A New Deal: Making Education Change Sarah Kerton, HE Consultant

What is a campaign? A working definition of campaign is an organised course of action to achieve a particular goal. Let’s break down our definition into two key parts: An organised course of action A particular goal

What is a campaign? It’s helpful to think about a campaign starting with what you want to achieve – the goal – and then moving backwards through the organised course of action.

Identifying your goals A new deal for higher education funding We want government to phase out tuition fees and restore public funding to universities. This is one of the goals of the NUS New Deal for the General Election. We will be using this throughout the rest of the session

Identifying your goals While we may all have the same particular goal, the way we go about getting there may be different. The student movement may show a unified front, however, each union decides on national, regional or local goals that link to collective aims. How does a new deal for education funding relate to you and your institution?

Identifying your goals EXERCISE: For the next 6 minutes, work in groups of 5 to set THREE campaign objectives related to the new deal for education funding, to be delivered in the next 12 months. Ensure your campaign objectives are SMART: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Time-bound. What is achievable in the time frame? We might not bring about the end of tuition fees but what other values related to this goal could you achieve within your institution?

Identifying your targets It’s not enough to know about a problem and complain about it. As a student leader, your role is to talk to as many people as possible, engage, inspire, and build student power such that it becomes impossible for the decision-makers to ignore you.

Identifying your targets It’s important to know who key decision-makers are and what their interests are in order to have the most impact. A key part of making education change is understanding who holds the power, who makes what decisions, and who has influence. When deciding on a target, it’s best if you choose a person or people, rather than an institution, because it easier to understand what specifically might influence them. It wouldn’t make sense, for example, to stage a protest in your Head of Teaching and Learning’s office if it’s the Registrar who decides of student finance.

Identifying your targets EXERCISE: Choose one of your objectives. You have 5 minutes to identify a list of stakeholders who could impact on achieving this. Create a list of: Allies Opponents Decision Makers

Power Mapping Power-mapping is one helpful activity for identifying targets and honing your strategy. The idea is to map out your potential targets, and the institutions and individuals who influence your target so you can begin to understand possible points of leverage. A power map can be a useful visual tool to help your team understand power, and see possibilities for campaigning.

Power Mapping Step 1: Choose your target. You have 1 minute to pick one of the stakeholders from your list. It’s best if you choose a person.

Power Mapping Step 2: Map the influences on your target. In three minutes, placing people and institutions on the map. There are two axes on the map – one indicates how influential that person is to your target, and the other shows whether that person is for or against your position (or neutral). Be sure to think really broadly about who is connected to your target – think work, political, family, religious, and neighborhood ties. For elected officials, be sure to look at their major donors and key constituencies.

Tactics There are many ways to influence decision-making on an issue. Think of each tactic as a tool in your toolbox to make change. You can pick and choose, combine them and create new ones depending on who your target is and what their interests may be. Be sure to think really broadly about who is connected to your target – think work, political, family, religious, and neighborhood ties. For elected officials, be sure to look at their major donors and key constituencies.

Tactics Discussions on tactics should always come after deciding on campaign goals and making a power map. That way, you can be sure that your tactics serve the final goal of your campaign. For example, it wouldn’t necessarily make sense to organise a die-in in your town centre if your goal is to secure hardship funding for students and your target is your Principal. Unless there are specific reasons, the tactic doesn’t match the target. Recognizing the creativity within ourselves and our organizing communities is just as critical as raising enough money to pull off something big. Effective actions are supposed to make people think outside the box, and so they need to be out of the ordinary. Our world is changing at a breakneck pace, and as activists, we need to keep developing new, innovative tactics to get out messages and flex grassroots muscle.

Tactics Come up with as many tactics as possible in TWO minutes. Write them on post-it notes and stick on the flipchart Recognizing the creativity within ourselves and our organizing communities is just as critical as raising enough money to pull off something big. Effective actions are supposed to make people think outside the box, and so they need to be out of the ordinary. Our world is changing at a breakneck pace, and as activists, we need to keep developing new, innovative tactics to get out messages and flex grassroots muscle.

Tactics EXERCISE: What tactics might work to influence the people on your powermap, to bring about your campaign objective? List and discuss what tactics might work in each case and why. Recognizing the creativity within ourselves and our organizing communities is just as critical as raising enough money to pull off something big. Effective actions are supposed to make people think outside the box, and so they need to be out of the ordinary. Our world is changing at a breakneck pace, and as activists, we need to keep developing new, innovative tactics to get out messages and flex grassroots muscle.

Nowhere near the end This is just a whistlestop tour through how you can bring about education change. If we have 5 hours, we would also cover: Building your strategy Planning successful actions Recruiting activists Influencing officials Communicating our power Grassroots lobbying Etc etc… Recognizing the creativity within ourselves and our organizing communities is just as critical as raising enough money to pull off something big. Effective actions are supposed to make people think outside the box, and so they need to be out of the ordinary. Our world is changing at a breakneck pace, and as activists, we need to keep developing new, innovative tactics to get out messages and flex grassroots muscle.

Come to EdReps But we will cover all of this and more at EdReps! 29th-31st July, College Court, Leicester You can register on NUS Connect – deadline is SOON! sarah.kerton@nus.org.uk Recognizing the creativity within ourselves and our organizing communities is just as critical as raising enough money to pull off something big. Effective actions are supposed to make people think outside the box, and so they need to be out of the ordinary. Our world is changing at a breakneck pace, and as activists, we need to keep developing new, innovative tactics to get out messages and flex grassroots muscle.