UCU’s event in the Long Gallery at Stormont on 20 January, highlighted the continuing stark inequalities in educational attainment and opportunities depending where you live in Northern Ireland.

UCU produced 18 constituency profiles, each containing forty statistics regarding further and higher education in Northern Ireland. The profiles – produced as a 24 page booklet – highlighted trends regarding further and higher education across the constituencies – for example, the higher numbers of females attending further and higher education across all constituencies, compared with the lower average earnings of females across all constituencies. The figures threw up what people in NI already know – that West and North Belfast perform poorly compared to the more affluent East and South Belfast constituencies (however, even in these areas there are pockets and areas of extreme deprivation). The research also showed that rural and marginal constituencies in border areas were under-performing in nearly all aspects of further and higher educational attainment.

The UCU will use its constituency profile booklet as a base for its election manifesto and continued activity with political representatives in the coming months. This will form the basis for a sustained campaign, linked with both the Ulster Teachers Union and the Irish National Teachers Organisation.

Make Education Count - Stormont lobby, 20 January 2010 (9 photos)
20 January 2010, Stormont
UCU takes the ‘Make Education Count’ campaign to Stormont | http://makeeducationcount.org.uk | Copyright Kevin Cooper

UCU Scotland will hold a lobby outside the Scottish Parliament on Wednesday (27 January) as part of UCU’s ‘Defend jobs, defend education’ campaign. The lobby will urge MSPs to oppose cuts particularly in the teacher education budget and will take place from 1pm.

UCU members will highlight the problems a proposed funding cut for teacher education [...]

UCU will launch its education manifesto on Tuesday 26 January at a lobby event in parliament to set out its key issues in all areas of post-16 education.
The manifesto is part of the union’s campaign to get parliamentary candidates to clearly state their position on education to allow the public to make an informed choice [...]

Northern Ireland’s MLAs are being asked to give their backing to UCU’s Make Education Count campaign.
At an event at Stormont, the UCU – supported by the Ulster Teachers Union (UTU) and the Irish National Teachers Organisation (INTO) – is presenting statistics that detail how Northern Ireland continues to lag behind the rest of the UK [...]

UCU has said the Conservative Party’s self-titled ‘brazenly elitist’ policy of recruiting graduates into teaching showed absolutely no understanding of the real demands of the teacher sector or the skills required to do the job.
The Tories have said they will pay off the student loan of graduates with degrees from some, as yet unspecified, universities [...]

UCU today welcomed the announcement by the Conservatives that they would suspend controversial new changes to the way university research is funded.
In an interview with the Times Higher the shadow minister for higher education, David Willetts, said he would delay proposals that would force 25% of future research to be assessed on ‘economic impacts’ by [...]

UCU today accused the government of being in ‘complete denial’ over the impact of university funding cuts.
Responding to claims in today’s Guardian newspaper by the business secretary, Lord Mandelson, that slashing £900 million from the higher education budget would be ‘very small in the context of overall university income’ the union warned over 14,000 jobs [...]

On Tuesday 26 January UCU will be holding a lobby of parliament to let MPs know what is happening in further and higher education and to make sure the voices of UCU members are heard in the ‘corridors of power’ in the run up to the general election.
As well as highlighting our industrial agenda, we [...]

Activists in Wales launched the Make Education Count network with a cross-party panel discussion on the future priorities of the first minister-elect Carwyn Jones.
Taking place just a day after Carwyn was elected to succeed Rhodri Morgan as leader of Welsh Labour and as the next first minister, UCU activists listened to speakers from all four [...]

The Make Education Count Westminster Network was launched on 2 December in the House of Commons.
On the heels of the ‘Location, Location, Location‘ report and news that the UK has fewer young people in education and training that the majority of other OECD countries, the launch emphasised social mobility and equality of opportunity.

Flanked by Make [...]