On 21 November, we were joined by Student Hubs alumni, former staff members, partners and funders to celebrate 16 years of student social action, and share memories of Student Hubs in recognition of our planned closure for January 2025.
The event kicked off at 6.30pm at Cecil Sharp House in London, a venue which hosts the English Folk Dance and Song Society and which has a long history of preserving traditional music and dance. It was important to us to find a venue which aligned with our own values whilst being rooted in the community, and Cecil Sharp House was the perfect venue for our own celebrations as we greeted friendly faces from across our history as a charity.
Arriving the at the event, our guests were greeted by food, drinks and various social action activities, a throwback to our many years of coordinating freshers’ fair activities to spark an interest in the Hubs’ local activities.
This included:
- Reviewing our newly launched Active Citizen Report, sharing case studies, testimonials and our approach to creating active citizens as an organisation;
- Sharing pledges to active citizenship;
- Writing postcards with positive messages for other guests;
- Speaking to our event videographers and sharing their memories of Student Hubs;
- Reviewing our posters of our student and alumni case studies;
- Listening to a playlist of songs to make social action to, and watching a slideshow of photos submitted by Hub alumni;
- Enjoying our historic impact reports and merch stand with Student Hubs keepsakes from our conference held earlier this year.
We were fortunate to have several speakers at the event, which included words from former student leader from the University of Southampton, Oana Lazar; our Vice Chair of Trustees, Alice Wilby; Student Hubs co-founder Adam Grodecki; and concluding words from our CEO, Simran Dhanjal-Field.
In her speech, our Vice-Chair of Trustees Alice Wilby shared:
“I would argue that fostering and developing social action should be essential to our conception of universities. We usually think of social action as being about volunteering, and that can be an important part of it, but really it’s about people and organisations giving their time for the common good, as active citizens. Fundamentally, there is an assumption underlying every university strategy I’ve ever read that we want to create change in the
world, through our research, our teaching, and the actions of our staff, students and graduates … If we can enthuse more institutions to adopt our model of co-created social action with students, not simply for the good of the individuals involved, but as the best way to fulfil their wider strategic goals and purpose, it would be a fitting legacy Student Hubs’ excellent work.”
In his speech, co-founder of Student Hubs, Adam Grodecki, shared:
“University is an unbelievably formative stage of life when individuals think about what they care about, what they could do, and their own sense of agency. So through supporting students to do good in the world, we can affect them massively as they go into the future. That was really the idea that just drove everything at Oxford Hub, and I think it still sits very much at the centre of what Student Hubs became. We started with an ambition to change the beliefs of students from all over the UK, to try and bring together a community or movement. It was probably the most formative thing that those involved in the foundation have ever done – and I’m sure for those of you who are in the room, Student Hubs has been a big part of your lives too.”
In her speech, our CEO Sim shared:
“Every day you go out into the world and you make decisions about what you’re going to do at work, and the choices you make with how you live your life and how you interact with other people. Every day whether you know it or not, whether you’re conscious of it or not, Student Hubs is there. It has shaped the way you think, whether you like it or not, but to me that’s the magic … As I come to a conclusion I’m going to leave you all with my final call to action as the CEO of Student Hubs. On your journey home tonight, I would like you to have a think about what that magic is for you because I think it’s slightly different for all of us. For me it’s to try and keep trying – even when things are hard and to support the people around me whether I know them or not I would like you to think on what was the magic for you and kind of hold on to that. Whether it’s tomorrow, a week from now, five years from now I want you to just keep pushing that message out and keep trying to keep Student Hubs alive that way because it’s the only way we’re going to make the world a better place. By actively participating in it, and being an active citizen.”
Following the speeches, guests continued to mingle and network, with the event wrapping up at 10pm. It was a pleasure to see our former students, staff, partners and stakeholders of Student Hubs gathered in one place, and a wonderful night celebrating all that we have achieved across our history.
We hope that our event attendees, and friends and colleagues across the charity and higher education sectors will continue on our legacy of student social action, active citizenship and changemaking.
You can see more about our legacy events as part of our closure here, and we hope to see you at one of our virtual events soon.