For now we will deal with the case of pandemics and their lockdowns.
Our area of concern is everyone having enough social interactions to get by, including each person feeling valued and accepted in at least one place.
We recommend that corridors cease to leave out one or more of their neighbours. We neither can nor wish to enforce this however. So we need to deal with each person having other options than their own corridor as regards a place where they are accepted and valued.
Usually, there are two options: 1) make friends in a different corridor and hang around in there instead, and 2) find a society.
Pandemics and lockdowns put an end to 1), so our present focus is on 2).
In Cambridge, we furthermore observe that the more official, competitive or prestigious a society is, the less likely it is for downtrodden people to feel we have a chance of being accepted or valued there. It is instead unofficial, collaborative and laid-back societies that are widely viewed as shining lights of hope in this regard. So these will be our main focus, including which circumstances foster creation and continuation of such societies.
In Cambridge, unofficial societies moroever have a long tradition of not only being self-governing but also of each designing their own means of governance. This can readily incorporate downtrodden members' needs without any requirement of "convincing" some university-wide 'societies syndicate' of the needs for such arrangements. Unofficial societies that are accustomed to doing this become flexible because of it. In turn, such flexibility is key in dealing with pandemics, including adapting for each time period under a new kind of lockdown or tiering.
(For posterity's sake, this webpage was written in 2020: the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic).
So unofficial societies have the means to adapt, and the individual independences to just go ahead and do so, while societies bound by syndicate rules largely do not. By each unofficial society doing this in their own way, natural selection can act. In contrast, syndicated societies' enforced common elements leave them trapped in the pre-pandemic era that their inflexible and partly externally written rules came from. This is similar to diversified agriculture being far more robust against disasters than single-crop agriculture is.
Indeed, one particular way in which unofficial societies people have adapted to this pandemic is by creating SoCaLAC. Our purpose here is to point to some unofficial society structures, techniques and flexibilities that are working well. We also feel that it is time for students at other universities to wake up to how you've been missing out on unofficial societies, as well as how these provide a happier and more independent time at university than would be the case otherwise.
Let us first consider the difference between "student societies at Cambridge" and a more general possibility: "tolerant societies in Cambridge". Some of the ideas behind tolerant societies in Cambridge are, firstly that there are two universities in Cambridge: University of Cambridge and Anglia Ruskin University. So it makes good sense for there to be societies that actually treat people at each of these universities equally. A second idea is treating people who used to be at university the same as people still at university, and likewise for townsfolk. A caveat here is that such ventures are for people who are at least of university age. This is for legal reasons. A third idea is treating undergraduates and graduates the same. A tolerant society in Cambridge is then one that does their choice of most of the above things or similar. There are strong moral and ethical grounds on which societies of this kind should have "at least equal rights" to student societies.
Some official folk have various reasons or excuses to not grant "at least equal rights" however. Unofficial societies people don't consider that anything can be done about changing this "official state of affairs"; we do however know some effective ways of "making do" with what we ourselves can provide.
For instance, universities often only give free room bookings if a student at the university asks for them. Universities often also require advanced notification if non-members of the university are likely to attend meetings held on the university's premises. There is a simple answer to these things: any affected unofficial societies are quite simply free to meet in grassy areas near, but not within, university grounds.
As another example, universities often only fund societies that have committees consisting entirely of current students. In Cambridge, there has been exception to this for some years now, with committees only having to have a majority of current students, as well as a few technicalities on which posts these have to occupy (and one post requiring a member of staff: the Senior Treasurer). Nonetheless, many societies are unofficial, meaning in particular not applying for such funding while not being bound to the corresponding syndicate's rules either. Indeed, some societies forego such funding due to having well-founded moral and ethical objections to treating ex-students, students at other universities etc differently from current students (or to committees, centralization, or normativities more generally) So if a group value laid-back activities and independence, and are open to having new members, they can quite simply call themselves a society in the unofficial sense and forego funding. It clearly then makes sense to be laid-back in ways that don't involve any substantial expenses! In Cambridge, we find that such societies can straightforwardly get by on 10 to 50 pounds per term. Organizers, members and supporters contribute to this sort of amount (sometimes in kind). A few unofficial societies even have zero running costs, e.g. by being entirely social media based or by making use of equipment that they already happen to have. It finally makes sense for society equipment to be lightweight and unbulky, so that its storage over holidays is unproblematic. We generally recommend a maximum of two full carrier bags per society. Art can be done within this ballpark. Acting too, and boardgames. Walking. Picnicking. Support groups. Creative writing, tag, good-natured kickabouts, frisbee, and more.
During a pandemic, moreover, official societies find booking a room is much harder. Social distancing means that far fewer people fit in venues (and thee are very few free larger indoor venues). Universities may also suspend such room bookings. So, while "rule of six" tiering applies, all societies are down to having to meet on nearby grass or for walks. Unofficial societies are used to this, and thus flourish, while official societies people are yet to figure out the practical logistics of how it works. It's less easy than one might think, e.g. how can new people tell which group on the grass is your society. What to do if more than six people want to show up (such as having enough organizers to lead multiple walks of six or less people in different directions). Indeed, some unofficial societies are quite often used to coordinating "how to be found", "how to be recognized", and "how to split up". (Even if our experience in splitting up came from other reasons, such as anxious people preferring small groups, covering ground better, or keeping apart members who don't get on with each other).
One suggestion then is that new people wanting to set up your own societies might consider doing it the unofficial way. All the decisions involved in doing this are yours to make, though places like this webpage indicate others' experiences of what works and what does not, as well as of some of the elsewise unforseen snags, which some people may find useful. Various further considerations that some of us particularly value are as follows.
* Prioritizing one on one and two on one interactions. This involves even more of the "finding each other" and "recognizing each other" in places with other people waiting around. Such one on one interactions continued to be allowed outdoors in the most recent lockdown, and were seen as valuable by quite a lot of people.
* Social media or email interactions are valued by some unofficial societies as much as, or more than, conventional large gatherings in person.
* Running meetings using Zoom or similar is something that some unofficial societies (and a few official societies) already had more experience of prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. Even to the extent that Cambridge students devised an adapted version of a video conferencing chatroom called Timeout. This Timeout has many suitable features for new participants, quiet participants, vulnerable participants and so on. Being able to just build this to suit our communities rather than having to rely on platforms designed for professional video conferencing illustrates the value of organizational independence by students. Just one Cambridge society: the srcf (student-run computing facility) built this within just a few months of the start of the pandemic.
If doing such things 'required getting permission' from officials who don't understand tech, who don't understand quieter people, who don't understand the practicalities of societal recruitment, or of support groups' needs, then such ventures would largely not be carried out. Timeout is moreover designed to be inclusive of ex-students and family members (as opposed to 'society syndicates' that effectively treat these people as second-class citizens or even as obstacles). Timeout is thus very clearly adapted to what support groups actually need. This is based on a combination of insight. Of knowing enough about tech to get the tech to match the inclusiveness and not the other way around. And on there being actually functioning feedback from users, so that temporary shortcomings can be pointed out safely and can be expected to result in improvements (as opposed to feedback being blanked or to those giving it being subjected to repercussions). And even if some groups stuff was not run like this, nothing would stop some other society from being free to develop our own platforms in accord with these functional and good-practice principles. For, indeed, at any point in time Cambridge has some 600 further societies, many others of which are well capable of creatively solving the many difficulties posed to our communities by COVID-19. Such groups should quite simply be left to our own devices rather than being shoehorned into using tech that is not of our own choosing, or modes of governance that don't meet our communities' or constitutions' expectations. At present then, remaining unoffical and freely governed looks to be a strong route to keeping enough space to be able to manoeuvre out of the current crises, and future crises as well.
* More on general types of problems encountered by societies (whether student or tolerant) at present shall be assembled here, leading to a survey here to generate more feedback. In building this, and writing and processing our survey, we certify that we are both veterans in the matter of getting societies through hard times on a shoestring as above, and open-minded to new peoples' comments and what new circumstances necessitate.
We have now started to define what societies are in a proper and inclusive manner here here.
We have also called a Generation Z challenge concerning building free shareable tech to sort out various kinds of societies' pandemic-related problems here. Email crisiscampuslife at srcf.net if you would like to join our mailing list, or campus.life.adaptation.to.crises at gmail.com for benevolent feedback.
If other crises wore to come along, then, why we would think out what to do during those as well.