise to a minimum of £6000 and there will be a cap of £9000. Therefore, students could be pay-ing up to 3 times more than what the price of tuition fees are currently.

Quite frankly people will wonder is go-ing to university worth £9000 a year? In order for universities to charge this amount of money they are going to have to answer to the students. Universities will have to make it worth their time and money. Surely if students are paying this kind of money they should demand high quality teaching and facilities and if universities cannot provide that, then how can they justify charging all this money? It seems that the country has moved away from the culture that only the rich and families that are ‘well off’ get to go to university, well the gov-ernment’s actions seem to be promoting this

culture all over again discriminating against families who are less fortunate than others which is terrible! University should be for all!! The NUS is outraged by the change in tuition fees from the government. Especially because one party of our coalition government the Lib-eral Democrats, in their election pledge stated they would vote against any rise in tuition fees. I think Nick Clegg has a lot to answer for, this is where many students voted for him to co run our country, how can we trust this man and the Liberal democrats after not following though with the promises they made to the country about the rise in tuition fees. NUS President Aar-on Porter said the liberal democrats ‘should be ashamed of themselves’ and i absolutely agree. So after reading all of the above i know what you’re thinking ‘But this will not affect me so why should i care?’ Well think about in years to come if you have younger brothers or sisters, nieces or nephews or even when you have chil-dren yourselves one day this will affect them so everyone should be concerned and outraged about the rise in tuition fees.

I know they have increased the graduate earning to £21,000 before graduates start pay-ing back their loan, which is good but the in-terest rate on the student loan is going to in-crease. The interest rates on student loans will make repayments more expensive for high-er- paid graduates which the government describes as a system with a ‘progressive ta-per’ but is this fair? It seems that professions like doctors, lawyers etc will be penalised for getting a good education and earning more than others. The interest rate should remain the same as it is now that would make the sys-tem fair for all! Maybe the English govern-ment should take a leaf out of the Scottish ed-ucation system where they believe that ed-ucation is a good investment in their peo-ple and do not charge any fees for their stu-dents that sounds like a good deal to me. So what is the price of Education? Is it fair to charge people all this money so they can create a life for themselves and a career? I guess the question is now would you pay up to £9000 a year to go to university?

by Lyndsay Murphy

COMMUNITYBThe

UNION AND COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT

Union DevelopmentOver the year and past few months the

UBSU team is developing and establishing a range of its services to meet the Vision, Mis-sion and the Values as an organisation. The Union has developed and changed a lot dur-ing past 6 months time which has seen sever-al major changes in the structure, operations and also in reaching out to its members. The major union developmental activities that are in the progress and improvements being made involves Benchmarking Initiatives and Charity Registration.

Benchmarking InitiativesThe benchmarking initiatives ensure that UBSU is constantly maintaining and improv-ing its standards in serving its members. UBSU is working towards different Benchmarking In-itiatives.

Investors in Diversity (IiD)The Union is keen in working towards Inves-tors in Diversity. The Induction for this initiative was carried out in the Bedford Campus in Octo-ber 2010 and it was attended by the UBSU ex-ecutive team and staff. The team ensured that all its operations involve keeping in mind the key term ‘Diversity’ in serving its members and stakeholders. This is also inline with our value where ‘Diversity’ is a one of the key values of the organisation.

Investors in People (IiP)Having been assessed in February 2010, the Un-ion achieved Investors in People with few rec-ommendations for continuous development. The Union Strategy Group had the review of the IiP and working towards maintaining the standards and continuously invest in the learn-ing of its people. The UBSU is also planning to produce its Learning Strategy in the coming months. This shows the commitment of your unions services in offering the best service for its members.

Students’ Union Evaluation Initiative (SUEI)We are fast approaching the SUEI assessment for the next cohort. The SUEI assessment will take place in the month of March/April 2011. The UBSU is constantly working on the various aspects of SUEI and has completed its interim assessment. Having achieved Bronze Award, UBSU is now aiming strategically at achieving the next level i.e Silver Award in the next assess-ment and has made changes to majority of its operations and structure. The team also are in the process of visiting the other unions for shar-ing the best practices

Green Impact The Union has just initiated and registered with the NUS Green Impact Initiative which is yet an-other benchmarking initiative which cares and ensures the Environmental policy of the UBSU. This initiative ensures reducing the waste and also energy saving activities within the un-ion, university, halls and also promoting to the awareness to the students.

Charity RegistrationAs promised, last year UBSU was working more on the Charity Registration process and it was going through major changes in the whole governance and operations of the union. The one of the key priority for the year 2010/2011 is getting registered with the Charities Com-mission as UBSU charity and we are working on it. The Charity Registration of the UBSU will achieve Charity status for the UBSU and more ways of looking at the sustainability of the un-ion will be looked into over years. This will help the Union to use different fundraising oppor-tunities and increasing its operations at a large in the future.

Out-Site Visits: This year an exclusive out-site visit plan has been made to make the UBSU represntation at all campuses including Luton, Bedford, Ayles-bury, Butterfield and Putteridge Bury. There will be one sabbatical officer and one staff availa-ble to meet with the students on a fortnight-ly basis. Hope this would bring closer the UBSU to the students of the different campuses and also serving the students the services that are offered by you students’ union. There will be hot desks at all campus and students should make use of this opportunity for the represn-etation of students issues.

Community DevelopmentThe UBSU is keen in addressing the Com-

munity issues and it caters different commu-nities at the University and also on the Local and National Communities through different services such as Societies and Raise and Give.

Societies TrainingContinuing the success of the last year training for the Executives of the Student Led Societies at UBSU, it has been now been placed in the hands of Student Activities Department. This year the Student Activities department has come up with the training for all the societies and it took place in two phases one in Bedford and another in Luton Campus.

The Bedford Campus saw three different So-cieties who involved in the training programme which includes:

1. The Film Club2. The Islamic Society3. Christian Union

The Luton Campus were filled with number of societies taking part in the training:

1. RaG Society2. Debate Society3. Think Peace4. Promised Destiny Gospel Choir5. HRM Society6. Christian Union7. Singing and Performance8. Pakistan Students Association9. Be-in-Style10. The Street Dance Society11. African Caribbean Society12. Law Society13. Chinese Students Association14. M and A Society

15. Break Dance Society16. MBA Society17. Chinese Student Christian Fellowship18. Marketing and Communications Society19. Role Playing Society20. Ghana Union Society

The training involved various aspects of run-ning the societies effectively. Also the necessity of taking part in the Democratic meetings like AGM, Student Councils has been addressed in the training. The societies felt that it was very useful in running their activities.

RaG (Raise and Give)The various Charities for Raise and Give (RaG) has been proposed to the Students Activities Committee by the students, sabbatical officers, student officers and the staff. The committee decided the charities for the year by analysing and voting of various factors such as usefulness for the students, youth, community, etc. There were 4 charities finalised for the year and those charities are:

1. DAME KELLY HOME LEGACY TRUST (NATIONAL CHARITY)

This charity inspires young people to find and fulfil their potential in sport or in life, through their workforce of elite sports performers. Hav-ing seen first hand what difference elite sports performers to young people’s development as role models and mentors, Dame Kelly set up the Trust to ‘Inspire young people to find and fulfil their potential in sport or in life through our workforce of elite sports performers.’ This means that DKH Legacy Trust provides support to other elite performers as they develop a new career, through the ‘Harnessing Talent’ project, at the same time making the most of their skills and experience by working with and inspiring young people through our ‘Inspiring Lives’ and ‘Inspiring Sport’ projects.

Inspiring SportDKH support young people to participate,

stay in and excel in sport. Inspiring LivesDKH help disadvantaged young people to

find and believe in their own talents. Every child needs a hero... someone to look up to and be inspired by, but too many kids just don’t.

Harnessing TalentDKH harness the talents and expertise of elite

performers to realise the talent in themselves and others.

For More information about Dame Kelly Hol-mes Charity visit the website below:

http://www.dkhlegacytrust.org

2. THE EAST ANGLIAN AIR AMBULANCE - EAAA (REGIONAL CHARITY)

The EAAA charity mainly serves patients those who are affected by the accidents in the Bedfordshire Region. The East Anglia region is increasingly being congested and seen in-creased number of accidents the charity has been increased its services to attend the inci-dents and still it is need of help.

3. THE LUTON FOYER (LUTON BASED CHARITY)

Luton Foyer is an information, advice and support centre that exists to help people to make positive changes to improve their lives. It is a charity and all the services and facilities are offered free of charge. It is open to every-one and offers a warm, non judgemental wel-come to all. It offers many services from under

the same roof so that clients can choose the help that suits their particular circumstances and tackle different issues in a safe, supportive environment. Confidentiality is assured and clients can continue coming to the centre for as long as they wish. It aims to treat everyone considerately, individually and fairly. The Char-ity is also offering the free services toi the Uni-versity Students along with the UBSU Advice Centre.

4. HEADWAY CHARITY (BEDFORD BASED CHARITY)

Headway is a charity set up to give help and support to people affected by brain injury. It does this in a number of ways:

Locally: A network of local Groups and Branch-es throughout the UK and Channel Islands of-fers a wide range of services, including rehabil-itation programmes, career support, social re-integration, community outreach and respite care. The services available will vary, depend-ing on local needs and resources.

Nationally: Headway UK provides support to the local Groups and Branches and helps to deliver high quality services through guidance on policies, procedures, standards and training.

There are lot more initiative has been tak-en by UBSU for the Community Development which will be presented in the next issue and hope to see you all in the next issue with more on the developments taking place withy UBSU.

Personal Safety in the communityThe Cycle Marking and Personal Safety pro-gramme is being conducted in the Bedford Campus on a regular basis. The students of Bed-ford Campus are welcome to avail this services at the Studnets’ Union. There was a surgery on 19th of October 2010 and there were studnets coming with the bikes. This is very helpful for the students come with bike to the university.

The Head Police Officer Val commented that “It is very useful to meet with students during such events and hope this services would ben-efit the universities students at large” She also added that she will be available in the Bed-ford campus on a regular weekly basis for sr-geries with the students and there will three more cycle marking programmes happing in the Bedford Campus for this year. The dates for the marking are Tuesday the 16th of Novem-ber, Tuesday the 7th of December and Tuesday the 21st of December and this will be happen-ing between 11.30 am till 1.00 pm in the Stud-nets’ Union.

The 3rd Year Performing Arts Student Phylli-cia Salmon Stated that “the cycle marking helps to protect my bike from theft and also it helps me to keep my bike safe. She was happy with the services offered through the Students’ Un-ion and thanked both the UBSU and Police Of-ficer. I would suggest all the studnets who are having their bikes to be marked during the above dates and times mentioned and make use of the services. Your safety is first priority.

by Jay Chinnasamy

double Olympic Gold medalist; Dame Kelly Holmes

7

UoB’s Equality Strand ForaThe University of Bedfordshire

aims to put equality and diversity at the heart of everything it does, and one way it tries to do this is by en-gaging students and staff through a number of Equality Strand Fora. The fora were established about two years ago to give students and staff the opportunity to voice their views and contribute to the over-all equality and diversity agenda. Championed by a number of sen-ior staff at the University, the fora raise issues and work to influence the organisation’s position on var-ious matters relevant to ensuring that legal requirements and good practice measures are adhered to.

The fora are constantly try-ing to expand the work that they do and the issues they cover and would welcome wider member-ship and input from students and

staff throughout the University. Meetings for each forum take place about three or four times a year and are open to all interested students and staff to attend.

If you are interested in becom-ing a member of any of the groups please contact:

Maria Udu – Equality and Diversi-ty Officer on ext. 3075; OR

Shajna Begum – HR Administra-tor (Equality and Diversity) on ext. 3191

The current fora Champions are:Eileen Scott – Age Forum Tim Stone - Disability Forum Professor Tiantian Zhang – Gen-

der Forum Professor Ravi Kohli - Race and

Ethnicity Forum Tim Stone - Religion and Belief

Forum Pending confirmation of new

Champion – Sexual Orientation and Transgender Forum

Other equality and diversity initi-atives that have taken place at the University include the production of the Single Equality Scheme, the launch of the Sexual Orientation and Transgender Forum, Refugee Week activities in May and June this year, a Women into Computing Conference hosted by the CATS Fac-ulty in May, Higher Education Acad-emy projects looking into Black and Minority Ethnic (BME) students’ de-gree attainment and at developing a more inclusive approach to learn-ing and teaching to ensure that the diversity needs of all students are taken into account.

By Maria Udu, Equality and Diversity Officer

CHRISTMAS COMES EARLYChristmas is here! Oh wait…no it’s not.Luton jumped onto the Christ-

mas bandwagon last month, streaming its stalls with tinsel and bars with baubles - but had we for-gotten it was only October?

The past month has seen shelv-ing sneakily make space for the Christmas stock, with more and more flooding in by the day. Is this the work of the manufacturers be-ing money grabbers, or is the de-mand from the public? Has Christ-mas become a quarter year prepa-ration for a day long event, or are marketing companies to blame for the 3month hype?

After talking to shoppers in Lu-

ton’s Mall, it seems the manu-facturers are providing the pub-lic with what they want. Lucin-da Rodrigues 18, is of the opinion that “gift buying in advance is so much fun” and her fellow shoppers armed with bags of wrapping pa-per and Christmas cards can’t help but agree that “the minute Christ-mas rolls into town they start their plans for the festive season”.

Male members of society how-ever take a different view. Simon Harding, 21, “loves” the festive sea-son however hates the commer-cialism and cost that accompanies it. “These shops with their decora-tions are just a constant reminder of the money we need to spend,” he sighs, and it really does appear

that the majority of the male spe-cies are in agreement of this state-ment.

A 32 year old father of three shook his head in despair when asked about Christmas, talking immediately about the cost in-volved, “Santa has already re-ceived my kids’ lists” he states, “he actually started getting the orders in June and these festivity filled shops aren’t helping.” To the guys out there, it seems that up until Christmas Eve, anything related to Christmas - or at least the shop-ping aspects, hangs over them like

the ghost of Christmas past..

It is clear that Luton loves the festive season and is eager to en-joy the family-oriented period. But it appears the build up to Christ-mas is like a chocolate bar to a di-eter - until it’s a visual you don’t think about it, and from that point on it is in constantly at the back of your mind!

By Sophia Mead

One meeting you won’t want

to miss!!!What?

The highest decision making body in UBSU is The Annual Gen-eral Meeting (AGM) and it is open for all students to attend. Come to the AGM and use your vote to make decisions about the way you want your union to run. In particu-lar, you can propose the rules (mo-tions). Motions which are passed by the AGM will become the pol-icies of UBSU and the officers will act upon them.

The Sabbatical and Student Of-ficers who you elected will be there for you to question. You can ask them about how the Union is be-ing run and what the Union will be

doing throughout the year.SURPRISED? Well, you shouldn’t

be because it’s your Union and

YOU ARE THE BOSS!!!

Why? If you feel there is an issue that

you want the Union to have an of-ficial opinion on, or there is change you’d like to make, then have your say in the AGM. You can write a mo-tion! Once it is passed by a voting majority in the AGM, it becomes a policy of the Union and your elect-ed officers will act upon it e.g. the quality of education, accommoda-tion, finance, social events, clubs, society, volunteering etc.

When & Where?The AGM is on Tuesday, 30th No-

vember 2010 in Bedford Theatre from 6pm onwards.

To get more information con-tact Dishon Arivanandham, VP De-mocracy and Diversity: [email protected] or visit www.ubsu.co.uk

FAQs

1. I am not from Bedford Cam-pus how do I attend?

Well, please speak to some one in the Students’ Union and we will ar-range transport based on your re-quest.

2. Do I get transport back?Yes you will. As long as you let us

know in advance.

3. I can’t make it for the AGM but is there any other way we could speak about our issues?

Yes you can, we have Student Council which is conducted during Dec, Feb, March and April.

by Dishon Arivanandham

EventsBThe

9the beldnd

EventsBThe

LATEST FILM REVIEWPARANORMAL ACTIVITY 2Recently the University of Bedfordshire

Film Club went to see Paranormal Activi-ty 2. Due to the success of the first film, we thought we were in for a treat, we were sad-ly mistaken. Here, the Film Club Co-ordina-tor, Holly Simms gives her review:

“Unfortunately there’s not much good to say about Paranormal Activity 2. Where-as the first is a memorable and original film which succeeded in its goal of scaring audi-ences through clever use of handheld cam-eras used by the characters themselves, the second is a sloppy attempt to reuse the same villain by linking the storylines and families from both films.

It could easily be described as laugha-ble, and when I say laughable I’m not being harsh; the entire screen was literally in hys-terics during the most climactic moments and expressing boredom through the rest. The storyline begins to border on ridicu-lous toward the end of the film as the teen-age daughter of the leading couple discov-ers the demon’s intentions with her family, although even for this you are grateful as it

seems to take hours for anything remotely interesting to happen.

The film is a classic case of the sequel not living up to its predecessor due to a sto-ryline which the writers must have spent all of five minutes on in order to churn out the film for cheap. It is a definite shame that this film is so poor as there is a definite potential for a new and original horror franchise here in the unique nature in which the films are shot and the dialogue giving a sense of re-alistic characters as opposed to the overly dramatic American horrors we see each year.

Full of unintentionally humorous charac-ters and scenes, the film would be a more appropriate choice for a comedy fan rather than those who like to be scared. Two words: cash sequel.”

Holly SimmsAlthough the opinions of the Film Club

are very negative towards this film, we invite you to watch it for yourself and send your review to The Blend’s editor at [email protected]

By Rhiannon Baxendell

THE DRUMS THE DRUMS

Eagerly awaited debut from the New Yorkers shows they can do more than surfing

Glorious sunshine beats down on golden sand whilst the sound of blue waves crash together. At the

same time, the very same star is struggling to break through a stubborn set of ominous clouds. Its eagerly awaited emergence is greeted with cheers and vast consumptions of pear cider and warm lager, though in all honestly this was happening before its ap-pearance.

The two scenes could not be more con-trasting geographically. The first an Ameri-can Apparel injected West Coast beach, the latter a hedonistic paradise in the form of a typical British summer festival. One thing both will revel in together however is the music of The Drums. It may be uber-cliched to say, but the Brooklyn 4 pieces catchy songs were made to be listened to on a sun setting beach or at a sizzling festival. Sta-ple song ‘Let’s Go Surfing’ best serves this notion, offering up the most recognisable bassline of the past year and whistling piece at the same time. The debut single from the Summertime! EP gave a glimpse into front-man Jonathan Pierces lyrics, with influenc-es like The Smiths, Joy Division and Orange Juice evident. He describes The Drums mu-sic as, “hope within hopelessness, within hope, within hopelessness” and of himself states, “I feel like the foundation of my life is sadness”. The Wombats these guys aren’t.

Each song however is disguised in joyous sound, embraced in shiny basslines (though no bass guitar is used), glowing summer gui-tars and the occasional heart melting synth, best heard in ‘I’ll Never Drop My Sword’ which sees Pierce in typical Morrissey dark humour form (“I wish your mouth was more like your heart/nailed shut”). Opening line

on ‘Best Friend’ replicates the Smiths front-man again as Pierce declares, “You were my best friend/but then you died”. Everything is tidy and infectious, anchored by simple, yet oh-so-effective drums. The combination of contagiously compelling American indie pop and harrowing Mancunian lyrics is the musical equivalent of peanut butter and jel-ly or gravy and chips. It shouldn’t work, but it does. Like The Smiths, The Drums have pro-vided music that many can find solace and ultimately a connection with. If they contin-ue in this vein there’s no saying to what they can achieve. The kookish awkwardness of The Drums in interviews only serves to fuel the notion that they’re not all at ease with themselves, making the music all the more poignant.

Highlight ‘Me and the Moon’ works its way in with New Order drumming before Jacob Graham and Adam Kessler weave in and out of each other on punchy guitars as Pierce re-calls of a manipulating lover reciting, “I don’t know how/ to feel without your love”. ‘Book of Stories’ serves to sum up The Drums in a chorus that will be chanted across the com-ing summers with Pierce letting millions of adolescent ears hear, “I thought my life would get easier/instead it’s getting harder/without you”.

With their Summertime! EP, The Drums set themselves up for a massive fall had the fol-low up not delivered. Thankfully, the New Yorkers have managed to encompass and embrace every piece of love and pain in their lives and work it into something deli-cate and subtle yet captivating.

8/10 Top 3: 1) ‘Me and the Moon’ 2) ‘Let’s Go Surfing’ 3) ‘Book Of Stories’

11

THE OLD TO THE NEWStudents’ Unions new Student Bar in Luton

by Leigham StoneIt’s fair to say that the old Students Union (SU)

bar wasn’t the most popular destination for Stu-dents. Whether it was the isolated destination, the tediously repetitive, same old events or the overall feeling of boredom.

Whatever the reason, an SU at any university should be a lively fun place that students cannot keep away from. Yet, the truth is, the old bar failed miserably according to some of the second and third year students who experienced the old SU.

In contrast, the new SU ; the Mezzannine bar and coffee area has recieved some great feedback. One student who was asked is second year Sports Ther-apy student, Anthony Kew, he said: “It’s a great pre drinks venue for all the students, especially the sports students. It’s in a much better position and it’s not boring, like the old one. I know it’s still early days, and the fosters needs to be a little better, but I like it.”

Chris Mountain, another Sports Therapist, drinks at the new bar regularly and agrees with Anthony, he said: “I like it because it seems very relaxed and chilled out. If I’m going out I like to start off there. I didn’t like it at all last year because I felt the drinks were too expensive and it was just too far away. So, yes, the new SU is much better.”

As the saying goes, the proof is in the pudding. Af-

ter a month of being open, the bar is looking encour-agingly busy and has been packed even during the day - something that never happened at the old bar.

Dave Duckering, the SU bar assistant manager, is not surprised with the early popularity of the venue, he said: “Its been a breath of fresh air, a new start for us. The whole feel of the place is better, we are in a better location and there is a lot of life to the union now. And there is always something going on, you will struggle to walk through these doors and not find someone you know in here. You will always find a friendly face. Spirits are generally high and the un-ion is a really fun place to be at the minute.”

Despite the recent optimism of the students and staff, some students do feel there is room for im-provement. Becky Lyons, third year Sports Therapist, thinks the bar shouldn‘t rest on their laurels, she said: “To be honest it does seem a bit ‘same old’ already, but its better than the non-existent SU last year and its got a good vibe. It just seems a bit too pretty to get wasted in at the moment!”

It seems whether you like the new SU or not, one thing is for sure, it is different. That is exactly what it needed, change. It is true that change isn’t always good, but as students we are entitled to give our opinion and at the end of the day the bar is for us.

W H A T MAKES A GOOD COCKTAIL?Whilst it is usually in

the classroom or science lab in which

inventions are created, for stu-dents, the best things can come straight from your kitchen. Take the example of Vodka and Red-bull: perfect for waking you up and starting your evening with a bang. Although, what else makes a good cocktail?

There are various ingredi-ents in our homes that allow us the ability to tickle our taste buds. My friend invented a very nice Virgin drink involving two spoons of coffee, a can of Coke (or Diet), and a touch of sug-ar. Adding Vodka to this delight would make it a Black Russian – a truly awesome drink. So think of this: whenever you have a

piece of work due in for the next day, and it requires you to have an all-nighter, take a swig of this bad boy.

As the Holidays are approach-ing, nothing beats a touch of eggnog. This, in addition with lemonade and a touch of lime creates the festive ‘Snowball’. The thick texture of this cocktail cre-ates a nice sense of warmth for the cold nights approaching. De-spite eggnog being a relatively difficult mixture to get hold of, this paper stronger recommends you try it.

I suggest a try of all of these drinks listed. However, it is most important that you drink sen-sibly. If you take the drink, the drink may take you.

By James Spiro

It’s your bar: what did you say?

The new Mezzanine Bar and Coffee area for the Students’ Un-ion has proved to be a great im-provement from last year’s Un-ion space in Vicarage Street. With new Plasma TVs and enough so-fas for all your friends, the new space ensures a quiet and social space with plenty of natural light. Students say that it is a “clean and lovely” place: “it seems much more appealing than the previ-ous SU.” They also said that they

‘would love to see more events here in the future.’ The bar pro-vides a wide variety of beverages and the corner of the Mezzanine is a private space where students can organise meetings and gath-erings. It is unanimous that the new space in the building pro-vides students with an environ-ment that allows them to relax and make new friends.’

James Spiro

UNIVERSITY OF BEDFORDSHIRE CHRISTMAS EVENTS 2010

Following last year’s success, the University of Bedfordshire is hosting two Christmas events this year at the Bedford cam-pus on Tuesday 7 December at 6pm in the Coffee Hub and in Luton on Thursday 9 December at 6.30pm at St Mary’s Church. Both events are free of charge and are open to students, staff and members of the public. Mince pies and mulled wine will be served afterwards and donations will go to the nom-inated charities, Inspire Mala-wi, www.inspiremalawi.com and LAMP; Lighting the way for

Luton’s Young Homeless, www.lamp.uk.net.

The Bedford event, Christmas Light, will be joined by special guests, Bedford Choral Society and dancers from local schools whilst the Luton event, Carols by Candlelight, will have car-ols led by the spectacular Lu-ton Youth Cantores.

For more information go to www.beds.ac.uk/chaplaincy

We look forward to seeing you there!

Rebecca Grant-Jones

ICE ICE BABY!, ICE ICE BABY!We all carry our mobile phones

with names & numbers stored in its memory but nobody, other than ourselves, knows which of these numbers belong to our closest fam-ily or friends..

If we were to be involved in an accident or were taken ill, the peo-ple attending us would have our mobile phone but wouldn’t know who to call. Yes, there are hundreds of numbers stored but which one is the contact person in case of an emergency? Hence this “ICE” (In Case of Emergency) Campaign...

The concept of “ICE” is catching on quickly. It is a method of con-tact during emergency situations. As cell phones are carried by the

majority of the population, all you need to do is store the number of a contact person or persons who should be contacted during emer-gency under the name “ICE” ( In Case Of Emergency).

The idea was thought up by a paramedic who found that when he went to the scenes of accidents, there were always mobile phones with patients, but they didn’t know which number to call. He therefore thought that it would be a good idea if there was a nationally rec-ognized name for this purpose. In an emergency situation, Emergen-cy Service personnel and hospital Staff would be able to quickly con-tact the right person by simply di-

alling the number you have stored as “ICE.”

For more than one contact name simply enter ICE1, ICE2 and ICE3 etc.. A great idea that will make a difference!

Let’s spread the concept of ICE by storing an ICE number in our mo-bile phones today!

Please forward this. It won’t take too many “forwards” before every-body will know about this. It really could save your life, or put a loved one’s mind at rest.

Remember:- ICE will speak for you when you

are not able to... .... .John Arinaitwe

ANSWER ME THIS?‘‘Can you keep a boyfriend or a girlfriend outside of university?’’

“YES! I don’t understand why it wouldn’t work? If they really wanted to be with one another they wouldn’t be distracted by the whole “uni” life, It

also raises a trust issue, If you have something good why mess it up be-cause of what everyone else is doing.

You don’t always have to join... you have what other people are looking for. Better to be apart and not in each other’s faces all the time... It gives each person their necessary space”. STORM

“No it will not work, I tried and due to my own mentality like me chas-ing girls, wasn’t taking it seriously as it was hard for me as I had player qual-ities. You have to already be in love”. OMARI

“Yes I think it could work because if you have a relationship that is built on trust and you’re both willing to make it work then you shouldn’t let distance be a factor of splitting you to up and causing problems.” ROSHEEN

“Things like trust, no foundation built, sexual frustration, temptation, peer pres-sure and meeting new people all these are factors that cause issues, only in some cases can it work”. SYNTHIA

“You got a choice. Do you want a rela-tionship whilst at university? Meaning you might get tempted to ‘beat’* or do you hold out and have a proper full on relationship.Trust me it can work but

you will be tempted”. SCOTT, F

“Well, like she will defiantly get jealous when she sees pictures with you and an-other bird, be too clingy and will push you away and just end up showing mixed

messages to a point where it will just end”. SCOTT, H

“Yes I think they can work be-cause you don’t see the oth-er person on a day to day ba-sis which reduces the intensity and makes you value time spent with the other person more. As you see them less often. This also allows you to still have

your independence and space as well” :) ELIZABETH, D

“No I don’t think it could work because ever one falls into temptation at some point and would find it hard to hold back of they where roasting** and their other half couldn’t be there in the time that they want them and need them”. KELECHI

“I think it could work because I am ex-periencing having a girl friend and I am now in my third year of uni and we are still going on strong. I personally think it depends on how much trust and dedication each other have enough to make things work out between them. I’m not going to lie and say it’s all easy because it isn’t, but if you really care about the person then anything could happen”. RYAN

“I don’t think it could work be-cause you never know what the other person is doing and you would always carry that thought around you finking if they are be-ing faithful or just catering to their needs. Plus most people would do anything to keep their

relationship going such as lying, that they are not do-ing anything wrong”. SAMANTHA

From the answers you can see that everyone has their own opinion on if it could work having a boy/ girl friend outside of uni. Personally I think it’s all down to how much trust there is in the relationship and if they could be mature about things and accept the fact that he or she are go-ing off to university. Which means they would see less of each other and that he or she would be meeting new peoples just about every day.

Leanne

Relationships can work within Uni with the right communications and mental behaviour of knowing right and wrong but having said that boy or girl temptation is as strong as hunger pains and we all known when you’re in that sit-uation most rarely use their minds and act pure-ly on instinct.

Rhys

By Leanne Thompson & Rhys Waul

Next issue: Christmas Edition, New Answer Me This: “When it comes to Christmas, what do you look forward to the most; food, presents, or spending time with the family?”

If you have an opinion on this and wish to share it with the student body? Send a max of 100 words to: [email protected]

Coming to university is a big step for students, because it requires them to make changes and become independent. One of the topics that seem to be talked a lot about during uni is; “can you keep a boy/girl friend outside of uni”. In this article I’m going to be talking about what different students from University of Bedfordshire think about having a boy/girl friend outside of uni. The contrasting opinions where done by myself who asked the female population what they thought and Rhys who asked the male population what they thought about this subject.

YES!

YES!

NO!

YES!

NO! NO!

YES!

NO!

YES!

NO!

*‘beat’ an urban colloquial phrase referring to having sex

**‘roasting’ an urban colloquial phrase referring to wanting sex after going without sex for long periods time

100% RECYCLED PAPER

ANSWER ME THIS? Thingsguys should be wearingthis winter

10 Avoiding the man-flu Guys, you all think your bodies are strong but this is not the case. We have a fabulous way in which we keep Mr Macho from getting the man-flu this winter. Just because it is cold doesn’t mean that you have to keep layered up and styled down. Finding a way to stay warm but have that edgy, cool style gives personal style and most importantly all females will love.

by Ariel McPherson 1. A man in a snood!Some people don’t know what a ‘snood’ is; basically it is a scarf that turns into a hood. This is an easy way to look nice and give an outfit more attention, giving the illusion of a longer torso. River Island snoods are £12

2. The snood-shirt Is the cool version of the shirt and making a chest look bigger. I think this is a must. The likes of Kanye West and Tinie Tempah look great in it. with people you want to hang around with.

3. Dog flap’ hat The Eskimos wear the smart ones when it came to minus Celsius. The trapper ‘dog flap’ hat, are the new beanie hat. I think they are adorable, hiding all kinds of head shapes. .

4. Lamartin Cardigan The Lamartin cardigan has been around since last winter, but it is great. There is nothing more to it! Every man should have one.

5. Skinny jeans are NO! A good pair of half baggy jeans hides a multitude of sins. I recommend a great designer pair, rather than Levi. Bench, G-star, Diesel great pattern cuts on the leg make work to give broader legs.

6. What time is it? Telling the time is cool, so more in digital. G-shock have a new limited addition watch from designers Dee & Ricky. It’s a new way of telling the time in Lego.

7. No more duffle Looking like you are going on a short break winter holiday makes you seem mysterious. A canvas holdall bag is great for a cool accessory. Chuck the duffle bag away (or deep into your cupboards.)

8. Don’t be so Ugg be a bit BrogueI think trainers are a must but Brogues boots are the male version to female Uggs. A great pair will do you justice.

9. Get Creative. If shoes aren’t for you then the Creative Recreation Leather collection. I recommend the Hi-Tops. Check them out!

10. Remember that night in MovemberIt is not just November but Movember. The only month I shall give men to grow a moustache. This is for raising awareness fundraising for prostate cancer and other male cancers. It is fun and charitable to see how long it stays on your face for. The Kent Brushes moustache combs go on sale and are mostly for charity. Just don’t ask for a kiss this month, you might not get one. Check out www.Movember.com.

Students’ CornerBThe

Puzzles.liSudoku, Kakuro, Akari and more...

Sudoku 9x9 - Puzzle 1 of 4 - Easy

6 1 2 41 2 8 56 5 2 7

8 9 2 14 9 3 53 4 5 7

4 6 1 93 9 8 7

9 1 7 2www.puzzles.li


9 1 63 4 7 5 15 6 3 4

4 6 3 12 6 1

8 7 9 62 1 8 7

9 5 3 8 63 2 4

www.puzzles.li


6 1 9 22 8 3 5

5 3 7 4 13 7 1 6

1 9 32 8 3 78 6 5 3 4

4 8 1 91 5 4 8

www.puzzles.li


2 9 5 81 4 6 28 1

4 9 5 32

6 8 2 75 7

4 5 9 83 7 4 1

www.puzzles.li

Free puzzles for your publication:www.puzzles.li


Sudoku 9x9 - Puzzle 1 of 4 - Medium

1 9 42 6 8

6 7 3 95 1 2 8

3 9 8 42 4 6 73 5 6 2

7 1 58 3 1

www.puzzles.li


5 16 9

9 8 3 41 5 8 2 4

1 26 9 4 7 8

6 8 3 77 4

3 9www.puzzles.li


3 6 2 9 44 6 7 8

1 31 8 6 7

8 2 5 92 4

1 6 7 36 4 3 2 5

www.puzzles.li


4 1 82 3 5

5 4 93 9 2 7

9 6 86 4 1 9

9 7 16 5 8

2 3 5www.puzzles.li

More puzzles like Kakuro, Futoshiki, Akari and more:www.puzzles.li


Sudoku 9x9 - Puzzle 1 of 4 - Hard

2 4 3 6 75 7 91 5 8

3 15 2 4 8

6 53 7 9

7 3 68 4 6 3

www.puzzles.li


4 7 23 2 75 7 9 1

3 8 4 2

4 6 1 39 1 3 6

7 5 18 3 9

www.puzzles.li


9 88 2 4 6 77 2 8

4 8 13 2

8 3 55 9 82 6 3 9 7

6 1www.puzzles.li


4 1 9 57 4

3 45 6 1 3

2 6 8 41 5 2 8

5 47 9

6 8 1 4www.puzzles.li

Free puzzles for your publication:www.puzzles.li

SUDOKO

EASY MEDIUM HARD

DO YOU WANT TO SEE MORE GAMES IN YOUR STUDENT PAPER? LET US KNOW WHICH ONES AND WE WILL LOOK INTO GETTING THEM IN FOR YOU!

It’s all a little …geeky.

Remember when you were in pri-mary school and your mum made you wear plimsolls and those dreaded frilly socks because she thought you looked just “adorable”, and remember boys those shiny shoes, white socks and trousers that were just that bit too short for you. Well who ever thought

that the geeky, preppy look would ever be cool, and who thought we would be spending money on those items we had once begged mummy dearest not to make us wear. Well, now its all about being preppy, geeky and get this... original. Yes, being original is something that everyone is doing but it ‘s never easy.

Meet Simon. (Cardigan- Charity shop. Rest of the

items- Topman.) This handsome, quirky and eccentric

character from Norfolk takes pride in what we wears, don’t we wish all boys did! And yes, those geek glasses really are prescription glasses!

So Simon I can see you go for the whole Indie thing, am I right?

Yeah,I try to adhere to as many ste-reotypes of that culture as possible.

What shop will I see you spending all your student loan in?

Definitely Topman. It’s not like I don’t TRY other stores, but when I do I just feel dirty and go back to Topman.

Any fashion advice for your fel-low fashionable guys?

No matter what people might say, skinny jeans are still cool.

Meet Lolade(3D flower mesh jumper- Ameri-

can Apparel. High waisted legging and studded belt- H&M. Suede Taupe shoes-ASOS.)

This sassy, sweet and just dam right cute London girl loves to shop, who wouldn’t with Oxford street right round the corner!

Right, so how exactly would you describe your style?

Definitely smart casual with a sexy girlie twist, I’m a brogue kind of girl and love the colour tan, so really I tend to look like an old granddad at times ha-ha, but that works for me.

Have you got a icon or something

that inspires you?Well I wouldn’t say I have an icon of

some sort but someone I do love is Ol-ivia Palermo, she puts things togeth-er so well. Although I get more in-spiration off the streets, I like see-ing people and what they’ve done and what they’ve put together.

Tell us something about yourself, an-ything?

Here’s something funny to re-member me by, if you ever see an old black man with high waisted leg-gings and brogues, its most prob-ably me in-disguise. So watch out! “Fashion is made to

become unfashionable.” - Coco Chanel.

By Lucinda Rodrigues.

SIMON

LOLADE

For a fast paced girl

Girls, we all know appearance is the key to success and first im-pressions are important. Now we are half way through the se-mester, do we still have to care as much? This isn’t Gossip Girl.

I have some tips that can make looking good easier without rushing to get to a lecture, for those who don’t have time to get ready. But those who party hard and have early classes, there is a quick way to maintain style.

Most girls take forever with hair, like straightening or curling. The messy bun is in, also the neat one as well. The option is to gel your hair into a bun very neatly at whatever height. The day has been hectic, cold and sweaty, find some hairspray or sprits go out clubbing. Reach your room, find a headband, and fall asleep. Wake up and run to your lec-ture, with one less thing to think about, a messy bun. This style can be done without re-gelling for like 4 days.

Nail polish can make you seemed more groomed than ac-tually doing your make-up, espe-cially with colours like browns, camel and coral reds. Barry M has created a special addition nail af-

fect polish that gives tyre track look on your nails, which is edgy.

Lipstick has always been an old fashioned ‘Marilyn Monroe’ actress for voluptuous glamour. But it has become accessible for every day. But the thing is if you choose red and pinks make sure you know your skin colour. If your dark skinned do not choose the brightest pink, pale skinned don’t choose the brightest red. Lipstick can be all the make-up you need, or buy colour stain for lip, cheeks and eye shadow. It is simple to apply, even without a mirror or the back of a lecture.

Try to plan an outfit from the night before and make sure your bag is packed with the right books. Worse thing is to have the wrong books. If you don’t really change your bag, make sure you buy a black leather bag. It goes with everything!

Clothing is the most impor-tant thing. Remember university is not necessarily a fashion show, but do what you wish. The look this winter is what I describe as Farmer John’s ex-wife on a mo-torbike (she can’t let go on the past but the futures fun.) It easy to put together and when you go home rummage through par-ents’ old clothes. This is easy to make look cool again like Burber-ry, Prada and Paul & Joe. Knitted kitty jumpers regarded as cute now, but please don’t look like Ugly Betty!

And this is not recommend-ed but if everything fails but on a big coat and some wellies. Let’s hope we don’t get to that stage but wake up early and get ready faster ladies.

By Ariel McPherson

15Are women like apples on trees?

Women are like apples on trees. The best ones are at the top of the tree. Most men don’t want to reach for the good ones because they are afraid of falling and getting hurt. In-stead, they just take the rotten apples from the ground that aren’t as good, but easy…….so, the apples at the top think something is wrong with them, when in reality, they’re AMAZING. They just have to wait for the right guy to come along, the one who’s brave enough to climb all the way to the top of the tree.”

This was sent to me today from a friend via BBM. I love ide-ologies as they

make you think and wonder. I thought I’d take this one and annotate it as I disagree with bits of it as it sets up false hope for women who gener-ally don’t have their “ish” to-gether they will look at this and think that this must me the answer as to why they’re lonely or broken hearted.

“Women are like apples on trees. The best ones are at the top of the tree.”

I like the analogy given be-tween apples and women as

it’s a symbol used to represent us, however the second sen-tence isn’t really correct. The best apples are not always at the top of the tree, they’re just like any other apple on the tree. You can find clammy and mouldy apples anywhere on a tree branch.

“Most men don’t want to reach for the good ones be-cause they are afraid of falling and getting hurt. . Instead, they just take the rotten apples from the ground that aren’t as good, but easy”

Now this is where I disa-gree. We all know men enjoy the chase women give them and know they’re prone to being stubborn and going af-ter what they can’t have. The metaphor for this is supposed to be that the women who are

hard to get are at the top and the easier girls are at the bot-tom. So for men getting hurt in my opinion is slightly false. Men never really hurt as much as we do, that’s just general-ly due to the fact women car-ry more emotions, men can pluck another apple it’s that easy for them.

“So, the apples at the top think something is wrong with them, when in reality, they’re AMAZING. They just have to wait for the right guy to come along, the one who’s brave enough to climb all the way to the top of the tree”

Once again the metaphor for this is supposed to be

that the “apples” at the top are more valuable so men are supposed to work harder. WRONG. Women who count themselves as being at the top of a tree are already out of their mind. Yes I believe every woman is special and should be treated with respect, if it were up to me no woman’s heart would ever break. But claiming to be at the top of this tree to me makes you sound self-centred. Eventu-ally, stuck up women will get tired of being lonely and date the next Tom, Dick or Harry which lowers their self-worth. No man wants to be with a self-centred, conceited girl who thinks she’s better than everybody. They want to be with an apple that adds more to their life and keeps them fruitful.

By Dami Oloni

TAXIGALAXY

TOWNHALL

What is the greatest sport on earth?Every now and then a fight

breaks out down at the pub, lines are drawn, challenges leveled and, with any luck, somebody walks out with very few blood stains. All over a seemingly innocent dis-cussion: What is the greatest sport on earth?

Some say “rugby”. Some say “baseball”. Canadians say “hockey”. The rest of the world says “football”. (Actually, some say “soccer”, too...but they mean “football”.)

I say: “kissing”. Yes, kissing is the greatest sport on earth. Allow me to explain just a few of the reasons.

Kissing is the most versa-tile sport around. There are so many types of kisses to choose from – at least one for just about every occasion.

There is the quick peck on the cheek kiss, the peck on each cheek kiss, the peck on your nephew’s cheek kiss while grabbing the other cheek flab with your hand, the wildly passionate kiss, even the ele-gant kiss on the hand.

Kissing is easy to transport. It really doesn’t matter where you are. You can kiss: at the gym, in the boardroom, in the space shuttle, even in the lecture halls from September through to June (bonus points for Summer kisses).

Kissing requires so little equipment, which means you can do it even when not pre-pared for the occasion, and even when you have to trav-el light. This makes it the ide-al participation sport for busi-nessmen, world travelers and

band groupies.Kissing always livens things

up. Try this: the next time you are in an oh-so-booooring lec-ture that seems to last oh-so-foreeeeever, why not just kiss somebody. Go ahead; try it. See how it livens things up?

Kissing is legal in most mainstream countries. Ru-mours are circulating that kissing will even be legalised soon on Mars, Jupiter and in Afghanistan.

Kissing is 100% biodegrad-able, so when you kiss some-body, you help the environ-ment.

Kissing is non toxic...un-less you kiss somebody who has just swallowed a bottle of poison. Even so, kissing is still safe, as long as you do not use your mouth.

Kissing is non-fattening. This is perhaps the best news of all, because dieters now have something to keep their mouths busy while not eating, and smokers can quit smok-ing without having to chew sweets until they:

a) need to diet orb) induce diabetes. You can kiss just about eve-

ryone: your girlfriend, wife, aunt, your veterinarian, the Prime Minister and your pet puppy. Don’t try kissing them all at the same time, though...especially not your girlfriend and your wife.

Finally, most kisses are not tested on animals, but who am I to reduce your sense of adventure?

By James Spiro

Students’ CornerBThe

VISUAL CORTEX Vs POSTERIOR PARIETAL CORTEX!

My gut-response to this ques-tion was really ladies, really? Haven’t women come so far? Slightly feminist and with a strong belief in the power of in-dependent women I found my-self asking: Should a guy actu-ally HAVE to notice a change in you for the change to be val-id? Should he really have to say “Hey babe your hair looks so good” when you cut it or dye it for you to feel completely fabu-lous or should he really have to say “Wow, you’re so sexy” when you’ve lost a bit of weight and try on your favourite figure-hug-ging jeans.

Really girls, really? In this day and age when women are run-ning for President, doing re-search to provide a cure for can-cer and helping to solve politi-cal affairs of the world should it really matter if one guy doesn’t notice that you’ve changed your nails from natural beige to fire red or that the highlights in your hair that were once a cop-per brown now shine a shimmer gold? Should a guy really be that important? Should his opinion really matter so much? And then it hit me! KABLOOM! The ques-tion said ‘If YOUR guy doesn’t notice’ and let me tell you this opened up a whole new realm of thoughts in my mind. ‘YOUR guy doesn’t mean the builder who wolf-whistled at you while

you walked past in that mini-skirt, neither is ‘YOUR’ guy the random hot man who smiled at you on the bus whilst your ap-plied your favourite strawberry lip gloss, oh no!

This is ‘YOUR’ guy! The most important guy, the one you possibly love, the one you think about 80% of the time, the one you call your boo, the Romeo to your Juliet! And let me tell you, this revelation turned my posi-tion completely around. I found myself proclaiming “How the heck can a guy who calls him-self your boyfriend not notice the changes that you make to your appearance regardless of how small?” Furious at all males, memories one by one floated back to me of the count-less stories I had heard from my sixth form friends with boy-friends who had slightly altered their appearances only to have the changes go completely un-noticed by their supposed ‘boy-friends.’ I actively pondered how possible it was that a guy could be so clueless.

The memory of what my friends had experienced even triggered a little personal en-counter of my very own: The first time I had my eyebrows thread-ed. I distinctly remember the feeling of joy as I walked into the house and heard my mum say “Aww Vicky your face looks so framed and pretty” and the

thrill I experienced when my lit-tle sister told me that she loved the arch. Unfortunately my hap-py mood dispersed quite a bit when my wonderful dad came home that day. I remember the excitement I experienced wait-ing for him, the way I flung open the door, ready for my compli-ment and found myself instead greeted with “Erm, your face looks a bit different ” Wow, I was pretty pooped for the rest of the day.

So I tell you, it seems that it’s not just boyfriends who don’t notice changes in appearance – It’s men in general! However from talking to a few guys and girls about their take on the is-sue it seems universal according to the opinions of both males and females that guys usual-ly are pretty oblivious to small changes, really only noticing the blatant visual ones. Delv-ing deeper into the issue my an-ger was slightly subsided as I re-alised that it seems that women cannot really blame men for not being very observant. It seems that the answer to the question of ‘Should men notice changes in their partners’ comes down to the age old ‘MEN ARE FROM MARS, WOMEN ARE FROM VE-NUS’ excuse – only this time sci-ence backs it up. Through vari-ous experiments conducted by researchers and scientists Helen Fisher, Lucy Brown and Arthur Aron it has been shown from their results that there are ’ pre-liminary brain differences be-tween men and women in love.’

It actually turns out that whilst men in love show activity in the visual cortex (the part of the brain involved in picking up strong visual cues), women in love display more activity in the posterior parietal cortex (the re-gion of the brain thought to be related to attention, detail and consciousness.)

So there you have it ladies – short, simple and scientific. Like most things it ‘Isn’t his fault” but rather “Just how his brain works”. Ugh, sad times! Just try to re-member this facet of knowledge the next time you create a flick with your liquid eyeliner and he doesn’t notice the difference in how sexy it makes your eyes look or when you start using a bronzer to create definition on your face and he does not com-ment on your new ‘glow.’ Just keep in mind that the next time you see your female friends that they are more likely to no-tice. Saying all of this however, make sure that you do not let him off that easily, after all the research did conclude that men notice strong visual cues. With this in mind the next time you see him and have made a dras-tic change to your physical ap-pearance be prepared girlies to receive a huge compliment, in fact if it doesn’t come be pre-pared to tell him to ‘kick rocks’ because everyone knows that Percy Sledge was not telling a fib when he sung “When a man loves a woman, can’t keep his mind on nothin’ else”

By Victoria Bolaji

IF YOUR GUY DOESN’T NOTICE A CHANGE IN YOU, IS HE STILL INTERESTED?

Could settling for sex mean settling for less?No strings attached.

Sometimes both genders are often found in relationships with no strings attached a part from sex. This means no phone calls unless it’s the time and place. No personal conversations, no dating, etc.

I personally believe that settling for sex out-side a relationship meant settling for less. I once believed that it was possible for females to do this and not get emotionally wrapped up unlike men.

As females, some of us like to tell ourselves that having a sexual relationship without label-ling it is fine. If men can, so can we. But are you really satisfied when it’s just that? What if feel-ings develop? Are you breaking an unwritten contract? Or are you trying to seal for a better deal?

Could settling for sex just be the fear of get-ting into another relationship of where you’re valued and actually fall in love. Admittedly writ-ing this was inspired by late nights of Sex and the City and I remembered a scene where Car-rie said

“I am someone who is looking for love. Real love. Ridiculous, inconvenient, consuming, can’t-live-without-each-other love..”

It was a scary quote, but the difference be-tween the character and us is she could admit it where as some of us are clouded by fear. What woman doesn’t want this? Can you honestly sit there and say you’d pass this offer up?

I guess you could say men take advantage of the situation due to the fact that they can. They’re not looked down on simply because they look like they have “hoes in different area codes” whereas the girl looks promiscuous. Sadly, most women think that the casual sex could indeed turn into a relationship, but why would it? You’ve already settled for less, why ex-pect more?

By Dami Oloni

17

Luton’s Premier Body Piercer

and Tattooist for 15 years

facebook.com/terrapintattoos

£10 OFF£5 OFF

tattoosover £50*

all bodypiercing**

* tattoos must be booked in advance to receive discount, deposit required, subject to terms and conditions** offer applies to all body piercings (excluding ear piercing) over £25, subject to terms and conditions

Terrapin Tattoos & Body Piercing61 Market Hall, Luton, LU1 2TA

01582 877 117www.terra-pin.co.uk

I know what you did last night… Do you?

by James Spiro

Nights at uni are never the same. I learnt this last night as I experi-enced things I can safely say i’ve never had to deal with. It is impor-tant to remember that throughout this night I WAS VERY DRUNK.

12:30am - We found a shopping trolly. This seemed like a great op-portunity to have fun and push each other around. Upon meeting more strangers, we took it in turns

to see how far the boys can push the girls.

12:34am - One of the boys has pushed the girls into the grass and she flies out the trolly. As it was dark outside, all we saw was her yellow glow stick fall to the ground, followed by the sound of a moan. She’d hit her head on the brick wall.

12:48am - She’s ok, it’s her friend that we’re now concerned about. She has mixed weed and drink and that is something that every-one knows should never be done. She can’t move the left side of her body and can’t remember who she is. I lift her up and take her to her room, on the top floor. I have no idea who she is or where she lives, but I try to help her.

1:09am - We successfully lift-ed her up the stairs, but we lost a toenail along the way. The first girl (‘trolly-gash’, we called her) had stubbed her toe and it was now poking up with blood pouring down her foot and on to the kitch-en floor.

1:13am - Girl number two is now in the safety position. Thanks to my certificate in first aid I placed her

on her bed and gave her some wa-ter. Back in the Kitchen, the blood is spreading around the place. The boy that has helped me lift the girl up is telling trolley-gash to place her thumb on her toe and press the nail back onto the emp-ty patch. This was simply too much: the sight of blood and moans in a random flat with strangers was not exactly what i signed on for.

“I have no idea who she is or where she lives, but I try to help her”.

1:20am - Back to my front door, i see my neighbour in his boxers ly-ing outside, in a pool of his vom-it. He couldn’t find his keys and

thought he was already in bed. I avoid the vomit and help him into bed. I tell him to drink a litre of wa-ter and that it would help with the hangover. After doing that, he gets up to vomit up the liquid i told him to drink. Time to leave, I decided.

1:31am - As I walk out, my other neighbour asks me what was out-side, as she had slipped and fell in it. I told her I didn’t know.

1:55am - With blood, toenails and vomit on my mind, I decided I needed to take my mind off eve-rything. As well as another drink, I made some toasties and pancakes.

They say uni is the best time of your life. If it’s anything like last night, I’d be happy just to get to my next birthday...

STUDY, SOCIALISE… BUT DON’T FORGET TO VOTE FOR X FACTOR?

The time is 7:28. The pizza has been ordered and everyone has taken their seats. Suddenly the music starts; loud booming that echoes throughout the house. A big blue stage reveals Der-mot O’Leary, who tells me that my Saturday night ‘begins right here!’

It was only a matter of time be-fore I blogged about the X Fac-tor. With around 15 million view-ers a week, it is probably the top-ic that concerns most of you. Af-ter weeks of analysis, and years of watching, I have finally made up my mind about what I think of it. Here it goes...

The Auditions:This is when the Judges are

seen at their best. The dramatised performances from the wan-nabe contestants start off the show. Here, they are so bad that it is ok for the judges to be mean and undermining. We see them laugh, and we side with them. Then, someone average comes along. This is where our views of them are compromised. Some judges say ‘yes’ and some ‘no’. Our love of them is questioned: why did they put them through? Why didn’t they? As soon as we question their decision, some-one amazing comes along. This is usually at the end of the show. Yes, their performance is great, and we can slowly see the twin-kle of cash in Simon’s eye. They all say yes to the contestant, as Simon turns and says ‘2004 yes-es’. The whole time, the produc-ers are editing the show to make the judges seen as these all-pow-erful and all-knowable gods that are among us mere mortals to tell us what true talent is.

The Live Shows:This is where the Panto peaks.

Dermot introduces the judges (who will enter the stage from rising in on a platform) to over-dramatic music that empha-sises how important they are. Throughout the show, the final-ists are subjected to performing with dyed red hair, motorcycles and dancing gymnasts. Then, they stand whilst the judges give their two pence on the per-formance. Most of the time, it is contrived and forced - a karaoke performance filled with enough gimmicks to outshine their actu-al vocal abilities.

Once upon a time, there was a show. It was honest, heart-filled, and cared about the success of its contestants. Over the last few years, that show has been mo-lested and morally raped - turned into a show of skillful editing and glamourised pub singers. Does Simon (or Louis, for that matter) think that Wagner We-can’t-pro-nounce-his-surname-so-we’ll-just-ignore-it can sell 1 million records? Of course not, but they kept him in the show as a re-placement to last years’ Jedward.

Perhaps the biggest curse of all is the one that prevents us from being able to turn our TVs off. I will be watching, criticizing, and admiring the true talent in the competition - Ms Mary Byrne.

By James Spiro

WelfareBThe

A DRINK TOO FAR??DID YOU KNOW THAT NEARLY HALF OF ALL VIOLENT INCIDENTS ARE ALCOHOL RELATED?

By Paula Mayes

Or that 80% of alcohol related deaths are caused by the short term use or consequences of drinking too much? Or that over 10% of the pop-ulation will suffer from an alcohol re-lated mental health problem?

Drinking alcohol can often be harmless and we understand that it is an enjoyable part of your student experience. We are not trying to dis-courage sensible responsible drink-ing; neither are we trying to be kill-joys and party poopers. But some-times a night out can have serious consequences.

UBSU has a duty of care towards you, our students, and it is therefore important that we raise the issue of alcohol awareness. We just want to get you thinking about it, and provide you with the information you need to make sensible choic-es. Drinking too much, for example, could lead you to take unnecessary risks with your personal safety, like taking an unlicensed taxi, walking home alone, having unprotected sex with someone or getting into fights. It also makes you much more likely to become a victim of crime.

Drinking too much can also have serious consequences for your stud-

ies and future careers. Making poor choices when you have A Drink too far?? may impact on the rest of your life. It could mean suspension or ter-mination of your studies (if you se-riously breach the Student Code of Conduct), a criminal caution or con-viction preventing further study or placements. You will find it difficult to get on your placements and PGCE courses with a caution or convic-tion for assault, drink driving or be-ing drunk and disorderly. Be mind-ful of the fact that exposing parts of your body which are not normal-ly on public display (yes…you know what we meanand it includes moon-

ing amongst other things!) could re-sult in you being arrested for public decency offences.

Turning up late to lectures be-cause of hangovers won’t help your studies either.

For some of you, student life wouldn’t be student life without the drinking and the partying, but to make the most out of your student experience isn’t it worth at least bal-ancing the benefits and risks? So re-member why you are at uni. Have a beer but remember your career and don’t let one night out ruin all of that.

Getting repairs done in your private accommodation

Problems with accommodation can be very stressful for you and we want to make sure you know your rights and have access to help and ad-vice if something goes wrong in your home. The landlord has certain responsibilities to you as a ten-ant and you have responsibilities too.

The landlord has responsibility for:• the structure and exterior (incl. drains, gutters and external pipes)

• the installations for the supply of gas, water and electricity and for sanitation

• installations for main heating and hot water supply

• if the Landlord provides a service or item, they should ensure it works (e.g. a washing machine) and is safe to use As a tenant, you are expected to:• Take care of the property• Ensure the fixtures and fittings are not damaged• Carry out minor repairs such as replacing light bulbs• Pay the utility bills unless it says in your tenancy agreement that the landlord is doing this

Getting repairs done

You should inform your Landlord in writing of any problems and keep a dated copy of your letter. Keep a note of any visits or telephone calls. Once you have informed your Landlord of a prob-lem:• allow the Landlord time to carry out the work• ask for a date when the work will be finished• allow the Landlord access to the property.

You should allow up to:• 21 days for non urgent repairs (e.g. broken gutter)

• 1-2 days for urgent repairs (e.g. broken toilet). It would be useful to:• take photos of the disrepair • get independent witnesses to write a statement about the disrepair, sign it and date it

• keep receipts for damaged property, excessive heating etc• obtain medical evidence from a GP/ counsellor/ social worker that the disrepair aggravated your physical/ mental health.

If the Landlord won’t act • Do not stop paying your rent. This is a very risky tactic as, unless a set procedure is followed, you could face court action for rent arrears. You do not have a legal right to withhold your rent because of disrepair. • Do not do the repairs yourself and try to claim the money back.

Contact your local council The council has extensive powers under the Hous-ing Act 2004, which can force a Landlord to carry out repairs. They can serve a notice on the Land-lord which: • specifies the work to be done• gives a deadline for the completion of the work.

If the Landlord fails to comply, the council can ap-ply for a court order and a fine for the Landlord. If the work is still not carried out, the council may do the repairs and then claim the costs back.

You could be entitled to apply for compensation for disrepair through the small claims court. Seek advice before doing this.

Please contact the Students’ Union Welfare and Advice Service for further help. We are located in the new Campus Centre at Luton and in the UBSU offic-es at Bedford.

Luton Borough Council (ask for Private Sector Housing)

01582 546000

Bedford Borough Council (as above)01234 221 797

South Beds District Council (as above)01582 472222

Mid Beds District Council (as above)01462 611200

By Louse Tadiar

UBSU & Luton Safer Neighbourhood

UBSU are pleased to tell you that Luton Safer Neighbourhood Team from Bedford-shire Police are running FREE personal safety awareness drop-in sessions on Thursday af-ternoons 1-2.30pm in the Mezzanine Cafe/Bar at the Students Union in the Campus Centre, Luton.

As well as being given advice on person-al safety there will be FREE property-marking sessions and mobile phone immobilisation.

A FREE personal alarm will be given to the first 50 students who come along and there will be alcotops available. Please come along and help us to help you stay safe.

If you are at the Bedford Campus, please contact [email protected] to find out when sessions are available there.

Louise Tadiar, UBSU Welfare and Advice Service

19Moving in Top Tips

….info from the UBSU Happy Housing project.

GAS, ELECTRIC AND WATER Inform the gas, electric and water suppliers you have moved in and give them meter readings so they know that any previous debt is not yours. If you are sharing have the bills put in joint names or you may find yourself with a big bill in your name and others refusing to pay

COUNCIL TAX Get a Council Tax Exemption Certificate from SID if you are a fulltime student and give a copy to your landlord, a copy to your local council and keep a copy

for your records

TENACY AGREEMENT Make sure you have read and understood your tenancy agreement. If there’s something you don’t understand or which seems unfair, get some advice

YOUR ADDRESS IS VITAL Make sure you give the University your address and full contact details or you may miss out on vital information

CHECK APPLIANCES Ask your landlord or agent for a Gas Safety Certificate. There is a legal obligation for the landlord to get gas appliances professionally checked every 12 months. If they don’t have one insist that they get it done

INVENTORY LIST Make an inventory as soon as you can and list everything that is dirty or broken. Put as much detail into this as possible and ask the landlord or agent to come and sign it

BACK IT UP IN WRITING If something goes wrong in your home like the heating breaks or the loo won’t flush, notify your landlord or agent immediately by phone and back it up in writing. That way they can’t say you didn’t tell them

CAREFUL, CAREFUL! Make sure you keep your home well ventilated by opening a window when you shower or cook and be careful about leaving lots of soaking washing on radiators. Condensation can cause mould and if you are the one helping to cause it you could end up losing some of your deposit

KEEP IT CLEAN Draw up a cleaning rota with your housemates and stick to it. Arguments about things like dirty bathrooms are avoidable but can escalate and cause stress for students who are sharing a house

If you have any problems or questions about housing you can contact:

We may need to refer you on but only to other professional organisations when we are unable to give specialist advice.

By Louise Tadiar

Money MattersAre you counting pennies…?

Most university students en-counter money problems at some point during their student life. Liv-ing independently on your own for the first time in your life can be very exciting and liberating, but it can also be challenging and stress-ful if you run into money problems. If you have never been in charge of your finances without your parents policing you, it can be very tempt-ing to spend your student loan on things that you want rather than need.

Help is at Hand! The Students’ Un-ion Advice Centre is running a year long project this year focused on Money Matters. This project will con-centrate on financial issues that stu-dents come across during their stu-dent life. This includes student fi-nance; help with budgeting, max-imizing your income, dealing with student debt and negotiation with creditors.

We work in partnership with a number of local agencies offering debt advice where we can refer stu-dents who need specialist support.

The best way to avoid money problems is to work out your budg-et using an income and expendi-ture sheet and stick to it. The basis of the budget sheet is that you add all your income and then subtract all your essential expenditure. This will then give you your available in-come which is your spending money after paying for your bills and food. You can download a budget sheet from www.nationaldebtline.co.uk or you can come to the Students’ Union to get a copy. You can also come to speak to us if you need guidance on working out your budget and useful tips on budgeting.

If you do run into money prob-lems, ignoring it is not the answer. Come to see us at the Advice Cen-tre for budgeting and money advice.

Watch this space for upcoming events and focused workshops on money matters.

BUDGETING TIPS:A large proportion of everyone’s

budget is food shopping. So here are some tips on how to save money on food shopping.

• Set yourself a food budget and stick to it, the best way to do this is to use a calculator on your phone and add it up as you put things in your basket

• Make a weekly shop rather than picking up bits when you are hungry

• Don’t just buy ingredients, plan your meals and then buy what you need to make them

• It is often cheaper to buy loose fruit and veg than the pre-packed ones (and more environmentally friendly)

• Do not go shopping hungry you will end up buying things you do not need

You can find more budgeting tips on www.martinlewis.co.uk/students

Below is one of my favourite recipes which is tasty, quick and very budget friendly. Hope you like it.

Budget Recipe: Tuna PastaReady in 15 minutes

Ingredients:Pasta of your choiceCan of tuna either in brine or oil1 Onion choppedKetchup OilSalt and pepper to season

Optional:1 clove of Garlic puréed or chopped

small Mixed herbs

Cook the pasta as per directions on the bag. Use as much pasta as you need depending on how many people you want to cater for. 1 can of tuna makes enough sauce for 2 generous servings.

While the pasta is cooking, heat oil on frying pan, add onions and fry for couple of minutes until golden. Add can of tuna including contents (brine/oil) and fry for a couple of minutes un-til it is well mixed with the onions. Add garlic and enough ketchup to make a smooth mixture and fry for another couple of minutes. Add salt and pep-per to taste and mix well with pasta ready to serve.

By Evi Earle

Careful where you park your trolly!

Students who are parking their cars on the residen-tial areas around the Polhill

campus at the University of Bed-fordshire should be aware that dis-content from local residents has

resulted in police ticketing cars in these areas. The standard parking penalty charge issued in Bedford is between £50-£70.

The UBSU will be looking into this matter and consulting with lo-cal community police officers about how such fines are being enforced.

Parking on the residential roads can result in restricted access for the local residents, it can cause difficul-ties to members of the public using mobility scooters or pushchairs and can also restrict the access of refuse lorries.

So to avoid being given £50-£70 parking fines we would urge you to consider using the pay and display parking available at the Polhill Uni-versity campus.

It has been brought to the atten-tion of the UBSU that some stu-dents are bringing their shop-

ping back to campus (or their private accommodation) using supermarket shopping trolleys, and then failing to return them. Local residents have been complaining to the university and to local supermarkets about this.

Not only is it unsightly and makes

the local area look bad, it is poten-tially dangerous, for example: if abandoned trolleys end up in the road they could cause traffic acci-dents. Such behaviour reflects badly on you as students and the Universi-ty. Please be mindful of this, and be responsible by returning any ‘bor-rowed’ shopping trolleys to the su-permarkets they came from. It is also worth remembering for future shop-ping trips that supermarket trolleys are not allowed to be removed from supermarket premises.

By Paula Mayes

Student ActivitiesBThe 23

LGBT SOCIETYAfter last years attempt at starting up the LGBT

society, we were looking to hit the ground hard with the first event of the year. To most,

a quiz night isn’t the most exciting event in the world but it garnered more attention than expected. The prize of £20 brought in interest from students all over the university, and a challenge had been issued that if over 40 people attended, the prize would be raised to £30. There weren’t as many attendees as this, but we were still delighted with the turnout that we got. Mixed in with the quiz event we had the arrival of a ka-raoke set up too, although originally we were operat-ing the quiz separately to the karaoke night in the new SU bar, the lovely hostess Paula K. kindly incorporat-

ed the quiz into her event. The blend of quiz and kara-oke really made the night memorable for a lot of peo-ple, and we are indebted to the SU team who helped make this happen. The night was an overall success and we’re looking into more for this term and next too. We’re next taking part in RAG week by attending the Pink party at Legends, hope to see you there! e-mail: [email protected]

By Ben Cottee

AFRICAN CARIBBEAN SOCIETY

Welcome to the new Universi-ty of Bedfordshire African Carib-bean Society (ACS). Our mission is to bring students together who have a common interest in African & Caribbean culture while making the whole experience beneficial to them. The ACS plan and organise social events such as; parties, fash-ion shows and show cases to enter-tain the students at our University, but also to allow the students to

show case their skills and gain val-uable work experience. For every event that we organize, it creates an opportunity for our future cam-eramen, photographers, graphic designers, event managers etc... to practice their skills and build their CV/portfolios. This year we want to be a loud voice for our members, and get their concerns and prob-lems across to the relevant people in the University. We would like to help our members with problems in accommodation, tuition fees, BREO and coursework deadlines, and we would like to hear any sug-gestions of what the university can do to improve the welfare of their students. We have a new and enthusiastic committee dedicated to the or-ganisation and execution of any-thing the ACS are doing. Your com-mittee members are: Tomi Adenle

(President), Aderayo Owoade (Vice President), Yinka Ayinde (Commu-nications), Melisa Lennon (Treasur-er), Nicholette Quartey (Secretary), Moyosore Oni (Sports), Jardine Mu-hammad (Media).

Special points of interest: Sign up for the street team is

available. African Caribbean come dine

with me auditions soon to come. ACS football team coming

soon Student forum (to address con-

cerns), details will be out soon.

C U at the CU?Getting involved with the Christian Union Socierty.

Hi first years! Hopefully you’ve all had the chance to settle down in this uni now. And second and third years, I trust you’ve gotten back to grips with this new routine we’ve had to learn? I sure have.

Anyhow, this is just an invitation from the Christian Union, Luton cam-pus. But who are we, you may ask? The Christian Union, or CU as it’s more commonly known is a society, it is probably one of the only societies who’s main priority is it’s non-mem-bers (yes, you read that correctly). Yes, we exist as a society to be a place where students who are already Chris-tians (of ANY denomination) can find friendship, acceptance and of course teaching from the Bible to help us live life as a Christian at uni, we will also help you to share your faith with oth-ers, BUT our main goal is to be a pos-itive influence to this uni by showing God’s love to our fellow students who don’t necessarily share our faith. Our slogan, if you will, is ‘Live for Jesus, speak for Jesus’ which is a good sum-

mary of our lifestyle.Come along, you DON’T have to be

a Christian to attend the CU, (yes, you read that correctly too) you can come along just to see what we’re like and how we tick. Feel free to ask any ques-tions or queries you may have about Christianity or Christians and we’ll do our best to answer them. If you come, expect to be welcomed, accepted for who you are and expect to have fun!

We meet every Tuesday evening at 7:20- 9:00 in room A420, Park Square. Feel free to drop by when you like, we’re open to everyone. So, I guess one day I’ll C U at the CU!

By Michael Everett (President)

Promised Destiny Gospel ChoirBy Chioma Anichebe

Do you want to improve your vocal skills, gain confidence whilst making a lot of new friends who love to do what you do? Then PROMISED DESTINY GOSPEL CHOIR is the place for you!

‘Promised Destiny’ is the University’s first Gospel choir, looking to bring forth change through music. We hope to show people the diversity in gospel music, singing a wide variety of styles from R’n’B to Indie Rock, yet keep-ing the message the same. Not only are we singing, but there will be guest teachers who work in the music in-dustry and chances to do song writing and private singing lessons. You do not need to be the best singer in the world, just ready to learn. To find out more contact: Chioma at [email protected]

RSSGThe Research Student Support

Group (RSSG) would like to invite any Post-Graduate Researchers to enrol on the RSSG BREO site.

Students can enrol on BREO by browsing the Organisation Catalogue available from the BREO Gateway, and searching ‘RSSG’.

The RSSG provides a forum for dis-cussion of academic, social and admin-istrative issues relating to research stu-dents.

Main duties include:1. Contribute to the research culture

of the University.2. To ensure representation at the

University Research Committee (URC).

3. Provide the University with infor-mation about research students’ needs.

4. Report back to members informa-tion from the University about its re-search environment.

5. To provide direct contact and sup-port for all research students across the University’s institutions and physical lo-cations.

6. Organise social events such as lunches and film nights.

7. Provide help for students with their academic work, such as sharing work-ing methods, sources of information and useful tools, through seminars, dis-cussion lists or email.

8. To provide informal help with Uni-versity and RGS administrative issues.

9. Provide informal help with settling into the University or the UK.

10. Provide contact with other re-searchers who may be able to help.

The RSSG Committee

SOCIETIES HIT THE GROUND RUNNINGOur Societies here at UBSU have got off to

a busy start in this new academic year. There are many societies that you can join, and if you want to start up your own, we can help you do that too! Here is what they have been up to so far:

BEDFORDOn the Bedford Campus, the Film Society

have been busy planning a Tarantino Night and a ‘Pants & Potter’ night during November. The Christian Union have been meeting week-ly and have so far been giving cheese toasties out during Freshers Week, they held an open mic night, they organised a speed-meeting and games night, and they also have a night of praise fellowship and music planned in De-

cember. The Islamic Society has been finding a new

treasurer and they are now planning to hold an information stall to recruit new members to the society. The Theatre Society have been already busy and are planning weekly meet-ings throughout November.

By Robert Searle

LUTONOn the Luton Campus our societies have

also been busy – and a number of new socie-ties have been created! Here is an update:

The Law Society are always one of our businest societies and this month has been no different as they are planning a Law Di-

versity Ball – and everyone is invited (contact UBSU for more details!). Our LGBT Society or-ganised a very fun and successful quiz and karaoke night in our new Mezzanine Café/Bar which was very popular. The Think Peace so-ciety has already had an interfaith trip to a lo-cal Jewish Synagogue and other events which aim to build relationships between people of all faiths and non faiths. Future trips to a Hindu Temple and Sikh Gurdwara are being planned. The RaG Society has raised over £300 already by hosting events including a comedy night and a Pink Party. Movember is also underway (where people grow a moustache for money!) and all proceeds will go to charity. Our Anime & Manga Society has been to an Expo in Lon-don where they had a great time, and a future screening is being planned. Our Greek & Cyp-

riot Society have organised a trip to Warwick Castle and have planned a party night too! The Christian Union has been meeting regularly and are organising a Christmas event, and our Chinese Society (CSSA) have also been busy rehearsing for the Spring Festival.

By Cherrelle Emanuel

We are always looking for new members to join our student groups, so visit www.ubsu.co.uk/studentactivities to see what you could get involved in! On the Bedford Campus please email [email protected] and on the Luton Campus please email [email protected]. Alternatively, come into your UBSU to see us!

21

Think Peace! What, Why and How?Think Peace Society is a new and growing society at the

UoB. This society was created by a group of very dedicat-ed individuals who thought and still think that there is a great need in the UoB for more integration between peo-ple from different backgrounds. Our aim is to get people talking, get them together and hopefully get them to be-come friends. We intend to do this by being active with-in the Luton community thereby benefiting the people and environment around us. We will attempt to promote understanding and tolerance between different groups through dialogue and discussion.

We hope to learn about the ‘art’ of peace-making and then teach it to others. In this respect, we plan on invit-

ing trainers to provide workshops for Think Peace Society members. Other events include Sharing Texts, inter-faith visits to different places of worship and World Food & Cul-ture days.

During this term we have 2 inter-faith visits planned – one to a Sikh temple on 17th Nov. and the other to a Hin-du temple on 24th Nov. Everyone is welcome to partic-ipate in these visits. More visits and events will follow in the coming terms.

We operate in partnership with and support of UBSU, Treehouse, Careers and Employment Service, Grassroots and Luton Council of Faiths.

For more information please visit our Facebook group at bit.ly/thinkpeace or email us at

[email protected]

Animaybe Society? By Michael Everett

Konichiwa/Konbanwa!!!! (de-pending on when you read this)

Hey, everyone and anyone who is interested in Japanese An-ime and Manga. Feel free to join us at the Anime and Manga Soci-ety where you’ll have a nice time meeting friendly people with a similar interest in this art form. We usually chill out and have fun, while doing things anime and manga related of course, mean-ing we’ll have special events and trips for all interested.

Even if you HAVE NEVER HEARD OF ANIME AND MAN-GA come along and see what it’s about, you may find that you like-or even love- the beauty that is anime and manga.

UBSU FASHION SOCIETYBy Deimante

We are an official UBSU fashion society. We have booked work-shops on every Monday in Janu-ary as well as international fash-ion meetings with fashion grad-uates with links to fashion indus-try. The main exhibition takes place on Saturday at the end of January and March. Our mem-bers would like to hear from stu-dent models, appearal/set de-signers, motivated event man-ager and newcomers with pas-sion for fashion :)

Please contact Deimante [email protected]

BUILD YOUR SELF CONFIDENCEI am delighted to

be able to offer you, student of Universi-ty of Bedfordshire, the heartiest congratula-tions, congratulations of a second year stu-dent at the university of which you have be-come an indispensa-ble pillar and the con-gratulations of all who are convinced you did your best the previous year.

Reading my arti-cle means you have successfully entered your second or third year, which means you were a hard working student, ate your veg-etables, got home ear-ly and never missed a class. If you have al-ready dealt with ex-ams it means you have a taste of sleep-less nights, stress, food disorders and all the negative aspects that comes with it.

First year students, not let yourself draw-back by these observa-tions but instead, heed my words.

I am sure that by now, you would know all and every trick re-garding revisions, mind maps and setting

targets/goals so I will not take you through that again. Instead let me lead you to an easy exercise to improve your self image (which is crucial for you as a student and future workforce people).

First of all, think pos-itive about yourself and always be grate-ful for the things you have. Enjoy a sunny day and take walks in nature (it has scientifi-cally been proven that man needs to be close to nature in order to have balanced exist-ence).

Music develops in-tellect and nurtures self esteem (make a reasonable playlist with not too much of a negativistic language).

Make a list of all good things you have done in the past; all of those valuable deeds, projects you have worked on, people you have supported, tar-gets you have reached and happy thoughts you had; by the end of the list, you will have a balance of how good you are without even

realizing it (hide it somewhere and read it through when you have a bad day at Uni-versity or work).

Do not be afraid to take risks; not it is the perfect moment to do that; not much to lose and every success or failure it is a valua-ble experience. If you explore options dur-ing university, it will be easier for you to be more decided and con-fident by the time you graduate.

Last but not least, for God`s name, inter-act with people, com-municate, do not in-volve yourself in acts of hate and try to be as approachable as you can be; friends made in University are less likely to be friends with interests; if some-one likes you, even if it seems too good to be real, he/she likes you!

So, enjoy your Uni-versity life to the full-est; smile, laugh, ap-preciate values (staff included) make friends and do not forget to eat your vegetables.

By Georgiana Alexandra Dobocan

Dame Kelly Holmes Trust

The University of Bedfordshire Students’ Union (UBSU) is support-ing the new initiative between the Dame Kelly Holmes Legacy Trust and the University of Bedfordshire, which has pledged to raise £25,000 for the charity, in return for a Back-ing Talent event to be held in the region next year for around 100 young people and families.

UBSU has supported this by adopting the charity as one if it’s main RaG (Raise & Give) charities this year. Fundraising events have already begun, and future events

include our annual Varsity be-tween the Universities of Bedford-shire and Hertfordshire, a Three Peaks Challenge, and a sponsored ‘Kick It Out’ football match.

In addition, the University has agreed to match all funds raised by students and staff for this wor-thy cause.

Ciaran O’Brien, Student Activ-ities Manager, said: “UBSU has a great track record of supporting lo-cal and national charities. This ini-tiative will benefit so many young sports performers in our region, and I am sure that the kindness and generosity of our students and staff will go a long way to helping the University meet it’s £25,000 tar-get.”

For more information about this, or to make a donation, please con-tact [email protected] or call 01582 743930.

By Ciaran O’Brien

Street Dance Society - SDSWhether you’re a ‘club-skanker’ or ‘2-stepper’,

even if you think you ‘can’t dance’, we say that you’ll never know unless you give it a try – so come and join in on our classes! We believe that as a generation we are fascinated with the ele-ment of dance and its culture. Within this soci-ety we aim to:

• Build a community of dancers in a positive atmosphere

• Encourage all levels of dance to challenge their abilities

• Promote health and fitness and• Have fun!We will be inviting industry professionals

as guest choreographers to teach classes and we hope to have trips to annual dance events (mainly in London) throughout the year.

Keep a look out for our posters when we start our classes. Our Facebook group is:

- UoB Street Dance Society – SDSContact for details:President: AJ Bediako – [email protected]: Donna Ojera – [email protected]: Sarah Badcock – [email protected]

By Sarah Badcock

LUTON TEAM DATE OPPOSITION HOME / AWAY RESULT

Basketball Women’s 1st 27-Oct Oxford University Women’s 2nd Home L 34-47

Football Men’s 2nd 27-Oct Oxford Brookes University Men’s 3rd Home W 6-2

Football Men’s 3rd 27-Oct De Montfort University Men’s 2nd Home W 4-2

Hockey Men’s 1st 27-Oct University of Warwick Men’s 4th Home D 3-3

Rugby Men’s 1st 27-Oct University of Northampton Men’s 2nd Home W 19-0

Basketball Men’s 1st 27-Oct University of Leicester Men’s 1st Away L 51-55

Football Men’s 1st 27-Oct University of Cambridge Men’s 1st Away L 4-0

Football Men’s 4th 27-Oct University of Bedfordshire (Bedford) Men’s 4th Away L 3-2

Netball Women’s 1st 27-Oct University of Lincoln 2nd Away W 34-28

Rugby Men’s 2nd 27-Oct University of Derby (Buxton) Men’s 1st Away L 63-0

Rugby Women’s 1st 27-Oct University of Nottingham Women’s 2nd Away L 36-0

Basketball Men’s 1st 3-Nov De Montfort University Men’s 1st Home W 78-70

Football Men’s 1st 3-Nov University of East Anglia Men’s 1st Home L 3-0

Netball Women’s 1st 3-Nov University of Leicester 3rd Home W 35-28

Football Women’s 1st 3-Nov Uni of Bedfordshire (Bedford) Women’s 2nd Home W 6-2

Football Men’s 2nd 3-Nov University of Northampton Men’s 3rd Away L 2-1

Football Men’s 3rd 3-Nov University of Worcester Men’s 4th Away L 4-3

Rugby Men’s 2nd 3-Nov University of Northampton Men’s 2nd Away L 26-5

LUTON TEAM OPPOSITION HOME / AWAY

MATCH TYPE

Basketball Men’s 1st 10-Nov Cranfield University Men’s 1st Home League Match

Football Men’s 2nd 10-Nov University of Northampton Men’s 3rd Home League Match

Football Men’s 3rd 10-Nov Anglia Ruskin University (Cambridge) Men’s 1st Home League Match

Basketball Women’s 1st 10-Nov University of Leicester Women’s 1st Away League Match

Football Men’s 1st 10-Nov University of Bedfordshire (Bedford) Men’s 2nd Away League Match

Football Women’s 1st 10-Nov University of Nottingham Women’s 2nd Away League Match

Hockey Men’s 1st 10-Nov Anglia Ruskin University Men’s 1st Away League Match

Netball Women’s 1st 10-Nov Newman College 1st Away League Match

Rugby Men’s 1st 10-Nov Staffordshire University Men’s 3rd Away League Match

Rugby Women’s 1st 10-Nov University of Nottingham Women’s 2nd Away League Match

Basketball Women’s 1st 17-Nov Coventry University Women’s 1st Home League Match

Football Men’s 1st 17-Nov University of Bedfordshire (Bedford) Mens 1st Home League Match

Football Men’s 4th 17-Nov Cranfield University (Bedfordshire) Men’s 1st Home League Match

Netball Women’s 1st 17-Nov University of Bedfordshire (Bedford) 3rd Home League Match

Rugby Men’s 1st 17-Nov Aston University Men’s 2nd Home League Match

Football Men’s 2nd 17-Nov University of Worcester Men’s 5th Away League Match

Football Men’s 3rd 17-Nov University of Northampton Men’s 4th Away League Match

Hockey Men’s 1st 17-Nov Oxford Brookes University Men’s 3rd Away League Match

Hockey Women’s 1st 17-Nov Anglia Ruskin University Women’s 1st Away League Match

Rugby Men’s 2nd 17-Nov De Montfort University Men’s 2nd Away League Match

Rugby Women’s 1st 17-Nov University of Northampton Womens 1st Away League Match

Football Men’s 4th 24-Nov Staffordshire University Men’s 4th Home Cup Match

Football Women’s 1st 24-Nov Oxford Brookes University Women’s 1st Home Cup Match

Hockey Women’s 1st 24-Nov Loughborough University Women’s 4th Home Cup Match

Rugby Men’s 1st 24-Nov Oxford Brookes University Men’s 2nd Home Cup Match

Basketball Women’s 1st 24-Nov Newman College Women’s 1st Away Cup Match

Hockey Men’s 1st 24-Nov De Montfort University Men’s 1st Away Cup Match

Rugby Men’s 2nd 24-Nov University of Nottingham Men’s 5th Away Cup Match

Student ActivitiesBThe 23Student ActivitiesBThe 23SPORTS TEAMS KICK OFF !

Continued from back page

Northampton 2nd 86-75, and the Rugby Women’s (Bedford) 1st beat Warwick 1st 17-5. On the 3rd No-vember we continued our impres-sive start to the season with Foot-ball Women’s (Luton) 1st stopping the impressive start by Football Women’s (Bedford) 2nd by beating them 6-2. Basketball Men’s (Luton) 1st beat DMU 1st 78-70 in a heated match, and Netball (Luton) 1st beat Leicester 3rd 35-28. In Bedford, Bas-ketball Women’s (Bedford) 1st im-pressively beat Cambridge 1st 67-39, Football Men’s (Bedford) 3rd beat Cranfield 1st 13-1, and Tennis

Men’s (Bedford) 1st beat DMU 1st

away 12-0.

Recreational sport has also be-gun strongly. On the Bedford Cam-pus, 17 Bedford Intramural Foot-ball teams are playing this sea-son, Dodgeball and Cheerleading have already started training, and the Swim team are off to Sheffield soon to start competing. On the Lu-ton Campus, the Badminton, Tennis and Swim teams have recruited well, and a Volleyball team will be start-ing again soon.

For any student interested in play-ing sport or joining a gym, please contact [email protected] (Bed-ford Campus) or [email protected] (Luton Campus), or sim-ply come in and see us at UBSU - your Students’ Union!

By Ciaran O’Brien

On your bike...Konstantin Tarasov, a Lithuanian student here

at the University of Bedfordshire, spent the last summer busy competing on his bike - and shoot-ing! This year he will be representing the Univer-sity and so, UBSU has helped to sponsor his trav-el and is buying him a UoB/UBSU branded cycling vest too! Here is his story...

It was an absolutely amazing summer of sport. With a brief plan in my head I managed to spend three and a half months training with friends from the “Favoritas” Biathlon Club in Visaginas and take part in seven different competitions.

For me everything started with the second stage of Lithuanian MTB Marathon Cup in Vilnius where I had to start from the last line due to miss-ing the first stage. Thankfully, I managed to switch into the race quite quickly and I finished 119 out of more than 250 elite cyclists. Then I had plenty of time to prepare for my first Summer Biathlon (running plus shooting) competition which took place on 1st August 2010 in Ignalina. I came third in the Masters group and to say the truth, I was not expecting such a good result, but I was very pleased with it.

Then on 8th August 2010, again in Ignalina, I took part in the third stage of Lithuanian MTB Marathon Cup and finished 84th. On 5th Septem-ber 2010 in Anysciai was the last stage of the Mar-athon Cup and I finished 95th. The overall rank-ing was 85th place which means that I am now in the top 100 of Lithuanian Elite Mountain Bikers.

Apart from these major events I also participat-ed in two hometown competitions and took 2nd place in MTB Cross Country and 3rd place in MTB Marathon.

My last competition was on 19th September 2010 in Estonia which was the Tartu MTB Mara-thon. It is second biggest Mountain Bike event in the world with almost five thousand people this year. It was real fun to get from the back of the starting line and pass more than 2000 people dur-ing the 90 km track full of sand, mud and water.

It was simply a wonderful summer where I gained lots of experience that I took with me back to England!

By Vlonstov Tarasov

BEDFORD TEAM DATE OPPOSITION HOME / AWAY RESULT

Rugby Men’s 2nd 13-Oct Oxford Brookes University Men’s 2nd Home L 40-6

Rugby Men’s 1st 13-Oct University of Nottingham Men’s 4th Away W 16-7

Badminton Women’s 1st 20-Oct Loughborough University Women’s 2nd Home L 6-2

Basketball Women’s 1st 20-Oct University of East Anglia Women’s 1st Home W 53-36

Football Men’s 2nd 20-Oct University of Bedfordshire (Bedford) Men’s 1st Home D 2-2

Hockey Women’s 1st 20-Oct Loughborough University Women’s 4th Home D 2-2

Netball 1st 20-Oct University of Worcester 1st Home W 43-21

Rugby Men’s 1st 20-Oct Oxford Brookes University Men’s 2nd Home L 18-12

Rugby Men’s 2nd 20-Oct University of East Anglia Men’s 1st Home W 11-10

Tennis Men’s 1st 20-Oct University of East Anglia Men’s 1st Home D 6-6

Football Men’s 1st 20-Oct University of Bedfordshire (Bedford) Men’s 2nd Away D 2-2

Football Men’s 3rd 20-Oct University of Worcester Men’s 3rd Away D 2-2

Football Men’s 4th 20-Oct Oxford Brookes University Men’s 4th Away W 3-1

Football Women’s 1st 20-Oct University of Leicester Women’s 1st Away W 8-2

Football Women’s 2nd 20-Oct University of Northampton Women’s 1st Away W 16-2

Hockey Men’s 1st 20-Oct University of Nottingham Men’s 4th Away L 6-2

Netball 2nd 20-Oct University of Nottingham 5th Away W 37-23

Netball 3rd 20-Oct Newman College 1st Away L 47-15

Football Men’s 1st 27-Oct University of Northampton Men’s 1st Home W 4-1

Football Men’s 4th 27-Oct University of Bedfordshire (Luton) Men’s 4th Home W 3-2

Football Women’s 2nd 27-Oct De Montfort University Women’s 1st Home W 10-0

Hockey Men’s 1st 27-Oct University of Nottingham Men’s 5th Home W 3-1

Netball 2nd 27-Oct De Montfort University 1st Home W 28-18

Netball 3rd 27-Oct University of Leicester 2nd Home D 23-23

Rugby Men’s 2nd 27-Oct University of Bedfordshire (Bedford) Men’s 1st Home L 34-3

Badminton Men’s 1st 27-Oct University of Lincoln Men’s 2nd Away L 7-1

Badminton Women’s 1st 27-Oct University of Warwick Women’s 1st Away D 4-4

Basketball Men’s 1st 27-Oct University of Northampton Men’s 2nd Away W 86-75

Basketball Women’s 1st 27-Oct University of Wolverhampton Women’s 1st Away L 49-47

Football Men’s 2nd 27-Oct University of East Anglia Men’s 1st Away W 3-1

Football Women’s 1st 27-Oct University of Kent Women’s 1st Away W 9-1

Hockey Women’s 1st 27-Oct University of East Anglia Women’s 1st Away W 4-1

Netball 1st 27-Oct University of Warwick 1st Away W 44-33

Rugby Men’s 1st 27-Oct University of Bedfordshire (Bedford) Men’s 2nd Away W 34-3

Rugby Women’s 1st 27-Oct University of Warwick Women’s 1st Away W 17-5

Tennis Women’s 1st 27-Oct Oxford University Women’s 2nd Away L 12-0

Badminton Men’s 1st 03-Nov De Montfort University Men’s 1st Home L 4-4*

Badminton Women’s 1st 03-Nov Oxford University Women’s 1st Home L 5-3

Basketball Women’s 1st 03-Nov University of Cambridge Women’s 1st Home W 67-39

Football Men’s 2nd 03-Nov Coventry University Men’s 4th Home W 5-1

Football Men’s 3rd 03-Nov Cranfield University (Bedfordshire) Men’s 1st Home W 13-1

Football Women’s 1st 03-Nov University of Birmingham Women’s 1st Home W 1-0

Hockey Men’s 1st 03-Nov Anglia Ruskin University (Cambridge) Men’s 1st Home W 8-2

Netball 1st 03-Nov Coventry University 2nd Home W 62-14

Netball 3rd 03-Nov Oxford Brookes University 1st Home L 25-20

Rugby Men’s 2nd 03-Nov University of Warwick Men’s 2nd Home L 34-15

Rugby Women’s 1st 03-Nov University of Cambridge Women’s 1st Home W 12-11

Tennis Women’s 1st 03-Nov University of East Anglia Women’s 1st Home L 12-0

Football Men’s 1st 03-Nov Aston University Men’s 1st Away W 1-1 (AET)**

Hockey Women’s 1st 03-Nov University of East Anglia Women’s 1st Away L 5-3

Hockey Women’s 2nd 03-Nov Oxford Brookes University Women’s 4th Away L 14-1

Netball 2nd 03-Nov University of Derby (Buxton) 1st Away W 44-17

Tennis Men’s 1st 03-Nov De Montfort University Men’s 1st Away W 12-0

Football Women’s 2nd 03-Nov University of Bedfordshire (Luton) Women’s 1st Away L 6-2

BEDFORD TEAM DATE OPPOSITION HOME / AWAY MATCH TYPE

Badminton Men’s 1st 10-Nov University of Lincoln Men’s 1st Home League Match

Badminton Women’s 1st 10-Nov University of Warwick Women’s 2nd Home League Match

Football Men’s 2nd 10-Nov University Of Bedfordshire (Luton) Men’s 1st Home League Match

Football Men’s 4th 10-Nov Cranfield University (Bedfordshire) Men’s 1st Home League Match

Football Women’s 1st 10-Nov University of Bristol Women’s 1st Home Championship

Hockey Women’s 1st 10-Nov University of Lincoln Women’s 1st Home League Match

Hockey Women’s 2nd 10-Nov Anglia Ruskin University (Cambridge) Women’s 1st Home League Match

Netball 2nd 10-Nov University of East Anglia 2nd Home League Match

Rugby Men’s 2nd 10-Nov Anglia Ruskin University (Cambridge) Men’s 1st Home League Match

Basketball Women’s 1st 10-Nov University of Nottingham Women’s 1st Away League Match

Football Men’s 1st 10-Nov University of Cambridge Men’s 1st Away League Match

Football Men’s 3rd 10-Nov University of East Anglia Men’s 2nd Away League Match

Football Women’s 2nd 10-Nov University of Warwick Women’s 2nd Away League Match

Hockey Men’s 1st 10-Nov Nottingham Trent University Men’s 3rd Away League Match

Netball 1st 10-Nov University of Birmingham 4th Away League Match

Netball 3rd 10-Nov University of Lincoln 2nd Away League Match

Rugby Men’s 1st 10-Nov University of East Anglia Men’s 1st Away League Match

Tennis Men’s 1st 10-Nov De Montfort University Men’s 1st Away League Match

Tennis Women’s 1st 10-Nov University of Birmingham Women’s 2nd Away League Match

Rugby Women’s 1st 10-Nov St Mary’s University College 1st Away Trophy Match

Basketball Women’s 1st 17-Nov Nottingham Trent University Women’s 1st Home League Match

Football Men’s 2nd 17-Nov University of Northampton Men’s 1st Home League Match

Football Men’s 3rd 17-Nov Coventry University Men’s 3rd Home League Match

Football Women’s 1st 17-Nov University of Worcester Women’s 1st Home League Match

Football Women’s 2nd 17-Nov University of Nottingham Women’s 2nd Home League Match

Hockey Women’s 1st 17-Nov University of Warwick Women’s 1st Home League Match

Netball 1st 17-Nov Oxford University 2nd Home League Match

Rugby Men’s 2nd 17-Nov University Of Worcester Men’s 2nd Home League Match

Tennis Men’s 1st 17-Nov University of Leicester Men’s 2nd Home League Match

Badminton Men’s 1st 17-Nov University of Leicester Men’s 2nd Away League Match

Badminton Women’s 1st 17-Nov Nottingham Trent University Women’s 1st Away League Match

Basketball Men’s 1st 17-Nov Cranfield University Men’s 1st Away League Match

Football Men’s 1st 17-Nov University of Bedfordshire (Luton) Men’s 1st Away League Match

Football Men’s 4th 17-Nov Anglia Ruskin University (Cambridge) Men’s 2nd Away League Match

Hockey Men’s 1st 17-Nov University of Leicester Men’s 2nd Away League Match

Netball 2nd 17-Nov University of Nottingham 4th Away League Match

Netball 3rd 17-Nov University of Bedfordshire (Luton) 1st Away League Match

Rugby Women’s 1st 17-Nov University of Nottingham Women’s 1st Away League Match

Basketball Men’s 1st 24-Nov Staffordshire University Men’s 1st Home Cup Match

Rugby Women’s 1st 24-Nov Oxford Brookes University Women’s 1st Home League Match

Badminton Women’s 1st 24-Nov Loughborough University Women’s 2nd Away League Match

Basketball Women’s 1st 24-Nov University of East Anglia Women’s 1st Away League Match

Football Men’s 4th 24-Nov Oxford Brookes University Men’s 3rd Away Cup Match

Football Women’s 1st 24-Nov Loughborough University Women’s 2nd Away League Match

Football Women’s 2nd 24-Nov Oxford University Women’s 2nd Away Cup Match

Rugby Men’s 1st 24-Nov University of Warwick Men’s 3rd Away Cup Match

Tennis Women’s 1st 24-Nov Nottingham Trent University Women’s 1st Away Cup Match

October & November Results & Fixtures 2010To Check the latest fixtures and results visit www.ubsu.co.uk/sport

23

Continued from back page

The best of 9 games fi-nal went all the way to the final game, a match which displayed some of the best Dodgeball the sport has witnessed in Europe, with Arney Noden coming home with a well deserved Silver Medal.

Ciaran O’Brien, Student Activities Manager, said: “The progress that the Dodgeball club has made so far is once a again testa-ment to the hard work and commitment our students and staff put into sport.

Congratulations to all of our students involved in re-cent successes at both club and international level.”

This season the Dodge-ball Club looks to build on the success of the past 9 months, with both men’s and women’s teams looking for new players to join the squad, whether they have experienced the sport or not. For more information or to get involved, please contact Steve Ball at [email protected] or call 01234 793155.

Uo

B S

PO

RT

S T

EA

MS R

ESU

LTS &

FIX

TU

RES

SPORTBThe

SPORT GETS OFF TO A FLYING START!

The University of Bedfordshire Students’ Union (UBSU) sports teams have got off to a flying start this year, managed by the Athlet-ic Union (AU). The Freshers Fayre in Luton and Bedford kick-started the recruitment drive, and the number of students joining both competi-tive and recreational sports teams has been very high. Here are the highlights so far this term:

Our BUCS league season kicked off on the 13th October with the Rugby Men’s (Bedford) 1st winning away against Nottingham 4th 16-7. The following week (20th Octo-ber) saw Football Women’s (Bed-ford) 2nd take apart Northamp-ton 1st by beating them 16-2, and strong victories from both Basket-ball Women’s (Bedford) 1st winning 53-36 against UEA 1st, and Netball (Bedford) 1st beating Worcester 1st 43-21.

The 27th October saw the Luton Campus season start, with an im-pressive victory from Rugby Men’s (Luton) 1st beating Northampton 2nds 19-0. Football Men’s (Luton) 2nd beat Oxford Brookes 3rd 6-2, and Netball (Luton) 1st continued their unbeaten league run from last season with a 34-28 win over Lin-coln 2nd. On the Bedford Campus, the Football Women’s (Bedford) 2nd continued their winning start to the season beating DMU 1st 10-0. Bas-ketball Men’s (Bedford) 1st recorded a good win against

continued on page 22

UNIVERSITY DODGEBALL TEAM TAKES ON EUROPE

By Ciaran O’Brien

After an astonishing first season finishing 6th in the UK Nationals, one of the University’s newest sport clubs has taken an enormous leap on to the international stage. The University of Bedfordshire ‘Bedford Bulls’ Dodgeball Squad has had a phenom-enal start since forming in January 2010.

Current Club Manager Martin Knight, along-side player Johnathan Rudland, have both become coaches for the England Lions Dodgeball Team, and over the summer have been selecting and prepar-ing the very best players in England to compete at the UK Dodgeball Association (UKDBA) European Championships 2010, which was held in London on the 19th September 2010.

Two of those players who made the Final Squad were University of Bedfordshire students: Arney Noden and Thom Stonehouse, who currently repre-sent the University first team. Both attended a num-ber of hard trials and training sessions to be select-ed. They were rewarded for their hard work, with 2 places in England’s Final Squad. Arney Noden in particular did well, and received his international debut at the European Championships.

With England being the host nation, they fielded two strong teams. After coming up against talent-ed opposition from the likes of Italy, Sweden and Scotland, the outcome came to an all England Final.

Continues on page 23

The Blend - Autumn Edition 2010

Documents

Transcript of The Blend - Autumn Edition 2010