The Beaver Making Sense of LSE Since 1949
Newspaper of the LSE Students’ Union
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beaveronline.co.uk
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Issue 912
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Wednesday 30 September 2020
“WE WERE ALREADY WORKING AT THE EDGE”
As the School faces record budget shortfalls and uncertainty plagues the wider academic job market, LSE’s young academics are voicing their concerns about precarious employment, increased workloads, and their future prospects in academia.*
Yasmina O’Sullivan Features Editor
L
ike many universities, LSE has faced substantial financial challenges in the fallout of COVID-19: early estimates put the shortfall from the cancellation of the Summer School alone at £70 million—a nearly 20% reduction in LSE’s typical annual income. Additional losses were incurred by LSE’s inability to rent out halls of residence during the Summer Term and the looming potential of students not returning, the extent of which will not be known until the first round of tuition payments later in the autumn. Such losses, confirmed to be “dramatic changes” by members of the Directorate, cast the spotlight on a key fact of early-career academic employment at LSE: 59% of LSE’s staff work are on contracts of between one to three years. They are considered ‘precarious’ by some, because their continued employment is highly dependent on the School’s overall financial outlook. That outlook, now also seems ‘precarious.’ Following a summer of organising by fixed-term staff and statements of support from permanent academic colleagues, The Beaver heard from multiple early-career academics and trade union representatives about
their concerns as LSE prepares to return. Their testimonies reflect a sense of betrayal by the university over a perceived abandonment of fixed-term staff, concern about the looming workload as the university pivots to blended learning, and fear for the quality of teaching, given the university’s approach. One staff member told The Beaver that COVID-19 has brought to light already existing fault lines in academia, which were “exacerbated in how the university has responded to the crisis. If not COVID, then something else would have shown this crisis point.” These testimonies challenge statements by LSE to The Beaver. An LSE spokesperson assured that it is “continuing to employ the necessary staff to ensure excellent teaching and research continues to take place.” However, young academics describe potentially increased teaching responsibility, spread between fewer staff, while balancing their need to produce academic work. “If you are not a precarious academic you can say this year is a wash out, my paper, my research, my book,” one staff member said. Can precarious staff stay it’s a washout year? Will they be rewarded in the job market if they say they provided extra support to the university through the crisis? No.”
Illustration by Ellie Reeves
Beaver Editor
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SE’s student satisfaction rate has risen to 84% in the yearly National Student Survey (NSS), which is completed by finalyear students and is considered a benchmark for student experiences across the country. The School scored 71% in 2018 and 78% in 2019. This year marks the School’s best result since at least 2014, when LSE peaked at 81% before years of protracted decline. The issue has long been a priority for the School: in his final report as LSE Director, Professor Craig Calhoun expressed that declining satisfaction rates
were among his greatest regrets, promising that “We are working now to effect a real step change.” The results mark a substantial improvement on LSE’s historical average, which had previously placed it among the lowest in the Russell Group and low among its London counterparts. The new results place LSE above its London neighbours at Imperial (81%), Queen Mary (80%), King’s (77%), and SOAS (77%). LSE ranked 64th nationally, and had the third-highest rating among London universities. To be listed, at least 50% of a university’s final-year students must respond to the questionnaire. Student satisfaction rankings are de-
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LSE Student Satisfaction Rises to 84%, Now Third Highest in London Colin Vanelli
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rived from the proportion of students agreeing or strongly agreeing with the statement “Overall, I am satisfied with the quality of the course”. Since January 2017, the National Union of Students (NUS) and Universities and College Union (UCU) have maintained a boycott of the NSS over concerns that the NSS treats “students as passive customers”, by coupling results to tuition-fee rises under the government’s controversial Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF), and over its use for internal performance management. In a year marked by renewed UCU strike action at universities across the UK, as well as by the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic during
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the NSS’s spring response window, notable absences from the list include Oxford, Cambridge, and UCL. Responding to the news in a July press release, Director Minouche Shafik said “I am delighted to see our NSS results continue to significantly improve, especially considering the challenges we have all faced in the last year. “Enhancing students’ educational and overall experiences remains a top priority for LSE, and will be a key focus as we move towards flexible ways of teaching and learning for next term. We have made great progress, but there is still more to do.”
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FLIPSIDE