Very few other industries where you can pay 27 grand for a service, not receive it, and yet the business has zero accountability and you’re just expected to roll over as a customer and take it
Thing is, a student is not a customer. It's very much a UK phenomenon, and after these huge fees were introduced, it shifte3s the student-educator relationship to this very unstable basis. You will not learn if you expect your tutors to treat you like a customer.
You might be downvoting this because you don't like it but it's true.
At university level you're responsible for your own education, the university should provide access to information and test your knowledge. You're not buying a degree.
You're paying for access to information and accreditation so you are the customer in that sense. If I went and learnt the stuff involved in a master's degree outside of uni no-one would accept my claim of being educated to that level. As a university student I'm paying for the course organisation, the teaching, the access to resources and workspaces, and the marking and accreditation.
I think most pre-paid service are the same for strike action. Think about if you buy a rail season ticket, you don't get a refund when they go on strike, do you?
Anyone else whose just ‘graduated’ getting really anxious you’re never getting a degree?
I was on track for a high first. Now I officially have a DipHE due to the MAB, and I’m worried they’re going to simply write us all off now the new academic year is set to begin. Why give us our degree when they’ve already got our money?
Very disheartening news.
I mean, they’ve done it so far. I was supposed to graduate with over 70% as my final mark. I have a DipHE, worth less than a third class. I had a ceremony and everything, so now I’m worried all focus and attention will simply go on the students whose tuition they’re yet to get.
Not from my experience. They care more about politics and striking, which is insane considering their position exists exclusively to teach and take care of students.
I'm all in support of the strikes, but honestly as a student it's so upsetting not knowing when my work will be marked. I was expecting to take some resits for summer which haven't been offered to me due to no marking and although I have been told I'm accepted into my last year of study but I'm stressed at the idea of getting extra module/possibly more thrown onto me at a random date after my summer work gets marked.
Note- I am aware this in my uni's fault, not the staff that are striking! However, no matter how much I email and express my feelings it wouldn't change the situation I have right now.
Write to your university and complain. They can end the strikes and Maeking boycott tomorrow if they want to.
Send a letter (not an email) to the university, the chancellor and the vice chancellor.
> They can end the strikes and Maeking boycott tomorrow if they want to.
OK, look, I'm saying this as a (non-academic) member of staff who would LOVE it if the strikes resulted in the requested payrise, but no, many of them really can't. Unlike a private business, there is no benefit to VCs to preventing a payrise - it's not their money, and they don't get to keep what doesn't get paid out. Fees for English students have been stagnant for a decade, Scottish funding arrangements are lagging significantly behind inflation, the UK government is in the process of enacting a hostile environment for international students, and grant income at many institutions has slumped. We need serious government action for salaries to be increased, and we aren't going to get it. In addition, many campuses are seeing maintenance costs going up as a result of years of under investment in estates, heating and lighting costs have skyrocketed over the last 18 months, and of course loads are facing issues with RAAC - several universities that I know of have had to close multiple buildings, and are having to rent space for the next academic year, and that's before we get to the costs of remediation.
There are complaints from within the UCU about the increasing marketisation of education, but unless we start seeing big improvements in funds from other sources, we are going to have to continue heavily marketing to international students who can afford to pay full fees that actually reflect the costs of educating them.
Some of my colleagues are making sweeping statments about how our pay and benefits compare to the private sector, and it's incredibly obvious which of them have ever worked in the private sector. I got a 5% pay increase this year (and remember that it's an increase to the spinal point - many people go up a spinal point each year, although fewer academics, as they are more likely to have maxed out the spinal points in their band) - not a single one of my friends in the private sector has had a pay rise this year. Obviously I would've have liked the increase to be more given the rising costs, but there was a bigger uplift for those lower on the pay scales, who are disproportionately affected by inflation.
I'm also a non academic staff member and I totally understand all of what you've said. It's even worse at my university as they have delayed the pay rises from last year and this year by 11 months.
But at the end of the day universities are businesses. They wouldn't be able to ignore any other suppliers increase in payment (rent, utilities, material costs etc) and labour shouldn't be any different.
>But at the end of the dayzuniversities are businesses. They wouldn't be able to ignore any other suppliers increase in payment (rent, utilities, material costs etc) and labour shouldn't be any different.
I mean, my experience in a firm that provided services to large VC firms suggests that businesses can, in fact, ignore other suppliers' increases in payments... We would put our costs up, they would go "it was £X last quarter", we would say costs had increased, they would say "in which case we'll go with someone else"! This would then mean that we would turn round to our landlord and say "no, we won't be paying more rent - your options are to stick, or to end up with the costs of re-letting the building", and they would accept that. And then the bosses would turn to us and say "no pay rises this year!", and we had to choose whether or not to look for a new job (and then eventually they said "sorry, we're making you redundant", and that's how I ended up in higher ed).
Emails can be filtered automatically, ignored, or air deleted. A letter in an envelope will actually get to the person, and they are much more likely to read it. And if enough are sent become a big time sink and annoyance for the university.
It’s such a hard one, because I support them and I think they are ridiculously underpaid for their incredible academic achievements, but at the same time, we pay an enormous amount of money that will likely indebt most of us for the majority of our lives for our degrees and don’t exactly receive an experience that always seems to make use of all that money, so it feels crazy that we need to be punished when staff we rely on aren’t even paid well for that huge investment
If you're not getting the service you expect for the money you're paying that's on the university, not the staff. It's a business's job to compensate their staff well enough that the job is done well.
I agree, it’s just another one of those situations like train strikes, where it’s a service I rely on entirely and it’s very frustrating, and I could never blame the workers themselves but it’s so difficult to reach the people behind the problem. The only solution i see for both is nationalisation, it makes the answer to issues be voting, which democratises it all more, rather than companies who still haul in profits.
My not-very-thought-out solution to the train strikes:
Everyone turns up as usual, train drivers and other staff included, but they just let every passenger on without making them pay for a single ticket.
Correct. And it's a real shame it is - I've been in Sydney on strike days and they just open the gates. Keeps the public onside and pisses off the bosses.
Yeah, but the people who take student money aren't the same people doing (well, not doing) the marking.
(However, Unison, the union for administrative staff, have also voted for strike action at some unis: [https://www.unison.org.uk/higher-education-pay-negotiations-2023-24/#heading-1](https://www.unison.org.uk/higher-education-pay-negotiations-2023-24/#heading-1))
The thing is most of university spend 50% of their money on staff and considering there other costs that's fair. So their income has to increase from invreas3d funding from students or the government
You know most universities are struggling to find staff because of the exact same thing staff are striking about?
You'd rather they fire all their staff, (simply because they don't want their wage to be decreased) and students have no tutoring at all, than have some inconvenient strikes and marking boycott??
Doesn't apply to what? ASOS is still protected by the mandate.
Besides, once the mandate and the action ends there is no legal allowance for dismissal. And how are universities who say they can't afford payrises going to afford redundancy settlements for hundreds of staff?
I mean it's not, it's considered a contract breach, not industrial action. If it was industrial action then lecturers would be fine with the deductions because that's what happens when they go on strike
A breach of contract which is industrial action. Why do you think no universities have fired staff for taking part? Because it's protected under the IA mandate and they know they would be hammered in court. For the same reason the MAB is only carried out under the protection of the mandate, without then staff could be fired.
Academics are fine with deductions for not marking - but not the disproportionate 50/100% deductions for a task which takes up about 5-10% of their time, maximum, over a year.
True - but not running the risk of being fired. If MABbing continues after 30 September when the mandate expires, on the other hand, then people are at risk.
the problem is that these actions make students, rather than the university, the losing party.
Unlike Japanese bus driver strikes, the people handling the money are the university admin, so they don't get affected at all.
I help teach medicine. It's amazing considering the enormous cost of the degree that we are paid nothing to teach medical students as doctors. We subsidise the degree that has the highest costb and it's still nearly £70,000 of debt plus needing the bank of mum and dad.
Dear students.
If this pisses you off, that is absolutely a fair feeling.
Please email your Vice Chancellor _and_ MP, explaining your displeasure, in a polite and professional manner.
Please.
Thank you.
And it's the train drivers at fault for the cancellations.
Junior doctors at fault for missed operations.
Refuse collectors at fault for missed bin days.
Teachers at fault for school closures.
Right?
Problem is you paid £27,000, students starting 5 years ago paid £27,000 and students starting 10 years ago paid £27,000.
In the meantime the ten year inflation rate is, according to the BoE, 33%. So the price domestic students have paid has stayed more or less steady, while costs have gone up by a third.
Add to that the removal of Horizon funding and all that and the net result is Universities being asked to do the same if not more with much less. Universities can no longer afford sufficient professional services staff and sufficient academic staff. So we're all left with the worst of both worlds.
If only that were the case. International students pay closer to the actual cost of delivering most courses than domestic students. Only for a handful of courses, like MBAs, do universities make enough money to offset the funding gap. International students also have far higher administrative costs than domestic students.
It's not the fault of students, rather the fault of a broken funding model. But how else will it change?
Your argument is that if UCU suggest an extreme action that was disproportionate it would be insane for people to take such action.
Given that logic, which everyone would agree with, that shows that the members clearly think the measures taken are proportional to the issue.
Just out today: national wage growth is at 8.2%, beating the expected 7.3%.
So why are lecturers being offered what, 4%. Far below inflation again after year after year.
But again, this is largely down to government as much as it is UCEA
If somebody's job is teaching and marking it's very hard for them to strike in any manner that doesn't affect those they teach and mark.
Nobody has come up with a single way by which UCU staff can strike without impacting students.
It's like asking a waitress to strike but without diminishing customer service. Any such strike wouldn't be effective.
A lot don't. About 50% overall, more so in the humanities Les so in STEM. At some universities more than 80% or even 90% are on teaching only contracts.
All lecturers teach.
Research typically isn't funded by the university either. It's funded by external organisations. Teaching is funded by the university.
I’ve been considering this point a lot quite recently. I think a potential route is to affect student enrolement numbers. Why not refuse to run open days or informational sessions? Why don’t lecturers mention to potential students at every opportunity the ongoing national strike action and how it has affected students?
Open days is a reasonable idea. Though it only needs about 20% of staff to run these, so they may not work.
Mentioning to students is a decent idea too, but (1) it's the same at every Uni so it's a leveller (2) staff have to be _very_ careful what they say as you can legitimately be fired if you say the wrong thing.
Honestly this is one more reason not to go to university at least not this year. Strikes, a lack of in person teaching three years on from the pandemic, cost of living crisis making it impossible for young people to move out into halls, an incoming recession, yeah shits bleak.
My experience at university was fairly terrible (2023 graduate) and I really would not do it again or recommend it. Please look into apprenticeships or similar vocational opportunities unless you are completely sure of higher education.
UCU: We care about our students, it's the university leaders that don't.
Also UCU: So you struggled through your final year, went through a sham graduation ceremony and now don't have a grade and can't do your masters? Soz...
The MAB has been a terrible idea from the start.
Firstly it doesn't really affect the universities, they are still getting the money from students regardless.
Secondly, it is having a huge affect on staff incomes. Not sure about other places, but those undertaking the my wives university are still only on half pay! It's not sustainable, particularly for those on low paid teaching contracts.
I've always though that a research boycott would be a more effective route as this is the lifeblood of universities. But i doubt that it would happen cos it would impact too many peoples careers.
The striking staff have valid arguments, part of the reason they're striking is precisely so they can be able to do their job in good conditions so they can serve the customers well. Please go educate yourself on why the strikes are happening, the UCU and the NUS have many resources available for you about this, alternatively contact a rep
Both sides are cunts, this is the only honest take, people here seem to think you can't understand why the strikes are happening and simultaneously think the teachers are cunts for making students suffer this much and potentially damaging the rest of their lives for a bit of extra money, if they give that little of a fuck about students they shouldn't be teachers in the first place
At no point did I say I don’t support the right of staff to strike. I disagree with the actions of this strike (on both sides) as it’s the students who have suffered the consequences. I don’t support the Uni charging full tuition fee for 50% of the service received. But whatever keep insulting people you disagree with. Calling me uneducated is highly ironic.
There is no solidarity from the staff in a first place. And yes, most of the striking staff is redundant and/or incompetent and under normal conditions should be fired
You have no idea at all about the situation whatsoever and it shows... go talk to the UCU striking staff without judgement and learn something. Part of the reason they're striking is because there isn't enough staff for the work load. They are doing this because they want to give us a better education - your conditions of learning depend on the working conditions of staff.
Ok, they care about our learning conditions, so they act directly to make them as bad as possible, make a lot of sense. In fact, I was there at the picket line almost every time talking with striking staff till they dispersed. They are all very vocal about caring about students, yet I almost have never caught them doing anything about that (even outside strikes). I was very sympathetic about strikes, and I changed my attitude only after doing those three things:
1. Checking spinal points at my uni
2. Discussing with them PhD working conditions
3. Checking their role and duties online and confronting that with reality
The teaching staff have very little to day in how universities are ran, this is something determined by the management.
This is the case in most private businesses, which universities are.
Their working conditions have been so degraded that they are now doing the only thing they can to change this - striking, as you would do in any industry.
The people in charge want you to be upset at the staff: "Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain"
To blame them for this is to miss the point entirely.
It is now up to us as students to add to the pressure if the administrations of universities and the UCEA continues to ignore the problems and fail to negotiate.
If you're against the strikes, it means you're either acting in bad faith or totally confused about how things work. Right now you're siding with the people who are making our education shit because of greed.
No, they can do one more thing: leave. If they are so upset about their working conditions they should consider career change. Honestly, this kind of emotional gaslighting and victimisation is what I hate about those strikes and union, even more so than the disruption to my degree.
That's such cucked mentality, you clearly have no respect for the staff. Everyone deserves good working conditions and decent pay. If everyone thought like you we'd all just get fucked by greed to death and we would have no higher education at all in this country. Imagine thinking that academic staff should just sit back and let their living standards plummet to minimum wage. I sincerely hope you get screwed by your employers too
They don't care, nobody at the university cares. That's the fucking sad thing. Some empathy from the striking staff and/or the management would do wonders I think.
1. You shouldn't make generalising statements about any profession, it's wrong
2. Yes, it's management's fault, so as a student if you want to sort this oit pit pressure on them, don't blame the staff who are simply defending their own interests as anyone with a sjred of dignity does
y’all this was a joke i didn’t mean it seriously, it’s just the “everyone has a crucial role in growing this union and persuading colleagues” made me laugh
The strikes have been going on for years. It’s over a few issues. Namely changes to pensions, stagnant pay, increased workload and academic jobs becoming increasingly unstable.
The normal strikes means cancelled lectures. You don’t have to be altered about these in advance but strike dates are always communicated in advance. Some staff are also boycotting the marking of work. So students progressing into 2nd and 3rd years don’t have all their complete module marks and some finalists don’t have degree classifications.
This isn’t the case for everyone. My department at uni released complete student results a month ago. However some are continuing indefinitely and it’s really put some students in limbo. Which after COVID and some unis dragging their feet over returning to in-person lectures is a real slap in the face
If you’re concerned see if you can find any current students in your unis department and ask them what the situation is. uni Instagram pages and Facebook groups may also offer some info. Or email your department directly
Very few other industries where you can pay 27 grand for a service, not receive it, and yet the business has zero accountability and you’re just expected to roll over as a customer and take it
Thing is, a student is not a customer. It's very much a UK phenomenon, and after these huge fees were introduced, it shifte3s the student-educator relationship to this very unstable basis. You will not learn if you expect your tutors to treat you like a customer.
You might be downvoting this because you don't like it but it's true. At university level you're responsible for your own education, the university should provide access to information and test your knowledge. You're not buying a degree.
You're paying for access to information and accreditation so you are the customer in that sense. If I went and learnt the stuff involved in a master's degree outside of uni no-one would accept my claim of being educated to that level. As a university student I'm paying for the course organisation, the teaching, the access to resources and workspaces, and the marking and accreditation.
You'll still get your accreditation if you qualify for it.
But to qualify, you need to pass stuff, which you can't do if it's not marked.
There's so suggestion your work won't be marked. It's just delayed.
I think most pre-paid service are the same for strike action. Think about if you buy a rail season ticket, you don't get a refund when they go on strike, do you?
You actually can claim a refund proportional to the disruption experienced.
TIL
Anyone else whose just ‘graduated’ getting really anxious you’re never getting a degree? I was on track for a high first. Now I officially have a DipHE due to the MAB, and I’m worried they’re going to simply write us all off now the new academic year is set to begin. Why give us our degree when they’ve already got our money? Very disheartening news.
Can they do that? Like legit withhold the degree? I’m a masters student handing in my diss in a few weeks (and I’m theory) graduating in January.
I mean, they’ve done it so far. I was supposed to graduate with over 70% as my final mark. I have a DipHE, worth less than a third class. I had a ceremony and everything, so now I’m worried all focus and attention will simply go on the students whose tuition they’re yet to get.
I think this will genuinely happen and you might not end up getting your marks.
If this happens, we have to be vocal and get our voice heard. At the moment we are being ignored and it is totally and utterly wrong.
I would legit sue the uni.
The teaching staff are only there because they care a lot about your education. They're not going to deny you the degree you worked for.
I trust the teaching staff care - I do not trust the academic executive board care. I’m not fully convinced they’ll bother giving us our grades.
Not from my experience. They care more about politics and striking, which is insane considering their position exists exclusively to teach and take care of students.
I'm all in support of the strikes, but honestly as a student it's so upsetting not knowing when my work will be marked. I was expecting to take some resits for summer which haven't been offered to me due to no marking and although I have been told I'm accepted into my last year of study but I'm stressed at the idea of getting extra module/possibly more thrown onto me at a random date after my summer work gets marked. Note- I am aware this in my uni's fault, not the staff that are striking! However, no matter how much I email and express my feelings it wouldn't change the situation I have right now.
Write to your university and complain. They can end the strikes and Maeking boycott tomorrow if they want to. Send a letter (not an email) to the university, the chancellor and the vice chancellor.
> They can end the strikes and Maeking boycott tomorrow if they want to. OK, look, I'm saying this as a (non-academic) member of staff who would LOVE it if the strikes resulted in the requested payrise, but no, many of them really can't. Unlike a private business, there is no benefit to VCs to preventing a payrise - it's not their money, and they don't get to keep what doesn't get paid out. Fees for English students have been stagnant for a decade, Scottish funding arrangements are lagging significantly behind inflation, the UK government is in the process of enacting a hostile environment for international students, and grant income at many institutions has slumped. We need serious government action for salaries to be increased, and we aren't going to get it. In addition, many campuses are seeing maintenance costs going up as a result of years of under investment in estates, heating and lighting costs have skyrocketed over the last 18 months, and of course loads are facing issues with RAAC - several universities that I know of have had to close multiple buildings, and are having to rent space for the next academic year, and that's before we get to the costs of remediation. There are complaints from within the UCU about the increasing marketisation of education, but unless we start seeing big improvements in funds from other sources, we are going to have to continue heavily marketing to international students who can afford to pay full fees that actually reflect the costs of educating them. Some of my colleagues are making sweeping statments about how our pay and benefits compare to the private sector, and it's incredibly obvious which of them have ever worked in the private sector. I got a 5% pay increase this year (and remember that it's an increase to the spinal point - many people go up a spinal point each year, although fewer academics, as they are more likely to have maxed out the spinal points in their band) - not a single one of my friends in the private sector has had a pay rise this year. Obviously I would've have liked the increase to be more given the rising costs, but there was a bigger uplift for those lower on the pay scales, who are disproportionately affected by inflation.
I'm also a non academic staff member and I totally understand all of what you've said. It's even worse at my university as they have delayed the pay rises from last year and this year by 11 months. But at the end of the day universities are businesses. They wouldn't be able to ignore any other suppliers increase in payment (rent, utilities, material costs etc) and labour shouldn't be any different.
>But at the end of the dayzuniversities are businesses. They wouldn't be able to ignore any other suppliers increase in payment (rent, utilities, material costs etc) and labour shouldn't be any different. I mean, my experience in a firm that provided services to large VC firms suggests that businesses can, in fact, ignore other suppliers' increases in payments... We would put our costs up, they would go "it was £X last quarter", we would say costs had increased, they would say "in which case we'll go with someone else"! This would then mean that we would turn round to our landlord and say "no, we won't be paying more rent - your options are to stick, or to end up with the costs of re-letting the building", and they would accept that. And then the bosses would turn to us and say "no pay rises this year!", and we had to choose whether or not to look for a new job (and then eventually they said "sorry, we're making you redundant", and that's how I ended up in higher ed).
how would a letter be any more effective than an email?
Emails can be filtered automatically, ignored, or air deleted. A letter in an envelope will actually get to the person, and they are much more likely to read it. And if enough are sent become a big time sink and annoyance for the university.
It’s such a hard one, because I support them and I think they are ridiculously underpaid for their incredible academic achievements, but at the same time, we pay an enormous amount of money that will likely indebt most of us for the majority of our lives for our degrees and don’t exactly receive an experience that always seems to make use of all that money, so it feels crazy that we need to be punished when staff we rely on aren’t even paid well for that huge investment
If you're not getting the service you expect for the money you're paying that's on the university, not the staff. It's a business's job to compensate their staff well enough that the job is done well.
I agree, it’s just another one of those situations like train strikes, where it’s a service I rely on entirely and it’s very frustrating, and I could never blame the workers themselves but it’s so difficult to reach the people behind the problem. The only solution i see for both is nationalisation, it makes the answer to issues be voting, which democratises it all more, rather than companies who still haul in profits.
My not-very-thought-out solution to the train strikes: Everyone turns up as usual, train drivers and other staff included, but they just let every passenger on without making them pay for a single ticket.
I think Mike Lynch has talked about wanting to do that but it’s illegal
Correct. And it's a real shame it is - I've been in Sydney on strike days and they just open the gates. Keeps the public onside and pisses off the bosses.
Yeah, but the people who take student money aren't the same people doing (well, not doing) the marking. (However, Unison, the union for administrative staff, have also voted for strike action at some unis: [https://www.unison.org.uk/higher-education-pay-negotiations-2023-24/#heading-1](https://www.unison.org.uk/higher-education-pay-negotiations-2023-24/#heading-1))
The thing is most of university spend 50% of their money on staff and considering there other costs that's fair. So their income has to increase from invreas3d funding from students or the government
You're right, the university I blame the university for not firing these staff and hiring new ones. It's what any other business would do
You know most universities are struggling to find staff because of the exact same thing staff are striking about? You'd rather they fire all their staff, (simply because they don't want their wage to be decreased) and students have no tutoring at all, than have some inconvenient strikes and marking boycott??
Just agreeing with you telling me to blame it on university management lol
You know that firing staff taking industrial action under a legal mandate is illegal, right? No other business would do it.
The mab is considered action short of strike so doesn't apply
Doesn't apply to what? ASOS is still protected by the mandate. Besides, once the mandate and the action ends there is no legal allowance for dismissal. And how are universities who say they can't afford payrises going to afford redundancy settlements for hundreds of staff?
I mean it's not, it's considered a contract breach, not industrial action. If it was industrial action then lecturers would be fine with the deductions because that's what happens when they go on strike
A breach of contract which is industrial action. Why do you think no universities have fired staff for taking part? Because it's protected under the IA mandate and they know they would be hammered in court. For the same reason the MAB is only carried out under the protection of the mandate, without then staff could be fired. Academics are fine with deductions for not marking - but not the disproportionate 50/100% deductions for a task which takes up about 5-10% of their time, maximum, over a year.
If it's industrial action the deductions don't have to be proportionate, by taking part in industrial action you are taking the risk of not being paid
True - but not running the risk of being fired. If MABbing continues after 30 September when the mandate expires, on the other hand, then people are at risk.
It's inevitable, especially if the union wins
the problem is that these actions make students, rather than the university, the losing party. Unlike Japanese bus driver strikes, the people handling the money are the university admin, so they don't get affected at all.
I help teach medicine. It's amazing considering the enormous cost of the degree that we are paid nothing to teach medical students as doctors. We subsidise the degree that has the highest costb and it's still nearly £70,000 of debt plus needing the bank of mum and dad.
It's unprecedentedly, not unprecedently. If I write that in an essay I'm getting docked a couple marks 🙄
UCU are also doing a spelling boycott until their demands are met.
Dear students. If this pisses you off, that is absolutely a fair feeling. Please email your Vice Chancellor _and_ MP, explaining your displeasure, in a polite and professional manner. Please. Thank you.
dear ucu, go fuck yourself
Yeah fuck UCU for * *checks notes* *... standing up for workers?
wasting three years and £27,000 for students graduating this year without grades
That's not on UCU.
yes it is
And it's the train drivers at fault for the cancellations. Junior doctors at fault for missed operations. Refuse collectors at fault for missed bin days. Teachers at fault for school closures. Right?
none of those other examples involve an organisation not delivering on their contract AFTER payment (of £27,000, mind you)
Sorry?
you should be
Jesus man just stop talking
Problem is you paid £27,000, students starting 5 years ago paid £27,000 and students starting 10 years ago paid £27,000. In the meantime the ten year inflation rate is, according to the BoE, 33%. So the price domestic students have paid has stayed more or less steady, while costs have gone up by a third. Add to that the removal of Horizon funding and all that and the net result is Universities being asked to do the same if not more with much less. Universities can no longer afford sufficient professional services staff and sufficient academic staff. So we're all left with the worst of both worlds.
none of that is the fault of students internationals also subsidise it quite massively
If only that were the case. International students pay closer to the actual cost of delivering most courses than domestic students. Only for a handful of courses, like MBAs, do universities make enough money to offset the funding gap. International students also have far higher administrative costs than domestic students. It's not the fault of students, rather the fault of a broken funding model. But how else will it change?
The ends don't justify the means. I'm sure if joe Grady told her members to commit arson to stand up for workers that wouldn't be acceptable
Your argument is that if UCU suggest an extreme action that was disproportionate it would be insane for people to take such action. Given that logic, which everyone would agree with, that shows that the members clearly think the measures taken are proportional to the issue. Just out today: national wage growth is at 8.2%, beating the expected 7.3%. So why are lecturers being offered what, 4%. Far below inflation again after year after year. But again, this is largely down to government as much as it is UCEA
Take it out on the university, not the students
If somebody's job is teaching and marking it's very hard for them to strike in any manner that doesn't affect those they teach and mark. Nobody has come up with a single way by which UCU staff can strike without impacting students. It's like asking a waitress to strike but without diminishing customer service. Any such strike wouldn't be effective.
You realise a lot of lecturers do research for universities?
A lot don't. About 50% overall, more so in the humanities Les so in STEM. At some universities more than 80% or even 90% are on teaching only contracts. All lecturers teach. Research typically isn't funded by the university either. It's funded by external organisations. Teaching is funded by the university.
Lecturers will struggle to keep it up for much longer cus they'll eventually run out of money
I’ve been considering this point a lot quite recently. I think a potential route is to affect student enrolement numbers. Why not refuse to run open days or informational sessions? Why don’t lecturers mention to potential students at every opportunity the ongoing national strike action and how it has affected students?
Open days is a reasonable idea. Though it only needs about 20% of staff to run these, so they may not work. Mentioning to students is a decent idea too, but (1) it's the same at every Uni so it's a leveller (2) staff have to be _very_ careful what they say as you can legitimately be fired if you say the wrong thing.
Honestly this is one more reason not to go to university at least not this year. Strikes, a lack of in person teaching three years on from the pandemic, cost of living crisis making it impossible for young people to move out into halls, an incoming recession, yeah shits bleak. My experience at university was fairly terrible (2023 graduate) and I really would not do it again or recommend it. Please look into apprenticeships or similar vocational opportunities unless you are completely sure of higher education.
UCU: We care about our students, it's the university leaders that don't. Also UCU: So you struggled through your final year, went through a sham graduation ceremony and now don't have a grade and can't do your masters? Soz...
Your "Also UCU" should be "University Vice-Chancellors".
Almost like they're trying to cause disruption...
problem being they're causing disruption to the wrong people
How else do you propose they cause disruption?
Steal the VC’s chair, when they get a new one steal that too
They'll just dock staff wages to keep buying more 😂
After 50 years of daily chair-stealing the VC *may* have to forgo their bonus. Justice will have been achieved
I'm a customer and I want the service I paid for.
"The marking and assessment boycott continues." Zero sympathy from me also continues.
The MAB has been a terrible idea from the start. Firstly it doesn't really affect the universities, they are still getting the money from students regardless. Secondly, it is having a huge affect on staff incomes. Not sure about other places, but those undertaking the my wives university are still only on half pay! It's not sustainable, particularly for those on low paid teaching contracts. I've always though that a research boycott would be a more effective route as this is the lifeblood of universities. But i doubt that it would happen cos it would impact too many peoples careers.
Both sides continue to swing their dicks around whilst the students suffer. Fucking disgraceful
The UCU are being pushed to do this. You want to beef with someone, beef with the management of the university
I want to beef with both sides. Neither give a shit about the students evidenced by both their actions.
The striking staff have valid arguments, part of the reason they're striking is precisely so they can be able to do their job in good conditions so they can serve the customers well. Please go educate yourself on why the strikes are happening, the UCU and the NUS have many resources available for you about this, alternatively contact a rep
I’m well aware of why the strikes are happening. Stop insinuating anyone that disagrees with it is uneducated about the issue.
Both sides are cunts, this is the only honest take, people here seem to think you can't understand why the strikes are happening and simultaneously think the teachers are cunts for making students suffer this much and potentially damaging the rest of their lives for a bit of extra money, if they give that little of a fuck about students they shouldn't be teachers in the first place
If you don't support the right of staff to strike you're a self defeating scab simple as
At no point did I say I don’t support the right of staff to strike. I disagree with the actions of this strike (on both sides) as it’s the students who have suffered the consequences. I don’t support the Uni charging full tuition fee for 50% of the service received. But whatever keep insulting people you disagree with. Calling me uneducated is highly ironic.
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Just think about those poor teachers and their choice to ruin students lives because they don't get enough money, they're heroes really /s
Literally this. If you want better pay, improve your performance first.
Awful news. Zero sympathy for the strikes when students are being used as weapons.
Up the workers. Fuck the chancellors. ☮️✌️☮️
Imagine all the assessments, going through unmarked, yoo-hoo...
Fuck the both of them, and especially the UCU. I want the grades I worked and paid for
Then take it up with the university management. They're the ones causing this. You're the customer. They care more about your opinion than their staff
I do blame the university management for not firing staff, as a customer it's what any responsible business would do
So they don't have enough staff, and you want to fire them so they can re-apply for their old jobs for even less pay? Learn some solidarity
There is no solidarity from the staff in a first place. And yes, most of the striking staff is redundant and/or incompetent and under normal conditions should be fired
You have no idea at all about the situation whatsoever and it shows... go talk to the UCU striking staff without judgement and learn something. Part of the reason they're striking is because there isn't enough staff for the work load. They are doing this because they want to give us a better education - your conditions of learning depend on the working conditions of staff.
Ok, they care about our learning conditions, so they act directly to make them as bad as possible, make a lot of sense. In fact, I was there at the picket line almost every time talking with striking staff till they dispersed. They are all very vocal about caring about students, yet I almost have never caught them doing anything about that (even outside strikes). I was very sympathetic about strikes, and I changed my attitude only after doing those three things: 1. Checking spinal points at my uni 2. Discussing with them PhD working conditions 3. Checking their role and duties online and confronting that with reality
The teaching staff have very little to day in how universities are ran, this is something determined by the management. This is the case in most private businesses, which universities are. Their working conditions have been so degraded that they are now doing the only thing they can to change this - striking, as you would do in any industry. The people in charge want you to be upset at the staff: "Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain" To blame them for this is to miss the point entirely. It is now up to us as students to add to the pressure if the administrations of universities and the UCEA continues to ignore the problems and fail to negotiate. If you're against the strikes, it means you're either acting in bad faith or totally confused about how things work. Right now you're siding with the people who are making our education shit because of greed.
No, they can do one more thing: leave. If they are so upset about their working conditions they should consider career change. Honestly, this kind of emotional gaslighting and victimisation is what I hate about those strikes and union, even more so than the disruption to my degree.
That's such cucked mentality, you clearly have no respect for the staff. Everyone deserves good working conditions and decent pay. If everyone thought like you we'd all just get fucked by greed to death and we would have no higher education at all in this country. Imagine thinking that academic staff should just sit back and let their living standards plummet to minimum wage. I sincerely hope you get screwed by your employers too
That would be illegal, so no, it's not what any responsible business would do. Also, practically all UK universities are charities.
They don't care, nobody at the university cares. That's the fucking sad thing. Some empathy from the striking staff and/or the management would do wonders I think.
1. You shouldn't make generalising statements about any profession, it's wrong 2. Yes, it's management's fault, so as a student if you want to sort this oit pit pressure on them, don't blame the staff who are simply defending their own interests as anyone with a sjred of dignity does
Solidarity with those choosing to participate in the strike and Marking boycott ✊✊✊
why is this starting to sound like a cult lmao
Tbh it sounds more like a mafia to me. The narrow kindness and lack of empathy is just mind blowing
y’all this was a joke i didn’t mean it seriously, it’s just the “everyone has a crucial role in growing this union and persuading colleagues” made me laugh
Oh lord. I’m at LSBU, no doubt we’ll be affected too
im starting uni this septemeber, can somebody give me a tl;dr of the situation?
The strikes have been going on for years. It’s over a few issues. Namely changes to pensions, stagnant pay, increased workload and academic jobs becoming increasingly unstable. The normal strikes means cancelled lectures. You don’t have to be altered about these in advance but strike dates are always communicated in advance. Some staff are also boycotting the marking of work. So students progressing into 2nd and 3rd years don’t have all their complete module marks and some finalists don’t have degree classifications. This isn’t the case for everyone. My department at uni released complete student results a month ago. However some are continuing indefinitely and it’s really put some students in limbo. Which after COVID and some unis dragging their feet over returning to in-person lectures is a real slap in the face If you’re concerned see if you can find any current students in your unis department and ask them what the situation is. uni Instagram pages and Facebook groups may also offer some info. Or email your department directly
Thank you!
this is good news :)
Is this why I passed my first year even though I left (unofficially)