Community - Campus Initiatives
The Campus Initiatives fund provides grants of up to £5,000 for projects that not only enrich the experience of our students and staff but enhances their personal and professional development.
Our initiatives are funded entirely by our donor community and thanks to your generosity, we were able to fund eight Campus Initiative projects for 2022!
SalFunni: UoS Edinburgh Fringe Project 2022
SalFunni is a student-led society at Salford, uniting aspiring comedians. Thanks to you, they were able to return to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival this year, developing their skills, experience, and meeting some of their idols!
Visualising Counselling & Psychotherapy Skills
To widen the range of teaching approaches and strengthen the student experience, colleagues from the School of Health and Society will create a series of didactic videos that demonstrate counselling and psychotherapy techniques for students, as real counsellors work with actors performing real-life narratives.
Biological Sciences Photography Club
The initiative enables students of the School of Science, Engineering and Environment to develop new skills and improve their wellbeing through photography-focused activities in the natural environment.
Zine Library Makerspace
Students and colleagues will have the opportunity to hone their creative skills by developing their own zines, with access to our library materials, such as screen printing and in-house design.
Listening to Healers
This is a collaborative performance project in which the stories of members of staff working in Royal Bolton Hospital are turned into a musical composition, helping to honour their incredible work over the past few years.
Staff members will be interviewed and their story told by professional musicians, dances, and actors who will demonstrate the physical effort of healthcare during the Covid-19 pandemic through physical theatre.
Referee Society
Thanks to the funding, the Referee Society will provide students with the opportunity to learn a new skill, referee games, and attain their FA Basic Referee Course Qualification, as part of the Universities Campus League and in conjunction with the Manchester Football Association.
Enhancing the Employability of Law Students
Through a pro bono, criminal appeals extracurricular programme, Law and Criminology students will enhance their employability and practical legal skills. Delivered in partnership with Freedom Law Clinic, students will contribute to client casework and undertake valuable legal research to identify fresh grounds of appeal.
Wildlife Student Film Festival
The project supports Libby Penman, a Salford MA Wildlife Documentary Production graduate, to submit the films she made whilst studying to film festivals, generating exposure for her work and the themes she explores, including conservation and climate change.
So far, Libby's films have been selected for six film festivals, with a further twelve submitted; and her film Glasgow Wildlife won 2nd place at the Conservation Optimism Film Festival and screened at the Oxford Museum of Natural History.
Community Growing Space
2022 also saw the opening of the Community Growing Space, a project initially funded the year before which experienced several delays due to the supply issues as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Led by Marta Strzelecka, our Environmental Management Coordinator, the Community Growing Space was designed as a social space for students, staff, and members of the local community. During the creation, the team regularly consulted with our community through the Green Campus Group, the Salford Ranger team, and the Wildlife Society, to gain an insight into possible additions and improvements.
The Space features 11 planters, a tool shed, two bird feeders, four benches, a hardstanding area, and two wildflower patches. Every element, other than the bird feeders, were created by the local community - volunteers from Growing Togetherness - with reclaimed wood from Touch Wood.
We are proud that the Space is actively being used by our community who are welcome to help themselves to whatever is growing in the planters, mainly herbs and flowers at the moment!
When asked about the highlight of the project, Marta said:
"The main highlight of the project has been the level of interest and engagement from our community. We've received lots of support and great feedback from students, staff, and local residents, which has been wonderful seeing as the space has been developed with and for them.
"Another highlight has been the presence of plants and wildlife in itself. We've had lots of comments from users and passersby, especially about the colourful wildflower patches, full of bees and other pollinators during warmer months, as well as birds visiting the garden, including regulars, a pair of robins, a pair of great tits, and a magpie. We've also had two sunflowers 'plant themselves' in the large planter, most probably from the bird seeds."