Last Friday, just as I was about to leave Union House, Amanda reminded me it’s our third and final National Recruitment Week next week (week beginning 14 May). This regular event can be met in the office with a range of responses, from “OK, where’s the banner and the stand materials? Who’s on the rota?” to “Really? Again? But we have [insert urgent and depressing problem here] to deal with next week!”
I have to admit, my feelings were closer to the latter this time, as first thing Tuesday I will be attending yet another meeting regarding yet another consultation which could result in colleagues losing their jobs. We simply haven’t got the time to think about something else…
And then, as I took a moment on Sunday to enjoy the Bank Holiday sunshine, I thought, actually, how can we not afford to do this?
We have six more weeks of term time, and six more weeks before our Annual General Meeting. There has never been a more important time for recruitment – if you think this year has been bruising, then next year will be even worse.
It is time to gather together as a community and to show that “We Are the University.”
During the strike weeks, the hashtag #WeAreTheUniversity became familiar to Twitter users: but even if you are not a keen social media user, you will understand the sentiment. We long since decided to stop calling the Senior Management Team “the University” in our communications (as in, “the University has decided…” this or that), because we are the University, not senior management. So few of the important decisions now are taken without any demonstrable benefit to education or research. We need to take a stand, and we need to do it via every means available to us.
Support your union, and help us to support you. Please, do whatever you can to help us recruit more members: talk to your colleagues, have honest discussions about how you are going to manage the pressures of a consultation in your department. Tell them to visit ucu.org.uk/join – it’s so easy to join the union.
And please don’t think it won’t happen to you: the two departments in the University that came top in the country in REF2014 are now looking to the next academic year with many fewer staff and with severely challenging recruitment due to by arbitrary decisions by the Senior Management Team. Those that remain wonder what the future will bring. As far as we are concerned, we want the future to be in the hands of the university community, and we hope, so do you.
Recruit a friend, put “LUNCH AT THE UCU AGM” in your diary for 15 June, and join the effort to save jobs, education, research, and community – for everyone here: 12:15pm for lunch, Building 44, Room 1041.