IGNITING STUDENT ACTIVISM #2 – ESCALATION

Posted on August 17, 2017 by Norwich Radical in Student and tagged activism, activismd, campaign, campus, compromise, direct actione, escalation, goal, group, group work, Igniting Student Activism, news media, occupation, plan campaign, social media, student, student activism, university.

by Bradley Allsop and Calum Watt

Rarely in our lifetimes has there been a more exciting time for young people to engage in politics. Change is in the air and nowhere else offers more opportunities to engage in this conversation, to learn valuable skills and to help shape society than university campuses. This series of articles seeks to offer some guidance for those aiming to ignite student activism at their institutions. Drawing on our experiences as campaigners we hope to highlight some common challenges and give you some advice on how to combat them.

The first article in this series looked at early steps of any campaign: doing your research, setting your goals, getting the message out there and beginning to grow your movement. This time we’ll be taking a look at some of the issues that occur as you begin to develop as a group.Continue Reading

TREATED LIKE ROYALTY — WHY I TRULY APPRECIATE UEA

Posted on February 12, 2017 by Norwich Radical in Community, Student and tagged accommodation, campus, cost of education, higher education, monarchy, norwich, Queen, rent, rent prices, response article, royal illusion, study, teaching, tuition fees, UEA, university.

by James Anthony

In response to Lewis Martin’s article ‘Don’t Be Fooled by the Royal Illusion – The Failings of UEA.’

The Queen’s recent visit to the University of East Anglia was, in my opinion, rightly celebrated as a momentous occasion in the university’s history. I might not be hugely pro-monarchy, but I am definitely pro-UEA, and I could appreciate the enthusiasm and atmosphere on campus on the day of Her Majesty’s arrival. I followed the event closely on social media and thought it brought a sense of enjoyment and happiness to a cold January day, with large a crowd turning out to celebrate not only the Queen, but the university as an institution too, which was great to see. However, I found it interesting that not everyone saw it that way.Continue Reading

NUS JOINS THE FIGHT AND BACKS RENT STRIKES

Posted on August 19, 2016 by Norwich Radical in Student and tagged A level, accommodation, accommodation costs, campus, consumers, DIY space, Golden Triangle, Houses of Multiple Occupancy, housing, london, National Union of Students, norwich, Norwich City Council, NUS, rent costs, rent strikes, results, results day, students, UCL, universities, university.

by Robyn Banks

It was announced yesterday under the cloud of A-level results that the National Union of Students (NUS) has given full backing to the rent strikes that have been happening at numerous universities up and down the country. Their reasoning behind this is that due to the rise of living in university housing on campus or other university owned places, it has almost become a secondary set of fees on top of the already high tuition fees.Continue Reading

EDUCATION AND COLOUR: THE IMPORTANCE OF BME STUDENT COMMUNITIES

Posted on April 7, 2016 by Norwich Radical in Student and tagged #Oscarssowhite, #rhodesmustfall, academia, aspirations, black, black professorts, black students, BME, campus, Cecil Rhodes, Community, degree, diversity, education, ethnic, feminism, gender, IFS, inequality, minority, minority households, minority students, Omar Khan, Oxford, POC, Preventing Prevent, privatisation, race, racial inequality, racism, Runnymede Trust, safe space, scholarship, social platform, student, student loans, students, UEA, university, white, Why is my Curriculum so White?, Womanist Society.

by Candice Nembhard

From #oscarssowhite to #rhodesmustfall, a spotlight has been shone on the lack of diversity and positive representation for POC across numerous institutions. Although these discussions have been catalysed in online spheres, the implications of these hashtags reference the real experiences of silencing and downplaying the importance of solidarity among BME (Black and Minority Ethnic) people — particularly in student environments.

In 2015, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) conducted a study that suggested more BME students as opposed to White British students were enrolling in university — despite statistically ‘underperforming’ in academia. A general consensus made by researchers was that students from minority households have higher aspirations regarding education than their white counterparts, even with the increase made to tuition fees and the potential privatisation of student loans at hand.Continue Reading

DETENTION CENTRES AND THE STUDENT MOVEMENT

Posted on March 31, 2016 by Norwich Radical in Inter|national, Perspectives, Student and tagged #DontDeportLuqman, #SaveLord, #setherfree, #shutdownyarlswood, activists, barbed wire, border regime, Campsfield, campus, children, deportation, detainee, detention centre, direct action, discrimination, divest, divestment, freedom, Harmondsworth, Home Office, immigrants, immigration detention, Justice for Cleaners, Lesbians and Gays Support the Migrants, LGBT+, mobilisation, Movement for Justice, NUS, prison, racism, sexism, Sheffied SU, Sisters Uncut, SOAS, student activism, student movement, student unions, students, sussex, uk passports, universities, women, Yarl's Wood, Yarlswood.

by Sahaya James

Harmondsworth detention centre, near Heathrow, is set in an anonymous business park. You can only tell it’s a detention centre because of the barbed wire.

Campsfield detention centre, near Oxford, is accessible by a nondescript turning on a nondescript a-road. The whole site is ringed by a line of trees.

Yarl’s Wood, however, is even more hidden than the rest. It sits hundreds of meters back from the road, behind a double layer of fencing, miles and miles out into the Bedfordshire countryside.

It is, essentially, a prison. Like every detention centre, it doesn’t contain people accused and convicted of crimes — it contains people without UK passports. Specifically, Yarlswood contains women and children.Continue Reading

UEA AND SUSTAINABILITY — FAIR WEATHER FRIENDS

Posted on March 6, 2016 by Norwich Radical in Community and tagged BHP Billington, biomass, biomass project, campus, climate change, climate science, colney lane, enterprise centre, environmental science, environmental sustainability, executive team, fossil fuel, generation park, low carbon, low carbon buildings, norwich rugby club, research centre, Shell, sustainability, sustainable building, sustainable economy, UEA, uea sustainability, University managers, yare valley society.

by John Heathcliff

As each day passes, it becomes clearer and clearer that UEA’s relationship with sustainability is one of convenience rather than conviction. Revelations about over £10 million of losses from the failed biomass project on the campus and the recently mothballed ‘Generation Park’ in Norwich have demonstrated the fundamental ineptitude at the heart of decision making at the University. Grand, white elephant projects intended to bring significant reputational benefit to the institution as well as new revenues have become undeniable disasters. National media have run the story, highlighting the amount of public and student money spent on failed projects that could have instead been spent on education and effective research.

Looking at these errors in isolation is bad enough. If you join together the dots, it only becomes worse.Continue Reading

FREEZE PEACH

Posted on February 26, 2015 by Norwich Radical in Perspectives and tagged campus, fascism, feminism, feminist, free speech, LGBT+, no platform, opinion, protest, racism, right to protest, sexism, trans, universities, university, women.

by Robyn Sands

The narrative of free speech has become increasingly complicated. It would be easy to assume that only teenagers and the most reactionary bigots would be likely to claim their right to free speech had been violated after having their views disagreed with, protested against, or denied a prestigious platform. But as this misunderstanding was repeated time and time again — cries of censorship followed UEA union shops decision to stop buying a newspaper it couldn’t even sell, legitimate protest was written off as silencing and oppression — it seems to have seeped in to the public consciousness.

Today, even the most critical thinkers seem to forget that the right to free speech doesn’t grant them the right to say whatever they like, wherever they like, and to be granted whichever platform they consider themselves worthy of. I have no right to walk in to my local KFC and preach vegetarianism on their property, just as I have no right to claim I am being silenced because The Guardian refused to publish this article.Continue Reading

campus

TREATED LIKE ROYALTY — WHY I TRULY APPRECIATE UEA

NUS JOINS THE FIGHT AND BACKS RENT STRIKES

DETENTION CENTRES AND THE STUDENT MOVEMENT

UEA AND SUSTAINABILITY — FAIR WEATHER FRIENDS

FREEZE PEACH

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