• This week I had someone in work shadowing me – Jude. I have no idea what she made of the randomness of being NUS President and what she’s going to say in her presentation next week, but I really enjoyed her company and it did make me sit back and think about the things I do as National President, and whether I could be more effective.
• Travelled to Oxford Brookes SU to address their general meeting on the NATFHE action. FYI the students ended up in support.
• Spoke at the AUT/NATFHE rally in Westminster Central Hall on Tuesday – the day of strike action.
• Meeting with the National Post Graduates Committee.
• Nurse of the Year Awards (I kid you not).
• Meeting with the Chair of UJS, re National Conference arrangements.
• Meeting with NATFHE to discuss the education select committee next week.
• Strategic Plan Team Meeting (nearly ready now)
• NUS Conference prep meeting, looking at all the issues that may come up, and drafting comments for some. It felt very strange to be drafting my congratulations statement to my successor for the press! Holding the tears back for now.
• Travelled up to North Oxfordshire for the AoC Governors Conference.
• Friday and Saturday was the AoC Governors Conference. It was this event a year ago that was my first AoC event. But this one was a bit different, for a start there were over 30 student governors at the event! And this time it really felt like our voices were being heard. Ellie made a (nother) storming speech and she actually got to open the conference. I sat on a panel about diversity – just take a look at the make up of you governing body or senior management team and see if it reflects the college community, and made a key not address which is reproduced further down the page. Our contributions were received very well (much better than the sexist after dinner speaker) and I even made a certain someone cry during my speech (if I could tell you, you’d be impressed). I can’t explain just how far our FE work has come over the last two years. I almost have to pinch myself. However for me it was also quite sad – yet another thing/event that I’ll never get to do again.
• Got back from Governors – headed to work on Saturday night – oh the glamour.
• Spent Sunday at my ninth and last Annual Conference Drafting commissions (not for me coming back years after leaving the NEC with a proxy in my hand). I’m glad that we’ve tried something new, I hope the new system will lead to a better debate at conference, however going through the same process again, having the same rows with the same faces was really draining. This is one thing I won’t miss about NUS.
• Drove up to Coventry Sunday night for Women’s Conference.

AoC Governors 2006

Good Afternoon everyone. It's a pleasure to be invited to speak to you today, the second of two real life learner representatives to address you. I’ll be focussing on the role of learners (or, as the ‘Guardian’ pointed out, students, as I still like to call them) in colleges; As you would expect I’m going to concentrate on Foster, his emphasis on the learner, and the challenges I believe he sets the sector on extending and embedding the learner voice into the organisation and culture of FE.

Addressing you all today is a proud moment for me, tinged with some sadness- because this is almost certainly the last time I’ll address an audience like this as President of NUS. And it has given me a chance to reflect on my history- on my battles to embed FE into NUS, and to amplify and encourage the student voice in the sector.

When I first became a student representative, as an FE student union officer and governor, as someone who chose college because of the unique community it provides, because of the adult orientated environment, and the right to representation, it never crossed my mind that I’d end standing up here today as the national voice of the learner.

Over the last few events I’ve met many of you, lobbied some of you, been lobbied by some of you.

And let me say how encouraging most of those conversations have been.

I've heard tales of students' unions given a new focus and more funding thanks to senior management buy in.

I've heard of Student Councils and Course Rep systems being established and extended giving learners more of an influence than ever before.

And I've heard of Student Governors making a hugely positive contribution to the work of their board.

But I have to say; I've also been disappointed. Some people have told me that they've tried, but they've failed.

Some people have told me that they used to have a Students' Union, but student apathy has meant that it has failed.

And some people have told me that they have student forums and committees, but students just don't seem to want to turn up.

And as I come to the end of my term it’s been these conversations I’ve been reflecting on.

Because the real question for me- and I guess the real question for some of you- is how seriously you take my views and the views of students in general. Am I just a novelty- an articulate rarity from the north paraded on the panel- or do my views matter. The student members of your corporations- are they just a novelty, or do you engage with them, listen to them, and build the representative structures to back them up?

I represent millions of students across the sector, and my first thought is that this year £60m of government funding will go into Students’ Unions and representation.

In Universities:

Students of higher education control vast budgets allowing them to set up effective systems to support students and voice their concerns, questions and complaints about their education.

Their advice services are strong; their committee attendance exemplary; they make loud and clear every day the hopes, aspirations and fears of students about their education. Many of you will have been involved in them.

In HE, student representation is a right.

Yet as our research proves, in the FE sector things are very different. The money going into student representation- both directly and indirectly- is tiny. That’s not to say we want bars, shops, and vast facilities. We’re not stupid. We know that Universities and Colleges are different beasts, with different purposes, different ideals and different funding levels. All we ask for is to have our voices funded fairly.

Then let’s look at schools. We know that funding per pupil in a school is more per head than someone in a college. That gap is something the government must close. But it’s not just cash. Thanks to Government legislation, it’s the law that pupils get consulted on their education both individually and collectively. So it’s thanks to culture and cash in HE, and legislation in schools that learners have their voice amplified so effectively.

No wonder then, that in his review of FE Sir Andrew Foster, (as Ellie said in her opening) called FE “the neglected middle child”. NUS was pleased to play an active and substantial role in the review. We spoke to students, getting them to respond online, taking part in meetings and focus groups and making clear their sense of voicelessness over their education.

The views, needs and perceptions of learners are crucial to getting the individual education process and the overall curriculum offer right.

The reality is that the factors that affect a learning experience are so often not simply determined by individual tutor and learner; more often they are impacted on by collective, institutional decision making too.

Not only does NUS believe that student representation improves education, we also believe that this process is educational in itself. In part, this is because asking ‘why did you say that’ helps us understand students in 2006, and partly because being asked gives students a sense of ownership and builds commitment from students to the notion of ‘co-production’ of successful learning outcomes. For us, the most important element of what the government variably calls "Citizenship" is about having groups and institutions within which we can learn about others' needs and advocate for them collectively - it's what being a member of a community is all about.

We, like you, have read Foster. And we like what we see. As you know, he says: "In common with other public services, FE must put the 'user' at the centre of policy and practice.

As you can imagine, we're delighted. We've been saying for some time that learner representation and advocacy are key to an effective and dynamic FE Sector - but sometimes it feels like we've been pushing at a closed door.

So on behalf of the millions of learners that I represent, let me say thank you to Sir Andrew. We look forward to working with the implementation groups to ensure that his recommendations get embedded into the sectors organisational culture and practice and maybe even the white paper.

But let’s get onto the subject of children. FE perceives itself as offering a uniquely adult, developmental environment for socially, economically and culturally diverse learners. Its successfully includes second chance learners; learners who have less access to social, economic and cultural capital; and those who traditionally undervalue educational opportunity but can nonetheless transform themselves through it.

Every college website talks about the adult environment, every prospectus, every leaflet and every open evening. But is it true? Our members are attracted to and motivated by the adult brand, but the reality is that FE’s “Adult Environment” is partly mythological. They tell us that it is equally and as often conservative, paternalistic and run in the interests not of learners but of colleges as providers, who market but do not deliver that expected adult environment.

NUS believes that this has a damaging effect on quality, on outcomes, on students’ motivation and the very perception of education of those whom the sector seeks to transform. Because Foster made an overdue, welcome and considerable effort to listen to and reach out to our members across the sector, he accurately identified this mismatch between intention and practice.

NUS’ longstanding policy goals are to see learners, co-producers in the educational process, empowered individually and collectively, locally and nationally. And we’re not alone. Because this agenda matches into a whole range of current government policies:

quality improvement models for public sector providers
• or citizenship in post-16 education and decline in political and civic participation

And so our proposals- our vision for students- bring these together to help the FE sector to become genuinely transformative and adult.

What that means in practice is clear. It’s time for an end to the excuses.

Colleges tell us that student apathy is at fault when elections fail because no money is put into promoting them.

Colleges tell us that student governors don’t work when it’s clear that a lone student in a room full of white, middle class men talking about finance is deeply intimidating.

Colleges tell us that we can’t fund unions properly because “things are different in FE”. Well yes, they are. School children have legislation and parent power to make their voices heard. University students have the cultural capital and the cash to do it. But what do FE Students have?

15 years ago it was this government in opposition that defended student representation and ensured it could still exist. Now in government, we are calling on ministers to make it happen for real- by ensuring that colleges have both sticks and carrots to encourage learners to make their voices heard.

Colleges want to be left alone to run themselves, to get OFSTED off their back, to self regulate and improve. It must and can only happen if learners form a strong and autonomous part of that process.

The good news is that our research demonstrates that with board and senior management buy in, some will from enthusiastic staff given time to do it, and a modest level of funding – as well as clear support for a development plan – student representation can survive and flourish.

And so if you want to join me in making this happen, let me now set out how. Let me set out clearly how you can go back to your colleges and make a strong learner voice a reality at your college.

First - go back and establish full and comprehensive student course rep systems. Ask what arrangements are in place for students to comment not just on lockers and canteens but on teaching and learning. Ensure you’re finding reps from across the college- and fund some training and support for those student course reps too.

Next, look at the budgets. The corporation is directly and legally responsible for approving the budget of the students’ union. So this year, make sure that you, as a Governing Body, adequately fund your students’ union as a representative body. Some of you do. Most of you don’t.

Provide professional staff support to enable it to take on the challenge of co-ordinating representation across the college. Develop them to help free students to be challenging, controversial or difficult, like good citizens are supposed to be.

Once that’s done, get your board to establish a corporation student affairs committee to supervise and run Foster’s recommendations about student surveys and consultations. Some college governors meet up with hand picked focus groups of students once a year. The best corporations have student affairs committees to talk through the issues that students themselves raise.

In fact- make my day- debate and approve, at your next board meeting, a learner voice policy that embeds all of this across the college, meeting standards agreed by students. It would be wise to do it now- before the Government forces you to do it later.

Then, demand that students are consulted when changes or policies are developed. Security policies, behaviour policies; bullying and harassment, discipline, teaching and learning, they’re all better when students are involved in their design.

And please don’t respond to the 7/7 attacks by banning religious groups and societies from your college. I’m not arguing for religious facilities on every campus, but I am saying that the right to free expression of religious and political views has to be a central, protected role in colleges. All of you should establish and foster a culture that encourages debate and the free exchange of ideas- and if that means Islamic societies, Christian Unions and Afro Caribbean Societies alongside 5 a side and chess clubs, then so be it.

And then, when all of that’s done, do the right thing, and raise the minimum number of student governors in your college to two. We know, and you know, that with another student in the room, they’ll feel more confident and they’ll be more effective. And don’t tell me that you can’t find one student governor as it is.

For some years now, we’ve had mandatory student membership of Governing Bodies. We believe this has been hugely successful; hundreds of students, clerks, chairs and principals each year report to us about the hugely positive contribution that having a student perspective on the corporation makes.

But mere membership is not enough. I know that finding and keeping Governors in general is hard; but ironically, it’s the ones under our noses that can be hardest. Some of this is about the term of office- it makes finding and keeping students on the board a real challenge. Some of it is about confidence- which is why, if we really want effective, confident and articulate contributions from students, our research suggests that having two student members can make a huge difference. But fundamentally, it’s about institutions and culture.

Building the development of student organisations into the ethos of your college shouldn’t just be fundamental, but mandatory. I’ve said it before students’ views don’t just appear out of thin air. They need time, space, encouragement and organisation to debate and produce. And that means two building a base of representation around course reps, students’ unions, student councils and student leaders.

And it’s that culture - rooted in the educational character and mission of your college - that I challenge you as governors to create. Sadly I still here the view promoted that Student Evaluations are worthless - that we can learn nothing from their views and that we should all do our best to resist them. I’d like to hope, however, that they’re not the views of the majority in this room.

I know that the cynics may see a relentless focus on learner advocacy as just another initiative, another box to tick, another meeting to hold and a passage in the self-assessment document.

But I'm here to tell you that it can, it will and it must mean more than this. A focus on learner voice means giving learners more power.

It means giving students a chance to initiate or resist change. It means that student representation must be supported and funded. It means students being encouraged to express interesting and controversial views. It means that complaints need to be something to learn from, not close down on. And it means that - occasionally - we need to get uncomfortable.

Now and again, given a voice, students suggest things that we never thought of. Now and again, students resist things that we wish were easier to push through. And now and again, students ask questions that we'd rather were never asked.

And when this happens it must be the sign of a healthy college culture.

And that’s what I mean when I say that it’s time for the neglected middle child to grow up. It’s time for an end to the excuses of student apathy or “it’s different in FE”. Students in FE - the very people we need to engage most in education - need their voice encouraged, funded and supported, both collectively and individually.

And it’s on that issue that I feel most strongly. The demography of FE - second chance learners, vocational students, the very people for whom education matters more than anyone else - this matters to us, and it matters to me.

My schooling in Sheffield led me to not expect much from life- even less from education.

But education - and being involved in it, creating it, co-producing it - changed me. We talk so much in this sector about the way in which FE transforms lives, but we should be careful. FE transforms lives for the worst when it is at its worst - conservative, paternalistic and run in the interests not of learners but of colleges as providers, who market but do not deliver that adult environment. It transforms lives like mine for the best when it is an open, listening, adult community - creating challenges, listening to learners, and building a culture of self improvement for itself, its staff and its students

Which is why focusing on learner voice is more than a moral imperative or a self- assessment tool. It strikes at the very heart of what we do and why we’re here. To transform lives- and society through them.

But let me finally say thank you to all of you at these conferences that have made me feel welcome in the sometimes-bewildering world of FE. You have taught me so much about education, about the sector, about power, authority structures and governance and I know, like millions of others, I will never forget the lessons I have learned.

Thank you.

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