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Student Ambassador

HANDBOOK 2013-2014

www.tedxuniveristyofedinburgh.com

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Welcome and thank you for being a part of our great Student Ambassador Team

As a TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh Student Ambassador you will be a part of the team creating the most inspiring and motivational conference of the year: TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh in February 2014. You will also take part in promoting TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh Salon events through active publicity and one off events on campus. Together we aim to engage with the student body and the wider community, all in order to share ideas worth spreading. We believe that your role is key to making the TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh experience the best it can be. As students from a large variety of different backgrounds you will have an invaluable understanding of the dynamics of student life, something that will be crucial to keep conversations going across all our campuses and levels of student life. Moreover, your creative skills and input is truly invaluable, and we hope that you will make use of it to the fullest. We want to provide you with a platform where you can use your skills to make it the best problem yet. Volunteering with us will help you to enhance your existing skills as well as developing or learning new skills. As you are all full of knowledge and expertise in your respective areas, we want you take advantage of this opportunity and make the most of your time with us. Your personal development is important to us. However, no one expects you to know everything, so we have put together a handbook to help you out, guide you and hopefully contribute to an altogether clear structure for upcoming TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh-year. Your committee team are here to help you on every step of the way. We have put together short role descriptions, and a guide to how you can get involved with the different teams. Weʼd love to get you on board on all our upcoming projects and help make your independent projects come to life. Please do not hesitate to get in touch if you have any questions about your role, the events and whatever else you may wish to discuss with us. Lots of love, Your Volunteer Coordinators

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ABOUT TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh: For the second time, students in association with key partners, such as Beltane Public Engagement, Innovative Learning Week and the Institute for Academic Development will be hosting TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh. Following the success from last year, TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh aims for an even wider community outreach, through various levels of community and the student body. By engaging students in the planning process and furthermore providing them with a high level of ownership to the events, TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh will be a truly student led project thriving on the vast knowledge and expertise found in our student body. The desired outcomes of TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh are based in the positives of internationalization on campus, by encouraging the students to ʻthink globally and act locallyʼ, generate innovation and entrepreneurship by active promotion of divergent thinking and inspiration. TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh also aspires to provide our students and the wider community with a platform on which new ideas can emerge, by valuing contributions of all actors and welcome creativity and carrying through ideas as they arise. We are here to facilitate the flow of discussion and ideas. The ethos of this yearʼs TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh is based around the idea of longevity and sustainability, through an inclusive, accessible, innovative, developmental, organic and personalized structure aiming to incorporate all areas of student life; through cross-disciplinary and collaborate actions.

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The TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh Committee Event Coordinators – Maggie and Theo As Event Coordinators we are responsible for keeping on top of the budget, engaging with partners both within and outside the University, organising the Committee, and being the main contact point for TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh. We facilitate Committee meetings, act as the contact point between the Advisory Group and the Organising Committee, and in general try to keep things as organised as possible! If you have any questions about the logistics of any of the events going on this year, please contact us on: eventcoordination@tedxuniversityofedinburgh.com Communications Team – Alina, Mike and Sam The Communications Team aims to inform the University of Edinburgh community about who we are and what we do. More specifically, we maintain TEDxUniversityofEdinburghʼs presence on social media, update the website, and stay in touch with student press. We work with what we receive from other teams and think of the best ways to present it to the greater public. If you want to get in touch, donʼt hesitate to contact us through social media, the website, or email: communications@tedxuniversityofedinburgh.com Creative Producers – Tom and Alex The Creative Producers are responsible for being creative! We organise the branding and aesthetic of the Conference and Salon events. We are also responsible for the production side of the events and the design of the event spaces. We work closely with the Communications team and Event Organisers to make sure the messages we send out are visually stunning and part of a coherent design. You can email us on: creativeproducers@tedxuniversityofedinburgh.com Speaker Development Team – Noer and Lian As speaker development leaders, we are in charge of inspiring and generating interest in the student community for TEDx and public speaking in general. We are also organizing training opportunities for those that are interested, and trying to help students build up public speaking as an essential and important skill. We are managing the Student Choice Awards, and creating a support

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system within the TEDx Speaker community! Feel free to email us at: speakerdevelopment@tedxuniversityofedinburgh.com Volunteer Coordinators – Emmeline and Mari As your volunteer coordinators we are dedicated to make sure that you have a valuable time with us at TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh. We will assist you with anything regarding room booking and creating socials, identifying the right channels for your ideas to come to live, and we will also make sure that you can develop skills and work with projects associated with our committee teams. We will be your main link between the committee and the student ambassadors, and as such all communication should go through us in order to make things a little more manageable. Email us at any time: volunteer@tedxuniversityofedinburgh.com

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YOU as a Student Ambassador As a student ambassador you are expected to support the committee and the teams in the production and running of the main event in February 2014 and the TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh Salon events. TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh expects you to commit time and dedication to the various projects run by the different teams throughout the year, and to contribute to a good volunteering environment with the Student Ambassador group. Please note that you should save plenty of time during all of Innovative Learning Week, as there will be plenty to do during to do leading up to our big event at the end of this week. The purpose of being a student ambassador is to be the outward face of TEDx on campus, engage with the audience and the wider community, and to keep the conversations going both prior to events and after. YOUR ROLE:

But, donʼt worry! You donʼt need to know everything! We will always be there to assist you, and you can contact us on: volunteer@tedxuniversityofedinburgh.com We will set aside time in each volunteer meeting to discuss ideas, volunteering opportunities, and identify the correct medium for your project ideas.

 ♦ Assist teams in the creative work, production, and

publicity of TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh on campus.

♦ Keep conversations going on campus, by keeping up

the momentum for people to get excited for

TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh events.

♦ Share your creative ideas and make them happen

through the right medium and within TEDx regulations

♦ Be the outward face of TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh on

campus.

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INDEPENDENT PROJECTS The independent project is designed as a way for you all to engage in teamwork, and formulate feasible ideas for potential publicity stunts on campus. For any independent projects, please send volunteer coordinators a proposal outlining the idea and the following: 1) purpose and target audience; 2) timeline; 3) logistics; 4) branding. The independent projects may or may not be used, and might be modified to fit branding and budgetary means. It will be done under the supervision of the appropriate team(s). The aim of the individual projects is for you to have increased ownership to your time as a student ambassador with TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh, and to increase visibility on campus. However, keep in mind that the focus of the student ambassadors lies within the assistance of the production of the events themselves, and as such, the individual projects will be projects run parallel to other activities run by the committee teams.

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JOINING COMMITTEE TEAMS Role specification and opportunities to get involved Let us know if you are interested in helping out with:

Event Coordination

• 6 or so informed, welcoming faces at each event (Salons and main conference)

Communications Team • Communications around TEDx Salon events – what can we do to keep

the conversations going? • Postering across campus • Leading photo campaigns (and any other campaigns of interest!) • School and society outreach, lecture shout outs • Creative brainstorming for launch of theme, etc • Helping us set up the launch in Bristo Square • Blogging about each event, about being student ambassador, about

any ideas inspired by the Salons • Web design (there is so much talent in our group!!) • Ideas for interesting social media campaigns • Anything to do with media creation for creative production is ideal! (See

below)

Creative Production • Designing the aesthetic and publicity for all events • Venue preparation this will include the main conference hall and

smaller installation rooms/ for the salons and the Conference ( during Innovative Learning Week)

• Creating innovative ways publicise the events across all campuses these include:

o Animation – lots of exciting and fun videos o Graphic design, both for the website and events o Photography teams, having lots of great photos of all our events

Speaker Development

• Volunteers will have opportunity to receive facilitation training • Student Choice Award: Engaging with students, promotion of

award/recruitment of applicants • Masterclass (general support & attendance)1

                                                                                                               1  Masterclass: The Masterclass is the final rehearsal for all speakers before the main conference.

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Volunteer Coordination

• Initial and independent project proposals revised, collaborated and executed collectively in teams

• As many one-off events as there are Salons and main event (5+1) • One- off publicity stunts around campus (flashmobs, chalk

campaigning etc) • Helping out creating volunteer socials, and managing these (e.g. pub

quizzes, walks, flash mob training etc)

Throughout the year we will need people engaging with these activities: General Activities

• Blogging for Salon events as well as the main event • Photographers for events, workshops and meetings • Active on social media: e.g posting TED(x)-talks on facebook, use

Twitter actively to raise awareness of TEDxUoE, prompt friends and family with ideas…

NB! The abbreviation ʻTEDxUoEʼ is ONLY to be used on Twitter.

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ABOUT EVENTS TEDx SALON EVENTS Four mini-events in the lead up to TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh based around the themes of the Global Academies at the University of Edinburgh and the Centre for Cultural Relations…

• Global Justice • Global Development • Global Health • Global Environment & Society • Global Citizenship (CCR)

Desired outcomes

• Generate publicity material and exposure from events • Provide volunteers with space for creativity and personal

development • Promote community amongst attendees, volunteers and

speakers/contributors • Develop skills of public engagement (for volunteer facilitators and

speakers) • Inspire to take further action

At the event

• TEDx Salon events: promotion; engagement around events to support students in conversations about themes; creating podcasts/art/etc around the events to keep the conversations going

• TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh 2014: On the 21st February we will need volunteers the entire day as well as through Innovative Learning Week in the lead up to help with getting the venue ready and general final event details. KEEP THAT WEEK FREE!!

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IMPORTANT DATES

USEFUL CONTACTS

• TED- The Rules: http://www.ted.com/pages/tedx_rules • TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh: http://tedxuniversityofedinburgh.com/ • Student Ambassador FB-group:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/683506848327363/

Partners • EUSA: http://www.eusa.ed.ac.uk/ • Beltane Public Engagement: http://www.beltanenetwork.org/ • UoE Sustainability Office:

http://www.ed.ac.uk/about/sustainability/home • UoE Innovative Learning Week: http://www.ed.ac.uk/staff-

students/students/studies/innovative-learning • UoE Institute for Academic Development: http://www.ed.ac.uk/schools-

departments/institute-academic-development • Grassmarket Community Project:

http://www.grassmarketcommunityproject.co.uk/

Date Event Location Time 27th November

TEDx Salon Event: Justice

Grassmarket Community Project

5pm -8pm

January (TBC) Launch of Theme University of Edinburgh

TBC

22nd January

TEDx Salon Event: Development

Grassmarket Community Project

5pm -8pm

Mid-February Masterclass TBC TBC 17th – 21st of February

Get in- Week: Save the dates to help out with the event

All over campus TBC

21st February

TEDx Main Conference

The Pleasance TBC

19th March

TEDx Salon Event: Health

Grassmarket Community Project

5pm -8pm

(26th March TEDxUoE Salon Event: Environment and Society)

Grassmarket Community Project

5pm -8pm

2nd April TEDx Salon Event: Global Citizenship

Grassmarket Community Project

5pm -8pm