After the email mailout of society information to incoming students was cancelled for this year, the information will instead be circulated on Trinity’s social media channels and on the orientation website, and in future years be circulated both via email and physical post.
Speaking to The University Times, President of Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU), Kieran McNulty, stated that the information would this year also be “heavily circulated” on the social media channels of TCDSU and the Central Societies Committee (CSC) alongside those of the college.
It emerged at the end of August that the email mailout, which is compiled by societies themselves and submitted to the CSC, before being sent out by the Academic Registry, was not to be sent this year. The email mailout, which had been sent to incoming students since 2014, was itself was a replacement of the physical mailout of society leaflets that had been sent in previous years.
In response to the email’s cancellation, heads of some of Trinity’s largest societies, including DU Law Society and Trinity St Vincent De Paul Society, signed a letter addressed to the Provost. The letter called for the decision to be reversed, describing the cancellation as “disappointing” and adding that “decisions such as this hamper our work”.
From next year, however, it appears that some stability may return to the process. According to McNulty, who organised the letter, society information is to be included in both a physical and email mailout from next year. However, speaking to The University Times, McNulty stated that the physical mailout will likely not consist of the leaflet-per-society model that had been in place in previous years, with a model along the lines of one leaflet per capitated body – TCDSU, the CSC, Dublin University Publications, Trinity College Dublin Graduate Students’ Union (TCDGSU) and Dublin University Central Athletic Club (DUCAC) for example – more likely.
From next year, the information is also to be included in the email sent from the Dean of Students to all who applied for a place in Trinity as well as on the orientation website.
McNulty also stated his aim of having the information available on students’ my.tcd portals in the future.
“I’m happy that a sustainable solution has been put in place for next year, and we will get that in writing shortly”, McNulty stated. “We’re doing all we can to ensure this year’s publications go out to students, but this is part of an ongoing trend which is dangerously overlooking the SU and college societies in these types of decisions.”
He continued: “Student activities, along with academia, are the heart of Trinity. I believe that we are all intending on making that very clear to the college executives: that what we’re doing is important and needs to be supported.”
