OUUEG Members Present

Cherry Alviani (Treasurer)

Steve Armitage

Anthony Dyson

Keiran Finan

George Hamer (Boat Officer)

Julie Hamilton (Assitant Kit Officer)

Alice Ind (Secretary)

Huw Jenkins

Paul McCloghrie

Chris Pirie

Steve Siller

Rhiannon Starks (President)

Glyn Taylor

Craig Wilson (Diving Officer)

In Attendance

Neil Carter (WebSite)

Apologies for Absence

No apologies were received

President’s summary/report of issues to be addressed (see sheet)

- Membership: have more “others” than Oxford students or employees than Sports Fed usually allows, but they understand this is due to the experience needed in a Scuba club.

- Accounts:

o Main account: income = £6042.69, expenditure = £5098.45

o Boat account: income = £720, expenditure = £833

Our accounts break even over the year.

- Problems of the club:

o Loss of novices or newly qualified divers

o Lack of people planning trips and trips left unfilled

o Lack of instructors

o Lack of motivation to plan events given low turn outs

o Resignation of committee member

o Personal differences within club

o Difficulty filling committee positions for 2007

- Comments from current and former committee members:

o Negative: division within club, lack of fun on being on committee, cliquey club, not accessible to undergraduates and their terms or need for holiday jobs

o Positive: enjoyed being member of the club

- Results from Sports Fed meeting:

o Club can continue for maximum of 1 year without students in positions of President, Secretary and Treasurer.

o These 3 roles cannot be combined – must be done by separate people

o If club loses OU affiliation, would not get money from Sports Fed and all kit is owned by university, who could sell the club back to the kit, but new storage would have to be found

- Issues to be discussed:

o How to attract and retain more members

o How to cater better for undergraduates

o How to encourage people to stand for committee posts

o How to encourage people to organise more trips and use the club boat

o How to ensure the focus of OUUEG is diving

Main Discussion Points

Some major impacts on our club are:

- Increase cost of diving, increased cost of being a student and therefore reduced expendable cash, relative decreased cost of diving overseas.

- Increased time and training required to become an instructor. Previously DLs could instruct without additional qualifications. Much more difficult for students to progress to instructors during time in the club.

- Students don’t have enough time to spend diving – often need to get holiday jobs.

- Publicity poor – people in Oxford don’t know it exists

OUUEG’s problems are universal to BSAC clubs – all have difficulty keeping members.

The success of studentdiving.com shows there are people willing to spend money on diving, but aren’t choosing to with us.

How to attract and retain more members

- Cheaper training: Novices are put off by high prices and unclear estimates of training costs.

o Suggestion: Previous plan of PADI as entry level qualification offered by club and use of commercial company to carry out the open water. Go Dive would provide kit and open water training for ~£100, total training ~£230.

Option of swapping to BSAC later if still keen.

More cost effective – to the novices.

Could also look at changing club affiliation from BSAC, but not necessary and could make membership more complicated and could cause divisions within club.

- Cheaper OUUEG membership: Some people don’t join due to cost or stay on email list until they find something they want to do before joining.

o Lower OUUEG membership fee (maybe not such a bit risk if no.s low now) and then offer holidays in a similar fashion to the ski club to get people hooked. But we are low on reserve money so would have to think carefully about this.

Ski club style trips: Sign up and pay deposit and go diving in November. Lots of glossy brochures etc.

But would need to book v early, though discounts on flights for groups are possible. John Brewer would be useful to speak to as his job is sorting out travel!

- Socials: a good social side keeps people motivated about the club, but recently dominated by older members – may seem cliquey

o Suggestion: could include other activities e.g. archery, punting etc.

- Instructor incentives: Well qualified people (DM, instructors etc) met at Freshers’ Fair don’t stick with the club even when efforts are made to stay in touch with them, or just wait on the email list without joining until something good comes up. This loses a valuable resource.

o Suggestion: could offer to contribute to (PADI) instructors insurance

- More Diving!: Not having an Xmas trip this year potentially lost us many divers as there is a long wait to get in the water. Need something to look forward to and will appeal to those people who trained overseas/during holidays:

o Suggestion: Have an Xmas trip, warm water ski club style trips as mentioned above.

o Suggestion: the university has lots of money available for expeditions maybe we could make use of it.

- Overall: As a club we could offer students the chance to meet other students, get cheap training with them, get trips organised for them and socials too – who could resist?!

How to encourage people to stand for committee posts

- Discussion of new committee: have nominations for all posts except President and Kit Officer.

o ACTION: Julie offered as Kit Officer if she can organise and delegate. (Julie Hamilton

- Discussion of the president’s role: Currently they have an unnecessary amount of club politics to be dealt with; have to chase up other people to do their job; sort out lots of Sports Fed stuff – forms and a recent crack down on OUUEG practices.

o Suggestion: more frequent committee meetings to ensure people do their jobs and don’t need to be chased up.

o Suggestion: although good to have students on committee, would be useful if older/more experienced non-student members helping out with advice etc.

o ACTION: Some more experienced members offered to help out with advice for new committee. (Steve Siller, Paul McCloghrie, Gyln Taylor

- Need a new committee and AGM to elect them:

o ACTION: Another call for more nominations and arrange an AGM. (Rhiannon Starks)

How to encourage people to organise more trips and use the club boat

- Need to get people to pay deposits for trips in advance. Organisers losing out when people cancel. This is a problem in part due to the small size of the club.

Also discussed: Club Kit:

- Looking after kit is expensive and a massive task to keep it all standard in with regs set up the same etc.

o Suggestion: Maybe people shouldn’t expect to hire so much kit and buy more for themselves e.g. Dive computers/timers.

o Suggestion: Maybe not need same stuff if doing more easy dives – e.g. warm water not need so many drysuits/semis.