Chemistry students at the University of Reading say that they are facing an uncertain future following news of planned changes to the department, announced at the end of last year.
Although the University of Reading has decided not to close its chemistry department, following proposals that it would be moved to the school of pharmacy, it is still going ahead with plans to end recruitment for its MSc and MChem programmes and only support chemistry research aligned with allied health professions, dentistry, nursing and pharmacy.
‘[The department is] not closing … but they’re still doing all of the things that we said “this is a bad idea and this isn’t what we want”, especially with the research focus and stopping the MChem and MSc,’ says Lucia Warner, a third-year chemistry student and student representative.
Sahima Khullar, a second-year student representative says that, for international students like herself, there’s a lot at stake. ‘You’re paying a lot to be here, you’ve moved away from home, you don’t want to be in a position of uncertainty.’
Warner says the students were first made aware of the proposals in an email sent out on the afternoon of Friday 25 October. ‘It was a pretty formal, long-winded email [saying] “we’ve proposed a closure with the department, if this is to go ahead we’ll stop running the MChem course and the MSc course, but those who are currently on the course will still finish” … It seemed okay until you really thought about it and what the repercussions would be,’ says Warner.
Khullar says that it soon became apparent – when she was asked to read out the email to her professor – that staff had not been forewarned that students were going to be informed of the plans. ‘None of the staff knew what was going on or the fact that this email had even been sent out. So everyone was just really stressed and, since it was the end of the week, there wasn’t much you could really do about it until the Monday.’
Elizabeth McCrum, University of Reading pro-vice-chancellor for teaching and student experience, says she understands the concerns of students in the department and adds that the university has been reassuring them about their future there. ‘We made the decision in December to commit to a future for chemistry at Reading while focusing teaching and research across a narrower range of areas,’ McCrum says. ‘We are currently running a limited voluntary redundancy process while we reshape the department for a future that fits these plans. We are mindful of the impact this will have on individuals, and until the process is concluded it is difficult for us to provide full details to students on how exactly they will be affected.’
Protest organised
All chemistry students were invited to a meeting on 31 October, but Soonyun Yau, a first-year student representative, says it seemed no one had been properly informed about exactly what was going to happen. ‘The meeting was originally going to be a chance where we would have some questions answered, but unfortunately the person who we were going to ask questions to didn’t show up, so it was a room full of students and staff who were all equally confused because no one had the information that they needed,’ she recalls. ‘At that moment, everyone realised just how serious it was for everyone, not just the students, but also for the staff.’
Collectively concerned about the future of the department the student representatives decided to organise a protest on 20 November, the day the executive board were due to meet to make the final decision. ‘I spent about a week trying to figure out where and when the meeting was going to happen,’ explains Lochlan McGregor, a PhD student and postgraduate student representative.
The reps then invited all of Reading’s chemistry students to come along to the protest. ‘We grabbed a load of lab coats from one of the teaching labs and we stood outside for two or three hours in November – so it was freezing,’ McGregor says.
Around 40 people were at the protest, including a few members of staff who, although not protesting, came along to support the students. ‘There was a sense of community that everyone felt, just the fact that everyone was together, fighting for the same thing,’ Khullar says.
‘I think it was really successful,’ says McGregor. ‘A lot of the board members, when they came out, said it was really great to see everyone and they were talking about it in the meeting.’
Course changes
On receiving the news the following day that, while the department would not be closed, significant changes would be made to courses, the student representatives say they were left feeling ‘frustrated’. A week later, on 28 November, they were given an opportunity to ask questions about the decision in a single hour-long session which was attended by the school director of teaching and learning and one of the pro-vice chancellors, which was ‘overflowing’ with questions, many of which could not be conclusively answered.
Khullar is bemused by the changes. ‘The fact that they’ve closed the MChem programme and aren’t offering the MSc programmes anymore, but they’re still offering the same bachelor courses and PhD course – it makes no sense. You need the same equipment for all three and you’re going to be needing the same amount of staff supervision, the same amount of experience, to conduct all three courses,’ she notes. ‘Their defence for that is that we don’t have enough students, which, in my mind, isn’t such a bad thing, because if there’s eight people in my classroom and there’s one professor, I’d learn so much more than if there were 40 people .’
She also points out that many people who complete their chemistry undergraduate at Reading come back for further studies, highlighting the department’s popularity. ‘They really enjoy their course. They love what they’re learning,’ she says.
Warner likes the department so much she made the decision to switch from a BSc to an MChem over the summer, along with several of her peers. However, she says that had they been told about the proposed changes to the department earlier, she may have chosen differently. Although they’ve been reassured that they’ll be able to complete their courses, her main concern is what the course will look like. ‘We understand that the chemistry department are going to do their best to deliver what they can, but it depends what staff go, it depends how the research [changes] impacts finding your project,’ she explains.
For PhD students like McGregor, who is working on organic fuel cell membranes, the university has been ‘quite vague’ about what will happen with projects, particularly those that are not aligned with healthcare. McCrum says that students at Reading will benefit from a chemistry department ‘with renewed purpose and clearer areas of focus’, as well as ‘research aligned to Reading’s growing strength in health innovation’.
While McGregor is fortunate that he has a fully funded position with a supervisor, some of his peers are less certain about their futures. He adds that practically every chemical industry in the area had sent ‘strongly worded emails’ to the university regarding the proposals.
‘We keep getting the phrase that [the decision on research projects is on] “a case-by-case basis”,’ McGregor says. ‘They’ve promised suitable supervisor replacement if your supervisor leaves or gets made redundant.’
Since the Q&A in November, the students say they’ve received little further information. ‘They promised [that], in the spring, they’ll put some students onto the advisory board that was going to go through the changes, but I don’t think we’ve had anything concrete since before Christmas,’ says McGregor.
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