Higher Education Cuts

[chairdriver]

So I took part in the protest today in Oxford against the proposed cuts to higher education.

 

Over 1000 participants. Just amazing. So encouraging, that there were that many bodies, all united together in disgust at the 80% cut in university funding.

 

It started peaceful, but when we were led into the Rad Cam square, and not allowed out by the police, it turned more fierce, people actively questioning their authority to prevent a group of people walking the streets they live in.

 

 

We got to Market Street, which leads onto Cornmarket Street, the busiest street in Oxford, and were met by a police line. Everyone started shouting "THIS IS WHAT DEMOCRACY LOOKS LIKE!" The moment when we pushed through was one of the most exhilarating experiences of my life (skip to 1:55 in the video).

(Try and spot me, I'm in a brown jacket)

 

And I love 1:28 in that video, where they tilt the camera and you get to see how big the march was, just hundreds of banners filling the screen.

 

Just amazing. So much momentum for more protest.

 

 

Education leads people out of oppresion.

[Guy]

You're not a student unless you've done at least one protest, right?

[nightwolf]

I would make a lengthy comment, but the whole thing of cuts and raising the amount in uni fees well...

It just fucks me right off.

[chairdriver]

You're not fully a person until you've done at least one protest.

[nightwolf]

You're not fully a person until you've done at least one protest.

 

This is completely wrong. Pssh, my fellow peers were able to completely change my course without any protests. :awesome:

[chairdriver]

This is completely wrong.

 

Perhaps wrong in some aspects, but not completely wrong. You cannot be a real person until you've questioned authority.

[The fish]

I wish the media would understand what the hell the cuts, and the subsequent rise in tuition fees, actually mean for people. They are NOT going to "prevent poorer people from going to University" - every is able to get the same, full tuition fee loan. Everyone is eligible for maintenance loans - they need to be adjusted so people at Universities in more expensive to live in cities get more money, but that's a different matter (though why the hell do people with poorer parents get grants? It assumes my parents are willing to give me several thousand pounds a year - trust me, they're not!)

 

The way the system works with tuition fees and the loans is that everyone is equally able to go to University, regardless of financial standing. The media does my fucking head in sometimes.

 

As for the increases themselves, it means you'll be paying back money for longer, which, whilst irritating, isn't too problematic for anyone. I do think Scottish students at Scottish Universities should start paying, though.

Edited October 28, 2010 by The fish

[chairdriver]

Fish, you seem to ignore the fact that people will still need to pay off the loans after university, and a £21,000 post-uni debt is far more of a deterrent to a poor family than a rich family -- any way you spin it, the proposition favours the rich. The right to education should not be exclusive to those that can pay.

 

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http://twitpic.com/31mf2f

[Cube]

But you don't need to pay that off until you have a well-paid job.

[Paj!]

I hate.

 

I haven't given it enough time or thought, as often I prefer to be willfully ignorant.

[nightwolf]

Perhaps wrong in some aspects, but not completely wrong. You cannot be a real person until you've questioned authority.

 

It entirely depends on whether you disagree with authority, I personally never usually have an issue and can usually find a less aggressive way to deal with it.

[The fish]

Fish, you seem to ignore the fact that people will still need to pay off the loans after university, and a £21,000 post-uni debt is far more of a deterrent to a poor family than a rich family -- any way you spin it, the proposition favours the rich. The right to education should not be exclusive to those that can pay.

 

No, it favours no one - the debt doesn't have to be paid off until you have a well paid job, and is matched to inflation. It has no relation to your family's income prior to you entering into higher education, but the media, and you, think it does. I dare say this is due to not understanding the system, or being retarded.

[flameboy]

pffff at least regular students still get some form of funding they've totally pulled the plug on teacher training it would seem...if I'd have been doing mine last year would have got $1500 towards fees now its just £240 if I'm lucky!

[Guy]

You're not fully a person until you've done at least one protest.

 

Then I protest protests. They are thuggish and annoying.

[Captain Falcon]

Then I protest protests. They are thuggish and annoying.

 

Plus for every decent civilian, there are a half a dozen or more self righteous wastes of space.

 

They tend to filled with young people and personally I take a little issue with them acting as though they know the answers to all the problems of a world they've barely spent any time in.

[EEVILMURRAY]

Perhaps wrong in some aspects, but not completely wrong. You cannot be a real person until you've questioned authority.

And to do that we need to get sweaty in a mass?

Fish, you seem to ignore the fact that people will still need to pay off the loans after university, and a £21,000 post-uni debt is far more of a deterrent to a poor family than a rich family

True. I'm just under £14000 myself. They seem to add about £80 interest every four[ish] months.

- any way you spin it, the proposition favours the rich.

People seem to be shocked by this, but it was an obvious consequence of voting Conservative.

But you don't need to pay that off until you have a well-paid job.

Over £15k a year last time I checked.

 

Once thing that pissed me off was at Nottingham Uni they put a cap on the number of "native" people can go there. Nottingham Uni is one of the best medical schools (I believe) in the country, so we get alot of Chinese Asians. Because they all want to be doctors. You can get better results but not allowed because you're British... Fucking stupid.

[Charlie]

It started peaceful, but when we were led into the Rad Cam square, and not allowed out by the police, it turned more fierce, people actively questioning their authority to prevent a group of people walking the streets they live in.

 

That would be because the police don't want 1000 people who will potentially cause trouble and disrupt the peace in the busiest street in the town.

 

Good job by the police for not letting you through.

 

I have never, and will never, go to a protest.

[ipaul]

I wish the media would understand what the hell the cuts, and the subsequent rise in tuition fees, actually mean for people. They are NOT going to "prevent poorer people from going to University" - every is able to get the same, full tuition fee loan.

 

On this point - Of course it won't technically block poorer people from going to university - but it will act as a deterrent, more so for poorer people.

 

I think raising fees to the levels being talked about is pretty fucking outrageous (especially from the Liberal Democrats) but they're doesn't seem to be any real opposition or other suggestions on how to deal with this. I understand the idea of a graduate tax is floating around with some people in the Labour party, but this seems like a half baked suggestion. The whole thing's just so frustrating.

 

On Chair's point about authority - I agree with him to an extent. Not on protests per se, but that it's hard to take a person who doesn't at least have a bit of the libertarian in them seriously. I think it's healthy to keep a mild scepticism about authority, at least some of the time.

Edited October 29, 2010 by ipaul

[Daft]

I don't know if I care. I used to. I used to care a lot about of these things.

 

Now I just don't know.

[chairdriver]

I have never, and will never, go to a protest.

 

What if something that you care about is under fire? It's all very well to look disdainfully at politically active people if you have the privilege to have nothing in political discourse that directly threatens you.

 

On Chair's point about authority - I agree with him to an extent. Not on protests per se, but that it's hard to take a person who doesn't at least have a bit of the libertarian in them seriously. I think it's healthy to keep a mild scepticism about authority, at least some of the time.

 

This. Not necessarily like "Police are the slavedrivers", but just question how far they have power over you when you're well within the law. (Perhaps what I was saying sounded too absolute?)

 

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The national march is happening in London on the 10th (I think). It will be interesting to see what happens.

[The fish]

This. Not necessarily like "Police are the slavedrivers", but just question how far they have power over you when you're well within the law. (Perhaps what I was saying sounded too absolute?)

 

Blocking up an entire street is a breach of the peace - that's why you need to get permission from the police in the first place. As much as you have the right to protest, you don't automatically have to right to do it in such a manner. If it'll greatly disrupt too many unrelated parties affairs (ie those of shoppers and shopkeepers), the police have (and rightly, in my opinion) the power to block parts of the route of the protest march.

 

What if something that you care about is under fire? It's all very well to look disdainfully at politically active people if you have the privilege to have nothing in political discourse that directly threatens you.

 

I went to the Iraq War protest, and, well, being the second largest anti-war rally in history (after the equivalent one in Rome), and that did a fat lot of good, so I'm rather disillusioned with protests.

 

Nowadays I prefer to make my feelings about matters known by means of relentless bitching and dissection and destruction of those who I am opposed to's point of view.

[chairdriver]

One thing I'm worried about is that the cuts will increase the gap between the top universities and the ones further down.

 

Really, the cuts are no threat to Oxford University as an establishment, because it's so rich anyway. It's going to be the less wealthy universities that suffer; I know a lot of people at Napier University in Edinburgh, and frankly the education they get in comparison to what you'd expect is outrageous. My friend Kat was planning to study Popular Music as part of her music degree, and they've basically turned around to her and said "We can't afford to teach that anymore", so she's stuck with classical composition or something that she doesn't want to do. I know Razz wasn't allowed to do a forensics course he wanted to do, because of the cuts.

 

Basically it's just really really shortsighted to cut funding to the education of the people who are going to be running the country later on, whether it be through politics, law, NHS, retail, business etc etc.

 

 

The most satisfactory solution to all this is to not cut everything as much, and actually tax extremely wealthy people / businesses properly. Vodafone is getting away with not paying £6 billion worth of taxes to the government. How is that in any way fair, when people's futures are being cut with the education cuts.

[Daft]

It's a dire state of affairs. No one will benefit from these cuts. No one.

 

What else would you expect from the utterly detached morons who run this country. Not that Labour are any better - in fact in many respects they are worse ("Education, education, education!").

 

Seriously, they got Browne ex-CEO of BP to do a review on higher education. Absurd.

 

The whole thing is a fucking joke.

[Supergrunch]

Are you going to the national protest then chair? My union and supervisor both want me to go, but my main reservation is that I'm not sure I fully understand the consequences of the cuts... From a superficial perspective it does seem problematic though.

[The fish]

So, own up, who voted Tory?