15 October 2012

Students prepare to make the University listen to stop fee rises

University of Auckland students are hosting a rally today called "Make Them Listen!"

This protest is the second in a campaign called 'Fight the Fees.'

The rally will occur just before the University of Auckland Council fee setting meeting.

University of Auckland students fees have gone up by 4% every year since 2010, the maximum allowed by law.

The students behind the campaign, Fight the Fees aim to communicate their opposition to fee increases. Last year, despite having students speak against the fee hike at the fee setting meeting, the University Council claimed they were unaware of student opposition to the fee rises.

Fight the Fees held a street party in order to raise awareness about tuition fee rises and promote debate around the commercialization of education last Wednesday 10th October with several hundred students in attendance.

Thousands of students have already signed the petition, which will be presented in todays University Council meeting calling for a 0% fee rise this year at the University of Auckland.

Only 25 students can fit in the meeting room at 4pm today. Despite multiple student requests, the Vice-Chancellor and the University have declined the request to move the location of the University Council meeting room to a larger space to fit more students. Instead, they have told students they can watch a lecture stream of the meeting in Old Government House lecture theatre.

"This is a tactical ploy to reduce representation. Two student reps on the University Council is just a form of tokenism and personifies the increasingly corporate nature of the university under which students, academics and the general public, the primary stakeholders in tertiary education, are increasingly ignored." says James Roberts, a student involved in the Fight the Fees campaign.

Fight the Fees, say "claims to austerity become laughable when our Vice-Chancellor is getting paid $800,000, while 15% of students are living in absolute financial distress and aren't able to afford basic accommodation, food and clothing requirements.

"A combination of student costs rising and the threshold for financial assistance rising has left me $15,000 in debt after 1 year of tertiary study. Quitting my degree and moving home to Whangarei is something I've seriously considered. I don't want a lifetime of debt." says Stacey Henderson, first year Bachelor of Arts student at the University of Auckland.

New Zealand currently has the seventh highest tertiary education fees in the developed world.

Any students wishing to join the Make them Listen! rally are encouraged to meet outside the Vice-Chancellor's office on Princes St at 3pm today.

ENDS

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