LUNA – a visionary future

Universum was filled with active LUNA with big dreams for the union, and their ideas were many. The board hosted a Vision Workshop for all LUNA members, with the aim to gather ideas for future union work and to see what the members find important. The interest for this was great. Members of most student councils were present and everyone took their chance to express their thoughts about how the union should be and not be.

During the evening, discussions was held about what the long term goal of LUNA should be and how the union could gather more members. Passionate ideas about having more social events for active members, and  a future education where you can choose to have all courses whenever you want, and the possibility to have them all in English. Furthermore some more concrete ideas were brought up, such as creating a committee with the task to host smaller social events for all LUNA members and to work for removal of grades on group work all over the faculty.

The discussions lasted until late that night, and there were lots of thoughts brought back home. The operational year has almost come to an end, but the union work has definitely not done that. There is a lot left to work on to make sure that the students at the faculty of science have the best university time that is possible. And the union has both ideas about what to do and members who want to do it. It will be really interesting to follow LUNA during the upcoming operational year!

You can contact the Information Committee at info@luna.lu.se. If you want to find out more about the union, you are always welcome to stop by the union office or simply browse our webpage. You can contact the union via this form (you can be anonymous) or by e-mail at luna@luna.lu.se.

A sporty Skvalborg celebration!

It is Skvalborg 2018, the sun is shining and Borgarparken is filled with LUNA members. They sit down together, they talk to each other and they enjoy the beautiful weather. But even though there is a nice, friendly atmosphere, it is possible to feel the upcoming competition.  It is time for the annual Absurd Student council Olympics, ASO, and this year have the Sports Committee and the Party Committee together planned three events for the teams to compete in; soap games, volleyball and reduction ball.

The teams for the day are the same as during the Novisch Period. LEMUR, SNYS, GLuFS and BÖÖL competes against each other, and even though the size of the teams differ, the hype is real in all of them. Some of the teams have even brought mascots for this special events. But the day is more than just a competition. Between the events  are there time for barbeque, ice cream eating and lots of laughs with good friends. So when the sun suddenly disappears and LEMUR has won the grand prize, the Champinjon, for the second year in a row, everyone can leave the park in a good mood and feel prepared for a wonderful weekend filled with Valborg celebrations.

The Information Committee hopes that you all have had a nice Valborg and are ready for the last month of school before the summer!

You can contact the Information Committee at info@luna.lu.se. If you want to find out more about the union, you are always welcome to stop by the union office or simply browse our webpage. You can contact the union via this form (you can be anonymous) or by e-mail at luna@luna.lu.se.

What should I choose?

The spring has come, and with that is it also time to decide which courses you should take during the upcoming fall. The 16th of April is the last day to apply, and since there are lots of courses to choose from, it might not be the easiest thing to do. The decision is extra hard for those who shall decide which master program they want to start in September. The student council for environmental scientists, MYS, wanted to help out and arranged an evening with information about the different masters programs given at their institution.

It was a mixed group of students from all three grades at the bachelor program who showed up in the Ecology building when the evening was about to start, all interested to hear which possibilities the institution could offer for their future and to be able to ask questions. The evening began with a short presentation of the programs are given at the institution, which in total is four different programs whereof one of them has four different specializations. After the introduction, teachers that are involved in the respectively programs held further presentation of the different courses that are included in the master programs. The attendees of the night was also able to ask whatever questions that might come up regarding the programs and a future as master student.

After thorough presentation of all the master programs and discussions of questions like; “How hard is it to get accepted to the different programs?” and “Which courses should i choose if I want them to combine with my bachelor in a good way?” was it finally time for some well deserved fika. Meanwhile chewing on a cake or a sandwich was it also possible to continue the questioning, both to the previous speakers as well as to current master students who attended the evening just to answer questions. All of this summed up to a little bit less confused environmental scientists that left the Ecology building that night, even though they still had a big decision in front of them. A decision which they have to take before the 16th of April. The information committee wishes you good luck with your own choices of courses; do not forget to apply before the 16th of April!

You can contact the Information Committee at info@luna.lu.se. If you want to find out more about the union, you are always welcome to stop by the union office or simply browse our webpage. You can contact the union via this form (you can be anonymous) or by e-mail at luna@luna.lu.se.

Finally it was time, time to enter AF-borgen for a glorious ball. The hype before was real; the tickets sold  out in just a few minutes and the ball committee kept up their admirable work for months to prepare everything. And suddenly, the big day had come, the day at UTOPIA.

Snow fell from the sky when the attendees entered the building, and there were no sight of a scanish spring. However, the welcoming atmosphere inside AF-borgen kept all thoughts about the cold weather away and replaced them with joy and laughter. Well dressed people in tailcoats and wonderful gowns talked to each other and took photos in different constellations in front of a glittery photo wall, before it was time to get seated.

Inside the dining hall, five tables were beautiful decorated with flowers and candles. The attendees were soon seated and the dinner started of with a piece of pie for starter, accompanied with some sort of table gift for most guest. That means a little present you give to the person sitting next to you, so there is something to play with if the dinner gets boring. So meanwhile the hunger grew when waiting for the main course, people where playing games, painted portraits of each other with colourful pens in songbooks, and ate the delicious chocolate that were found inside their presents. And of course, they were singing songs. Because, even though it is not allowed to burst out in spontaneous singing during a ball, you are more than welcome to sing along when the ballmasters says it is time to do so.

When the dinner was finished, after delicious food and lovely speeches, it was time again. Time for the traditional walz to live music. Time to dance all night long to the tunes of fission ships. Time to have a wonderful evening together with fantastic LUNA friends at UTOPIA.

LUNA sweatshirts and union whales!

Have you seen strange people in LUNA sweatshirts hanging around at your student council fika during the past week? Maybe accompanied by a paperwhale on a stick? That is the sign on that the union election is getting closer. On the 17th and 19th of April is it time to elect new people to all posts within the union. Therefore, is the nomination committee, together with the information committee and the board campaigning to get candidates for the post. The procedure is easy. Through visiting fikas, they try to reach out to students at the different institutions and make them candidate and nominate people to union positions!

Have you not been lucky enough to pass by the campaigning people? Do not feel sorry, you can still nominate whoever LUNA member you want to a position in the union. Just klick in to the union webpage and hit the” Election 2018” button. There you find a formula which you fill in to nominate or candidate, but do not forget that there should be motivation for the nomination at a minimum of 30 words. All nominations are more than welcome, and you might make someone very happy through showing that you believe in them.

LUNA Election 2018 on Facebook

The campaign will continue and do not be surprised if LUNA sweatshirts and whales (kårvalar) shows up outside your lecture hall. They are nice, not scary. You are very welcome to talk to them, ask questions about the union election or about life in general, or let them help you to nominate. Because you should not forget to nominate, it is both important and fun!

Read detailed information about the election on the webpage here.

You can contact the Information Committee at info@luna.lu.se. If you want to find out more about the union, you are always welcome to stop by the union office or simply browse our webpage. You can contact the union via this form (you can be anonymous) or by e-mail at luna@luna.lu.se.

Finally – UTOPIA ticket release

A new year has come, and with that is it also time for new exciting events within the union. One of the biggest, and probably most spectacular of them all is Utopia, the science unions own annual ball. The tickets to the ball will be released to all LUNA members this Thursday, 1st of February at 18.00, and for everyone one week after that, 8th of February. These dates are important to keep in mind if you want a ticket, since the demand for tickets is great. Last year, all of them ran out in two minutes at the first release.

”So, why that great hype?” you may ask yourself. Well, there are many reasons to attend a ball, and there are many students within LUNA who has lovely memories from the ball last year. However, the information committee decided to ask the ball masters from this and last year for their best reasons to attend UTOPIA.

Alisha, who is one of the two ball masters in charge of this years ball, answered the question with that UTOPIA is the ball of the science union, which you definitely don’t want to miss! Furthermore, she says that it is a great opportunity to make memories for life together with good friends, or to put it simply, it will be awesome!

Johanna and Daniel, who had Alishas job last year lists a few other reasons to join the UTOPIA family. First of all, balls are one of the most central and student-like parts of the student life. It is much more than just a sitting, it is a part of the history of LUNA. The union had a ball many years ago, but the tradition disappeared and was brought back to life again last year. Apart from that, UTOPIA is an evening when you get the chance to dress up in your finest clothes and be surrounded by lovely LUNA people a whole night. And maybe one of the most important things, you get delicious food which you don’t need to cook by yourself!

The information committee wished you all good luck at the ticket release on Thursday and hopes that we will meet in AF-borgen at UTOPIA!

You can contact the Information Committee at info@luna.lu.se. If you want to find out more about the union, you are always welcome to stop by the union office or simply browse our webpage. You can contact the union via this form (you can be anonymous) or by e-mail at luna@luna.lu.se.

JoL-Afton – What can we do?

What LUNA can learn from others – an interesting discussion night. It is December the 6th and the Gender and Equality committee hosts a JoL-afton in Lundmarkssalen. It does not, if you might think so, have anything with christmas to do. Instead, it is a discussion night open for everyone, were values within the union are discussed.

To get the discussion started, the committee has invited the head of the gender and equality committee at the F-section at TLTH, Robin Berneståhle. He introduces the attendees to a project that was done at the F-section during the spring, through which values at the section were charted. The tools used to do that were discussions with lots of members of the F-section, both active and non active ones, as well as collecting written thoughts from members. Since it was possible to be anonymous when giving information to the project, lots of information was collected. Robin shows a huge bundle of papers to the attendees of the evening and it is easy to understand the wide range of the project, which has made the section better on criticizing itself and being able to see how more people can be included.

After the presentation, which is nicely performed, especially through showing papers which have been part of the investigation, the attendees of the night are split into three different groups and interesting discussions appears. The questions brought up were among other values within LUNA, what we can learn from the investigation on the F-section and were you can turn if  you of some reason not feel mentally well. It is really important that these things are discussed and that the union is aware of which values people see in their work. The discussions during the evening and Robins presentation were therefore a great start at a discussion that should be incorporated in all union work!

You can contact the Information Committeeat info@luna.lu.se. If you want to find out more about the union, you are always welcome to stop by the union officeor simply browse our webpage. You can contact the union via this form (you can be anonymous) or by e-mail at luna@luna.lu.se.

A visit to a Health, Environment, and Safety Committee meeting

“It is quarter past, so I think we should start!” The health, environment and safety committee has gathered in the sofas inside the union office and the chairperson Leo is eager to start the meeting. After he has taken the role as secretary upon himself, the committee members are allowed to report everything that has happened at their institutions since the last meeting. But there is not that much to say. The committee is pretty small, just one member from each student council and the chairperson, and many of the institutions have not had any HMS-meetings.  So, after reports regarding new microwaves at the centrum of geology and new chairs in the Ecology building, the members do not have much left to say, and Leo takes the word back. He quickly mentions that the list of student rights will be updated, and that there have been discussions about the possibility to have English speaking members in the health, environment and safety committees at the different faculties at the university. After that, he begins to present the results from the” Are you okay?” survey that the committee conducted this spring.

At this point, everyone present seems to become way more interested in the meeting. It is totally quiet when Leo shows the level of stress students feel at the different institutions. The aim with the “Are you okay?” survey was to see how students at the faculty of natural sciences felt, and there were questions about stress, if you feel like you will manage your courses and if you like your study environment, etc. The investigation was successful. 463 answers were received, which corresponds to one third of the students at the faculty. And from those answers, Leo has put together the colourful graphs that he shows the meeting attendants.

The discussions about the graphs are both engaged and touching. Some of the attendees wanted to know why students at their institution had a stress level at the verge of collapse. Other tried to explain different phenomena from their own experiences. What is clearly shown is though that the situation is not the same at the different institutions. Some are good at answering emails, others have students who generally sleep bad. But the fact that a significant amount of the students who answered the survey have sought help for mental illness is a sign that something needs to be done. The work done in the environment, health and safety committee are important, because no student should have a stress level on the verge of collapse.

You can contact the Information Committeeat info@luna.lu.se. If you want to find out more about the union, you are always welcome to stop by the union officeor simply browse our webpage. You can contact the union via this form (you can be anonymous) or by e-mail at luna@luna.lu.se.

LUNA Halloween – A Unique Sitting

Lophtet is filled with people. They are everywhere, even though they do not look exactly like people. Among other things there are angels, pumpkins, a piece of sushi and a lot of vampires. The reason to why people in this quite odd mixture of costumes have gathered is that LUNA’s party committee is hosting a Halloween sitting. And they do not just host it, they do it in a really good way.

You cannot imagine that it is the first sitting they host. Food is served quite fast, they keep track of everything and they have hired a wonderful photographer and two fantastic toastmasters, who manage to keep the hype up with songs and laughter. Because meanwhile everyone sing well-known songs with high voices, songbooks are passed around to get new notes and people are cheering. You cannot see anyone feeling bored, not even when you pass the whole room and press yourself against the wall to reach the toilet. It is necessary since the hall is filled to its maximum.

The LUNA members where as hyped to get their tickets as they are during the sitting. Everyone want to join, and the hype reaches its peak when the sitting is over and LUNAs own band Fission Ships enter the stage. They make the whole bunch of people dance together until they cannot think of anything other than the dance. Apart from that, the band really makes the sitting to something other than a usual sitting at a nation.

This is LUNA, and this is how fantastic we can organise things if we try our best. Because even though the vegetarian food is way too spicy to eat, the night is marvellous. There are people laughing everywhere you turn and the night does not end until the party master tells everyone to leave at 02.20. That fact alone is a good grade for an awesome night!

You can contact the Information Committee at info@luna.lu.se. If you want to find out more about the union, you are always welcome to stop by the union office or simply browse our webpage. You can contact the union via this form (you can be anonymous) or by e-mail at luna@luna.lu.se. See more pictures at the Facebook page.