How to support DC affected by strikes at Nottingham Uni

[Anonymouse27]

DC is in final year at Nottingham Uni. Obviously paid the full tuition fee and had less than 20% of promised tuition. Been advised that strikes will continue until December. Coursework deadlines have been pushed back due to cancelled lessons. Then told coursework will be replaced by exam later on.

Also following press release about cuts to courses, lots of staff leaving anyway.

I and she have emailed the Vice Chancellor and I have a reply to say that if DC feels that they have been negatively impacted they have to make an official complaint using the complaints process.

I completely support the lecturers and I said so in my email. I am devastated that my daughter might not get her hoped for result this year due to so many lectures being cancelled.

I am not sure if it will make any difference if she does the complaints procedure and I am sure it will stress her out.

Any advice, please. For her and to support the staff. Thanks.

Many universities exploit PhD students or newly qualified people without a job to do teaching at low wages. Universities generally pay by the contact hour, but that can take 3 or 4 hours to prepare. It means they’re earning less than the minimum wage. It’s a very exploitative environment.

I mean, that is actually her concern. She is wanting to apply for a postgrad course and feels she will struggle on her postgrad if she has just not covered the expected content on her undergrad. She does her best on her own, but does need some guidance and ideally, teaching.

When my DS was at university some departments would strike and others would not.

LMFTFY… some departments had a larger proportion of workers in the striking union than others and so educational provision was less affected.

Get over it.

when I was at uni my dissertation supervisor went on strike for nearly the whole first semester. Then he disappeared for the entire second semester due to Covid.

by the end of the third year students should really be able to study alone.

Dare I ask what is reasonable for her to expect from Uni in exchange for the £10k she has paid. They did promise lectures, tutorials, seminars ...
She could study on her own at home. She wanted to do their approved course of study as offered to obtain the qualification as described.

They should refund a portion of the tuition fees that match’s the amount of teaching lost.

They just take your money and don’t deliver? That’s scandalous.

When else do you pay for something and not receive a service, and no offer of a refund?

I’m stunned by how little teaching actually takes place compared to when I did my degree.

And kids (well more often their parents) are paying for accommodation too when quite often they could just commute for the lesson/seminar time.

Hope you get a good outcome OP.

Precedent here, OP.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cgqnjjkkenno.amp

UK fee-paying students can claim £100 of compensation for each module disrupted, up to a maximum of £600.

And kids (well more often their parents) are paying for accommodation too when quite often they could just commute for the lesson/seminar time.

I believe that Oxbridge may require students to live within a certain distance of the cities but otherwise, students have no obligation to live in halls if they can commute.

Universities have been chronically underfunded for over a decade. Salaries in real terms have been massively diminished, support staff have been cut and staff trying to ‘do their jobs’ are broken because it is simply impossible to do everything - even with the extra unpaid hours that 90% of staff are working.

Write to your MPs. It is the governments and the tax payers who need to consider what a world-leading education system is worth to them. All academics are working incredible hours. And they only strike when there is no other way. Nobody chooses to lose pay for no good reason.

https://www.officeforstudents.org.uk/media/pdkfv134/regulatory-statement-on-industrial-action.pdf

Love that you consider English a core subject, it is at school but definitely not in HE. I’m an English Lit lecturer and the whole of the sector is an utter disaster. Arts and Humanities have been hit the hardest but most other schools are now following suit. English is not valued whatsoever, it’s been in decline since the tories took over in 2010 and massively cut funding, placing a huge emphasis on STEM subjects. Look at falling A Level numbers.

To begin with it was post 92 institutions, many of my friends were made redundant overnight at Huddersfield uni last year and the year before for example. Ditto Leeds Beckett. Now it’s arriving at Russell’s like Nottingham and Sheffield. The only uni’s that will always be protected, like absolutely guaranteed protection, are Oxbridge. They have so much wealth from so many different sources, they just don’t ever need to worry about cutting courses. I think they could feasibly run a course with two students.

I’m at a Russell and we have known this day was coming for years. We don’t earn loads either as someone suggested. Our pay starts at around 40k. Professors can earn around 100k at top institutions but more often than not it’s closer to 70-80k. They’re striking because every year they get told their job might be on the line, some even have to re-interview for it. Absolutely zero job security and certainly speaking to friends at Sheffield, schools have just been told to reduce costs by x amount with no actual direction about how to achieve this.

I could go on and on about this. We have an extremely high workload. We don’t just arse about all day giving fun lectures and marking the odd essay. Because support staff have been massively cut, we now also act as emotional support and additional academic support for many students, especially given the huge anxiety epidemic in Gen Z. Oh and we have to have a certain research output each year too on top of everything else.

It’s a mess. As I say, I could rant about it all day. I don’t think many A&H courses will exist outside of Oxbridge eventually. You can complain all you want as well, they don’t give a shit. Sorry to be cynical but they don’t. The striking won’t achieve much either. The VC’s earn 300k+ a year, they build new fancy buildings filled with state of the art technology all whilst firing hundreds of staff members through compulsory redundancies. Oh and they don’t often pay them either, they didn’t at Huddersfield… Google it.

Even if they aren't striking, there are a lot who are being threatened with redundancy who are quiet quitting. Single digit contact time already, then lectures cancelled for any reason, no pastoral care. It's shocking, any other service and you'd expect the right to a refund.

Ds1 at Notts for year 4. I'll check with him re how many lectures cancelled.