Question 4
This question asked respondents to scale, from 1 to 7, dislike to like, seven different characteristics. Those characteristics were; the decor, the atmosphere, the cost of the drinks, the meeting of friends, the entertainment, the opening times and finally, the closing times. These results were then correlated, comparing the average score given to each characteristic with the regularity of attendance.
Fig 4.2 GRAPH SHOWING THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CHARACTERISTICS AND THE REGULARITY OF ATTENDANCE.
Those attending the club infrequently scored the “meeting of friends” the highest and the atmosphere and closing times the lowest. They seemed less concerned about the earlier closing times.
Those attending once a month scored the “meeting of friends” the lowest of all the groups, and the rest of the classifications approximately average in comparison with the whole group.
Those who attended three times a month scored the “meeting of friends” the highest and the “atmosphere” was given above average scores. The “closing times” was the only category to receive well below the average allocatable score.
Those who attended every week objected most the earlier closing times, giving it a mean score of 1.7. Cost of drinks and the “meeting of friends” is what those who regularly attend appreciate most.
Question 5
This question ventured into new terrotority as far as the College Club was concerned. Friday night parties had been launched on Halloween night and then had continued through Michealmas term without much success. The pilot study had identified the lack of awareness to be due to failure in good advertising. Asking the students whether they were aware would give an on idea of the success of the marketing techniques.
Fig 4.3 GRAPH SHOWING WHETHER PEOPLE WERE AWARE OF THE FRIDAY NIGHT PARTIES
When asked whether the students would possibly attend Friday night parties, generally the response was positive, almost 2/3rds saying they would use the facility;
Fig 4.4 GRAPH SHOWING WHETHER PEOPLE WERE LIKELY TO ATTEND THE FRIDAY PARTIES
Many of those who said that they would not use it on a Friday commented that this was because they did not stay at College at the weekends.
Question 6
The next question asked people whether certain entertainment would encourage them to use the College Club on a Friday night. The options included; a regular DJ, karaoke, comedy acts, live bands, video, sky and finally if there were just the bar facilities. The scale began at 1, for would not attend, to 4, for would not make any difference, ending at 7, for more likely to attend.
Fig 4.5 GRAPH SHOWING THE PREFERENCES FOR ENTERTAINMENT OPTIONS ON A FRIDAY NIGHT
The actual scale ranged from one to seven, but the maximum that was used was five.
The only options that received below a would make no difference score were the option of only bar facilities and the karaoke option. With the option of karoake, 21% rated the option highly i.e. a score of 6 or 7, but 18% rated it very lowly i.e. a score of 1 or 2; the resulting average being a score of 3.5.
The live band and comedy acts rated the highest, although it was noted by a few of the respondents that this is a fairly expensive option.
Question 7
The lack of lunch-time facilities for students was raised during the pilot study. The college club was opened in response to this. There are not many places to go to eat lunch on the campus, so when a place was opened specifically, we needed to find out where the students went instead.; 52% went to the mess, and the remaining went to eat in the Spar shop on campus, some went to the library, some into the village to the pub and an amazing 20% went home.
Fig 4.6 GRAPH SHOWING THE FACILITIES THAT STUDENTS PRESENTLY USE FOR LUNCH
Question 8
We were not interested in those people eating in the mess as they already pay for their meals. Both the Spar and the library offer sandwiches and hot drinks. This was identified by pilot study as possibly the advantage over the College Club; as at the time, the College Club was only offering cold drinks and snacks.
Fig 4.7 GRAPH SHOWING WHETHER PEOPLE WOULD USE THE COLLEGE CLUB IF VARIOUS OPTIONS WERE AVAILABLE
The scale on the graph begins at one, indicating that the students were unlikely to use the club for lunch, increasing to four, indicating that they would use the facility if the options were offered. The results indicate that longer opening hours is not an important factor, with the other options varying in appeal.
Question 9
Many student unions are open each night; and the students use this instead of the pub. It was understandable that the majority of students who lived in Swindon said that they would not use this facility if offered. Out of the remaining students, eight said that they were likely to use the facility regularly, and thirty said that they would attend irregularly, although the level of irregularity could not be identified.
Fig 4.8 GRAPH SHOWING WHETHER PEOPLE WOULD CONSIDER USING THE CLUB IN THE PLACE OF THE PUB.
Question 10
The College Club can be hired for private events. With the exception of the rugby team using the club on a Wednesday afternoon, the club is rarely used by individuals or groups.
Fig 4.9 GRAPH SHOWING WHETHER PEOPLE WOULD CONSIDER USING THE COLLEGE CLUB AS A VENUE TO HOLD VARIOUS EVNTS.
When questioned, approximately half of the students said that they would consider the College Club as a venue, with a few exceptions saying that it was a high possibility, especially for sporting or group events. The remaining half of the respondents said that they did not consider the club a suitable venue.
Question 11
Thirty-eight people, 61%, felt the club should not limit the membership of the club. Only 2 people expressed a wish that it should be open to undergraduates only. Another five people said that people permanently attached to the college should be permitted into to the club.
The only people who were considered as not being acceptable were those on short courses and other ranks, but only a total of five people answered this.
Fig 4.10 GRAPH SHOWING THE WISHES OF THE STUDENTS CONCERNING WHO SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO USE THE CLUB
Eight people, however, considered that the Wednesday night party should only be open for undergraduates, but that other people were more than welcome at other events.
Question 12
In order to identify whether the respondents were a fair representation of the student body, it was useful to ask a few personal questions; their sex, what degree year they were, and who was their sponsor whilst they were studying.
The results show that a quarter of the respondents were female whilst the student population is closer to a ratio of 1:7, males: females. The 53° students constituted a third of the respondents with 52° only being 20% and the remaining 47% being 51° students. It was though that a high proportion of the third years replied as they were aware how important the results would be as part of a project.
The results showing whom the students were sponsored by indicated that 57% were LEA/DOH students which is only slightly higher than the actual figure. Although no respondents were overseas military, the overall respondent sample was close to the actual make-up of the student body, therefore making the results a fair representation of the undergraduate population at RMCS.
Question 13
When asked What could be provided?, non of the students had any suggestions.
4.3 STAFF BASED STUDY.
The staff-based study was completed in two parts; informal interviews, and secondary data in the forms of the minutes of meetings.
4.3.1 SECONDARY DATA
Any secondary information contains considerable bias. Minutes of meetings are an interpretation and summary of what is said. The information is then interpreted by the researcher. Because of the high level of bias involved with interpretation, the emphasis was placed upon the action followed up from the meeting.
Unfortunately the CCPC has not met in the last four years, and it was decided that any information that contained within previous minutes would not be relevant to this study.
However, a meeting was held on the 27th October 1998, between the College Club committee, the Academic Registrar, the Chief-of-Staff and the Deputy Principal. These minutes can be found in Annex F.
The meeting covered seven main topics;
- the meeting itself
- the post of Bar Manager
- the opening times
- the culture
- property
- entrance i.e. membership
- funding.
The meeting began by stressing the importance that future meetings should
take place…on a regular basis.
Between October and March, no further meetings have taken place. One had been planned for the beginning of December, but it had to be cancelled due to prior engagements of the staff.
A paid Bar Manager was discussed at length with the job description (Annex G), being based upon the hours of 12:00 until 15:00, Monday to Wednesday to cover the lunch time openings. The outcome of the discussion was that the funding would be provided by Prof. Brown, the Deputy Principal to pay for the post, for one year. The position was advertised around the campus, and in the local area, but to no avail. As such, the lunch time openings are still being run by a student.
The subject of the opening times was discussed at length with the students stressing that attendance was reduced due to the earlier closing, but the staff were adamant that there was no possibility of reverting to the original times.
The staff expressed their wish that the parties were moved onto a Friday night so that the following day’s lectures would not be affected. The committee expressed their concerns over the funding for these parties, and Prof. Brown offered to provide the funding. Three parties were held on Fridays, the first being on Halloween. The success of these were limited, with approximately 70 people attending each. The future likelihood of success was likely to be limited, as identified when the students were questioned (Fig. 4.4), and therefore the College Club committee took the decision that the Friday events would not be continued in the Spring term.
Culture was the next item to be discussed. It was noted that the student body saw the club as being a facility for after-hours drinking. It was acknowledged that this would take some time to change. It was suggested that if we increase the facilities in the club, then people would use it more often. Again the question of funding arose. It was brought to the attention of the committee that there was a fund that could be used for such items and that a request should be made. The Bar Manager did submit a bid in the order of £2000 for some sound and lighting equipment, unfortunately the proposal was not accepted, and no money was received.
It was the discussions about membership to the club in this meeting, that led to the inclusion of the relevant question in the student study. The meeting ended with the club remaining officially non-rank conscience but it later came to the attention of the College Club committee that the majority of the people on the short courses, similarly the other ranks were told that the club was not for their use (College Club minutes Dec 1998). As such no decision was made in the meeting to restrict the membership, but someone decided to tell people otherwise.
The area of funding was brought up continually throughout the meeting with the College Club committee highlighting the fact that extra costs are being incurred because of the students living in Swindon. The final point that was made was that the College Club was not there to make money. The success measurement was
not profit, but a positive balance of payments..
(Minutes, dated 27/10/98)
4.3.2 INFORMAL INTERVIEWS
The informal interviews were carried out in order to identify whether any member of staff could suggest events that the College Club could host. This part of the study focused on those members of staff who had daily interaction with the students
The main suggestion came from the Student Co-ordinator. This post involves interaction with not only the undergraduate students, but also the postgraduates and the families of those attached to the college. A new initiative was starting in the beginning of the Michealmas term, for a Families Group to be formed. The initially used the Mess to meet in, but found that it was not suitable, and was quite expensive. The College Club on the other hand, provided a large area for the children to play in, a seated area and the facility for refreshments. The only cost that would be incurred would be people to run the bar if required. Since the idea was suggested, the Families Group have used the College Club every Wednesday morning as a informal meeting place, and once a month for a larger social event.
The other suggestion was to use the College Club as a venue for the lunches when there were UCAS visits, i.e. prospective students visiting the college. Again the advantage of the College Club over other venues on college is that it has a large area so seating can be arranged, but also, it is the only student area that is on the college grounds. This again was taken aboard as a suggestion and has been implemented successfully, although some more furniture would be advantageous.
4.4 CONCLUSION
Although the students were not overly enthused with the College Club facilities, the results were encouraging on the whole. The attraction of the College Club seems, from the results, to be the cost of the drinks, and as a facility to meet friends. The entertainment did not rate highly on a Wednesday night and it did not seem to be a deciding factor when people considered whether or not they would attend Friday night functions.
As a facility for lunch-times, the College Club did not rate highly. The provision of hot drinks, food nor longer opening hours did not encourage it’s use.
The staff based study identified that the college hierarchy were in favour of the club being used during the lunch-times, and even offered to fund the post for a paid Bar Manager. The other two suggestions from the general staff emerged a success, and they seemed to have empathy for what was trying to be achieved.
However, those in the College hierarchy, were not overly supportive, especially where the Wednesday night parties were concerned. They were ready to point out the problems with the College Club but did not seem concerned that the solutions that they came up with were not productive.
