President

From ICCC

Contents 1 This is what you need to know to run the club 2 Pool sessions 3 RCC meetings 4 Fresher's Fair 5 Fresher's Trip 5.1 Things to think about beforehand 5.2 Things to do on the day 5.3 Your duties once in the land-of-sheep include 6 Other stuff that crops up occasionally 7 Previous Presidents

This is what you need to know to run the club

• Anything to do with money, give to the treasurer. The only time you need to look at anything mentioned in Club Finance is when doing the budget. Occasionally you have to sign things.

• Anything to do with trips, give to the vice president. Unfortunately this can't include booking buses. Either the pres or the treasurer has to do this. Go here to check bookings (what we've we've had, and presumably what we've booked?).

This leaves ... quite a lot, actually.

Pool sessions

... are easy after a while but at the beginning you have to make sure:

• Freshers find their way from a south ken meeting point over to paddington.
• The right sort of coaching is happening, like capsize drills, then forward paddling and sweep strokes, then braces, then draw strokes. Try and explain the context in which skills will be needed on the river, as you only have a couple of sessions to get these guys ready for Wales, so it has to be quite intensive. And don't let mark teach rolling cos I is rubbish at it.
• Swap overs happen regularly, or you split the session in two and send the rest to the pub.
• Polo isn't too vigorous for the first few goes - no paddles helps.
• Everyone converges in the pub afterwards for the all-important socialising.

RCC meetings

... are monumentally dull but unfortunately compulsory for you or the treasurer. The union website has lots of useful stuff, including the trip registration form you have to fill in and hand in to the Student Activities Centre (downstairs on the right in Beit quad).

Fresher's Fair

... is mainly your responsibility. This is important, because we need Fresher's to get our membership up to the required level. Things to think about:

• Lots of advertising.
• Get a couple of laptops with lots of video, and a couple of monitors (talk to Rob T), plus power cable.
• Get some kit out and pile it around the stand. Make committee members sit in boats.
• Get everyone's e-mail addresses on a sign up sheet. Put these on the Mailing List, and send out lots of e-mails about the first few pool sessions and the fresher's trip.
• Give out flyers with relevant contacts and dates.

Fresher's Trip

The major challenge for you and your treasurer and vice-pres. This is always the most popular trip of the year, so we should hopefully be able to get 2 busses and some cars. This makes it the biggest trip, and the most effort to organise.

Things to think about beforehand

• Some way in advance, pick a date (about three/four weeks into term, avoid Halloween!) and instruct your vice-pres to book the hut.
• Buses can be booked 3 weeks in advance (although you only get allocated a bus two weeks in advance) and its a good idea to be there on the dot to get at least one bus booked, ideally two, remembering that we need ones with roofracks.
• Start the signup process a couple of weeks before the date by sending out a slappers e-mail and by adding the trip to the signup system on the web (see Admin system).
• Check your e-mail and the Slappers e-mail regularly, and answer the flood of questions/requests/random mumblings as promptly as you can.
• Check how many bus drivers you have going, and find more if needed.
• Check how many experienced paddlers you have going, compare to the number of freshers. Find more old-timers if necessary.
• Check how many people are bringing/needing to borrow what kit (signup system should help here), and compare to how much kit we actually have. Beg/borrow/steal/buy enough to make up the difference.
• Deal as harshly as their excuse merits with anyone trying to drop out, particularly if its last minute.
• Oh, and don't forget the trip registration form has to be handed into SAC or Mark will kill you. 'First Aiders' = Mark + any medics going. 'Emergency procedures' = 999. The rest is obvious, just tick all the boxes and fill in all the names.

Things to do on the day

• Delegate the shopping to someone who knows vaguely what to buy, telling them how many people and how many veggies. Try and get this done early, or by a car.
• Arrive at Beit quad as early as possible and start organising kit into piles. Make sure sufficient kit it actually taken to Wales. The best way to do this is to put everything in stores into the bus.
• Make sure you've got everyone you're supposed to have, and that they've all brought the stuff you've instructed them repeatedly to bring. If anyone has forgotten their sleeping bag, issue them with Theo's old one that lives in stores, thus ensuring they don't freeze but also that they never forget ever again.
• Since you've sent several reminder e-mails telling people when and where to meet and not to be late (without sounding too bossy), everyone will turn up at 5:50, and you might even beat our record getaway time of 6:15.
• Depart for Wales, and relax ... while making the freshers feel at home. They might be feeling a bit left out by all the old-timers swapping summer stories over their heads.

Your duties once in the land-of-sheep include

• Presiding over the discussion on what to paddle. You get the final say, as with everything, but also the final blame, as with everything. This usually just involves trying to tactfully ensure everyone's views are heard until some sort of consensus is reached.
• Organising groups on the river so that there is an appropriate experience range in each group, while also avoiding obvious personality clashes and splitting up of preferred paddling partners/couples. Bring headache tablets.
• Demonstrating safe and sensible use of the ladder in the hut on Saturday night.
• Making sure its not always the same people who cook/clean/washup etc.
• Answering the freshers' questions without sounding like a know-it-all, and making them feel welcome.
• Maintaining reasonably low levels of faff so that things happen at approximately the right times, i.e. on the river before lunch time, off again by dusk, that sort of thing.
• Achieving the above without shouting too much, which just pisses everyone off as well as giving you a sore throat.

Once you've got this once right, its all easy from here on! The other trips are run on broadly the same lines as above, and now you've had a practice you hardly have to think about it, meaning you can devote your attention to...

Other stuff that crops up occasionally

• Dart trips - are slightly more complicated, as you need to book access tickets about 6 months in advance, and find accommodation. Try and get Nick to blag the 'party-barn'.
• The National Student Rodeo - is a good laugh, but you need to work hard to persuade people of this, if they've heard rumours about the water quality. Also look at getting to other national completions/events.
• Tours - you get to choose where we go for longer trips/holidays at Christmas, Easter and summer. These are a great way to get some more cash out of the union, but unless things change don't bank on much money for anything except summer. However, tours are important, as we get to give people the opportunity to experience a much wider range of paddling and to improve dramatically at the same time. We've been running better and more varied tours than most other uni canoe clubs.
• The budget - with your treasurer you get to decide how much money to ask for from the union for next year.
• Equipment - you get to go out and spend club cash on shiny new toys. Choose carefully.
• Controlling your committee - without doing anything as boring as having a meeting, make sure the rest of them are doing what they're supposed to / what you tell them to. Don't be afraid to delegate!
• The AGM - you get to feel important and chair a proper meeting, albeit consisting soley of your drunken friends.
• Coaching / training - happens all the time, at the pool and on the river, but occasionally means organising something more, like a 4* course or first-aid training.
• Other random stuff - T-shirts or hoodies, meet-ups with other clubs, masterminding the move back to south ken for pool sessions, Freshers Handbook Entry.

RE, 2005.

Previous Presidents

2007-2008 Rachel Fox
2006-2007 Patrick Clissold
2005-2006 Claire Browne
2004-2005 Ralph Evins
2003-2004 Nick Farren
2002-2003 Glyn Richards
2001-2002 Asa Denton
2000-2001 Rob Tuley
1999-2000 Nigel Thacker
1998-1999 S. Hicks
1997-1998 S. W. Cooper
1996-1997 N. Shirtcliffe
1995-1996 R. Oldfield