15 minute read
INTERNATIONAL EXPERIENCE
Sara Mattar | Head of Photography
Earlier this term UoR’s Vice-Chancellor Professor Robert Van de Noort responded to questions about the international student experience in an interview with current Part-time International Officer, Sara Mattar.
The questions- which focused on topics including higher tuition fees, visas and homesickness -formed Sara’s work as a PTO aimed at encouraging international students to speak more openly about their mental health whilst at the university.
And having provided Sara with detailed answers to her enquiries, she plans to use the responses to structure an informative guide for international students which signposts them to support and addresses their frequently asked questions.
1. Why do international students pay double the amount that home students do?
“The UK government sets a maximum tuition fee for ‘Home’ (UK/EU) students, whereas there is no limit for international student tuition fees. Like all UK universities, we receive some government subsidies for some groups of Home students to offset the difference between tuition fees received and the total cost of delivering tuition and support.
As a university, we compete in a global market for international students, and our tuition fees reflect this. Additional income from international student fees allows us to fund activities where costs exceed income, for example teaching of some higher-cost subjects and research activities.”
2. Why is a visa not provided within international students’ tuition fees?
“As not all international students need a Tier 4 student visa to study here, it would be inappropriate to include the cost of a visa in the fees as not all students would need this. We are not aware of any other institution where the tuition fee includes visa costs. However, the University does pay the Home Office for every student it wishes to sponsor under Tier 4 and for each Conformation of Acceptance of Study (CAS) which we issue for this purpose. In cases where students’ visas are refused or they wish to extend their visa, we do not charge the student for a repeat CAS.
Our International Student Advisory team offer free immigration advice and support for all our students. This is important as external organisations offering one-to-one advice would usually charge significant amounts to access this. “
3. What additional services and support are provided for international students?
“Our dedicated International Student Advisory team provide support and information for our international students and their dependants. For example, we provide information about living in the UK, opening bank accounts, registering with the police, and applying for schools for dependants.
Answering the questions that are on many of our minds...
sional English language support. In addition, Blackbullion – our money smart online tool – provides specific learning sections for international students.”
4. It is common for international students to feel homesick when travelling overseas to study. How do UoR address this?
“This year, we have launched ‘Global Buddies’ - a monthly event held in the Library café. These events are open to all and provide a place to meet new people as well as celebrating different cultural events and celebrations.
We are also aware that international students are more likely to stay in Reading during the vacations and we put on events to bring these students together. Our popular ‘Gingerbread’ event just before Christmas was fully booked and we also provided our students with information on events in Reading over the festive period. For any students experiencing homesickness, whether from the UK or from further afield, I would recommend that they speak to our dedicated Student Welfare Team in the first instance. You can drop in and see them in the Carrington Building, or contact them by phone or email. Seeour website for further information.”
Chairing Student Voice
Sara Mattar | Head of Photography
CHINESE STUDENTS SHOWCASE ARTWORK Xiaomeng Fang | Head of Design
The touring art exhibition “0 Distance” came to the University of Reading on Wednesday, January 22nd. All artwork was by young Chinese artists from universities across the UK, such as Royal Holloway and University of the Arts London.
The exhibition was open to all forms of the arts, being ‘0 boundary’ and ‘0 element’, intended for the artists to fully exploit their ideas, creativity and potential.
Being a student voice chair has its advantages and disadvantages however, it is such an amazing job to be the voice of the whole student voice meeting.
Its perks are that you get to delegate the meeting and choose what topics will be chosen. However, its disadvantages are that you are under pressure as there is a specific time you have to stick to and that you cut people off from speaking when they have passed the one minute of speaking.
In order for an idea to pass it has to have a majority of approvals by student voice member where it then has to have more than 200 votes by all the students.
There were six campaign ideas that were competed in an all student vote where 680 students voted for the ideas. The two that got the main votes get approved. When an idea has been approved, full time officers have to work on it within a time frame of two years.
The two campaigns that has been passed the last student voice was: “RUSU to campaign for the university to introduce a security text service” where this would be done by the welfare officer over the next two years; “RUSU to campaign for the university to make parking on campus more accessible” which was assigned to the diversity officer. The policy that was passed and would be looked at by the president is: “RUSU to write a sustainable crockery and cutlery policy”. This policy had 329 votes where 289 votes were ‘for’, 23 votes ‘against’ and 17 abstentions.
In order to implement the ideas, every campaign and policy that have passed would have to be assigned to one of the full time officers where they would have to work on it for the next two years by researching about it and trying to make it happen in university.
All ideas need at least 200 votes to pass. If you have an idea that want it to happen make sure you put it on the RUSU website in the Change it section as they are voted by the students and ideas could happen.
I would definitely recommend going for the student voice chair position. If you are interested please do message me or email me. The exhibited works ranged from abstract, cartoon style artwork to a short documentary on a Buddhist Academy, depicting the daily lives of the locals.
Presented by the Chinese Students and Scholars Association of Reading (CSSA Reading) in collaboration with another four UK universities, the exhibition took place in SACLL in the Edith Morley building.
REFRESHERS’ FAYRE For images of the event, please see the Photography section.
On Tuesday, January 21 clubs and societies from across the university came together to recruit new members at RUSU’s annual Refreshers’ Fayre. The Fayre took place in UoR’s SportsPark and featured hundreds of stalls hosted by the various club’s committees. Taz Usher | Print Editor
The event was free to attend and students were encouraged to visit the fayre in search of something new to try or enquire about as we progress into the new year. Local organisations including Domino’s pizza treated visitors to freebies throughout the day.
Photo by University of Reading
“It is important to note that the majority of my colleagues did not participate in strike action in autumn 2019, meaning most classes went ahead as normal on strike days. Where there has been impact, our first response will be to minimise this. Schools are working hard to identify the most appropriate way to deliver teaching or materials for any classes affected so that students’ learning is not unreasonably affected.
If students consider that they have been academically disadvantaged in an assessment as a result of strike action, we have set up a separate process for reporting this which will ensure that programme examiners take this into account.
This process is calledImpact of Strike Action on Academic Performance. Please seeour website for further information.“
Trump’s impeachment trial
The Democratic party wrapped up their case for impeachment on Friday, after a three-day presentation in the Senate. Kathryn Parker | Part 2 Law
Despite the backing impeachment received in Congress, the Senate are more sympathetic to the President, with a Republican majority of 8 seats.
Having moved to the trial portion of the impeachment proceedings, it is now for President Trump’s lawyers to give their promised “robust” defence. It is now a matter of waiting to see whether the Democrats have convinced the Senate enough to continue.
Yinan Zou | Part 2 BA Politics and International Relations
FEBRUARY 2020 Brexit: What Comes Next?
Francis Raynes | Part One Politics
On Friday, January 24 Boris Johnson formally signed the Withdrawal Agreement that allows the UK to leave the European Union.
RUSU Marketing
Achievements and progress were celebrated last month at the annual Big RUSU Update Conference.
The event- which took place on Tuesday, January 21st attracted a promising attendance of 125 students and saw representatives from RUSU summarise the charity’s work from the past year.
Student Social Venues and Events- which includes entertainment, 3sixty, Café Mondial, Monterey, Mojos, Catering and Events- saw a reduction in both income and surplus and contributed £82k compared with £202k the previous year. It was noted that this was a good result for an area that is in decline nationally. and produced an overall surplus of £50k
The following campaigns were also praised for their positive impact on University life:
1. ‘Embody Positivity Campaign’ to advocate body positivity
2. ‘Never Okay’ campaign to raise awareness of bullying and harassment with an online reporting system
3. ‘Good lad initiative’ to run workshops to promote equal gender relationship and improve attitudes to male students
4. ‘Live Mojo’ showcasing amazing musical talent
The income granted to the Student Activity groups- which includes sports, societies, RAG, volunteering and student mediaincreased again from £232k to £247k.
The Business Development Area-which focuses on generating new income from the existing RUSU facilities- increased its income level from £272k to £299k 5. ‘Hello Neighbour’ campaign to promote positive engagement in relation to the local community
6. ‘Diversity Digest’, a digital platform to celebrate culture and community across campus
7. ‘Zero Tolerance’, a policy against sexual harassment and discrimination 8. ‘Speak Up, Stay Safe’, a platform allowing students to report areas which don’t feel safe
9. Guarantor scheme ensuring all students have equal access to private rental contracts 10. ‘Veggie Pledge’ to reduce student meat consumption in January 11. ‘Let’s Start Talking’ to promote a space for students to open up about their mental health issues and free sanitary product provision.
In the coming year RUSU says it will keep working hard to improve student life at the University.
And some of its upcoming plans which students can look forward to include the instalment of glass pods on campus to increase study space, a Mojo’s renovation, new options in the campus merchandise store, a platform informing students about talks on campus, a Sporting Excellence Scholarship, a 3G pitch on campus, and working with Olio: a food recycling app that students and businesses such as Mondial can donate their food waste to. The sheaf of gilt-edged papers sped to London via train, a reminder of one permanent link to Europe that won’t be severed after Brexit. But aside from the pale concrete monolith of the Channel Tunnel, its gaping mouth symbolic of the black hole left by Britain’s wrenching departure, what other connections to the continent will remain?
The rhetoric in Brussels has been hopeful over the past weeks, with European Council president Charles Michel declaring: “We start a new chapter as partners and allies.” This new chapter of the story, though, is still nothing more than a blank page for the momentand tensions exist over whether the second stage of negotiations can succeed.
Despite the fireworks and celebrations, on 31st January the UK will enter an eleven-month transition period during which the government must follow EU regulations on trade and accept the decisions of the European Court of Justice. This gives almost a year for fresh talks between the UK and the EU to work out the details of the future relationship- and Boris Johnson has claimed that this deadline of December 2020 will not be extended.
Whether or not Big Ben chimes to mark the occasion, another clock will start ticking at midnight on the 31stone that could set alarm bells ringing in Downing Street at Christmas next year.
In that month, there would be three options on the table. The most optimistic vision would involve a UK-EU trade deal being signed and sealed for the long-term, although this would not cover issues such as security.
The second scenario would see negotiations over the future relationship stall, and if this happened Britain could default to World Trade Organisation rules, with punitive tariffs placed on continental imports.
Those conditions would essentially mean that Britain left the European Union with ‘no-deal’. The final option would be to extend the transition period to allow for further negotiations, but since Boris Johnson has ruled this out it appears unlikely.
The basic situation continues to focus on a stark and confrontational choicedeal or no deal. With the additional time pressure, coupled with the memory of Theresa May’s failure to keep to previous Brexit deadlines in March, serious tensions begin to rise over the government’s ability to fully finalise the arrangements.
That fear won’t be calmed by the EU’s public suspicions of the December timetable. For all the gravitas placed on the exact minute of Britain’s departure, its clear that Brexit remains far from over.
Coronavirus- start-up and symptoms
How many bottles do I have to drink until I get Coronavirus? Despite the name, Coronavirus has nothing to do with the beer! Coronavirus is a term given to a large family of viruses that typically cause respiratory infections. They are very common- some subgroups are even responsible for the common cold. In mid-December, a new strain of the virus was detected in Wuhan, China. This outbreak is a particular concern as in 2003, Annie Davis | Part 2 Biomedical Science
a similar outbreak occurred. The strain caused severe acute respiratory syndrome, which caused 10% of those infected to die. This time around, the virus is causing individuals infected to develop a fever, fatigue, a severe dry cough, and difficulty breathing. Symptoms are usually mild however in rare cases can be fatal. When new strains emerge it is very concerning as we often lack immunity to it and have no protection or treatment.
SECOND WAVE OF
STRIKES MAKES ITS WAY
TO CAMPUS
Annie Davis | Part 2 Biomedical Science
14 days of University and College Union (UCU) strikes are due to take place at the University of Reading between Thursday, February 20th and Friday,March 13th.
This is following previous strikes that took place on campus last term between Monday, November 25th and Wednesday, December 4th. After this period of strike action, UCU and the University were still unable to come to a mutual agreement with regards to pay and pension contributions.
Much like last term, members are striking due to disputes over pay, and pension contributions which they were unable to sort with the University directly. This is because there have been changes to the pension scheme, with members suggesting that pension contributions should be over 26% of annual salary. The University remain on the stance that this would not be affordable and is an unrealistic request.
Disputes with pay come as the annual pay increase was set between 3.65% and 1.8%, depending on the job role.A particular concern for strikers is that average gender pay gap at Reading is currently 4.2% higher than the national average for the education at 14.3% according to data published by UCEA in May 2018.
Following a student vote, it was declared by RUSU that the Union and students support the strike; this position is being upheld throughout this year’s strike period. Although many students may feel frustrated by this news, it is important to understand the reasons behind the strike. Pay gaps, within gender and race are very important issues, and we as a society have a responsibility to address them.
At Reading, we want our staff to feel valued and paid fairly for the important work that they do, regardless of race, gender or role. However, as young people it is harder to understand the grievances surrounding the pensions.
It’s difficult to imagine working a fulltime job at this stage in our lives, let alone retirement. As we have an ageing population i.e
people are expected to live much longer than they use to, pensions are becoming much more expensive and promises regarding pensions are becoming harder to keep Photo by Annie Davis
due to life expectancy and the current poorer, unstable economic climate. they feel as if their academic performance has been affected by the strike.
It is important to remember that as before, each department and course will be affected differently by the strike. After the strikes, lecturers will be keeping to their contracted hours and, in other words, will not make up for missed timetabled hours. The University has asked that members of staff make up for missed content, however This will enable your department to make adjustments. This applies to coursework over the strike period and to exams throughout and at the end of the year. https://student.reading.ac.uk/essentials/_the-important-stuff/industrial-action-2019.aspx
