Hello bulletin readers - for those who do not know me, I am Tim LaRock and I am a postdoc here in the Mathematical Institute as well as the maths representative to the Oxford branch of the University and College Union (UCU), the trade union that represents academic and academic-related staff across the University.
I am writing to share information about the ongoing Marking and Assessment Boycott (MAB) called by UCU. Since Thursday 20th April, UCU members have been engaged in a national MAB at over 140 universities as part of our Four Fights dispute over pay, pay equality, workloads, and casualisation. This means that colleagues across the country, including many colleagues in departments across the University of Oxford, are refusing to perform any duties related to summative marking or assessment until the employer organisation UCEA returns to the bargaining table and settles the dispute.
Members participating in the MAB ask that colleagues refrain from accepting work that has been refused by members as part of the boycott, and that colleagues consider joining the boycott themselves as improvements to our pay and conditions will be felt by all of us, now and in the future. Oxford UCU maintains a local hardship fund that can be accessed by members who lose wages due to industrial action.
If you have any questions about the MAB in particular, or about UCU in general, please feel free to write to me (@email) or drop by my office (S2.12). If you are looking for more context on the dispute, I have recently published an article in Issue 06 of Art Review Oxford that contains some of the recent history. You can also browse the UCU website including the MAB FAQ.
