In the coming weeks and months, University lecturers up and down the country are striking. Once again, students will be the ones that suffer.
Over the past year, emails from the Colm Harmon have generally been portents of bad news for students at Edinburgh. Last week’s was no different: a summary of the dates of upcoming industrial action.
The content of the email is all too familiar; after all, this is the fifth major staff walkout in the last five years, and the third in the last twelve months. Since learning moved offline, barely a month has passed without speculated or actual industrial action.
As far as directly concerns students, what matters is not the ins and outs of the pay dispute, but that universities are refusing to offer financial remuneration. Under its terms and conditions, Edinburgh absolves itself of responsibility for strikes by categorising it as a form of disruption beyond its reasonable control (alongside ‘Acts of God’, terrorist attacks and natural disasters).
It is not alone in this. Not a single university in Britain has offered students a refund on their tuition fees. Universities argue that staff pay is not in their direct remit, which is decided by the Universities and Colleges Employers Association (UCEA).
This is a fundamental failure on the part of not just Edinburgh, but all UK universities. They continue to demand full tuition fees of up to £9250 per year (substantially more for international students) for a product they know is not the one that students will be receiving.
Edinburgh has established a ‘Learning Opportunity Fund’, where students can apply for up to £350 to put towards alternative learning endeavours. But this accounts for less than 4 per cent of what students from England and Wales pay each year for their tuition, when for some students, half of their in-person teaching this term is being lost due to strike action.
In any other consumer contract where a provider was continually unable to fulfil its contractual obligations, it would be reasonable for a buyer to request a renegotiation of terms. The contract between universities and students should be no different to the one that is negotiated when enlisting the services of a lawyer or an electrician. So why are universities getting away with it?
At the heart of the problem is that UK universities are fee-charging enterprises operating with a public sector mindset – a hangover from the pre-1998 era when university education was wholly a provision of the state. Times have moved on, and today’s students are paying customers.
If universities are unable to reach a settlement with striking employees, it is both morally unjustifiable and inherently unsustainable to leave the burden to fall onto paying students. Such greedy and exploitative behaviour will eventually lead students to question whether a university education is even worth investing in.
Universities must adjust their Terms and Conditions in recognition of the fact that their ultimate obligation is to their students. Failure to do so, and the future of the sector hangs in the balance.
Image “Old College, University of Edinburgh” by Ipoh kia is licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0.
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When will Universities do the right thing and compensate their students?
In the coming weeks and months, University lecturers up and down the country are striking. Once again, students will be the ones that suffer.
Over the past year, emails from the Colm Harmon have generally been portents of bad news for students at Edinburgh. Last week’s was no different: a summary of the dates of upcoming industrial action.
The content of the email is all too familiar; after all, this is the fifth major staff walkout in the last five years, and the third in the last twelve months. Since learning moved offline, barely a month has passed without speculated or actual industrial action.
As far as directly concerns students, what matters is not the ins and outs of the pay dispute, but that universities are refusing to offer financial remuneration. Under its terms and conditions, Edinburgh absolves itself of responsibility for strikes by categorising it as a form of disruption beyond its reasonable control (alongside ‘Acts of God’, terrorist attacks and natural disasters).
It is not alone in this. Not a single university in Britain has offered students a refund on their tuition fees. Universities argue that staff pay is not in their direct remit, which is decided by the Universities and Colleges Employers Association (UCEA).
This is a fundamental failure on the part of not just Edinburgh, but all UK universities. They continue to demand full tuition fees of up to £9250 per year (substantially more for international students) for a product they know is not the one that students will be receiving.
Edinburgh has established a ‘Learning Opportunity Fund’, where students can apply for up to £350 to put towards alternative learning endeavours. But this accounts for less than 4 per cent of what students from England and Wales pay each year for their tuition, when for some students, half of their in-person teaching this term is being lost due to strike action.
In any other consumer contract where a provider was continually unable to fulfil its contractual obligations, it would be reasonable for a buyer to request a renegotiation of terms. The contract between universities and students should be no different to the one that is negotiated when enlisting the services of a lawyer or an electrician. So why are universities getting away with it?
At the heart of the problem is that UK universities are fee-charging enterprises operating with a public sector mindset – a hangover from the pre-1998 era when university education was wholly a provision of the state. Times have moved on, and today’s students are paying customers.
If universities are unable to reach a settlement with striking employees, it is both morally unjustifiable and inherently unsustainable to leave the burden to fall onto paying students. Such greedy and exploitative behaviour will eventually lead students to question whether a university education is even worth investing in.
Universities must adjust their Terms and Conditions in recognition of the fact that their ultimate obligation is to their students. Failure to do so, and the future of the sector hangs in the balance.
Image “Old College, University of Edinburgh” by Ipoh kia is licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0.
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