NUS-USI, the student movement in Northern Ireland was formed in 1972 by bilateral agreement between the National Union of Students of the United Kingdom (NUS) and the Union of Students in Ireland (USI), to address the particular problems of representing students in Northern Ireland.
Students at an affiliated college are members of both national students' unions, and benefit from full representation in each body. The elected leader of the organisation is a full-time representative, elected as a sabbatical from one of the member colleges, and serves as a member of the USI Officer Board and the NUS National Executive Committee. An elected term is one year long (July–June). An officer within the executive of the movement may hold an officer position for a maximum of two terms.
The current President of NUS-USI is Fergal McFerran, who graduated from Queen's University Belfast in July 2015.
NUS-USI also has a number of part-time student officers filling the following roles:
Like birds on a high line
They line up at night time at the bar
They all once were lovebirds
Now bluebirds are all that they are
They landed in hell
The minute they fell from love's sky
And now they hope in the wine
That they'll find a new way to fly
A new way to fly
Far away from goodbye
Above the clouds and the rain
The memories and the pain
And the tears that they cry
Now the lessons been learned
They've all crashed and burned
But they can leave it behind
If they could just find
A new way to fly
By the end of the night
They'll be high as a kite once again
And they don't seem to mind all the time
Or the money they spend
It's a high price to pay
to just find a way to get by
But it's worth every dime
If they find a new way to fly
A new way to fly
Far away from goodbye
Above the clouds and the rain
The memories and the pain
And the tears that they cry
Now the lessons been learned
They've all crashed and burned
But they can leave it behind
If they could just find
A new way to fly
They'll leave it behind
As soon as they find