Student protest at the Uni

[chip]

Maybe because, in order to persuade enough MPs to vote the legislation through the House, academics were PROMISED the money. Now that the top-up fee legislation is on the books, and the money's going to arrive, the employers are reneging on the promise.

That and the admitted erosion of salaries compared with those outside higher education of 40% over the last 20 years. Even Blair recognises that there's a problem with HE remuneration.

...and the introduction of top-up fees is an opportunity to address the problem that will NEVER (indeed CAN never) come again.

The last twenty years has shown that, short of industrial action, nothing makes a difference and the erosion continues. It is for this reason that the NUS (both locally and nationally) are solidly behind the AUT (and NATFHE at Brighton Uni) action.

The decisions made by individual academics are tough ones and to suggest that they don't care for students is so far wide of the mark it renders me speechless.

Rant over.

I'm not sure that I agree with that very much. The problem arises in part because the AUT is the sole negotiating body for non-professorial grade staff and it negotiates nationally for a uniform pay award. It does not differentiate between disciplines and the relative market salaries that can be commanded or adjust for local market forces - such as cost of living.

So, for example, a lecturer in travel studies at Wolverhampton Poly can expect to be paid roughly the same a lecturer in genetics at Imperial College (omitting the London allowance) at around �38000 after a few years. This is madness and it should come as no surprise that the AUT is largley populated by poor academics in disciplines with low market rate salaries. I would also wager that most students affected by this action will not be in disciplines such as the sciences, engineering, law, medicine etc. Indeed, a clinical academic can expect a salary from �80000 - �150000 as they split from the university-based negotiations years ago.

Until universities can negotiate local pay deals that reflect the market rates for staff in different disciplines, this problem is not going to go away.

As an aside, it is interesting to note that six of the labour MPs who voted for increased fees are ex presidents of the NUS who led campaigns against scrapping the grant system and replacing it with loans - you can trust them, can't you?

 

[ben andrews' girlfriend]

Chip - you're from soton - do you know when coursework is likely to be handed back, or is it still sitting in a pile somewhere?

And, have the people marked it, but not given it back?

 

[chip]

Chip - you're from soton - do you know when coursework is likely to be handed back, or is it still sitting in a pile somewhere?

And, have the people marked it, but not given it back?

I'm not in the AUT and would not take part in action like this. I know in my school that one person is taking action and he has been relieved of these duties so that no students will be affected. All my marking is up to date and returned to students and that is the same for all my colleagues. I'm marking a 230 page fourth year group project right now (its quite good really)

From what I hear, most people have actually done their marking but have not returned the coursework or grades to students. There was an announcement the otherday that talks would resume and a "realistic offer" would be made. I guess that some of the people taking action are expecting it to end soon.

At the end of the day its down to us as individuals whether we wish to support this action, but only if we are in the AUT. I would not expect that admin staff in course offices would want to sit on piles of marked work so the lecturers will have it somewhere. Essentially, if the academic responsible for marking your coursework is taking action then it will get back to you sometime after either the lecturer or the AUT call an end to this nonsense.

Have you been told (or asked) if your examinations will be affected?