The LUU exec isn’t backing the NSS boycott, here’s why they should be

Student Unions across the UK are making the decision to boycott the National Student Survey (NSS), except the exec of Leeds University Union, who have in a personal capacity decided to not back the boycott. The NSS is a step towards increasing tuition fees, the better each university performs the more they will be able to charge for degree courses.

The boycott is being led by the National Union of Students but is also supported by the University and College Union, which is made up of university teaching staff such as lecturers and tutors. 25 per cent of Student Unions have so far signed up to the boycott, to protect their students from potential rises to fees, so why is it that the LUU exec has decided to not support the boycott?

The Teaching Excellence Framework was launched in 2016 to allow Universities to drive up tuition fees on the basis of whether they meet certain market-based criteria, like graduate employment, income and student satisfaction. This is supposed to be used to measure quality of teaching but in reality, the TEF serves as a rating system, sorting universities into Gold, Silver and Bronze institutions based on how they score in these arbitrary metrics. This information is then used to determine which universities should raise tuition fees, and by how much. According to some government projections, fees are already expected to rise to £9,250 per year by 2017/18, and they could be as high as £12,000 by 2020.

Universities minister Jo Johnson announced recently that he would use the results of National Student Survey as an indicator of the proposed Teaching Excellence Framework despite the fact that studies have shown no discernible link between student satisfaction and academic performance. The real motive behind the NSS then, is to use student feedback as a means of justifying tuition fee rises. The government is manipulating students’ legitimate concerns about quality of teaching to charge them even more to go to university.

The National Student Survey is just another example of the creeping neoliberalisation of higher education by which universities are encouraged to operate like businesses by treating their students like consumers. When the government allowed universities to treble tuition fees they incentivised the most elite institutions to only try and attract the wealthiest students who could afford to pay, but ended up with most universities charging the maximum £9,000 a year. While education was once seen as a vehicle for social mobility, it’s quickly becoming a system for reproducing social inequality.

Last time fees were raised, it prompted a national outcry from students up and down the country as it led to the poorer students being pushed out of the opportunity of going to university. Students at Leeds even occupied the Michael Sadler Building in protest and the then exec said “We are ideologically opposed to higher fees and we’ve got a policy to that extent. We oppose it and will argue against it at any opportunity”.

With so much opposition, we feel the Union should be supporting a campaign which is so important in terms of protecting students by reducing the possibility of further tuition fee increases.

A decision as to whether LUU should officially boycott the NSS will be debated in the Better Union Forum next month, however it is expected that all six members of the current exec will speak against the boycott. If the motion fails to pass with the support of 75 per cent of the panel made up of a 16 random students, it will go to a campus-wide referendum.