We're planning on setting up a website for student group - most of the content is fairly static but certain portions such as events and members would turn up from the database. I've never worked with PHP much, and was wondering would a CMS system like Drupal or PHP Nuke be appropriate for this kinda work?
Is there anything else that would allow me to go about creating a template and then reusing it across the website?
You can try out all of the CMS available @ http://php.opensourcecms.com. I've never used PHP Nuke before, but Drupal can easily do the job.
Check out the Calendar module in Drupal for the event function.
Drupal would be a very good choice for this. It has its learning curve, - anything you choose will. But eventually the light bulb will go off and you'll see how logically its organized and how flexible it is to extend.
And there are vast resources available to help you get up to speed quick. Tutorials and videos touching all angles of how Drupal works. And then there are uncountable quantity of themes, hundreds of add-on modules of every kind.
With a handful of additional modules added to the core distribution (cck certainly, maybe views and taxonomy too) you can configure basically everything and not ever touch a line of PHP code.
It is extremely simple to install and get started with. I have both Drupal 5 and 6 running under xampplite on a lil MSI netbook! .. Downoad and be up and running in under 15 mins.
FYI, please try the following link: http://www.compassdesigns.net/joomla-blog/How-to-Choose-Between-Joomla-Drupal-and-Wordpress.html
Try out Joomla! works the best not just in content management but also theres extensions that you can use to allow users to book meetings and schedule events. Easy and simple.
Try out the +Joomla! instalation and hosting and just worrie about contents! They will put the rest working for you for super cheap price.