STUDENTS’ UNIONS WILL ALWAYS BE POLITICAL

Posted on May 19, 2019 by Norwich Radical in Student and tagged anonymity, anti-apartheid, anti-war, BDS, boycott, class, climate change, decolonising the curriculum, democracy, featured, harassment, international students, israel, malia bouattia, marketisation, NUS, office for students, palestine, privilege, racism, social media, student activism, student history, student movement, student politics, student societies, Tories, tuition fees, UEA, UEA SU, UEA Union Council.

By Robyn Banks

Over the last few weeks, UEA Students’ Union has received a number of comments from certain students on social media, complaining about it being ‘political’ and choosing to take political actions such as organising boycotts and funding students to travel to rallies. The SU is also being accused of acting undemocratically for taking these actions. Whilst these accusations are nothing new, in these recent cases the accusers are creating an obscure binary on what the SU can and can’t be seen doing, with a particular focus on only serving certain students’ needs.

FFS, OFS – BANKRUPT UNIS AND A MORALLY BANKRUPT REGULATOR

Posted on November 9, 2018 by Norwich Radical in Student and tagged bailout, featured, higher education, Manchester Metropolitan University, marketisation, Michael Barber, office for students, students, tuition fees, universities, university finances, Wonkfest.

By Robyn Banks

Last week, the news broke that three universities in the UK are facing bankruptcy if they don’t receive financial help from the government. One institution in the North West and two in the South of England, all unnamed, are having to survive on short term loans in order to function on a basic level. Most concerningly, one of them is already in talks with insolvency lawyers, suggesting that it could be filing for bankruptcy before the academic year is out.

EDUCATION AS EMANCIPATION – BEYOND TUITION FEES #7

Posted on May 4, 2018 by Norwich Radical in Student and tagged Beyond Tuition Fees, capital, capitalism, commodification, corbyn, cultural capital, david richardson, degrees, dissent, economy, education, featured, Free Education, government, HEFCE, higher education, Labour, labour market, marketisation, nationalisation, office for students, pedagogy, policy, professional classes, public ownership, research, society, state funding, student experience, student satisfaction, students, teaching, tuition fees, UEA, uk, UKRI, universities, university staff, workers.

By Michael Kyriacou

It is a time of extraordinary potential for change in UK Higher Education. Labour’s promise to end tuition fees has defied the critics and united many behind Corbyn’s political project. But what will the implications for universities be if this comes to pass? And what can we do to leverage this progress? In this series, the Norwich Radical and Bright Green are bringing together perspectives from across the sector to explore these questions.

The traditional arguments for ‘free education’ focus on reducing the upfront price of university courses to zero. Rather than HE being a commodity to be traded on the open market, it becomes a good paid for by the government. This kind of argument rests on a contradiction: we cannot solve the commodification of HE by continuing to assert the existence of HE as commodity, even a nationalised one. Abolishing tuition fees is undoubtedly a good thing, but to move beyond their legacy we must understand HE as devoid not only of its price but also its status as a commodity. We need to explore the potential for HE grounded not in classification or institution but in the fundamental equality of intelligences – HE without the degree.

THOUGHTS FROM THE FRONTLINE OF MARKETISATION – BEYOND TUITION FEES #3

Posted on April 19, 2018 by Norwich Radical in Student and tagged Beyond Tuition Fees, collective action, consumer law, consumer rights, consumerism, contact hours, corbyn, counselling, course closures, education, Free Education, funding, government, higher education, Labour, market regulators, marketing, marketisation, office for students, picket lines, policy, postgraduate, postgraduate education officer, postgraduate tutors, precarious contracts, profit, public, regulation, research, risk, specialist courses, state-funded education, student protection plans, students, students' unions, Success as a Knowledge Economy, taxation, tef, Tories, tuition fees, UCU, UEA SU, uk, UK Research and Innovation, universities, university collapses, USS strike, utopianism.

By Maddie Colledge, UEA SU Postgraduate Education Officer

CW: Mentions suicide

It’s common for arguments in favour of free education to be dismissed as abstract or utopian, and for students who promote it to be belittled as naïve. I fear that in our attempts to try to portray the significance of free education, we have fallen into a trap where the concept has become so expansive and broad, and the term so overused, that it has lost all meaning. We need to move away from talking about ‘free’ education, and towards articulating a vision more explicitly centred on ‘state-funded’ education or ‘public’ education. For me, the description ‘free’ makes the concept feel distanced from the viable possibility of education funded through public taxation, and does us no favours in making it reality.

UCU STRIKE TO PROTECT PENSIONS

Posted on February 12, 2018 by Norwich Radical in Student and tagged academic staff, academics, direct action, education, featured, investment, KEF, lecturers, NUS, office for students, pensions, REF, solidarity, strike, tef, trade unions, tuition fees, UCU, UEA, UEA SU, university staff, USS.

The much-reported Universities and Colleges Union (UCU) strike in protest of cynical changes to university staff pension arrangements begins next week. The UEA branch of UCU and UEA Students’ Union have produced this statement for The Norwich Radical, to offer an introduction to the issues surrounding the strike. The Radical encourages all students, in Norwich and elsewhere, to stand in solidarity with the strikers by not attending classes on the dates of the strikes, and by sharing their message with your peers.

FEES, FREE SPEECH AND FILIBUSTERING – A BRIEF HISTORY OF SAM GYIMAH MP

Posted on January 19, 2018 by Norwich Radical in Student and tagged cabinet reshuffle, EMA, featured, filibustering, first aid, free speech, government, higher education, homophobia, homosexuality, jo johnson, maintenance grants, nurses' bursaries, NUS, office for students, Parliament, Sam Gyimah, secondary schools, students, tef, theresa may, Toby Young, Tories, tuition fees, Turing Bill, UCL, UCU, universities, Universities minister, voting record.

by Robyn Banks

Here’s a sentence I’ve wanted to write for some time: Jo Johnson is no longer the Universities minister. Last week Theresa May ‘promoted’ him to the transport office and made him the new minister for London. His removal came just days after Toby Young was forced to resign from the Office for Students (OfS) board, in part due to his link to a eugenics conference held at UCL.

SOMETHING STINKS IN THE OFFICE FOR STUDENTS (AND IT’S NOT JUST TOBY YOUNG)

Posted on January 5, 2018 by Norwich Radical in Student and tagged Boots, BPP, Carl Lygo, climate change, contraception, David Palfreyman, deforestation, degree awarding powers, Elizabeth Fagan, Equalities Act, featured, free schools, free speech, funding, government, HEFCE, higher education, HSBC, jo johnson, Katja Hall, marketisation, Martin Coleman, media, Michael Barber, Monisha Shah, NUS, office for students, OxCHEPS, politics, regulation, Rose Bruford College, Ruth Carlson, Simon Levine, Steve West, student representation, Surrey University, Toby Young, Tories, UWE Bristol.

by Robyn Banks

This week, the government took the turn of the year as an opportunity to quietly announce the makeup of the board of the Office for Students (OfS), the new higher education ‘market regulator’ set to replace the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE). Naturally, it didn’t go unnoticed, and much has been said about the selection of Toby Young, infamous Tory party supporter. His appointment and the makeup of the rest of the board shows the absurdity at the heart of the body Jo Johnson has created, and why it will struggle to be taken seriously.

TRADING FREEDOMS – THE OFFICE FOR STUDENTS PROPOSALS

Posted on October 27, 2017 by Norwich Radical in Student and tagged academics, Cardiff University, censorship, clampdown, debate, establishment, freedom, freedom of choice, freedom of speech, germaine greer, government, HEFCE, higher education, jo johnson, mainstream media, no platforming, office for students, power, regulation, rights, safe spaces, safeguarding, student politics, student power, students, students' unions, transphobia, universities.

by Robyn Banks

CW: mentions transphobia

‘Universities must bring back freedom of speech!’ That was the premise of various headlines surrounding Jo Johnson’s announcement last week of proposed powers for the Office for Students (OfS). One of those proposals is that universities and student unions that don’t conform to Johnson and the OfS’ concept of ‘freedom of speech’ could receive sanctions in the form of fines. While the powers of OfS are still only at the consultation stage, this announcement gives us a rather concerning insight into the plans and aims that Johnson has for the newly formed office.

office for students

FFS, OFS – BANKRUPT UNIS AND A MORALLY BANKRUPT REGULATOR

EDUCATION AS EMANCIPATION – BEYOND TUITION FEES #7

THOUGHTS FROM THE FRONTLINE OF MARKETISATION – BEYOND TUITION FEES #3

UCU STRIKE TO PROTECT PENSIONS

FEES, FREE SPEECH AND FILIBUSTERING – A BRIEF HISTORY OF SAM GYIMAH MP

SOMETHING STINKS IN THE OFFICE FOR STUDENTS (AND IT’S NOT JUST TOBY YOUNG)

TRADING FREEDOMS – THE OFFICE FOR STUDENTS PROPOSALS

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