#011 Ft. Michael Hester, $300k+ Annual Expenditure as President of Melbourne Arts Students Society

The Campus Experience with Josh Farr

Our next guest is Michael Hester, President of the University of Melbourne Arts Students Society. With more than 2100 members, MASS is the largest student society at the University & Michael leads a team of 15 committee-members with an annual expenditure of over $300,000. We discuss how Michael & his team approach working in partnership with the Faculty of Arts, Scholarships, innovative approaches to reengaging alumni & the importance of health for students. Top Quotes: “We have an Arts Fest during Orientation Week where we take over 3 or 4 floors of a building with different activities, click-baity advertising, that gets students to feel welcome at University & on-board.“ “We have about 40 leaders… & we run a workshop on how to market MASS. Students love if you can add value to their experience vs sell a product straight away… It’s all just person to person connections that help people feel included.” “What we do best is demystify university.” “There’s no sort of connection with a faculty that has to be inherited. You can change & discover new opportunities just by meeting face to face with them… We ask, “What are the goals the faculty are looking for?” Then look at what we’re trying to provide. Someone in that middle ground is a project or an event that we can run. We can use their resources & they can use ours.” “Start small, not to leap towards your end goal.” “Staff were surprised by how innovative the program was, there hadn’t been a collaboration between a faculty in a financial sense before. It really took off, it was put in the staff publication!” “We had 500 people come [to our BBQ] & we sold 80 t-shirts on the first day. From there, we’re going to list them on our Facebook as a regular product.” “People are willing to help us out, even if they left the university walls 10-15 years ago.” “We’re all students, we’re all trying to have a great time, there’s no reason why we need to stand alone.” “While there’s a lot to do, my biggest priority is making sure everyone has a break from university firstly & is looking after themselves & having a good time because you can’t run a club unless you’ve got members that enjoy being around.” Resources: Accessibility scholarship Faculty 110: https://arts.unimelb.edu.au/scholarships/prizes-and-scholarships/the-faculty-of-arts-110-scholarship Wait, did someone say, ‘Mood Board?’ Here’s how Michael describes it: 1. On one side, “What do you like to wear to university? What would be appealing to wear?” 2. On the other side, “What sort of charity logos do you think are received well by students?” Then you cut out different photos from the internet & pop them on a board. Then you review the A1 poster board in the common room, stand back & look for recurring themes. Link to the RUOK Day event: https://www.facebook.com/events/1061505490683647/ Connect with MASS: https://www.m-ass.org/ www.facebook.com/mass.unimelb Connect with Michael: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-hester-%E4%BD%95%E8%BF%88%E5%85%8B-724451137/ For more interviews with leaders like Michael, make sure you follow Campus Consultancy. Website: www.campusconsultancy.org/podcast Facebook: facebook.com/campusconsultancyAU LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/campusconsultancy/ Join us again soon!