Tuesday, 26 October 2010
www.savethestudent.org
www.savethestudent.org is a good example of "anti-slacktivist" online activism as it presents statistics and reliable opinion on what can be done to prevent student fees being raised rather than a simple "like" button, ultimately offering a foundation knowledge of why people should get involved rather than a chance to be portrayed as interested in current events.
Monday, 25 October 2010
backround info, research, sources and opinions
In 1998 student grants worth about 2200 pounds were abolished and became loans along with an increase in tuition fees excluding students whose parents earn less than 16,000 pounds a year. This Labour government change headed by secretary of state for education and employment at the time David Blunkett was the most radical change in education in 30 years.
In 1998 media activism was not as powerful or active as it is in 2010 due to the general population’s lack of internet access and even knowledge of the internet. More than 10 years on the internet has developed massively and given recent news stories suggesting there may be another radical change in university tuition fees, it seemed relevant to observe some of the media activism which has been used to help oppose these policies.
There are suggestions that following Lord Browne’s recent report on university funding that the coalition of Liberal democrats and conservatives will be either putting no cap on tuition fees allowing universities to charge as much as they feel reasonable or capping it at 7,000 pounds as well as having stopped interest free payback on student loans. Considering just over a decade ago students were receiving government grants it is safe to say student’s are rapidly losing the luxuries of further education. However with no rallies or protests you doubt wether students are informed enough or wether they are too apathetic towards today’s government.
To have an effect through a medium like media activism it would need to be in large numbers but there are no stand out websites or blogs. Given the inter-generational unfairness of the situation, the fact that the people who decide student finance were given free education with university grants should spark mass unity and activism among students but there is little evidence of this. For anti Iraq war rallies the internet was used not only to try and unify the public and highlight support but to help with logistics such as venue’s and meeting time’s for protests. The french student coalition also used the media in the same way to oppose student loans. Despite this there is evidence of media activism in the form of Facebook groups with the number of "likes" hitting the 10,000 mark, although in comparison to the 2400000 students in the UK this figure seems shockingly low, showing a lack of enthusiasm amongst Facebook's users.
http://www.facebook.com/maxsezlovely#!/pages/UK-Students-Say-NO-To-Higher-Tuition-Fees/155392394498865
depite sparking online debate and being a useful tool for many activists, groups and fan pages are generaly an indicator of the number of people who vaugly agree with a cause or issue, rather than activists themselves. because of this, members of such pages have recently been coined "slacktivists" due to the zero level of commitment to a cause that liking a Facebook page requires, highlighting flaws in reliability of statistics from social networking activism. Although in many cases this would seem to be true, it is esenialy the same method of commitment as a petition would have been, only globaly avilable for internet 'consumers'. taking all this into concern it would appear that prehaps it is not the lack of media activism but instead, the lack of "slacktivists" willing to commit to something that may require serious support.
Instead it would appear that many who have stood up against the rise in student fees are of older generations, appalled at the price the government has essentially put on higher education in comparison to previous years. because of this many traditional forms of media activism have been used in order to communicate the economical, political and even family based issues of not supporting activism on this issue. one such example is this cartoon depicting a mother and father debating there new childs future.
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=155494801155291&set=a.155494797821958.25838.155392394498865
In 1998 media activism was not as powerful or active as it is in 2010 due to the general population’s lack of internet access and even knowledge of the internet. More than 10 years on the internet has developed massively and given recent news stories suggesting there may be another radical change in university tuition fees, it seemed relevant to observe some of the media activism which has been used to help oppose these policies.
There are suggestions that following Lord Browne’s recent report on university funding that the coalition of Liberal democrats and conservatives will be either putting no cap on tuition fees allowing universities to charge as much as they feel reasonable or capping it at 7,000 pounds as well as having stopped interest free payback on student loans. Considering just over a decade ago students were receiving government grants it is safe to say student’s are rapidly losing the luxuries of further education. However with no rallies or protests you doubt wether students are informed enough or wether they are too apathetic towards today’s government.
To have an effect through a medium like media activism it would need to be in large numbers but there are no stand out websites or blogs. Given the inter-generational unfairness of the situation, the fact that the people who decide student finance were given free education with university grants should spark mass unity and activism among students but there is little evidence of this. For anti Iraq war rallies the internet was used not only to try and unify the public and highlight support but to help with logistics such as venue’s and meeting time’s for protests. The french student coalition also used the media in the same way to oppose student loans. Despite this there is evidence of media activism in the form of Facebook groups with the number of "likes" hitting the 10,000 mark, although in comparison to the 2400000 students in the UK this figure seems shockingly low, showing a lack of enthusiasm amongst Facebook's users.
http://www.facebook.com/maxsezlovely#!/pages/UK-Students-Say-NO-To-Higher-Tuition-Fees/155392394498865
depite sparking online debate and being a useful tool for many activists, groups and fan pages are generaly an indicator of the number of people who vaugly agree with a cause or issue, rather than activists themselves. because of this, members of such pages have recently been coined "slacktivists" due to the zero level of commitment to a cause that liking a Facebook page requires, highlighting flaws in reliability of statistics from social networking activism. Although in many cases this would seem to be true, it is esenialy the same method of commitment as a petition would have been, only globaly avilable for internet 'consumers'. taking all this into concern it would appear that prehaps it is not the lack of media activism but instead, the lack of "slacktivists" willing to commit to something that may require serious support.
Instead it would appear that many who have stood up against the rise in student fees are of older generations, appalled at the price the government has essentially put on higher education in comparison to previous years. because of this many traditional forms of media activism have been used in order to communicate the economical, political and even family based issues of not supporting activism on this issue. one such example is this cartoon depicting a mother and father debating there new childs future.
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=155494801155291&set=a.155494797821958.25838.155392394498865
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