What is the University Student Council's main agenda for the coming year?
This year's council was elected on a platform of participation and solidarity, with the successful candidates having the backing of 19 student organisations. Throughout the year our actions will be based on that platform. We want to achieve closer ties between students and organisations and between the different organisations, both on university and national levels. We want to work together rather than compete.
For example, we recently held meetings with the General Workers Union and Union Haddiema Maghqudin youth sections to discuss the pensions issue and formulate a joint policy. We would like to push forward together on the issues on which we share common ground.
Another major undertaking this year will be the implementation of the students' charter, spelling out the students' rights and obligations. The university has pledged to introduce it this year after we reached agreement on what it should contain.
The charter will formally define the students' relationship with the university. For example, students will have the right to information on study units, to their exam results within a reasonable time, to view their records held by the university and to take leave from their studies for work or personal development. They will have the responsibility to prepare for lectures and submit work on time, to treat staff and students with openness and courtesy, and provide honest and fair feedback to staff, among other obligations.
The KSU will try and make sure the charter is implemented properly.
The council will also be seeking to implement an SMS system which would inform students of cancelled lectures, new timetables, exam results and other urgent or important information.
So KSU members come from a broader spectrum of students than last year. What real impact will that have on your work?
In contrast to last year, when the KSU elections were caught up in controversy, there is a very positive feeling this year. We showed we could work together before the elections and we want to keep it that way, as well as rope in those who were not in the coalition. As the KSU members come from prominent positions in several organisations, there is the feeling that they can be trusted, because people already know them and can relate to them.
How much of a say does the KSU really have in policy making at the university. For example, did you have any say in the strategic plan that has just been issued?
As a pressure group, the KSU is impossible for the university to ignore. We are technically a union and represent the whole of the student body. We have means of bringing pressure to bear, such as when we protested over the stipends issue.
Students are also represented on Senate, Council and faculty boards, so yes, to a certain extent we did have a say in the strategic plan.
The trouble is, we do not occupy many seats, and our aim is to make our representation reach at least 20 per cent. In some universities representation even reaches 51 per cent, because they go on the student-as-consumer concept.
Because we are poorly represented, we lack effectiveness when it comes to the formulation of university policies. That's not to say that the university is not forthcoming and helpful. But the impact we can have within the structures of the university is limited.
I get the impression that most of your proposals actually fall on deaf ears. The KSU has been pressing for some time for a students' rights charter, for a formal complaints procedure, for bigger representation in university structures, for Students House to be extended, for an alternative transport system, for an extension of the grounds on which you can demand a revision of papers... but seemingly to no avail.
Our proposals do not fall on deaf ears. The university authorities do believe these things are important. For example, the students' charter is about to be implemented.
The problem is, they do not act on our proposals very fast. It has taken three years for the students' charter to get to this stage. All universities have a students' charter. This university had already accepted the Socrates Charter. Why should they not have accepted to adopt ours, especially when many faculties already respect the principles it will contain?
As regards Students House, there's a lot of money involved, granted, but an extension will be of enormous benefit to the students and university alike. Things certainly need to move faster.
I think it is a problem of bureaucracy. Or maybe there is not enough manpower. Students give a lot of input, and although there is continuity on our part, even though KSU members change from year to year, unless we're careful the momentum we establish on projects dies down.
More than three weeks ago we asked for a meeting with the rector to discuss KSU's year plan and various other issues. We've only now been given an appointment. We need to try to create a more efficient university-student dialogue forum.
The university appears to be perennially underfunded. Don't you think the stipends system as it stands is draining government resources that could be used to strengthen other aspects of the university. Isn't it time to at least consider means testing, for instance?
KSU agrees with the system as it is, based on the report it issued which showed that the stipends system is an investment in the student and important for Malta as a whole.
The university is incredibly underfunded, especially with the increase in student numbers. We are willing to help university authorities push the government for a bigger budget for the university; but we also believe that we need to attract more funding from the private sector.
We have some ideas for fund generation and would like to work on them with the university. This is a clear example of how the university and KSU should work hand in hand.
If you had the power to immediately change one thing at university, what would it be?
I would lessen the apathy that exists to a certain extent among both students and staff. The university does not foster student life on campus, and a lot of students don't inform themselves of what's going on. They come here for their lectures and their exams and then go home.
But university life should also be about mingling with other students socially, taking part in extracurricular activities, going abroad on exchanges, discovering your talents, having fun...
There is no feeling of pride in belonging to this university, as there apparently used to be in my father's days. I doubt that today's students will look back at their experience here and see it as the best time of their lives.
And without student life, there is no solidarity among students from different faculties. If, say, one department were to need support in staging a protest about some issue, I doubt how many students from other departments would join.
I find it blasphemous that some lecturers even discourage participation in student organisations. Not only would these student volunteers have less time to study, but they would be at a double disadvantage because of the attitude of these particular lecturers.
The university should acknowledge and give credit to those who take part in these groups and activities. After all, they'll be among the leaders of the future, and the country sorely needs to invest in human resources.