Earlier this year, we launched a new community spotlight series, led by your Community and Volunteering Officer, Charlotte Colombo. These spotlights cover some of the brilliant volunteering opportunities you can get involved with, in and around Southampton, alongside your studies.

Today’s spotlight is on Southampton Hub and Charlotte spoke with Melissa Camargo, Communications Officer at Southampton Hub.

What is Southampton Hub?

We are the Southampton based branch of charity focusing on encouraging and supporting students who want to and are passionate about making an impact on their local community.

How does Southampton Hub work, and how do students come … Read the rest

The student group, Southampton Hub, launches Bio-Cycle, Southampton’s first ever student-led food waste recycling scheme in a bid to benefit the local community by recycling and repurposing otherwise wasted food.

The scheme works by providing you with a five litre food waste caddy, filters and a roll of compostable bin liners at the cost of £10, which includes automatic registration for the regular weekly food waste pickup service.

Up to 160 students are already benefitting from the project, with waste collections organised at 33 households across Southampton, equating to approximately 200kg of recycled food waste every month.

All collected … Read the rest

There is nothing more satisfying and worthwhile than giving. And what better way to start than with our annual Student Volunteering Week, which is back for another year between Monday 22nd-Sunday 28th February. You can get involved with events, talks, volunteering tasters and much more across the University and Southampton.

What is volunteering?

Volunteering is ‘freely offering something’, usually your time, to a cause.

It is a common misconception that volunteering is just helping charity. It can be that, but it may also include:

• Coaching your local football team
• Representing your Halls of Residences in a Halls Committee
• Organising an

Students here at SUSU have launched a crowdfunding campaign to raise money for activity days for children from disadvantaged backgrounds. Southampton Hub has recently launched their Branch Up programme, which aims to provide activity days to children in the local area. These children will be partnered on a one-to-one basis with student volunteers from the University of Southampton, with the first activity day taking place on Saturday 14 March. Branch Up was originally set up by students in Oxford and has recently expanded to Southampton and London.

Branch Up is a community volunteering project led by Southampton students and supported … Read the rest

Tickets for the annual Sustainability Festival run by members of the Southampton Hub have been released, allowing students and members of the public to snap up entry to the popular one-day event when it takes place on March 7 2015.

The interactive conference aims to raise awareness about the issues linked to sustainability, and will focus on what we can do to promote sustainability in all areas of our lives, as well as empowering others.

Based on the theme of Sustainable Consumption on a Student Budget, the festival-inspired day will feature workshops from students and local members of the community … Read the rest

Southampton Hub, a student group at the University of Southampton, and SUSU’s Community Action Group are teaming up to participate in a national event to celebrate

volunteering in Higher Education; ‘Student Volunteering Week’. Plans are afoot for a variety of events and stunts, including a campaign to encourage further volunteering and one-off  opportunities for students to get involved in the local community.

Now in its 13th year, Student Volunteering Week 2014 will be taking place from Monday 24th February to the 2nd March. SVW brings together organisations from all sectors to promote and celebrate the volunteering efforts of students … Read the rest

A group of Southampton students are helping disadvantaged pupils achieve their academic potential. Working as part of the education project, Schools Plus, the structured year-long programme will see the group from the Southampton Hub tackle educational disadvantage in Southampton schools.

This will involve the students entering local schools acting as a positive role model to increase pupils’ aspirations and understanding of higher education. The students will then develop valuable and transferable skills in tutoring, communication, leadership and relationship building as well as benefit from networking opportunities and information about careers in education.

So far 183 Southampton students have gone through … Read the rest

We are very pleased to congratulate Natasha Unwin, a University of Southampton student and co-ordinator of the Southampton Hub society, on being one of five students nationally to be shortlisted for the Student Volunteering Award.

Tasha was nominated by Student Hubs, who are the national charity that the local branch society Southampton Hub is a part of, and was put forward for her continuing dedication in supporting other student volunteers in to taking action.

Southampton Hub is a network of students from the University of Southampton, who are engaged in changing society for the better. If … Read the rest