Query on university club affiliation

[spur]

About to start looking through the BOF website but thought some on here will know the answers quicker than I can find them, so thought worth asking:

a) for students to be able to run in BUCS champs, does their university have to have a registered club, and if so, what do they need to do to register a recognised uni club if one is not in existence at present?
b) can a university group join BOF and a local club via a group membership or not?

any advice appreciated, cheers

[Scott]

for students to be able to run in BUCS champs, does their university have to have a registered club?

No, you don't need to be a registered club to run at BUCS. You do need to get your university sports/athletics union to do your entries for you, but they normally seem quite happy to do this if you ask them in plenty of time, regardless of whether or not there's an actual club.

what do they need to do to register a recognised uni club if one is not in existence at present? can a university group join BOF and a local club via a group membership or not?

There is no group membership of BOF; whether local clubs have group membership is up to the individual club.

I'm not sure what you mean by "registered club" - for registering a club with your university, the criteria vary and can be quite strict (minimum membership numbers etc).

Registering a student club with BOF is more straightforward - you need a President, Secretary and Treasurer, you need a (simple) constitution, and you need to pay the BOF registration fee, which for student clubs is less than a tenner. I'd encourage you to register with BOF anyway - it's good publicity for your existence!

[spur]

Many thanks for the above, the BOF membership area refers to "Associate membership" for activity centres and youth groups, is there further guidance on this?

Is there guidance on the BOF website on registering a university club with BOF?

[Scott]

"Associate" membership is a bit of a funny one. Nobody seems entirely sure who it is intended for or what the benefits are, and there are only twenty of them in the whole country. It is possible that the whole category will be scrapped at the next BOF AGM, and the current associates encouraged to reregister in a different way.

I think affiliating to BOF as a club would be your best bet. Unfortunately, there is no guidance on the website on how to do this at the moment. The office staff are really helpful, so it's probably easiest just to email and ask - info@britishorienteering.org.uk

If you haven't already done so, it will probably be worth getting in touch with your local open club as well - if nothing else, they can be handy for arranging lifts to events.

If you have any problems (particularly with the BOF side of things), drop me an email - sjcollier@gmail.com

[lucy]

OK Scott you seem like the man to ask this beauty.

Does a University club have to be just for students, or could we set one up with staff to start with to get the ball rolling and have events to raise awareness of the sport and money? Also as there isn't a University club west of Bristol as I understand it at the moment could we have say a Plymouth Universities club, a Devon Universites Club or even South West Universities club. Has anyone done anything like this before? There are over 27,000 university students based in Plymouth, right between two active clubs, it's a disgrace that there isn't any student orienteering going on and not great for the future of the sport.

Any thoughts? from anyone?

[Mrs H]

ShUOC certainly includes Sheffield University and Sheffield Hallam University as all my children are/have been members. But not for the purposes of BUCS I believe where they have to field their own teams.

[graeme]

OUOC used to be open to members of Oxford Poly (now Brookes) and random Irish students from Culham.

More generally, you can pretty much do what you like. e.g. http://www.jok.org.uk/constitution got us through the BOF hoops even when they were actively trying to stop us . Army/RAF clubs managed to get family members of servicepersons included. You used to need some "condition of closure" for a closed club, but "Member of a University in Plymouth" would surely cover it?

Nowadays, unless you were planning to win BUCS, nobody is likely to complain.

(did you map the campus yet?)

[lucy]

Thanks for all the help and support campus map is under way for an urban sports event in march (tbc). Supported by 2012 legacy project which is based in the students union, this will be the second time we have included orienteering, but first time on campus.

Will be interesting what sort of interest we get.

[madmike]

Army/RAF clubs managed to get family members of servicepersons included.

We used a tough qualifying criterion for RAFO in our constitution as i recall it is

"a connection with the Royal Air Force"

The very best of luck with your efforts down in the SW - I don't recall ever seeing orienteering whilst I growing up down there way back when

[Scott]

lucy - absolutely no problem from a BOF point of view with forming Devon Students OC (or whatever) with students from different universities. I think it is possible that it could limit your ability to get support from the various universities involved, but you probably know more about that than I do. Have you spoken to the guys who are trying to get something going at Exeter?

For BUCS you enter by University - whether or not there is a club is generally irrelevant.

Also, I got your email a couple of days ago - am in the Lakes at the moment, so will reply on Monday.

[andypat]

We used a tough qualifying criterion for RAFO in our constitution as i recall it is

"a connection with the Royal Air Force"

My mate once got into the RAFA club in Dumfries on the basis of a blazer he bought in Burtons with a fake wings badge on it!

[madmike]

well most RAFA members eyesite isn't up to much any more, and of course if he was spending money at the bar......