This will come as a huge relief for university students across the country who will be entitled to compensation for lessons missed due to recent striking. The announcement comes just as university workers prepare for an additional three days of strike action in May. This comes on the heels of a recent high-profile industrial dispute that has seen thousands of workers already lose their jobs.
International fee-paying students will get £2,500 compensation for each disrupted module. Though cumulative compensation may be in excess of £1,200, it is capped at that sum. Home fee-paying students will receive compensation of £100 per disrupted teaching module, up to a maximum of £600. The compensation amounts vary based on how many modules were affected by the strikes. This guarantees that students are made whole with appropriate compensation for the degree of disruption they faced.
As a result of the continuous strike actions, the jobs lost in the precise interruption approximately totals 300. Still, over 200 university employees have already accepted voluntary severance. This has led to legitimate worries about the effect that these cuts have had on educational quality and the student experience. A university spokesperson noted, “Teaching has been missed due to industrial action and it has not been possible to repeat or replace.”
Fairness and efficiency are the primary goals of compensation distribution. The university’s policy of a standard calculation at the module level instead of counting the total number of hours missed is the correct approach. Using this approach, we are able to process compensation for students more quickly. Above all it follows the guiding ambition of the Office for Students (OfS).
“We have taken a standardised approach calculated at module level, rather than total hours missed, so that compensation can be administered quickly to students, in line with the expectations from OfS,” – University spokesperson
The Office for Students emphasized that while they do not set compensation levels, institutions should ensure fairness in their compensation practices. “The OfS does not set the levels of compensation, but universities should ensure it is fair and takes into account the scale of disruption faced by students,” stated an OfS spokesperson.
