 Welcome to the very first DCUT TV news of 2016. I'm Simon Joy. And I'm Darren McGowan. Here are this evening's headlines. Students Union hold referendum on constitutional changes. General Election 2016 campaign keeps up with students deciding who to vote for next week. Explicit photo-sharing in UCD creates calls for mandatory sexual consent classes across government colleges. This week a referendum is being held to seek the authorization of membership of DCUT to amend the constitution. These changes will introduce an Irish language officer to the executive, modify nomination requirements, expand the deadline for elections, create a gender neutral constitution and make my own house keeping changes. Andrew Beren has more on why you should vote. Following allegations made against him. There is just over a week to go until voting begins for the general election and politicians are hard at work canvassing for votes. There isn't a street lamp or telephone pole that isn't covered in election posters and it's hard to escape the constant coverage of the race. A big question over this election is whether young people will turn out to vote. Social media is playing a big role in this year's election with many politicians and parties using Facebook and Twitter to connect with voters and perhaps it will result in a high student turnout. There have been several successful voter registration drives as USI and other organisations have reported that over 80,000 students have registered in the last two years. A problem for many college students is whether to go home or not on the day to vote. I ask students of DCU whether they will be using their right to vote on February 27th and what issues are affecting them the most. Will you be voting in this year's general election? Yes I shall. And what issues do you think are affecting students the most? Issues I see affecting students the most will probably be accommodation and the fact that the cost of accommodation is continually rising. Will you be voting in this year's general election? Yes, yeah hopefully, as long as I can make it. You know obviously there's plenty going around of students needing to get loans instead of grants and Susie stuff like that and obviously that's terrible. I mean it's hard enough to get a Susie as it is. I will indeed. I think everybody should be using their right to vote. It's there for a reason. And students kind of came out in their numbers last year with the same sex marriage referendum. It was really nice to see that. Hopefully they'll come out again and vote for the election. A big issue affecting students every election are third level education fees. Several priorities have addressed the issue in their manifestos. Finnegea want to introduce a new loan scheme for third level education. They would make college free to access and graduates would begin to pay back tuition fees once their income reaches a certain level. Finnegea Falls say the student contribution fee will not rise for five years if elected. They have also committed to increase funding to third level colleges as well as examine a new loan system for students who cannot access the student maintenance grant. Labor states that they will cut student fees by 500 euro if re-elected. Sinn Fein wished to abolish student fees gradually over a term in government. They say to do so they will reduce the student contribution and replace the lost revenue to colleges through the Central Exchequer. These type of promises have come up in previous elections in order to gain the student vote. Yet with a successful marriage equality referendum last year that saw students and youth get involved in politics, projections are high for student turnout. If people are still unsure who to vote for, they can use the smart vote website to see who is running in your constituency and what candidate is best matched to you by answering 30 questions about policy and comparing your answers to the TDE's. Voting will take place Friday the 27th of February and if all goes to plan the count will begin the following day. I'm Jordan Kavna, DCU TV News. For the alarming cases in recent weeks of explicit images being shared of women attending DCU. mandatory sexual consent classes are to be introduced by the colleges through the union along with the International College of Dublin. Ethan McCormick has this report on the recent events and we are DCU's DCU should be following in this book. DCU students last week in relation to Revenge Porn I spoke to welfare officer Donal Hurican and DCU students about the need for sexual consent classes in DCU. So after all the stuff that happened recently in DCU Trinity we're looking into something for next year night for the orientation talks we have a sexual consent talk at the orientation for students. Like for other students in the years it's hard to get them to come talk like for instance during Shaggy we had a consent talk but it is hard to go. We've also put on a lot more classes as well. Whether or not students go is the question but for first years coming in we're going to hopefully have consent talks at every single orientation talk in DCU so that's where we build the culture of it through the years. Yeah I think they're a good idea because then people know like what the rules and regulations are for sexual consent so people might not be aware and might think that something is okay so then just springing classes to make people aware I think it's a better idea than not having anything to do with it. I don't really agree with the other side I kind of feel a little bit insulted because you're generalising, I'm not generalising and I think that the culture of going through sexual consent is a kind of major class in quite a bunch of other areas and there's no delay in trying to raise the problem but don't take it as a barrier to just change the rules. So you don't always have to think about it in seconds because we have a right to do that. There's no time for that in the case it's a right never. So I think it would be really important especially you have to be able to push it to get these consent classes and the university is more focused on understanding people's thoughts so I think it's a great idea to bring them in. Yes I do believe that sexual consent classes should be brought into DCU I think it's very important, it's obviously a huge issue I mean just look at what happened in UCD we need to start educating people about this. I think it would be a good idea because it's happening a lot more nowadays that girls just don't get into the habit of saying no and they're too weak to say no and they feel like if I don't say no I'm saying yeah do it that way. So I think it would be a good idea because it would protect a lot more girls and probably a lot more lads as well because a lad wouldn't know if a girl is saying yes or no if she's not saying no then they take her saying yes so it's all to do with that and the psychology of it so it would be a good idea. This is Ethan McCormack for DCU TV News. DCU Careers Week took place last week and featured some opportunities for current students to understand more about what they can get out of their degrees. Kevin Kelly went out to meet the graduates who are one step further on in their lives and got their stories of life after college. At the game well with Ellie Fries from left half forward Chris Conroy with the cavern native kicking four of Carlos' five first half points. After a slow start the defending champions kicked in the gear on the back of some outstanding play from Monaghan corner forward Shane Carey who kept DCU within touching distance with two fine first half scores. Careers Week in DCU saw events take place across campus to get students thinking about the careers ahead of them. Events took place on many different topics related to careers from J1 presentations to movie showings to LinkedIn workshops. The main area of help though came with info stands sitting around buildings which provided students with the help and know how they needed. Siobhan Murphy is a careers advisor here in DCU. The information stand is here today as part of a wider suite of activities as part of Careers Week and Careers Week was a joint project with Students Union and the Careers Service. One of the things that we really wanted to get out is to get careers out into all of the faculties during this week. We've had loads of different skill sessions but we thought perhaps an information stand about how you engage with the Careers Service might be very beneficial to students. So as they passed through the building what we're encouraging them is to really look about how they would engage with the Careers Service, how would they book an appointment, what are their options and what are the services that we offer. And we've had a tremendous turnout all of this week. So some people are very interested in one specific thing about postgraduate study, perhaps how to get a job. So we're just giving them a little bit of guidance about how they would actually engage with our service and how we can actually help them in a very real and meaningful way. The Careers Office will help all students looking for careers advice, just dropped by. Kevin Kelly, DCU TV News. Now apologies for earlier on for our brief type of difficulty and all and everything video package. This week a referendum is being held to seek the authorization of this membership of DCU Students Union to amend the constitution. These changes will introduce an Irish language officer to be executive, modify nomination requirements, expand the deadline for elections, create a gender neutral constitution and make minor housekeeping changes. Andrew Byrne has more on why you should vote. Voting will take place this week where members of the student body will be asked to vote on changes to DCU Student Union constitution. The changes proposed by Class Council include expanding the deadline for elections to be held by, modifying nomination requirements, creating a gender neutral constitution and introducing an Irish language officer to the SU Executive. Currently the DCU-SU constitution says that the SU elections must take place before week 9. However, this ruling is currently being looked at because with the amalgamation with St Pat's SU, the timeframe doesn't suit their student body as many are on placement. The proposed amendment to the constitution will allow the students union to take place after week 9. Because as it stands, if we have the elections at the present date, finally St Pat's students won't be able to run because they're on placement. So by us pushing elections to be 10, finally St Pat's students can run. That's why I want to change it so they can run. Students will also be asked to vote on the creation of a new part-time Irish officer. An Irish officer is basically someone who sits in the exact and who is the voice of the Irish language on campus. So not only do they stand up for people who are studying Irish here in DCU, people who speak Irish, but also for the campuses as a whole, as DCU strives to promote Irish, but also then to make sure that DCU is living up to its responsibilities in terms of the Irish language here on campus. Other proposed amendments include making the language in the constitution more gender neutral and altering the nomination process to allow for the larger student body. Andrew Bond. DCU's Get Involved campaign has kicked off a partnership with the RTE TV program, Operation Transformation. Rachel Keller has been looking at the initiative in greater detail, as well as finding out how you can take part. January every year sees a spike in people's interest in health and fitness, with many vowing to lead a healthier lifestyle. It also marks the return of RTE's Operation Transformation to our screens, a show dedicated to improving the nation's health. This year DCU brought Operation Transformation to campus. The health initiative was launched on the 2nd of February, in order to encourage students to make better lifestyle choices. We spoke to James Donahue, the main man behind the operation itself. James Donahue. James Donahue. So you take lots of students, they're kind of in the library some nights till 10 o'clock and they go flat out for two weeks in the library till 10 o'clock and they're forgetting to exercise and eat properly. So the campaign is just more so to get people thinking about stuff like that and try to get people more active about campus. So we launched it kind of last week in things in motivation weeks so people can start talking about it. Next week we're going to do kick to habit week so we're going to do things like detrimental to kind of your physical and your mental health so we're going to do camp and smoke and drinking and stuff like that. Then we're going to try to get students more active at the end of the semester, there's the 5k rule. The campus pharmacy is also playing its part in the initiative by offering a range of services. These include the free weekly weighing, healthy eating recipe book and expert advice and guidance. You can also avail of cholesterol, iron level and blood sugar checks for an inclusive price of 70 euro. The pharmacy will continue to offer these incentives until the end of operation transformation this year. Until then, keep an eye out around campus for other events taking place. I'm Rachel Callagher with DCU TV News. DCU have kicked off their bid for a second consecutive Sigerson Cup title in style as they demolished ITF loan by 6 goals and 14 points to 1 goal and 7 points. Jack O'Toole has the full match report from the weekend. DCU then extended their lead after a great sweeping move started by double midfielder Shane Cartey. After several handbasses the ball eventually worked its way up to Michael Quinn who then picked out Dermot O'Connor with a lovely crossfield pass with the mayor footballer finding himself in acres of space before popping the ball over the bar. O'Connor would add his second point of the game a few minutes later as DCU began to turn their patient build up into well taken scores. O'Connor's point was enough to ensure DCU entered the break all tied up with a half time score of 5 points apiece. Cary started the second half in much of the same vein as he ended it as first opening the scores with a well taken free to give the visitors an early second half lead. As the second half wore on DCU began to pull away from Carla as Cary continued to punish the hoster at the middle of the park. The informed forward picked their former Brisbane Lions star Colin Begley who in den turn found Alton Haney who kicked his only point of the game to give DCU a three point lead. Cary would add another free and a well taken point from play the first substitute David Mannix further extended the visitors lead with a well taken point just meters in from the sideline. Further scores from Mannix and a lay point from substitute Stephen O'Brien would ensure DCU left with a comfortable win and a place in this year's semi-finals. After the game we caught up with DCU coach Nolomoy to hear his thoughts on the game. Typical Sigerson, tough game, there's no easy games in Sigerson and we've known that down through the years, we've known that. You've got to show up every single day and to be fair to them we did show up but they've put in a phenomenal performance in the first half and they really put it up against it to us. But look, like last year the team found a way to win and that's what we try to put into our team. It's about finding solutions to the problems that are thrown out at you and looking off we came out in the second half. They seem bestowalfully as a lot in the first half but you really pulled away early in the second half. Would you make any adjustments at half-time or what's the difference? Well, we knew they were going to play that game. Obviously they made the pitch much, much smaller as well and I think that certainly didn't suit us making, you know, narrowing the pitch by 20 metres. It became a very, very confined pitch and they probably ran out of steam in the second half and, you know, they have some great football players. That was, you know, don't take away from them. I really admire them and really the quality of their football and maybe just with a few quality players and a better bench in the second half and that allowed us to pull away. And talking the semi-final obviously has brought you one step closer to your goal and obviously repeating the champions would be fantastic. Yeah, it has been done I think in 20-something years. We're going up against the hosts and the favourites. Loaded team. But look, it's a challenge. As I said to the guys a few moments ago, if you're not in, you can't win. So at least for there and we'll give it 100%. I'm Jack O'Toole, Life Mighty Carlo. And finally, committee members handed it over to a check from the money raised during this year's 24-hour broadcast. The society raised a record amount of over 7,000 euros for the mental health charity Jigsaw, a branch of Headstrong. Glenn Murphy went along to find out to get the full story. 88 cent. Last Monday, members of the Media Production Society's committee travelled to Jigsaw's headquarters in Dublin City Centre to present them with the check for the money raised. We spoke to Jigsaw's fundraising coordinator, Susanna Riley, to ask her what she thought of the money raised. We're in Headstrong in Jigsaw to all of the students in the Media Production Society that did such a fantastic job during the 24-hour broadcast in December. We're absolutely thrilled here with the amount of money raised. It's really superb and it'll go a long way to helping and support more young people around their mental health, particularly here in Dublin City Centre with the opening in New Jigsaw hope here later on this year. So just a massive thank you to everyone who got involved for all of the hard work, for everybody who supported with donations and really just helped raise such a fantastic amount of money and just really raised awareness around Jigsaw. So thank you.