Politics
DSU is intended to be an apolitical democratic organisation. To this end every student has a vote in the principal elections and in the sovereign body of DSU, the Union General Meeting - as in most students' unions. DSU holds two major elections a year, and has pioneered the use of electronic voting to increase participation. In the 2003 and 2004 Sabbatical elections it received the highest turnout of any student union in the UK, a fact used by some to show the continued relevance of DSU to the students of Durham.
DSU has succeeded in having a say in national student politics. In 2004 a campaign run by the Union appeared on BBC, ITV and Channel 4 News numerous times throughout the debate over variable tuition charges. A huge number of regional and local TV and radio appearances for Union officers were secured over that period. During this time, DSU won praise from politicians, many within NUS and other Unions in the North-East for its uncharacteristically high-profile impact on the national debate on University funding.
Read more about this topic: Durham Students' Union
Famous quotes containing the word politics:
“Philosophy, astronomy, and politics were marked at zero, I remember. Botany variable, geology profound as regards the mud stains from any region within fifty miles of town, chemistry eccentric, anatomy unsystematic, sensational literature and crime records unique, violin player, boxer, swordsman, lawyer, and self-poisoner by cocaine and tobacco.”
—Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1859–1930)
“All you can be sure about in a political-minded writer is that if his work should last you will have to skip the politics when you read it. Many of the so-called politically enlisted writers change their politics frequently.... Perhaps it can be respected as a form of the pursuit of happiness.”
—Ernest Hemingway (1899–1961)
“The one thing sure about politics is that what goes up comes down and what goes down often comes up.”
—Richard M. Nixon (1913–1995)