Tertiary Update Vol 16 No 23 - Sixty day ‘rights freeze’

Tertiary Update is our weekly bulletin about news in the tertiary education sector from the perspective of people working in the sector. Is this email not displaying correctly? View it in your browser. 60 day 'rights freeze' The government's proposed new employment laws could see union members locked in a two-month gap without any employment rights just when they need them most, says TEU national secretary Sharn Riggs. "During that time union members have none of their collective agreement rights, because the collective agreement will not exist," says Sharn Riggs. "And they will not be allowed to take industrial action. Meanwhile the employer can actively promote individual employment agreements to undermine the old collective agreement." [Read more...] Survey shows widespread insecure work in tertiary education A survey of nearly 2000 TEU members shows insecure work, casual and fixed term employment agreements are widespread in tertiary education. One in six respondents said they were currently in an insecure, casual or fixed-term position, and a further one-third said they had been in such a position in the past. [Read more...] Supreme teaching award winner highlights inequity TEU national president Lesley Francey says that competitive funding and tendering in tertiary education is creating perverse outcomes where top teachers are side-lined to make way for research. Her comments follow Ako Aotearoa's Tertiary Teaching Excellence awards earlier this week. [Read more...] Science and maths teachers shine in teaching awards Ako Aotearoa’s Tertiary Teaching Excellence Awards recognised outstanding tertiary teachers and lecturers this week. A total of ten awards for Sustained Excellence in Tertiary Teaching (worth $20,000 each) were presented to a diverse range of teachers at the ceremony in Parliament. [Read more...] Treasury documents reveal budget-cutting pressure Documents released under the Official Information Act by Treasury confirm the government is dampening demand for tertiary education to balance the books, says the Labour Party's tertiary education spokesperson Megan Woods. [Read more...] NZ pushing for new global trade-in-services agreement New Zealand and a group of countries that have called themselves the "Real Good Friends of Services" are negotiating a new trade agreement, the Trade in International Services Agreement (TISA). [Read more...] Monsters University is released in NZ cinemas today. Hopefully it doesn't turn out to be a documentary. Friend on Facebook Follow on Twitter Forward to a Friend Other news As scores of colleges rush to offer free online classes, the mania over massive open online courses may be slowing down. Even top proponents of MOOCs are acknowledging critical questions remain unanswered, and are urging further study - Inside Higher Ed Inside Higher Ed Six hundred professors have signed a letter condemning "disreputable" plans by the University of Liverpool to force its non-academic staff to accept new terms and conditions - Times Higher Education British working-class students are less likely to play a full part in university life because of the financial burden of getting through a degree course, according to research - The Telegraph Last week the Oregon legislature took the first steps toward possibly implementing a plan that would allow public college and university students to forgo upfront tuition payments in exchange for paying a portion of their wages back to their alma mater for about 25 years following graduation. While it may mean no money down, it could still add up to large tuition bills - Inside Higher Ed  follow on Twitter | friend on Facebook | forward to a friend  This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 New Zealand License.  2013 Tertiary Education Union  You are receiving this email either because you are a financial member of TEU and we have added you to our mailing list, or because we have a record of you previously opting to add yourself to our mailing list. Our mailing address is: Tertiary Education Union PO Box 11 767 Wellington, Wellington 6142 New Zealand Add us to your address book  unsubscribe from this list | update subscription preferences