Felix goes to #SPANC for the weekend

Lugging the recommended 200 copies of Felix, I skilfully avoided Friday rush hour and made my way to King’s Cross to attend the Student Publication Association National Conference (#SPANC) being hosted at Nottingham Trent University. Due to an administrative oversight (idiocy) tickets were exclusively via Grantham (lovely station) and highly reasonably priced (expensive). After relieving myself of about 30kgs worth of newspaper at the hostel, I headed on down to Nottingham Trent Union (NTU) to meet with my hosts and the other Felix rep (our estimable Editor-elect).

NTU is plush. Opened mere months ago, this billion-dollar facility boasts everything you could ever need from a union (in-house Costa anyone?). Indeed, if you like thinking 568 and Metric are ‘ok’ then I recommend you never visit NTU.

Our hosts were warm and welcoming and we were soon chatting and sharing publication stories over £2.75 Guinness’. SPANC proper didn’t start until the Saturday morning so we let ourselves be taken on the ‘Average-Bars’ tour of Nottingham. Despite the distinctly mediocre environs, we had a roaringly good time getting to know some of our fellow student editors.

The 9am Saturday morning start wasn’t the best way to recover, but Felix are nothing if not hardy. There were speeches from an eclectic bunch of journalists giving us an excellent insight into both how a career in the field can evolve as well as how to improve our own publications. We finally managed to rid ourselves of all the Felixes at the swap-shop only to quickly regain the weight by picking up a diverse range of excellent student publications.

Felix then decided to split so as to give an official presence at both the next sessions – a talk with the local representative of the National Union of Journalists (Diana Peasey) and a Q&A with Nick Petrie of The Times. Petrie is one of those infuriatingly successful young people who, at 26, is already Deputy-Head of News Development at The Times. This success is made all the less bearable by the fact that he was lovely guy who’s impossible not to like and who also does a huge amount to help out budding hacks (check out wannabehacks.co.uk). I managed to pose a Q relevant only to myself (journos with science backgrounds) which prompted a palpable collective eye-roll from the others.

We then headed for an afternoon group-therapy session about our respective unis and unions with James Thornhill of The National Student. Some of the stories were truly horrific involving power-hungry sabs and dictatorial universities with the papers involved showing the kind of courage and fight that puts our protests against Imperial West to shame.

Due to another admin oversight, I had been unable to book two consecutive nights at an establishment and thus needed to move to the Clarence Hotel. Now, this is the point where I bestow upon you an important life lesson – there is no official criteria for calling yourself a hotel.

Arrival at the ‘hotel’ did not bode well. A sticker on the window informed us that the place had once been “rated on Trip Advisor”. It took the ‘manager’ 20 mins to find my keys in a Fawlty Towers-esque mix up that culminated in us disturbing an amorous couple. After navigating my way through corridors containing [presumably] broken bed frames, the room did not disappoint. A quantity of plugs that suggested that the hotel was scared I would run out of energy was accompanied by lashings of stains. To cap this, my bathroom was a 1m2 crime scene capped with a convenient murder weapon/drug hole.

Highlights from neighbouring rooms (Editor-elect and Cardiff Uni) included plastic spoons for door handles (logical), wardrobes that couldn’t store clothes but could provide multiple entrances to magical lands (exciting) and sinks that were not connected to plumbing/mains (aesthetic). But hey, the beds were clean and doors were lock-ready.

The evening entertainment was an awards dinner followed by the NTU event Climax. Both were highly enjoyable though I may have outstayed my welcome with the bar staff by constantly asking them if they took Euros.

Suddenly, it was 9.45 in the morning and we were late for the Sunday morning death session back at NTU. Thankfully NTU is wonderful and has a plethora of highly comfortable chairs. By not moving any of my core and ingesting a constant rate of fluids, I was just about able to concentrate.

Our final guest speaker was tabloid journalist and writer William Coles – a fascinating and entertaining talker who covered everything from finding a story to increasing your charm. Finally, there were the elections to the committee of the SPA where our Editor-elect continued her election-winning habits and duly bagged herself the role of Events Officer.

My soothing stop at Grantham (still lovely) allowed time for reflection on what was a brilliant weekend. It’s well worth getting involved with Felix to attend these sorts of things. At the very worst, your Twitter following will increase by about 350% (as mine did) or even better, you’ll meet some genuinely interesting and intelligent people doing some really exciting stuff. Keep an eye out for SPANC 2015 as Felix has high hopes for hosting next year!