Communist Students were stirring things up at this year's conference of the National Union of Students Members and supporters of Communist Students made a stand for principled Marxist politics at the 2014 conference of the National Union of Students, where CS member Robert Hayes was standing for the ‘block of 15’ individually elected members of the executive. The ...
Communist Students member Robert Eagleton outlines the platform he is standing on for the National Union of Students ‘Block of 15’ From April 8 to 10 students from across Britain will gather in Liverpool for the annual conference of the National Union of Students. This year, comrades in Communist Students have decided to stand me as ...
Last week saw an outbreak of student protest. Daniel Harvey reports The sudden re-ignition of student protest on campuses began on December 5, when students from the University of London began an occupation of Senate House Library in Bloomsbury. A set of demands blasted the “undemocratic and unaccountable” university management, and announced the solidarity of the ...
Callum Williamson on the offensive against university workers and students The strike action taking place in universities across the UK this week follows the refusal of the University and Colleges Employers Association (UCEA) to resume national negotiations with Unite, Unison, the University and College Union, the Educational Institute of Scotland and the GMB (the last two ...
The goal of reforms to higher education undertaken by successive governments has been to subject universities to the immediate needs of the capitalist class. Through pouring money into universities, funding research, the tuition of future employees and through creating links with specific courses, capital is remodelling higher education to benefit its operations directly. The government ...
Recorded at the meeting organised by Communist Students & the CPGB on Monday 22nd of October. Mark Fisher's intro: Replying to the debate: Replying again:
Author of Capitalist Realism (Zero Books), Mark Fisher is the speaker at this meeting jointly organised by the CPGB and Communist Students. All are welcome, and there will be plenty of time for discussion. Mark sent us this intro, which gives a taster of his talk. Recent changes in the funding of higher education in the UK have ...
From the National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts The National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts is calling for a National Student Strike this March, in support of a nationwide strike on pensions by the lecturers’ union, UCU, and coinciding with an official walk-out called by the National Union of Students. A date will be announced later this week, ...
Education targets become ends in themselves, argues Michael Copestake The pernicious and self-defeating influence of targets, league tables and over-examination in schools has thrust the education system once again into the media spotlight. This time outside its regular place in the annual news cycle, which, as residents of Britain at least will know, usually follows the ...
What did the classical Marxists actually say on the subject of education? James Tansey has been finding out, and draws some lessons for communist work today. In February 1865, at the age of 24, Paul Lafargue first met Karl Marx in a visit to report on the progress of the International Workingmen’s Association in France. Marx ...
According to the secretary of state for education, Michael Gove, ‘one of the under-appreciated tragedies of our time has been the sundering of our society from its past’1. Unfortunately, he was not referring to the tendency for subjects like politics and economics to be taught in a manner completely torn from all historical context, but ...
We are republishing this article as it should be of interest to anyone on the student left. In it, Mike Macnair argues that student unions are not like trade unions, and unity must be built primarily around politics, not 'student issues'. Across England and Wales university students are starting their courses with ‘freshers weeks’ and existing ...
Here we republish an excellent article by Bertell Ollman, a professor of politics at New York University. His book, 'Exams and changing the rules' is reviewed here. I. The psychologist, Bill Livant, has remarked, "When a liberal sees a beggar, he says the system isn't working. When a Marxist does, he says it is". The same insight ...