Marking & Assessment Boycott

[aridapricot]

So how do you think this will pan out this time? Are you taking part? How do you think things will go in your university/department?
My uni is docking 30% pay. Also in my department (where the spirit tends to be "yes we'll do whatever UCU asks us to do but we'll also go out of our way to cause any inconvenience to students") people are already talking about mitigations... 🙄I am not a UCU member and won't be taking part but I also fear that at some point I will be asked to cover colleague's marking or (even worse) redistribute it (given that I'm HoD).

Completely agree with everywitchway. I too am afraid of the fallout if UCU win.

Still here. Still MAB-bing. I can't be the only person running out of money, right? Am surrounded by colleagues who seem able to keep going until the end of the year (or the end of the fight!).

Have no hope for the negotiations. This is pointless and demoralising.

Hi there @SchnitzelVonCrummsTum have you applied for the national and local hardship fund?

I haven't because I wanted to leave that for people who are really desperate e.g., those on temp contracts or single parents. But maybe I need to just do it.

If it didn't all feel so pointless and destructive it would be easier to swallow the losses.

You definitely should apply, that’s what the money’s there for.

What are people’s thoughts on the latest UCU/UCEA correspondence? Having read the UCEA letter, I can’t say I see it in quite the same light as UCU’s tweet is painting it. To me it reads as if UCEA are prepared to have a meeting to discuss whether UCU will suspend the MAB in order to make progress on the non-pay aspects of the 4F dispute (notwithstanding that the UCU membership have already rejected the terms of reference for the discussions to do that). UCU seem to be saying that negotiations are resuming simpliciter. I am confused also by the twitter debate about the difference between “pausing” the MAB and “suspending” it.

I also think you should apply to the fighting fund @SchnitzelVonCrummsTum. Obviously some people will feel the effect of MAB deductions sooner than others but this has now been going on for so long that a lot of people will be feeling it now. Does your local branch have their own fighting fund? Some branches do, and from what I've heard sometimes it might actually be in a better state (proportionally) than the 'central' one?

https://twitter.com/DrJoGrady/status/1679749623534043136

I do hope this leads to something. If this goes on for much longer I am strongly considering re-joining UCU and start doing MAB. I am currently doing two or three jobs due to people being on MAB and I cannot go on like this, the pay hit looks at this point more attractive than a complete MH crash down the line.

Reading today's statement, I'm not holding my breath :(

https://www.ucu.org.uk/article/13087/Joint-statement-from-UCU--UCEA-on-todays-talks

This is such a massive shitshow. I'm so sorry you're doing several people's jobs @aridapricot - if I remember correctly, you're HoD and that's a massive job on its own? - and it's just not okay.

Thank you for everyone who said to apply to the hardship fund. I swallowed my pride and applied to the central and institutional funds. I think I can keep going til mid August now. Slowly my colleagues are dropping off it ...

Genuinely dreading having to do exam boards amid teaching in Sept/Oct, because I think that's when we'll have sufficient grades to even start to classify some additional students. This will rumble on for months.

This is such a massive shitshow. I'm so sorry you're doing several people's jobs @aridapricot - if I remember correctly, you're HoD and that's a massive job on its own? - and it's just not okay.

I have asked to have a chat with my line manager. I thought the worst was over when we awarded degrees, but now it's onwards to progression for non-finalists, and in a couple of weeks time it will be re-sits. Obviously the most visible part of impact is on the students but I think that the most durable one will be on departmental dynamics and relationships between colleagues. I suspect UCU is aware of this and I only hope universities notice soon.

The impact is massively long-lasting. My institution participated in the MAB last year and there are still outstanding progression issues being dealt with. The PS staff are bearing the brunt of it. For all the talk of solidarity, my academic colleagues don’t seem to extend it to non-academic staff. That really sticks in my craw.

I do wonder whether UCU has a long term strategy in this. Where do they go to from here if this doesn’t work?

I do wonder whether UCU has a long term strategy in this. Where do they go to from here if this doesn’t work?

I imagine the mandate will expire at some point - is it after 6 months? And I imagine UCU will re-ballot? On the one hand I can see some MAB participants not wanting to repeat th experience and voting no, on the other what I see with the whole "4 fights" thing is a massive sunk cost fallacy syndrome that makes it difficult for people to say no to further action after they've invested and lost so much.

I’m just doubtful as to how successful it’s been. Unless there are big developments from these talks, will there be an appetite for more? It’s not pretty but universities seem to have adapted to the MAB.

Ours has been externally marked- badly- and it's so painful, especially with big projects. I feel so bad for the students I don't think I can do this again.

I don’t think universities have adapted to the MAB. The chickens are coming home to roost now. Students can’t graduate with their marks, can’t progress, there are problems with students who want to go abroad or on placement years and it will take the entire next academic year until the mess is cleared up. The MAB is inflicting huge damage, which worries me because in irresponsible hands it could be a tool to really devastate our sector. Who will suffer most? Arts and humanities and some of the social sciences because they are the most unionised departments of universities. All very unfortunate.

I think "adapted" in the sense that (at least in my place) processes are still happening. Students are graduating or progressing, albeit without complete grades. From that point of view I think UCU was hoping to bring the system completely to a halt and this hasn't been the case across the board. But there is chaos and dissatisfaction all around, and this isn't sustainable.

When I say adapted I don’t mean everything is fine, far from it. But the consequences of the MAB are being put back on academic and professional services staff, not suffered by management. This is why I wonder what UCU’s long term strategy is. What do management care if a student can’t do a year abroad or isn’t eligible for a visa after “graduation”? They are not the ones dealing with a backlog of students who can’t progress because their exams haven’t been marked. So they have to listen to some uncomfortable speeches and chanting at graduation. In the meantime they’re saving money on the MAB and the students keep rolling in. As it’s a nationwide action, it’s not as if there is even particular reputational damage at stake. Maybe international students will decrease. However, I don’t know where they are clustered. If it’s not in arts and humanities then even that’s not an incentive to do anything.

HE is in dire need of reform, both in terms of the financial model and its role in society. But I don’t think that the MAB will be the catalyst for that reform. If anything, Sunak’s capping plans are taking us further down the road we’re already on.

What will happen if a student graduates and then down the line it’s found they failed a final year module?

At my place the overall logic seems to be: If in doubt, allow student to move on (to graduation, progression, study abroad, etc.). This can have consequences down the line - a student is allowed to progress without demonstrating the required knowledge, and they'll be satisfied in the short term, but then maybe they'll be found to be unprepared for second year or Honours and they will struggle with workload, or even eventually kicked out having lost one or more years, etc. But again as you say management won't be feeling any of this, it will be administrators and academics doing advising and convening roles. Many striking staff won't be feeling this either if they are not in such roles.

I also cannot help but thinking that any leverage MAB could have has been eroded by Covid. Under Covid, the logic in many places was "if in doubt, progress"; extensions and mitigations were granted automatically without even the need for evidence (at my place). I am not questioning that this was the best or only course of action under the circumstances. Many UCU members I know were strongly in favour of it, and in some cases of even stronger mitigations such as "automatically progress everyone and don't even make the students submit assessment". I (as someone who is HoD and used to be Assessment Officer) and administrator colleagues have first-hand seen the consquences of this: we now have many students who are incapable of time management, need an extension for each and every asignment, or are ill-prepared for study even after years at university. Management, and colleagues lucky enough to ditch such assessment and advising responsibility, are more sheltered from these consequences, to the point that they might be justified to think "well ok it's not that bad, no one has died". If so many academics acquiesced with the universities' decisions to drastically lower standards for two years (regardless of whether it was justified or not), then they cannot be surprised that the university is applying the same measures they cheered on in a different context.

All of the above.

It's also about Grady's mismanagement of the whole dispute. Some of the stronger unions - for obvious reasons - are in the Post-92 sector, many of whom are not USS members, and who consistently voted 'yes' in the disaggregated ballots. They took huge hits in their pay packets whilst other USS affiliated institutions didn't meet the 50% threshold - in essence, they were taking on this fight for them and bearing the consequences of that.

Meantime once Grady makes headway on the pensions dispute - the only thing she apparently cares about - she wants the whole lot resolved. Post-92 say 'hang on, we've achieved NOTHING out of this and sacrificed the most. You are not throwing us under the bus'.

Hence the fury when she stood down strike action in March, effectively undermining the strength of her own position.

It should never have been four fights: the USS dispute should have been kept separate and the main one a simple matter of pay and conditions. Not being clear about precisely what we are asking for has muddied the waters and, probably, the negotiations.

And the ballots should all have been aggregated.

Grady has walked us into this. As General Secretary, she's unfit for post.

Meantime once Grady makes headway on the pensions dispute - the only thing she apparently cares about - she wants the whole lot resolved

Members were stupid enough to vote for Grady on the basis of some tweeting she did during the previous pensions dispute rather than any actual credentials that she had. It was obvious how her "leadership" was going to pan out. She had no record of trade union experience before that point.

I think her PhD was in pensions but she tends rather to rely on her “miner’s daughter” persona for TU credibility.

Sorry, arid and ghislaine for misunderstanding you.

I agree, we seem to be back in covid mode: ‘let’s be generous to the students and pray everything will be well’ but the difference is that the students are not necessarily in covid mode and those that have worked hard would like to get their well-deserved marks. I’m getting some very fed up vibes from students and I also wonder for those who are at universities that did not bring in external markers: when will all the missed marking be completed? And by whom?

Also worth noting that quite a number of institutions - including those of some of the UCEA leadership - are barely affected by the MAB (only tens of staff participating in some RG universities). Such institutions/their leadership are unlikely to move much when they haven't felt much impact of MAB.

It’s amazing how much impact just one striker can have, though, if you don’t have an alternative marker.

These institutions are just not affected significantly - they have 10s of students from specific humanities/social sci subject areas graduating with gaps in their transcripts (out of 10k+ graduates) and tiny numbers of progressing students with unconfirmed marks. Yet their UCU branches are very active on social media suggesting that the MAB is having a big impact on these institutions.