UPDATED: Warwick SU petition for lecture-free Freshers’ Week

Warwick Students’ Union (SU) are petitioning the university to create a lecture-free Freshers’ Week, with a management meeting on the issue taking place this week.

At the management meeting will be members of the university senior management team, heads of department and faculty board members.

This petition is a major public sign of the SU pushing for university management to scrap lectures and incorporate a Week 0, following former President Isaac Leigh’s calls for reform in January.

Warwick is one of the only UK universities not to have lecture-free Freshers’ Week. This petition asks for a Welcome week to be implemented starting next academic year, in 2017.

The petition states: “The University will very soon be deciding whether to incorporate a Welcome Week/Freshers’ Week for undergraduates in future years. We know that there is student demand for this and it has been student policy for at least 8 years but we want to demonstrate the strength of this demand via a student petition.”

I cannot stress enough how important a true Welcome Week, free from major academic commitments, would be to new students at Warwick.

Luke Pilot, Warwick SU President

Speaking exclusively to the Boar before this week’s meeting, President Luke Pilot confirmed yesterday that himself, Education Officer Hope Worsdale and Postgraduate Officer Nat Panda will look to present a final paper to the Universities Senate Committee in February.

Between then and now, a series of consultations are being planned in order to finalise the proposal.

Commenting on the SU’s plans going forward Luke stated: “There’s a few different models proposed in the paper, we obviously want a full week zero. It will go through for consultations. We’ve meet with nearly every member of senate, we’ve figured out who is for it and who is against it. If successful we can say we’ve already started working on this and we can start implementing it now in time for 2017-2018.”

In recent years various Sabbatical Teams have pushed for a lecture-free Freshers’ Week. An SU policy was even voted in by Warwick students in 2008 backing the idea, but failed to materialise in the form of legislation.

The previous two SU Presidents Cat Turhan and Isaac Leigh both placed the issue in their manifestos.

Speaking about the efforts of his predecessors, Luke stated: “We’re pretty much picking up the work from the last two years of Sabbatical Officer teams. So what Cat and Isaac did was to get it on the agenda. Cat brought it back to the forefront, Isaac then started the background work on it. He spent a lot of time researching what week zero would look like structurally and operationally.”

Warwick is one of the only UK universities not to have lecture-free Freshers’ Week. This petition asks for a Welcome week to be implemented starting next academic year, in 2017.

Amongst staff members unconvinced by the proposal are Professors Saul Jacka of the Department of Statistics and Alison Rodger the Head of Chemistry.

Jacka commented: “I am in agreement with all the motives I have heard for having a week zero, and have a great deal of respect for the campaign. Where I disagree is simply that I don’t think week zero will achieve (some of) the desired objectives. In particular, I believe it won’t “introduce students to university life” and will especially fail to help the more vulnerable/less self-confident students.”

Rodger voiced similar concerns, stating: “Many students come to University focused on their academic goals and worried whether they will be good enough. Those students and also students who are introverted are not well served by the kind of programme hear being put forward.”

She also pointed to the fact the Warwick’s Chemistry department already run a first week centred on light contact hours: “We run a week zero for our MSc students that has an academic focus with a range of social activities and team working integrated. This works very well as students get their academic feet under the table as well as making friends.”

The effects of a Lecture Free Freshers’ Week on student welfare looks set to be a major point of debate.

In a post on Facebook, SU president Luke Pilot commented: “I cannot stress enough how important a true Welcome Week, free from major academic commitments, would be to new students at Warwick. Providing enough time and space so students can fully engage with this new community without compromising their wellbeing is imperative.”

The university does not wish to comment until the outcome of the meeting has been decided.

You can sign the petition here.