Redundancies at Sussex

[louderthan]

Leaked this morning. I knew it was coming but I’m still absolutely reeling. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c7v9ynd7m57o

Just had an all-staff briefing which was on Zoom and kept lagging, so I don’t feel particularly well informed…!

So sorry @louderthan The HE sector is a binfire and no one cares.

How much did Sussex spend on appealing the OfS fine? Which wouldn’t have happened if Adam Tickell had stopped the extraordinary harassment of Kathleen Stock.

We are apparently all getting an email tomorrow to tell us if our role is ‘at risk’. There will be 600 ‘at risks’. Then there will be a consultation process and all the ‘at risks’ will be invited to volunteer. If they get 200 voluntaries, all well and good. If not, they move to compulsory. So easy isn’t it!! The whole process has been very badly managed from the start. I’m gutted.

By email! That adds insult to injury. I'm so sorry @louderthan

I hope you have some parachutes.

Sorry for you individually, but think the university deserves it for the dreadful way it treated Kathleen Stock and allowed her to be treated.

I don't think the treatment of Prof. Stock would have been particularly different at any other UK university. Setting aside he high profile cases (such as Selina Todd & Jo Phoenix) there are a lot of us who've been subjected to the "chilling effect" of transactivism on UK campuses. It's still going on - low level keeping one's head down.

And now with universities cutting staff, any kind of notoriety makes academics a potential target.

It's got nothing to do with that. It's happening to universities across the country.

I’m really sorry for you personally OP.

but the whole higher education platform needs to be massively scaled back. Loads of the degrees they are selling to young people aren’t worth the paper they’re written on. If you get CDD at a-level and then get accepted onto a Mickey Mouse course and it costs you £60k you aren’t going to increase your earning potential by that.

I think teens are waking up to that reality.

I do tend to agree with you. I think the writing has been on the wall for a while and Sussex in particular has had its head in the sand. We’re not RG, we’re not strong on STEM and Brighton is horrendously expensive. We all knew redundancies were on the cards but it’s been very poorly handled.
I’m on leave tomorrow and am meant to be enjoying myself at the theatre in London but I imagine the day will be slightly marred by waiting for the email of doom…

Well, I am safe for now. The email arrived at 5.01. I know of three people in my team who are ‘at risk’ and the wider department is likely to be amalgamated with two others (I’m PS).
There’s a Town Hall next week so we’ll know more then. We’re all completely drained by today.

I'm glad you made it through, louderthan, but I know it still must be an awful time for you and your colleagues. Wishing you the best.

@Spacestory , could you point to some examples of 'Mickey mouse' courses?

While I am the last person to argue that UK's system of tertiary education is ideal, and indeed I struggled with the marketing elements of my last role because I couldn't reconcile them with my personal ethics, nevertheless, before wishing decades of acculmulated institutional knowledge and practice away into the bin of lost histories,* I suggest trying to envision a genuinely better alternative that can work in the 21st century.

*not to forget the individual human wreckage job losses leave behind, and the small cities and towns with part of their economic heart excised

Solidarity from an academic from another university going through the same process. It’s been a shitshow from start to finish - poorly organised and the SMT seem to be making it up as they go along. The fantasy/magical thinking from them that the ‘student experience’ won’t be impacted is particularly egregious. I’ll be taking VR at the end of this academic year - an earlier than intended retirement - but I’m so relieved to be in a position to leave HE.

@sortaottery i don’t think naming and shaming specific courses is that helpful but I mean those which accept students with, for example, CDD at A level or CCD and which don’t lead into an obvious career.

in those cases it’s taking children who aren’t suited to academia and selling them an idea. It’s usually not value for money for those young people and they end up in a lot of debt with no greater earning potential than if they’d just got a job after A levels.

my own friend did a degree like that and has worked in the same bar now for 20 years that she worked in as a uni summer job.

It is not universities' fault the job market is poor. I have taught in an institution which took students with poor ir no qualifications and transformed their lives. I'll not have this cheap rhetoric if done people are just not suited to uni. If they want to go they should go. And let's not have the oh we're not RG so this is why we are in trouble. On a professional board like this we know RG is marketing - albeit one that conjures some sort of reality into being.

My daughter got CDD at A level and is studying a STEM subject at a non RG Uni. She's made loads of friends from diverse backgrounds, which she never would have done if she'd stayed home and her confidence is soaring. I'm not thrilled about the debt, but whatever she ends up doing it will be worth it.

The concept of "Mickey Mouse" degrees is a myth peddled by the right wing to bring back scarcity in HE.

Totally agree @rhabarbarmarmelade - the really awful thing is that if some universities fold, it's more likely to be the "lower ranked" post-92 universities, yet they're the ones that offer social mobility to working-class kids - we know that educational dis/advantage maps onto social dis/advantage.

And after 14 years of Tory austerity - punishing ordinary people for the global financial crisis which was nothing to do with them - we thought the change of government might bring a government that cared, and so might change the nature of the discussion about the necessity of higher education in a knowledge economy. I don't think we expected more funding, but I certainly expected a government that cared: that saw the value of the one of the world's best HE sectors. We punch waaaaay above our weight in research & teaching.

But what we get is nothing. Institutions being hollowed out, and individual careers just left & lost. An academic career is a long time in the making, and requires an extraordinarily high level of drive and excellence, and dedication; it's not nothing.

I went to Sussex in the last year before fees went up and I can’t say I’m surprised to be honest.

Some of the lectures and course were excellent but equally a lot of it was complete guff. I begrudged paying 3k a year never mind 9! I’ve only just paid off my student loan and I only owed 10k

I had to do a course on gender studies and even then as a super lefty 19 YO I was thinking what a load of bollocks.

But sure let’s keep arguing that it’s all the government’s fault that young people don’t want to spend 9k a year on this.

Whereas I went to Sussex and had a transformative experience with excellent teaching, tutorials and seminars only, and my DN is there now receiving the same (but with some lectures). I’m sorry this is happening.

While it is (genuinely) lovely to hear of students increasing their confidence and making friends, that is not a good defence of the university sector IMO as it could be done in many other ways. Does it need massive financial input from parents and the government?

I am senior at a RG and even I advised my 16yo not to apply unless he has looked up the graduate premium for the course and thought about what hte equivalent financial input could get him. As an example, I said it would pay for pilot training, or we could buy him stock and pay rent to get him started in a small business.

I do believe we will go back to a situation eventually where university students are perhaps 25% of the pop and the rest are supported to do other training. The trouble is getting there, which may not be pretty

Tory austerity?

Tory austerity policies between 2010 and 2019 did not cut the national debt;

2010: Total net debt stood at approximately ($1.4) trillion (£1.0 trillion), which was roughly 64% of GDP.

2019: Total net debt increased to roughly £1.8 trillion, which represented around 80% to 84% of GDP.1, 2, 3, 4]

In total, approximately £800 billion was added to the national debt during the 2010–2019 austerity decade. The austerity period significantly reduced day-to-day departmental spending, but the overarching goal of reducing the total absolute debt level was never achieved. 1, 2, 3]

Now our debt level is 94% of GDP.
We are nearing the end of the rope.

Some departments are better than others. I did a philosophy module and it was fantastic.

But from my experience Sussex had a problem with a lot of modules basically being filler, or departments trying to teach a module themselves when it would have been better handled by another one.

I had friends doing ecology at both and the degree at Brighton seemed to be much better. Similar with media. At the time Sussex had the cache of being the “better” uni but it’s not really true anymore.

The fact is that Sussex is now a middling uni and there are courses where the content is not up to scratch in comparison to other unis. That plus students want a better ROI and it doesn’t have a good rep for STEM etc.

The future might be merging with Brighton and having fewer, better quality courses.

We are nearing the end of the rope.

I know we are, but I don't think the universities and those who work (very hard) within them, are the ones who've brought us here.

I think a lot of people don’t know the reality of the countries where university is free as well.

For example in a lot of Europe university is free but you go to the university near your home. There is little in the way of student loans, if you want to move away your family has to pay for everything. I know people who got into top unis in Italy and Portugal but they couldn’t afford to go.

They also don’t have courses in fashion journalism.

University is often harder too! It’s very common for people to fail the year. They aren’t babysitting people with Cs and Ds through their degrees. Support for ADHD dyslexia etc? Nope.

We want an American style university system without having to pay for it (and to be fair the US community college model is really good).

I wish to clarify that nobody is babysitting DD at university - she would never ask for help. The higher grades demanded by RG universities do not mean their courses are harder, they have just marketed themselves as elite.

It's appalling to think anyone wants to go back to the situation where HE is only for the wealthy few.

I don’t know where you’ve got that idea from “a myth peddled by the right wing to bring back scarcity in HE.”
It was coined by Margaret Hodge member of the Labour Party.