Cambridge Defend Education

In recent decades we have seen a series of unprecedented moves towards the marketisation of education in England. Undergraduate fees have been introduced, increased, and tripled – despite mass student protests. Student debt is being sold off to private interests. The Education Maintenance Allowance, designed to support low-income students, has been scrapped. Funding for research councils has been cut drastically, leaving many postgraduate students without the financial support necessary to study. University administrations across the country increasingly exploit low-paid, outsourced, or zero-hour contract labour. We believe that these events are underwritten by a concerted, cynical strategy of privatisation that seeks to turn lecturers into service providers, students into consumers, and universities into businesses. The drive to maximise profit ensures that the most marginalised elements of society are pushed further into the periphery, economic and social advantage are increased unfairly, and that the elite remains unaltered and homogenised. The university should be defended, not sold.

Throughout the country, students are organising this defence. The response from university administrations and the police has been chilling: disciplinary proceedings and suspensions, injunctions against protest, police spying, draconian bail conditions, illegal arrests and beatings at the hands of police. The Vice-Chancellor and representatives of the University of Cambridge administration have yet to comment on any of these concerns. Their silence, whilst students are threatened, beaten and arrested for defending education, is deeply troubling. We ask that they stand with us, concerned students and lecturers, to work toward remedying the following:

 -   The continuing collusion of university administration with the police, including the refusal to condemn police spying on student activist groups.
 -   The tacit support of the administration for the series of undergraduate fee hikes, the student loan sell-off and the increase of the new, consolidated Graduate Fee.
 -   The dismissal of the legitimate grievances of striking Higher Education workers.
 -   The continuing use of zero-hour contracts, outsourced labour, and low pay within the university as a whole.
 -   The university’s position on the commercialisation of higher education, from which we believe these issues stem.

 

Signed,

Amelia Horgan; Amy Gilligan; Adrian; Richard Braude; Matt Phillips; Daisy Hughes; Decca Muldowney; Lucy McMahon; Alex Wolfers; Jia Hui Lee, CUSU Education Officer; Colette Howarth; Owen Holland; Megan Barford; Orla Polten; Johannes Wolf; Louise Banable; Isolde Penwarden; Naomi; Miranda Slade; Laurence Rowley-Abel; Joseph Persad; Alyson Cruise; Lolita White; Joseph la Hausse de Lalouviere; JG; Clive Peace; Harry Wright; Martha Perotto-Wills; Richard Bethlehem; E Turner; Sam Brain; Lucy Barnes; Marianne Brooker; Rachel Bower; Jesse Haughton-Shaw; Fred Cotterill;Anija Dokter; Emma Bourne; Gideon Farrell; Bram van der Velden; Rosie Jewell; T Kearey; Oscar Addis; Paul Raekstad; Ben M. Fulton; Philipp Klaus; Joe Jarrett; Ingvild Wathne Johnsen; Hannah D; Alex Moran; Olivia Bowman; Francesca Ebel;Gregor Donaldson; Hannah Davis; Oliver Finn; Jack Belloli; Luke Freeman-Mills; Hannah Graham; Christopher Clarke; Aubrey Richard Wanliss-Orlebar; Ben Platt; Caitlin Doherty; Gabriel Polley; Louis Willis; Jessica O'Driscoll-Breen; Jessica Denniff; Nienke Boomsma; Kyung Oh; C. P. Landin;  Leonardo Kellaway;  Joe Duffy;  Bethan Kitchen; Isobel Urquhart; Tom Arnold-Forster; Alex Nelson; Freya Curtis; Rebekah Kearey; Rosie Morgan; Maciej Godek; Rebecca Moore; Ian Kearey; Jasmine Hackett; Katie Stone; Justin Katko; E Robson; Richard Parker; Hugo Herman-Wilson; Ludivine Clément; Lucy Beynon; Lawrence Dunn; Oliver Titheridge-Stone; David Grundy; Hilary Hughes; Michael Tencer; Kate Lewis Hood; Joe Young; Natasha Collett; Tom Hallgarten; Rosie Nicolson; Nina de Paula Hanika; Qasim Z Alli; Robin Jones;  Ian Heames; Laetitia Ward; Rosie Skan; T. Lawson; Gabriella Prescott; Victoria Aubrey; Sara Stillwell; Lara Ferris; Daniel Macmillen; Martha Elwell; Sarah-Jane Ewart; Hester van Hensbergen; Rowanne Willett; Barney McCay; Sophia Peacock; Marjam Idriss; Dr. Andrea Brady; Gabriel Fleming; Abi Parr; Harry Hurd; Beau Marshall; C. Hinchliff; Rosanna O’Keeffe; Amy Reddington; Y Gereshon; Louis Goddard; Chris Hitchcock; Conor Mulheir; Tom Foxall; Tom Haniff; Joanna Dennis; Alice Housset; Sophia Flohr; Helena Kernan; Edmund Bolger; Pierrot; Wendy Rattray; Lucy Wilson; Vivien Chong; Dominic Hinkins; Michael Heaton; Mark S. Mendoza; Eloise Oakley; Susie Cronin; Andrew P. Diver; Sandra Kri; Irini Koulovasilopoulos; Max Crean; Marilyn Phillips; Dr. Laura McMahon; Silke Wildendahl; Oscar Farley; Joscha Thiele; Lili Thomas; Madeleine Pepe; Kate Edwards; Joe Simpson; Clare Hymer; Alexandra Barker; Conor McMahon; E. Thornton; Remi Oriogun-Williams; James Tytler; Prof. Brad Epps; Ryan Frost; Dr. Lori Allen; Gloria Dawson; Lauren Steele; Dr. Robert George; Sarah Garland; David Mears; Sarra Facey; March Gutt;Danny Tompkins; Fuad Musallam; Martin Levine; Marijne Mak; Toby Crisford; Eleanor Metcalf; Kelcy Davenport; Michal Koczwara; Chris Page; Felix Wilks; Joseph Dante Simpson; Prof. Clément Mahout; Liam A. Livesley; Rsoa Uddoh; Maximilian Fries; Luke Ilott; Elisif Wasmuth; Seva Kachanov; Rebecca Schofield; James Stafford; Ashraf Ahmed