LUU Welfare Officer Charlotte Warner has protested against the closure of School of Healthcare courses during her graduation ceremony today.
Warner collected her Nursing degree wearing a sign that read “save healthcare courses”. Earlier, she had encouraged fellow graduates to sign Christmas cards for Vice Chancellor Sir Alan Langlands with the message “All I want for Christmas is… Healthcare courses”. 120 cards were collected on the day.
The School is currently undergoing an assessment of its “academic and financial sustainability” with many of its courses facing the axe. This is despite excellent graduate employment and high student satisfaction scores of up to 100%.
Warner’s protest follows joint action by unions UCU, UNISON and UNITE in November to lobby the University against the proposed changes.
Speaking to LS after the stunt, Warner said: “I think it’s really important that graduates know about [the review] as well as current students because of their careers, the future and the community of Leeds”.
“If students aren’t being trained here then the healthcare around Leeds will suffer”.
Commenting on the reaction she received from those who attended the ceremony, she said: “It was really great, lots of people cheered and the lecturers loved it.”
Leo Garbutt