Students start petition to keep Biology lecturer

A petition has been set up by students within the Biosciences department to protest against the department’s decision to dispense with the services of Dr. Ronny van Aerle, a Lecturer in Environmental Biology.

Dr. van Aerle (Photo: University of Exeter)

The petition, which has gained over 300 signatures since being set up last week, says that ‘Dr. Van Aerle is such a great lecturer and it would be a great loss to the students and to the department if he was to leave this summer. This petition is to show that the students believe he is a great teacher and we strongly encourage him to stay with the help of the University.’ The 300-plus signatures include messages of support from current students, alumni, and members of staff.

Dr. van Aerle told Exeposé that he has received ‘no indication’ that his contract was going to be extended, and also that he ‘never expected such a demonstration of support by the students’, before adding that he was ‘extremely thankful’ for said support. He also said that ‘from the start my contract has always been on a fixed-term basis, so it was likely that at some point it wouldn’t be extended’.

When contacted by Exeposé, Amy Chadwick, the student who set up the petition, said that she was ‘amazed’ by the response that the petition had provoked. She added that ‘the students love him’ and that ‘he is one of the best lecturers in the Department’. Comments left on the petition also pay tribute to Dr. van Aerle; Dr. Mark van der Giezen, a Senior Lecturer in Evolutionary Biochemistry, posted that Dr. van Aerle is ‘a great colleague and even greater bioinformatician and fish biologist’, while other signatories described van Aerle as ‘by far the best lecturer in a department full of good lecturers’, and ‘an incredible asset to the university and its students’.

The Biosciences department have given Exeposé a statement on the matter, saying that while the department understand the situation and can appreciate the views of the petitioning students, Dr. van Aerle is leaving because his post is a short-term one which expires in the summer.

Owen Keating, News Editor

Protest on Tremough campus

A recent FX protest march through Falmouth. (photo: Flex)

Students and staff based on the Tremough campus are protesting against Falmouth University’s decision to transfer the contracts of 130 members of Academic and Support staff to a private company owned by Falmouth and the University of Exeter, known as FX Plus. This is the first time that a UK university has transferred its entire Student Support service to an external company.

The employees at the University, which gained full university status in December, work in a variety of student support roles, including Library and IT Services, academic skills assistants and disability support teams. Their new roles within FX Plus will mean that they are no longer entitled to receive pay in line with national standards, since university-owned subsidiaries such as FX Plus are allowed to operate outside these pay scales.

One member of staff at Falmouth, who did not wish to be named, told Times Higher Education that a librarian newly recruited to FX Plus could be paid as much as £5,000 a year less than staff moving over from Falmouth.

“That is a very significant amount when you are on the lower end of the pay scale,” she said.

In a statement on behalf of FXU (Falmouth and Exeter Students’ Union), Falmouth President Scott Pearson said: “We have been assured by both Falmouth University and Falmouth Exeter Plus that there will be no adverse effect on the delivery of services to students”, while FX Plus Chief Executive Niamh Lamond has assured staff that their contracts will not be altered.

Speaking to Flex, Falmouth University’s student newspaper, a member of the FX Protest who wished to remain anonymous said of FX Plus: “It’s not directly accountable to the students in the way a University is. Our concern is that it takes away that accountability.”

The falmouthexeterprotest website has also expressed concerns over the move, as staff will potentially be linked to regional pay scales in Cornwall, one of the poorest counties in England, rather than the national scales to which they were previously associated. They claim that the move will disadvantage students undertaking Higher Education in Cornwall, as they believe that a lower pay scale will reduce institutions’ capacities to attract the best applicants for their job roles.

The protestors have said on their website that “there has been no clear argument or evidence presented to us that demonstrate how [the outsourcing] will improve services. We know that no alternative models have been looked at and staff have not been consulted on the decision making process.”

News of this protest comes amidst a national backdrop of university privatisation controversies, after 400 students at Sussex University protested against the outsourcing of catering and support staff earlier this year, with 200 students occupying a lecture theatre.

Owen Keating, News Editor