Students should spend an hour on the picket line

[Jux]

..... supporting their lecturers instead of asking for their money back. Education is not a commodity like a big mac.

Students can support the strike and complain to the university about missing lectures, they're not mutually exclusive. Having seen the treatment of lecturers go from that of respected academics to effectively like zero hours staff, I wholly support them (and the non academic staff) in their efforts to get better treatment.

(If you are a student and your coursework is affected by the strike, then ask for an extension, or even put in mitigating circumstances to be considered later in the course. I know my university is granting extensions for this reason.)

At least one of dd's lecturers has moved deadlines to compensate for strike action.

Oh, bollocks does anyone get 7 weeks annual leave.

You don't think it's possible your relative just has ordinary good manners and doesn't work when you're visiting? That's called flexible working. Lots of us have it. He still has to make it up some other time.

jux, I'm afraid I do understand 'should' in this case as implying pressure to do something. It's what the word means, after all.

Btw, your DD's lecturer shouldn't be moving deadlines. That negates the point of the strike. (I know it's happening, though.)

I think that lecturers are asking a lot of people who have grown up in the culture of NOT getting a free education to support people who are actually fucking up the degrees for which they've paid.

That's not to say I disagree with you but the idea that these kids are just whiny consumers is extremely unfair. Find a way to help them come round to your way of thinking, don't just assume they will. After all the strike may well fuck up their final degree mark otherwise what's the point of it?

I certainly don't think they're whiny consumers.

The majority of people striking will, I suspect, also be people who didn't experience free higher education. Many will have paid much lower rates than today's students, but I think most will sympathise with students (and feel angry on their behalf) that they're put in this position, with so much debt.

Right, but tuition fees started in '98 (I think). So most undergraduates will have never lived while people are getting a free Uni Education. I think this will make a cultural impact on people.

I don't doubt lecturers are feeling sympathetic but you must see that it's paradoxical to ask for support from those who are directly affected by the action - and probably feel that those striking have no experience of being where they are.

In any case, asking for their money back is the only power they actually have, isn't it?

Yes, I can imagine that's true about the cultural impact.

I can't begin to know what lecturers feel. I've never been one, nor (again) have many of the people striking. And this is directly relevant. Lecturers are people with relatively secure, well-paid jobs. A lot of us don't have that, and we are still providing high-quality education.

I do agree with you no one has any right to demand or expect support from students. And I think they absolutely should ask for their money back.

What I would like to see students doing, is understanding what the situation is with their education. Who gets paid? How much are they paid? Where is the money they are charged for their degree spent? Etc.

(And, FWIW, in 1998 I had no idea whether university education was free or not, nor indeed how the costs of it might relate to the 50p I got as pocket money. And I am ten years older than the youngest person I happen to know who's striking.)

Oh yes, I absolutely agree with your last point. But I feel that might take a bit of encouragement to investigate rather than a broad command to 'support us'.

I meant your last point about looking at the situation with their education. The bit about being too small to notice things in 1998 is not relevant to a discussion about cultural impact but I think you know that

@SarahandQuack
35 days’ annual leave here

I think it is relevant to cultural impact, actually.

I agree that there are different cultural impacts for different generations, but my point here is that a lot of people seem to be imagining a situation where there are 'lecturers' (established, well-to-do, grown-up types) and there are 'students' (young, vulnerable, never teach classes or take on any responsibility).

Actually there's a lot of overlap. There are plenty of mature students. There are plenty of 24-year-old PhD students who teach classes. There are absolutely tons of junior academics who are less financially secure than when they were students, and who also paid for their own degrees.

It's like the internet. Sure, there's a particular effect that comes with having grown up with the internet an unquestioned fact. And there's a difference between that generation and the generation who never experienced the internet until they were adults. But there is also a generation in between, and the cultural impact of the internet on them is still a 'thing,' even if it's not exactly the same thing as for either generation above and below.

@sansou, part of the debate with pay is about working to contract - ie., doing things like taking that. I do not believe anyone sits around enjoying their untroubled 7 weeks off (especially the way it was described, as someone just lazing around all summer).

I’ve always supported strikes in British universities because they don’t pay enough. However that doesn’t mean that I shouldn’t have resented paying £15k a year. In both instances the university is to blame not the staff. When students say they want their money back this is a reflection on the management on universities.

OK SarahAndQuack but your memory of your awareness or lack thereof is literally irrelevant isn't it? Because culture is not about one individual nor, necessarily, conscious awareness.

I can’t strike with them because I have other lectures to go to and deadlines to meet and if I pay for something and don’t get it in it’s entirety I want at least some of the money back.

Also worth pointing out the university degrees and education aren’t really the same thing and that education is most definitely a commodity.

Oh, absolutely, my personal memory isn't the point, but I think probably you understood what I was getting at, despite my shocking lapse into anecdote rather than po-faced academicese.

If you prefer: 'It may be speculated that the introduction of tuition fees might have a distinct cultural impact on the generation born in the 1980s and early 1990s, as compared with their parents born in the 1950s and 60s and their students born after the millennium.'

Better?

No need to be snarky Sarah. Obviously my point was pure conjecture anyway. I think maybe I did misunderstand your point. Shall we call a truce??

I'm sorry - I thought you were being jokey and was attempting to go with it. It's a 'tone on the internet' one. I think we are broadly in agreement, anyway!

According to my undergraduate DD at her university there is a 23% gender pay gap, particularly astonishing as her uni, Royal Holloway, was one of the first all female colleges which counts Emily Davidson as an alumni. She also tells me that many lecturers don't have contracts so in fact will get nothing like the Pension contributions and holidays PP alluded to.
Interestingly she tells me one of the only departments not striking is physics for whom the majority of staff are either white males or visiting lecturers.
DD fully supports the strikes but they've been asked by those taking part not to join them but to show support by writing to the VC about the impact on their education (who incidentally has just given himself an £80,000 pay rise ) 😡

SarahAndDuck

If they want to support the strikes, they may as well spend an hour on the picket lines and ask for a refund. The two need not be mutually exclusive.

Universities care about student satisfaction ratings and about the financial bottom line. If the strikes are clearly shown to affect both of these, their impact will be much greater and the employers will be under much more pressure.

@Jux

H is a lecturer he earns more money than us mere mortals can ever dream of, his pension is amazing, he gets 6 weeks paid holiday plus bank holidays plus university closed days (4) ... he's no striking because he knows he is treated very well. Yes there's temporary contracts (he was 35 before he was permanent) but his staff now on temp contracts are paid far more than typical for their age, around £30k for someone in their late 20's is great and they work 9-5, get to travel abroad ... it's a charmed life.

@SarahAndQuack

Yes they do! H's contact is 42 days annual leave of which bank holidays (8) and university closure (4) are mandated dates

For comparison I get 35 including 8 bank holidays, and my deal is good (non profit sector)