Top Ten of Trinity
This term has seen students questioning what they are getting from their colleges, OUSU, the University and the government.
10) Fees have been an overriding issue. Our dons revealed they supported them, 'Finance & Funding' protested against top-ups by taking the shirts off their backs and the Tories told us they could manage without them. Yet, despite spiralling debts, we still face the prospect of £3,000 in 2006 and no discernible limit on future rises.
9) As if this wasn't enough, rent rises in several colleges have sparked controversy not only in breaking through the boundaries of the Van Noorden Index by several points, but in the machinations of the Estates Bursars' Commitee.. Despite the purportedly autonomous nature of Oxford colleges, reinforced by the reveltions of OUSU's College Inequalities Report, students across the University will not only face higher tuition fees, but a huge burden in terms of living costs...
8) And on the subject of clandestinity, we face more stint reform, and a chance to resurrect the old OxStu 'Save the Tute' campaign. The spirit lives on, as we are now getting less history tutorials. Is it really better for students, or is money-saving the only issue? If they only made students aware of the constraints, the teaching system could be more successfully negotiated than leaving the bad taste of conspiracy. The tute has kept Oxford at the top thus far, we should fight to keep it...
7) ...OUSU are kind of doing that, but not enough other things to make colleges want to stay in it. Referenda on disaffiliation are proliferating, as the only tangible presence of our representative body throughout the year seems to be its publications and protests. Let's hope they take some entz tips from Cambridge's Student Union and give students a reason to pay that extra 80 pence.
6) Students clearly want to branch out of college, and who would have thought the Oxfordromance debate would get so heated! And with Aphrodite's useful tips on love, it couldn't be easier.
5) More serious issues beckon however. Crime. Laptops, bikes, and assaults seem to be incaresingly plaguing supposedly serene Oxford, and we are warned from all quarters to be on the lookout. Drunk black-tie clad Cowley-dwellers take heed...
4) Of course not all Oxford students are like that. Access is rarely off the agenda with even that bastion of tradition, the Oxford Union getting in on the act. Is a joint campaign with OUSU in the offing? Well, perhaps not but the two presidents got on rather well (p.24)
3)How could we fail to mention, the only source of Oxford gossip - the rambunctious John Evelyn. Well, until this term when it got taken over by boring union hacks and only reached the tip of the OxStu gossip iceberg except one week which they retracted because the allegations were...unsubstantiated.
2) Myths surrounded the Chancellorship election last term, and since Patten's victory, the battle for a Vice-Chancellor is hotting up. For the position that actually matters to students; the power behind the figure head, we can only hope this race is a more credible affair.
1) Finally, to you the students. War protests, fees protests and rumours of disafiliation only confirm that despite the odds stacked against them, students are not losing heart in lobbying for a better deal. We enjoyed reporting it all.
Tanya and Jamie have left the bounds of editorial independence.
12th Jun 2003