Wednesday 10 June was one of the most memorable days that I’ve had at NUS. We launched the Blueprint for an alternative higher education funding system and the culmination of a huge amount of policy and campaigning work while I’ve been in office.

It is the first time that NUS hasn’t just criticised, but we have come up with our own credible model – so much harder than I ever imagined, but has radically altered the landscape of the debate.

Despite the best attempts of Bob Crowe’s tube strike and the bad weather we started the day by launching our model online and followed this event by a hosting a number of stakeholder briefings. The response we received was overwhelmingly positive.

The individuals and organisations that we spoke were united in their opinion that NUS was proposing something that was not only credible but something that was new and radical. I spent the day discussing details with student officers, sector policy officers including HEFCE, HEA, UCU, Million+ the Conservative, Labour and Liberal Democrat Parties and the overwhelming consensus was that not only had NUS re-energised the debate but also that we were driving the agenda forward.

For me this bravery that we have shown is something that I am really proud of. Not only has the Blueprint already met some of its key objectives - to broaden the debate beyond fees and the cap, to demonstrate our credentials for a place on the 2009 review and to demonstrate how important this issue still is to ordinary hard working families.

We also managed to catch our opponents on the back foot their delay in responding and they failure to come up with a coherent or credible response exposed the weaknesses of their strategy and should give some people in our movement confidence.

The Blueprint is emphatically not the end of the policy work for our education funding campaign Funding Our Future, it is the beginning. We need you to feedback your opinions on the values and principles that it contains.

What is fairer in the Blueprint? What matters the most to you? Is there anything that could be more socially just? What are the core features that you want to see in an alternative funding system? Please read and debate the contents of the Blueprint but it is only tool for our campaign for a fairer funding system. Our campaign needs your contributions to make it stronger. Feel free to email me. Get involved!

In unity,

Aaron Porter

• Blueprint

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