Accordion

The current system is not working as intended. Union Council rarely reaches quorum, most class rep positions are unfilled, and officers are overloaded with meetings and admin rather than visible representation. Students have told us they experience the system as slow, formal and inaccessible, and they often solve issues informally or not at all. The new ecosystem is designed to be lower‑barrier, more responsive, and better aligned to the realities of Mary I students.

Advocacy Roles are designed as pure advocacy positions:

• Focused on representing students in institutional decision‑making spaces (e.g. academic council, quality committees, senior fora).
• Not responsible for day‑to‑day operations, event logistics or systems administration.
• Expected to be visible and accessible on campus – scheduled time each week for being “out, not in office” talking with students.
• Advocacy Roles are elected and must remain visibly accountable to the student body. Their role descriptions will explicitly include visibility and student contact, not just meetings.

A key part of the redesign is reducing their committee load and operational tasks so they can actually do visibility and advocacy well, rather than juggling too many “hats”.

Community Organisers (COs) are the “engine room” of student engagement:

• Spend most of their time in student spaces (canteens, library, corridors, society events) having 1‑to‑1 conversations.
• Identify patterns in what students are saying – emerging issues, frustrations, opportunities.
• Support students to form Action Squads around specific issues (e.g. housing, timetabling, wellbeing) and help them plan campaigns.
• Monitor Energy Petitions, triage issues, and ensure students receive timely responses.
• Work closely with Advocacy Roles and Learning Reps so that student‑generated issues are fed into the right committees and decision‑makers.

They do not replace elected officers – they make it possible for the democratic system to function in a time‑poor, commuter‑heavy environment. Their job is to build relationships, surface issues and support campaigns; they do not “speak for” students in formal institutional spaces.

The current proposal assumes COs will be paid student staff (e.g. part‑time roles held alongside study), line‑managed by MISU staff. This balances:

• Peer credibility and lived experience (they’re in the same world as the students they speak to).
• Professional support and continuity from staff (training, supervision, safeguarding).

Details such as exact hours, pay and recruitment processes will be worked through in implementation planning.

Class Reps

The proposal shifts from a large, often vacant class rep system to a smaller but more reliable Learning Rep model:

• Learning Reps are selected (via recruitment, not mass elections) for commitment and understanding of their programme area.
• They sit on key academic committees (e.g. faculty boards, teaching & learning) and are responsible for gathering structured feedback from their cohorts.
• They receive an honorarium to recognise their time and responsibility.

This is designed to fix chronic vacancy and engagement problems while ensuring academic representation is high‑quality and continuous.

Union Council and AGM

• Union Council in its current form (large, quorum-dependent, low-engagement) will be significantly reduced or replaced by:
• Sortition panels (DPC, SCC) for decisions and accountability.
• Union Council in its current form (large, quorum‑dependent, low‑engagement) will be significantly reduced or replaced by:
• Sortition panels (DPC, SCC) for decisions and accountability.
• Action Squads and Energy Petitions for issue‑surfacing and campaigns.

The AGM / General Meetings may remain for core legal functions (accounts, trustees’ report, certain constitutional points), but the expectation is that most meaningful democratic work happens elsewhere in the new system. Exact constitutional changes will be drafted and consulted on before any referendum.

Students don’t need a title to participate. They can:

• Submit issues and ideas through Energy Petitions (digital, always-on).
• Speak directly to Community Organisers when they’re on campus.
• Join Action Squads on specific topics (e.g. housing, timetabling, placements).
• Take part in co-creation workshops and listening sessions that MISU will run each term.
• Be randomly selected to sit on sortition panels (see below).

The system is designed so that representation is not limited to people willing or able to hold formal roles.

Action Squads are short-term, issue-specific groups of students supported by Community Organisers. They:

• Form around a concrete problem (e.g. WiFi outages, Friday 5pm lectures, accommodation issues).
• Meet informally (on campus or online) for a limited period (e.g. 4–8 weeks).
• Gather evidence, agree demands, and plan realistic actions.
• Work with Advocacy Roles / Learning Reps to get the issue onto the right agenda.

They are designed for students who care about a particular issue, but can’t commit to year-long roles or regular formal meetings.

The intention is that Thurles is designed in from the start, not bolted on:

• One Advocacy Role may be explicitly Thurles-focused (or there may be a campus-based split).
• A Learning Rep will represent Thurles on relevant academic bodies.
• At least one Community Organiser will have a clear Thurles remit.
• Sortition panels will be balanced so Thurles students are represented.

Details will be shaped in consultation with Thurles students, but the principle is: no more “poor relation” feeling – Thurles must see itself in the structure.

A key design principle is clear feedback loops:

• Energy Petitions will show public status updates for issues.
• MISU will publish regular “What We’ve Done This Month” updates – issues raised, campaigns run, wins and honest “we tried but couldn’t” explanations.
• Sortition panel recommendations and responses will be shared.
• Learning Reps and Advocacy Roles will provide brief termly updates.

The aim is that students can see a clear line from what they say to what MISU does. Adjustments can be made through the following:

• Regular review through the Student Confidence Conference.
• Opportunities each year to adjust role descriptions, processes, and resource allocation.
• Ongoing co‑creation and listening sessions with students and staff.

The goal isn’t to launch a perfect system, but to launch a much better system with the capacity to improve itself.

This FAQ will be updated as the model is refined and as more decisions are taken.

The current system is not working as intended. Union Council rarely reaches quorum, most class rep positions are unfilled, and officers are overloaded with meetings and admin rather than visible representation. Students have told us they experience the system as slow, formal and inaccessible, and they often solve issues informally or not at all. The new ecosystem is designed to be lower‑barrier, more responsive, and better aligned to the realities of Mary I students.

The proposed ecosystem has seven main components:

● Advocacy Roles (2 elected) – pure representation roles on institutional committees.

● Community Organisers (paid part‑time) – build relationships, listen to students, spark campaigns.

● Learning Representatives (paid honoraria) – programme/faculty‑level academic reps on key academic committees.

● Energy Petitions (digital) – always‑on, low‑barrier way for students to raise issues and ideas.

● Democratic Procedures Committee (sortition) – randomly selected students who deliberate on constitutional/procedural changes.

● Student Confidence Conference (sortition) – randomly selected students who review and scrutinise the work of Advocacy Roles, COs and Learning Reps.

● Staff Support – professional staff who provide continuity, training, and operational support.

Advocacy Roles are designed as pure advocacy positions:

● Focused on representing students in institutional decision‑making spaces (e.g. academic council, quality committees, senior fora).

● Not responsible for day‑to‑day operations, event logistics or systems administration.

● Expected to be visible and accessible on campus – scheduled time each week for being “out, not in office” talking with students.

A key part of the redesign is reducing their committee load and operational tasks so they can actually do visibility and advocacy well, rather than juggling too many “hats”.

Yes – that’s a core design principle and a concern that’s already been discussed.

● Advocacy Roles are elected and must remain visibly accountable to the student body. Their role descriptions will explicitly include visibility and student contact, not just meetings.

● Community Organisers are paid organisers, not substitute officers. Their job is to build relationships, surface issues and support campaigns; they do not “speak for” students in formal institutional spaces.

We will communicate clearly what each role does, and timetable visibility time for Advocacy Roles so they are actively present on campus, not squeezed by meeting commitments.

Community Organisers (COs) are the “engine room” of student engagement:

● Spend most of their time in student spaces (canteens, library, corridors, society events) having 1‑to‑1 conversations.

● Identify patterns in what students are saying – emerging issues, frustrations, opportunities.

● Support students to form Action Squads around specific issues (e.g. housing, timetabling, wellbeing) and help them plan campaigns.

● Monitor Energy Petitions, triage issues, and ensure students receive timely responses.

● Work closely with Advocacy Roles and Learning Reps so that student‑generated issues are fed into the right committees and decision‑makers.

They do not replace elected officers – they make it possible for the democratic system to function in a time‑poor, commuter‑heavy environment.

The current proposal assumes COs will be paid student staff (e.g. part‑time roles held alongside study), line‑managed by MISU staff. This balances:

● Peer credibility and lived experience (they’re in the same world as the students they speak to).

● Professional support and continuity from staff (training, supervision, safeguarding).

Details such as exact hours, pay and recruitment processes will be worked through in implementation planning.

The proposal shifts from a large, often vacant class rep system to a smaller but more reliable Learning Rep model:

● Learning Reps are selected (via recruitment, not mass elections) for commitment and understanding of their programme area.

● They sit on key academic committees (e.g. faculty boards, teaching & learning) and are responsible for gathering structured feedback from their cohorts.

● They receive an honorarium to recognise their time and responsibility.

This is designed to fix chronic vacancy and engagement problems while ensuring academic representation is high‑quality and continuous.

Students don’t need a title to participate. They can:

● Submit issues and ideas through Energy Petitions (digital, always-on).

● Speak directly to Community Organisers when they’re on campus.

● Join Action Squads on specific topics (e.g. housing, timetabling, placements).

● Take part in co-creation workshops and listening sessions that MISU will run each term.

● Be randomly selected to sit on sortition panels (see below).

The system is designed so that representation is not limited to people willing or able to hold formal roles.

Energy Petitions is a low-barrier digital channel where students can:

● Submit problems, suggestions or ideas at any time.

● Quickly show support for others’ ideas (e.g. by “backing” or commenting).

● Track the status of issues (e.g. “being explored”, “Action Squad forming”, “taken to [committee]”, “closed – outcome explained”).

Community Organisers review submissions regularly, look for where there is real “energy” (widely felt or deeply felt issues), and then:

● Either help resolve simple issues directly.

● Or convene an Action Squad and/or escalate to Advocacy Roles or Learning Reps.

It’s not a “vote” like an election, but it is a structured way to turn everyday experience into campaigns and action.

Action Squads are short-term, issue-specific groups of students supported by Community Organisers. They:

● Form around a concrete problem (e.g. WiFi outages, Friday 5pm lectures, accommodation issues).

● Meet informally (on campus or online) for a limited period (e.g. 4–8 weeks).

● Gather evidence, agree demands, and plan realistic actions.

● Work with Advocacy Roles / Learning Reps to get the issue onto the right agenda.

They are designed for students who care about a particular issue, but can’t commit to year-long roles or regular formal meetings.

The Democratic Procedures Committee (DPC) is a group of students selected by random lottery (sortition), not elections, to look at constitutional and procedural questions. For example:

● Changes to democratic structures.

● Rules about how elections or referendums run.

● Questions about how new roles fit into the constitution.

Key features:

● Students are randomly selected from the whole student body (with some balancing for demographics).

● Meetings are facilitated deliberative sessions, not procedural “councils”.

● Members are briefed and supported to understand the issues.

● They produce recommendations that inform constitutional changes and, where needed, student-wide referendums.

This replaces ineffective, low-attendance governance forums with focused, representative deliberation.

The Student Confidence Conference (SCC) is another sortition-based panel, focused on accountability rather than rules:

● Meets twice a year.

● Reviews the work of Advocacy Roles, Community Organisers, and Learning Reps.

● Hears short reports and can ask questions.

● Discusses whether students can have “confidence” in how each role has acted.

● Issues written recommendations (e.g. “we want more visibility from X”, “Y should focus less on events and more on academic issues”).

The aim is to give ordinary students a structured way to hold representatives and staff to account, beyond social media criticism or low-attended AGMs.

Sortition is used widely (e.g. juries, citizens’ assemblies) because it:

● Includes people who would never stand for election but still have valuable perspectives.

● Reduces dominance of the same “usual suspects”.

● Can be stratified so panels roughly reflect the student population (year, campus, gender, etc.).

It doesn’t replace all elections – Advocacy Roles are still elected – but it complements them by making some key decisions through informed, representative deliberation rather than low-turnout elections and empty councils.

Professional staff are there to provide continuity, capacity and safeguards, not to replace student leadership. This allows officers and student leaders to focus on advocacy, engagement and problem-solving, rather than being buried in admin.

The intention is that Thurles is designed in from the start, not bolted on:

● One Advocacy Role may be explicitly Thurles-focused (or there may be a campus-based split).

● A Learning Rep will represent Thurles on relevant academic bodies.

● At least one Community Organiser will have a clear Thurles remit.

● Sortition panels will be balanced so Thurles students are represented.

Details will be shaped in consultation with Thurles students, but the principle is: no more “poor relation” feeling – Thurles must see itself in the structure.

The proposal assumes:

● Union Council in its current form (large, quorum-dependent, low-engagement) will be significantly reduced or replaced by:

● Sortition panels (DPC, SCC) for decisions and accountability.

● Union Council in its current form (large, quorum‑dependent, low‑engagement) will be significantly reduced or replaced by:

● Sortition panels (DPC, SCC) for decisions and accountability.

● Action Squads and Energy Petitions for issue‑surfacing and campaigns.

● The AGM / General Meetings may remain for core legal functions (accounts, trustees’ report, certain constitutional points), but the expectation is that most meaningful democratic work happens elsewhere in the new system. Exact constitutional changes will be drafted and consulted on before any referendum.

A key design principle is clear feedback loops:

● Energy Petitions will show public status updates for issues.

● MISU will publish regular “What We’ve Done This Month” updates – issues raised, campaigns run, wins and honest “we tried but couldn’t” explanations.

● Sortition panel recommendations and responses will be shared.

● Learning Reps and Advocacy Roles will provide brief termly updates.

The aim is that students can see a clear line from what they say to what MISU does.

No. There will be a phased transition, broadly:

1. Finalise the model and constitutional changes.

2. Hold a student referendum on the new structure.

3. If passed, introduce key elements (e.g. new officer roles, some paid positions) in the first implementation year.

4. Build out the rest of the ecosystem (COs, Learning Reps, sortition panels, Energy Petitions) over one or more years, with review points.

From the start, the expectation – shared by the College – is that this is iterative: some elements will need tweaking once tested in the real world.

The system is being designed with “learning built in”:

● Regular review through the Student Confidence Conference.

● Opportunities each year to adjust role descriptions, processes, and resource allocation.

● Ongoing co‑creation and listening sessions with students and staff.

The goal isn’t to launch a perfect system, but to launch a much better system with the capacity to improve itself.

This FAQ will be updated as the model is refined and as more decisions are taken.