Students arriving at Goldsmiths, University of London this autumn found a campus embroiled in a bitter industrial dispute that has upended timetables and disrupted courses. Florence Sweeney, a part-time student, said there had been “virtually no teaching” so far this term for many of the fine arts students, and that a group were seeking remuneration. To not even get welcomed or proper briefings, it’s really disappointing, especially for a place with such a good reputation for producing exceptional contemporary artists.” Goldsmiths is famous for the stellar array of artists among its former students, including Steve McQueen, Sarah Lucas and Damien Hirst.
But it has been financially squeezed in recent years by falling applications in its core humanities subjects and the erosion of domestic tuition fees, setting off what one staff member described as “non-stop” rounds of redundancies and restructuring. Now entering its 21st week and with no end in sight, the current strike involving University and College Union (UCU) staff is the longest in living memory in British higher education, originating from a staff marking boycott in April over proposed job cuts. Goldsmiths’ management responded firmly to the boycott by deducting 100% of pay from those involved.
The union argued that amounted to a lockout and a formal ballot followed, so that since early June a group of UCU members at the south-east London university have been on indefinite strike. Joe Newman, a Goldsmiths UCU branch co-president, said: “We’ve resisted as much as we can over the last two rounds of restructuring and redundancies. But right now, the scale of the action that we are taking is in response to the unprecedented scale and speed of the cuts management are pursuing.” Newman said students were largely supportive because they “have more in common with staff on precarious contracts than with senior managers on six-figure salaries”, who he said wanted more savings despite earlier cuts.
Students who are new can’t believe that management is about to launch an incredibly messy redundancy process.” The university said only “a small portion of our staff – around 8.5%” were on strike, leaving most students unaffected, and that it had offered significant compromises to the union, including a pause on compulsory redundancies. But it was not prepared to scrap the 100% pay deductions for the marking boycott, saying it had spent significant amounts to ease the impact on students. John Carver, a part-time student in his second year, said he had decided to suspend his studies after attending a “dismal” departmental meeting at the start of term.
There wasn’t any light at the end of the tunnel,” Carver said. But what’s going on now is that [replacement] tutors are being brought in who don’t know the students and it’s not as impressive, to put it politely.” James Evans, an international student from the US, said visa and funding restrictions meant he had to stick with the MFA course despite the disruption. The marks aren’t the important part, but the dialogue is, and there were very important fixtures for the year that went without any discussion.
It was a bit frustrating. But this year it’s been worse,” Evans said. There’s still no feedback on projects from last year, but beyond that there’s no structure, barely any communication.
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