Revolting Students

According to the MEN freebie edition, our students had a protest today. I read this in the queue for the bank at lunchtime.

Which was handy to know, when the same protesting mob reached the building opposite and stormed the doors at 4.50pm!

I don't tend to read the student's noticeboards. They tend to be full of events that the over 25's should not even consider. There is no amount of tequila in this world that will turn back the ageing process! So I hadn't been aware of this, until they turned up at the building across the way.

It had an air of flash-mob about it, or maybe our lot were not the most organised anarchists on the block. The guy with the loudhailer didn't have the clearest diction, so it was hard to know what they were protesting about. And the placard makers hadn't really pushed the boat out, so it was hard to see what they were protesting about. The clearest was a nice little A3 with "NO TO CUTS", so we weren't completely in the dark.

However, they managed to bring a nice little salsa band, got the attention of a Channel M camera crew and some community police, and the police helicopter did a quick fly-by, so I think a good time was had by all!

I wouldn't claim to be the biggest fan of students; but everything they said is correct. They are being fleeced by this Uni, and deserve better. Shame the Uni is too busy pissing-off all the support staff, to notice! The very staff who are now too demoralised to provide the service that could make all the difference.

The students are cash cows, the staff are wage-slaves. Here's a bit from an e-mail from my mate S, who is escaping into the real world in 2 weeks;

"I completely and utterly believe that we are all capable of more than what we are currently doing. I even more believe that the UoM does not have our best interests at heart and will bleed you dry over time (it has me)."

Ok, not the best writing you'll ever see. But you tolerate this blog, and that will never win prizes! The plan seems to be to take support staff who are good at their jobs, make half of them redundant (minimum), make the remaining staff overworked and then throw in a paycut. Then to be really sure, take away any aspect of the job that needs a functioning braincell. This justifies the next pay cut - if you are knackered and stressed and not performing, then how can you justify the pay grade?

But still, we've got a few Nobel laureates knocking around on a good fee, and a nice glossy brochure talking about our plans to be world leaders by 2015. What more do we want??