Anyone else not striking?

[goingpearshaped]

I am not in UCU so not striking. Anyone else? I can sense the divide already between those striking and those not in our dept, I really hate this. Agh, what a mess all round.

EE posts are emerging as the latest battleground for UCU Twitter warriors. You have all the EEs who're loudly announcing their resignation on Twitter to rounds of applause. Then, you have all the UCU Twitter warriors asking 'If you're an EE and you've not resigned yet, why not?'.

Yesterday there was someone getting cheered on for resigning as EE for a PhD thesis...

I think PhD examiner resignations can make sense in that you are refusing to inflate the ranks of precarious post-docs trying to put together a living out of various hourly paid appointments. But then ideally we should address the problem before people even start PhDs, rather than after they've done all the work...

Uni of Kent have just ratified degree awarding without EEs and with missing marks. Who mentioned meltdown?

Dropping EEs entirely for taught courses wouldn't be a particularly negative step in my view. The UK HE system is far too obsessed with quality assurance.

I would never accept an EE position to resign from. What a thankless piece of drudgery that is. If you want a boost for the cv, it's far better to be the external assessor for degree validations. Less time-consuming and marginally more interesting.

@acfree123

Dropping EEs entirely for taught courses wouldn't be a particularly negative step in my view. The UK HE system is far too obsessed with quality assurance.

IMHO there can be too many rounds of internal vetting of exam papers, which degenerate into 'I wouldn't have phrased it exactly like that' nit-picking. However some sort of external oversight is required; as an UG and PGT EE I've discovered major issues e.g. marks awarded for work that didn't exist, discrepancies between markers of >20%.

@Itchylegs

Uni of Kent have just ratified degree awarding without EEs and with missing marks. Who mentioned meltdown?

This is what they will all do if enough people resign. The one thing they can’t do without though is the actual marks which is why marking boycott makes sense. But why first make people lose 18 days pay?

I'd hate to go down that route as that's where the US is with wildly different standards at different universities (to put it mildly).

I’m always staggered by what US academics post on twitter - in a world without EE. One posted she gave everyone an A because the pandemic was enough to deal with; others change course evaluations half way through

They also have no admin staff/standard regulations and all students seem to be able to beg for grade changes. What a time sink!

We have open days next week (outside of term time).

I've heard that my branch of UCU are encouraging our student helpers to go 'on strike' in solidarity

@KStockHERO

We have open days next week (outside of term time).

I've heard that my branch of UCU are encouraging our student helpers to go 'on strike' in solidarity

This stuff will backfire. Some universities have huge surpluses and could easily afford higher pension contributions. Many do not, are in quite a dire financial position, and cannot afford to lose students. Individual programmes that don’t recruit enough will close and this will lead to redundancies (already happening in humanities). I saw Jo Grady on tv the other day and in the manner of a teenager when challenged about these issues she just said ‘they can afford it - they have billions’, failing to distinguish between eg a rich Cambridge college and a post-92 in an undesirable part of the country.

I'm breaking my own rules next week and WFH with remote meetings (normally if I'm WFH on a strike day I just hold off on meetings too).

Absolutely @GCAndProud

I'm not sure what their plan is. To target recruitment activities and put students off coming? I get the argument that this will 'disrupt' the functioning of universities and cost the universities money, which is perhaps the aim. But those disruptions to recruitment/numbers and financial losses will filter straight down to departments. This may mean:

• A hiring freeze which increases everyone's workload
• A hiring freeze on new permanent staff until things settle out which means more short-term, precarious teaching-only contracts
• Redundancies

All of these fall under 'Four Fights', the very stuff that UCU are protesting against. I don't get it.

I'm talking about my own top RG institution here. That's to say nothing of universities in very different financial circumstances.

I think that sort of tactic shows how UCU under Grady fits more with the organising model of trade unions rather than the service model. These last tow campaigns have been much more about the experiential side of building 'comradrarie' than achieving finite goals.

The online nastiness continues, alongside downright silliness, eg a bloke dressed as a flamingo on the picket line (representing 'hasn't got a leg to stand on, or something' ). Other than loss of teaching for our beleaguered students, and loss of pay, what is this achieving?

@reshetima

The online nastiness continues, alongside downright silliness, eg a bloke dressed as a flamingo on the picket line (representing 'hasn't got a leg to stand on, or something' ). Other than loss of teaching for our beleaguered students, and loss of pay, what is this achieving?

Well, quite. Our branch is on strike this week. I teach on a masters programme where I know that some of the students have been working for years to save for the fees or in the case of one of them, has remortgaged his house to do the course. I just feel so bad for them and it is they who suffer, not the management.

The flamingo thing is so cringeworthy but it just sums them up. All show and no substance. I am guessing a lot of money has gone into producing ‘merch’ this year, with our branch boasting that they have enough pink hats for everyone on the picket line.

I also saw one academic saying that he thinks he will be forced to live on cat food as a pensioner, as his DB income will be 9k a year. He didn’t mention a) he’s been paying in for 15 years so will already have built up decent DB pension provision that will be added to his 9k a year, making it more like 16k or so, b) the average occupational pension pays around 3k a year, c) he will have state pension on top of that and most importantly d) he will get a cash lump sum of £300,000 on retirement in addition to DB income. Yes, complain about pension cuts but don’t fucking outright lie and invoke ridiculous poverty tropes when you will be nowhere close to any poverty line.

Oh dear, I haven't seen the flamingo but it sounds awful

We have open days all this week.
I've heard from student helpers that members of UCU have been contacting them to convince them to 'strike'. Those that aren't striking were being asked outright why they're not striking as they come into buildings.

Our branch of UCU is offering 'striking' student helpers 75% of what they would've earned this week as helpers if they strike. Good use of the hardship fund

Has anyone seen this? Lol lol lol
twitter.com/lorcaat/status/1504194610213670921

I have seen that whole drama, @aridapricot. How ironic! I remember when the TRA academics who hounded Kathleen Stock were also saying how awful she was because she left UCU and didn’t strike (probably after the GS laughed on social media about wanting her fired), yet it’s their own lot who are the true strike breakers. It’s truly astounding actually and there’s been far too little pushback. UCU hasn’t even responded - remember Jo Grady’s public calling out of an MP who attended a meeting at a university? How about two well-paid professors holding an academic conference to boost their own careers (they want to launch an academic journal from it) during a strike that’s apparently all about protecting the most precarious workers? You couldn’t make it up.

Maybe we should also ask UCU where all it’s cheap pink tat is produced (there seems to be much more of it around this time compared to other times). I do hope it’s made in a country that has good strong employment protections and pays its workers a fair wage 😂 😂

@GCAndProud

I have seen that whole drama, *@aridapricot*. How ironic! I remember when the TRA academics who hounded Kathleen Stock were also saying how awful she was because she left UCU and didn’t strike (probably after the GS laughed on social media about wanting her fired), yet it’s their own lot who are the true strike breakers. It’s truly astounding actually and there’s been far too little pushback. UCU hasn’t even responded - remember Jo Grady’s public calling out of an MP who attended a meeting at a university? How about two well-paid professors holding an academic conference to boost their own careers (they want to launch an academic journal from it) during a strike that’s apparently all about protecting the most precarious workers? You couldn’t make it up.

Maybe we should also ask UCU where all it’s cheap pink tat is produced (there seems to be much more of it around this time compared to other times). I do hope it’s made in a country that has good strong employment protections and pays its workers a fair wage 😂 😂

I saw that drama unfold last week. Absolutely astounding. Absolutely hilarious.

Like @GCAndProud I was wondering how this squares with UCU condemning the MP visit to Sheffield. Oh, wait, it doesn't. What a motherhumping surprise.

I also saw photos of a "decolonization reading group" as part of the teach-outs on social media. Looked like a normal reading group, just not inside a university building. Apparently if your research involves an approved Very Urgent topic, you're allowed to carry on.
I wonder if people have interiorized that dozens of strike days per academic year are now a regular occurrence, and they're finding ways of rationalizing their opting out of strikes on certain days. People I know who in the past would be absolutely adamant that everyone needs to strike and there are no exceptions have suddenly discovered that if you're on research leave or on a research contract you can keep working, as striking wouldn't cause disruption to the employer.

How about two well-paid professors holding an academic conference to boost their own careers (they want to launch an academic journal from it) during a strike that’s apparently all about protecting the most precarious workers? You couldn’t make it up.

OMG @aridapricot and @GCAndProud - that is such special pleading. Activist conference, my foot.

Anyone else's local department UCU reps sending emails to people who they have been given names of from the branch UCU as those who have not declared that they have voted? Emails accusing non voters of being anti democratic?