To UoN Management,
Casualised Language Centre staff at the University of Nottingham have been demanding the basic dignity of direct employment, including through a recent letter to management signed by over one hundred staff members. However, management has ignored this request—in the process, contradicting their own Principles for Casual Engagement—and instead announced plans to let go all Language Centre casual workers, and end all their language teaching. This is a damaging decision, which we—the undersigned—call on the University to reverse.
Even on its own terms, the decision to let go casual staff—over 20 workers in total—does not make sense. Amidst concerns about a large financial deficit, University management is slashing ‘unnecessary activities’. Yet the work of the casual staff at the Language Centre generates a surplus. Hundreds of University students pay extra to enrol in language modules. Hundreds more students from the wider Nottingham community pay for evening classes, all of which are taught by casual workers. The revenue from these classes more than covers delivery costs, even after factoring in opaque central University administrative costs. But University management—in a common but misguided effort to save money by cutting ‘less’ profitable or ‘unnecessary’ units—looks set to forfeit revenue in a manner that—experts warn—could worsen its overall financial outlook. This is not a mistake it can afford to make.
Finances aside, the Language Centre layoffs are a harsh blow to casual workers themselves. Many have been teaching full-time equivalent hours for years, dedicating their time and energy to work that—in their own words—they ‘absolutely love’. On hearing the news about layoffs, they described feeling ‘shocked’, ‘gutted’, and ‘heartbroken’. ‘I could barely hold in my tears’, said one worker with over a decade of experience at the Language Centre. Workers also challenged being treated as ‘disposable’. ‘Quite a few of us have been around for so many years already. We should be treated as employees and not just casual workers. We can’t be just dropped off, that’s it.’ As things stand, because the affected workers are all casual, they do not benefit from any consultation, redundancy procedure, nor redundancy pay.
Beyond their own unfair treatment, casual workers are equally concerned about their students. Once the casuals go, there will be no more evening classes. Undergrad and postgrad modules will also be scaled back to whatever the remaining, directly employed staff can provide. Classes that have already been advertised to students will simply not exist. ‘It’s such a sad situation’, said one worker. ‘I have received emails from my students about how they’re looking forward to resuming classes in October, but what can I say to them? There will be no classes anymore. It’s just terrible.’ Another casual worker questioned, ‘How can the University of Nottingham, which wants to have a global reach, not offer languages to its students?’ As it stands, classes for a rich diversity of languages—French, German, Spanish, Japanese, Korean, Mandarin Chinese, Arabic, Hebrew, Italian, Modern Greek, Portuguese, Polish, Russian, and British Sign Language—will be cut, leaving the University of Nottingham a smaller place.
Casual workers also highlight the cost to the Nottingham community. ‘It is not only a case of making profit for the institution. Sometimes it is also about what we give to society, to our neighbours. Students [mostly from outside the University] really appreciate that we do those hours in the evening.’ What’s more, since the Language Academy and Language Hub both closed, there are few language learning opportunities left in Nottingham. ‘If we do go ahead with this foolishness’, noted one casual worker, ‘then we are really limiting the nonspecialist language provision in the city.’ And not just in the city. The Language Centre caters to students from as far away as Mansfield, Lincoln, Derby, Matlock, and Leicester, among other places.
On community-related impacts, a casual worker teaching British Sign Language offered a final, crucial point. The cuts to BSL teaching ‘would be detrimental to the Deaf Community both locally and nationally’, given limited provision. ‘Students in areas of study that will lead to public facing jobs are participating in the BSL course to improve communication… with deaf people.’
Ultimately, there is only one conclusion. In the interests of the University, its workers, its students, the Nottingham community, and even beyond, Language Centre casuals and the teaching they provide must be saved. Casual workers should also be moved onto more secure, fixed term or permanent contracts. This change can be made at little to no extra cost to the University. More importantly, it is the right thing to do, as the University itself acknowledges.
