Planning an Event

An external speaker is defined as any individual who is not either a BCU student or a BCU/BCUSU staff member, who wishes to speak on a topic to your members.

Any ratified society is able to invite external speakers onto campus to interact with society members and we will consider requests in line with the principles of the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act 2023.

This act makes provision in relation to freedom of speech and academic freedom in higher education institutions and in students’ unions. 

If you want to bring an external speaker onto campus, you should add the relevant form to your activity submision.

Please note that any external speaker requests have to be approved by the Students' Union and may also require input from the University security team. Because of this, they can take up to two weeks to be processed so please consider this when planning your event and plan as far in advance as possible.

External speakers should NOT be advertised until you have received confirmation that they can come on campus.

Any event that's being undertaken needs a risk assessment and the relevant form will be added to your activity.

• Most standard classroom based activities will fall under the scope of our standard risk assessment.
   
• If your activity isn't covered by that risk assessment, but is a regular session your society holds, you'll likely have completed a specific risk assessment already.
   
• If this is a one-off, or new event which isn't covered by either of those risk assessments, you will need to submit a new one as part of the process.

 Please check the risk assessment form which will give you more detail.

My booking is for a one-off event requiring multiple rooms?

If your event requires multiple rooms (for example, two classrooms to accommodate a large number of members) then you should include the additional rooms in the preferred space section.


My booking is for a regular society meeting which repeats each week?

If you are requesting the same space, on the same day and time, across multiple weeks (for example a regular society meeting), please complete one form and select 'yes' when you're asked if your request is a multiple booking request. 

Multiple booking requests for different rooms, days or times will still require additional forms to be completed.

The documents below are useful for societies looking to host events. Click on the link to download the document.

Bake sales

• Bake sale guidance
• Bake sale allergen information sheet
• Bake sale risk assessment