SU's weekly blog: Which way to the sports fields?

by James Burden

University of the Arts London has forever been short on facilities.

When you begin to compare UAL to other universities up and down the country, you begin to wonder why don’t we have any sports facilities or allotted time for extra curricular activities?

It’s frustrating that at the ‘prestigious’ University of the Arts London, the only sports and activities facility offered is a small studio at the Hub to share amongst its 21,000 students.

This is a complete embarrassment when you compare this to other London universities. For example, London School of Economics (LSE) have 9,000 students, the equivalent of LCC, and own a twenty-five-acre site that supports their football, rugby, netball, tennis, ultimate frisbee, cricket and athletics societies.

Not only that, they have a multi-purpose venue with indoor seating, squash courts, a gymnasium, and social space that can double in the evenings to host club and live music events.

Sports halls, sports fields and a gym are a given at every other university whether based in London or elsewhere in the UK.

Lacking Satisfaction

Surely a modern university like UAL should be able to offer facilities that at least match the ones of our fellow institutions; opening doors for more student engagement and improving the current “shocking” student satisfaction levels.

For the past four and a half years that I have been both a student and a Students’ Union Sabbatical Officer, the university has continually stood by their somewhat outdated response that: “Art students aren’t interested in sports.”

Who writes the rules stating that an economics student for example, is more likely to take part in a sport than an arts student?

It’s completely unfounded and untrue. It shows the stark reality of how out of touch the university’s management, lecturers and deans of the colleges are with students at the UAL institution.

Sadly, the university has stated its intentions loud and clear when it comes to sports and extra curricular activities - just look at the timetable issues.

For the past five years, students have been calling for Wednesdays to be free from timetabling, yet the university continues to put up barriers for students wanting to represent their university on the sports field by timetabling lectures and classes on Wednesday afternoons.

Students are being put in a position of deciding what is more important - sitting in a lecture or proudly representing their university against other universities on the sports field.

We're caught in a vicious cycle where the university won't adhere to free Wednesday afternoons from timetaProxy-Connection: keep-alive Cache-Control: max-age=0 ed classes, meaning many students cannot get involved in sports, societies, volunteering or any other activity. 

But then the university doesn’t feel that enough students are involved in sports or societies to warrant new or any facilities. 

Student experience isn’t only made up of turning up to college, handing in work and then going home. The experience should include: being part of a community and making the most of the opportunities that only a university student can be offered.

The Students’ Union will continue to push the university into improving facilities but it’s the students’ voices that will really focus the attention of the university staff.

We want things to improve, yet UAL is going backwards, not forwards and that’s for £3,225 per year. The more they see you won’t stand being ripped off on your student experience, the more the university management will listen.

Take part in the autumn referendum and vote for the motion on ‘Wednesday Afternoons Free’ and ‘Sports Facilities’ from November 20–26.