{"id":1108,"date":"2019-12-13T13:26:46","date_gmt":"2019-12-13T13:26:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/subtext\/?p=1108"},"modified":"2019-12-16T18:50:27","modified_gmt":"2019-12-16T18:50:27","slug":"tiers-4-fears","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/subtext\/2019\/12\/13\/tiers-4-fears\/","title":{"rendered":"TIERS 4 FEARS"},"content":{"rendered":"
Contributed article<\/span><\/div>\n
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Many have found fault with the recent efforts of the Student Registry to track postgraduate research (PGR) students’ attendance by ‘provision in Moodle PGR Records to record supervisory meetings’ (email to supervisors, 16.10.19).<\/span><\/div>\n
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This new online system of recording all meetings between PGR students and their supervisors is being touted as a way of protecting the rights of students from negligent supervisors, as well as complying with UK Visas and Immigration’s increased scrutiny of students on Tier 4 visas.<\/span><\/div>\n
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Since the new online system offers a non-obligatory notes section in which to log the content of meetings, all the process appears to achieve is a numeric record of dated meetings. Quite how this ensures the quality of engagement from either party is unclear.<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
Thus we arrive at the secondary premise: surveillance of international PGR students. Students who already register with the Police, the Home Office, the University (through appraisals, registration and DNA tests) and their Departments. Students who are already the object of intense scrutiny by a Home Office intent on making life for them in the UK as uncomfortable as possible.<\/span><\/div>\n
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Caoimhe Mader McGuinness from Unis Resist Border Control (URBC) says these schemes are often presented as safeguarding students’ experience or health:<\/span><\/div>\n
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‘It is sold to lecturers as a way of making sure that the student is taken into account and sees someone, but this is also the sort of data that is used by the Home Office to, if they so wish, declare that that student hasn’t been to enough contact points and then potentially deport them.’<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
(See Guardian article – Hostile Environment: how risk-averse universities penalise migrants, dated 5.6.18)<\/span><\/div>\n
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It now appears the University’s need to maintain its license to recruit foreign national students (how else would we pay for all the new buildings?!) is, ironically, making it an accomplice to the Home Office, contributing to the UK’s increasingly hostile environment towards our foreign students.<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
I hope the readers of subtext need no wordy exposition on the intellectual and cultural benefits of a diverse PGR student population. This new system is yet another stumble down a slippery path towards exclusion, alienation and infringement of the rights of those from abroad who choose to enrich Lancaster University’s community through postgraduate research. Shame on management for their capitulation. Philip Pullman had it right: we need some scholastic sanctuary.<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Contributed article Many have found fault with the recent efforts of the Student Registry to track postgraduate research (PGR) students’ attendance by ‘provision in Moodle PGR Records to record supervisory meetings’ (email to supervisors, 16.10.19). This new online system of … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":568,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[21,4],"tags":[541,349,540,537,542],"class_list":["post-1108","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-contributed-article","category-news","tag-caoimhe-mader-mcguinness","tag-home-office","tag-international-students","tag-issue-191","tag-unis-resist-border-control"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p99sHo-hS","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1485,"url":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/subtext\/2021\/02\/19\/diary-of-a-rent-strike-organiser\/","url_meta":{"origin":1108,"position":0},"title":"Diary of a Rent Strike Organiser","author":"Johnny Unger","date":"February 19 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"Contributed article by Jude Rowley Lancaster students have spent the last five weeks calling on University management to cut the rent and start taking student wellbeing seriously. When the pandemic hit last March, students \u2014 fed-up with being abandoned by University management and following in the footsteps of their predecessors\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "contributed article"","block_context":{"text":"contributed article","link":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/subtext\/category\/contributed-article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":963,"url":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/subtext\/2019\/04\/02\/bailrigg-not-fm\/","url_meta":{"origin":1108,"position":1},"title":"BAILRIGG NOT-FM","author":"Johnny Unger","date":"April 2 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"As subtext goes to press, Bailrigg FM's members have been sent an email informing them that Lancaster SU will no longer be supporting the station's FM broadcasting license, something it has held for over 20 years. This would mean the station going online-only from the end of August 2019, and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "contributed article"","block_context":{"text":"contributed article","link":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/subtext\/category\/contributed-article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":598,"url":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/subtext\/2018\/05\/24\/general-knowledge\/","url_meta":{"origin":1108,"position":2},"title":"GENERAL KNOWLEDGE","author":"Johnny Unger","date":"May 24 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"In subtext 176, we reported on the Students\u2019 Union\u2019s Annual General Meeting, which was held at the end of Lent term and aborted due to inquoracy. Keen to be of assistance, we pointed out that, as per their bye-law, LUSU was required to hold another AGM within a week. 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Like many of her colleagues, Amy has learnt a lot from the pandemic, like the fact that she can (kind of) do her job without being on campus, and it is much cheaper for the University if she doesn't take\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "contributed article"","block_context":{"text":"contributed article","link":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/subtext\/category\/contributed-article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":610,"url":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/subtext\/2018\/04\/24\/deep-dive-casualisation-and-precarious-working-practices\/","url_meta":{"origin":1108,"position":5},"title":"DEEP DIVE: CASUALISATION AND PRECARIOUS WORKING PRACTICES","author":"Johnny Unger","date":"April 24 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"PRECARI-R-US The casualisation and precarious working practices of academic staff are issues that universities are loath to acknowledge, let alone address, and are a far bigger issue than they would admit. 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