The holiday season wasn\u2019t a quiet one for Higher Education, and this time it wasn\u2019t just VCs under scrutiny. Lucky us; Students\u2019 Unions were also under the eye of Jo Johnson and others, after accusations of \u2018no platforming\u2019 those whose views we disagree with. Remove from the equation that their examples are so old, we\u2019ve heard them 20 times over, or taken so far out of context they\u2019re just a dot on the horizon, next to the journalist who strung them together, somewhere along the line, Johnson decided that Students\u2019 Unions\u2019 \u2018no platform\u2019 policies were a priority issue that he needed to tackle head on. So here I am, hoping to do one of two things; to either persuade you that he\u2019s wrong, or to remind you why Students\u2019 Unions have a role to play in this area.<\/p>\n
Academic freedom is crucial to the success of Higher Education and, as a Students\u2019 Union, our job is to represent students\u2019 rights. It\u2019s only natural that we want them to have the best education possible alongside the best student experience while they\u2019re at Kent, which also means listening to students\u2019 concerns and supporting them while they\u2019re studying.<\/p>\n
This is where the \u2018snowflake\u2019 insult appears. It\u2019s actually quite clever really: this image of a snowflake, delicate, melting quickly. I speak to students every day, and I am yet to meet this snowflake. Instead, I am meeting passionate people who are learning from the horrors of history, fighting against voices who speak up with hatred and threats and violence and defending the rights of people against those who preach xenophobia and intolerance. That is what we<\/em><\/strong> are not tolerant of.<\/p>\n In a reasoned debate, I\u2019ve seen students stand up and take on attitudes, challenge stereotypes and call out prejudice. But, facing a room full of opposition, with a lone speaker on stage, allowed to go on unchallenged \u2013 this is when the environment becomes unsafe; when students who live, study and socialise in this space are made to feel uneasy, knowing there is a person who is preaching hatred against who they are to their peers \u2013 people they live and study and socialise alongside.<\/p>\n Ideas should always be challenged. Debate should always be had. In this world, the privileged have a duty to support the oppressed, and unfortunately, they won\u2019t always. Often, this privilege is used to amplify their own voice, to confidently dictate their own views. It\u2019s this behaviour that the \u2018no platform\u2019 policy challenges; not to restrict free speech, but to prevent students from feeling harassed, victimised or unsafe in the academic space they call home.<\/p>\n This is what we want to achieve through our Diversify my Curriculum campaign; we want to see academics teach as broad a range of texts and authors as possible. We want to see ideas from across the world examined, and above all, we want to break free from tradition and deliver a world class education that teaches students that there is not a \u2018certain type of person\u2019 who can achieve great things, both in academia and in life. The more we learn, explore and develop our thinking through a diverse curriculum, the more our graduates will leave with the ability to challenge intolerance and prejudice in the world.<\/p>\n Ruth Wilkinson, Kent Union President<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"