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Jules Hedges (May 11 2021 at 10:25):We were talking about this a while ago over on #general: co/appreciation, but I want to announce it on General. Due to the University of Leicester not backing down on its plans to entirely close several departments, including maths, the University & College Union has "greylisted" the university, and calls on the international community to do the same. Here's the start of the email I received:
Dear Dr Hedges
I’m writing to ask you to support our union's global boycott of the University of Leicester whose management has threatened over 100 staff with compulsory redundancy. We have implemented the ultimate sanction of 'greylisting' to urge the university to stop the proposed cuts and to hold urgent talks with staff unions to resolve the current dispute.
UCU calls on all members, supporters, other unions and the international academic community to support staff at Leicester including by:
not applying for any advertised jobs at Leicester
not speaking at or organising academic or other conferences at Leicester
not accepting invitations to give lectures at Leicester
not accepting positions as visiting professors or researchers at Leicester
not writing for any academic journal which is edited at or produced by Leicester
not accepting new contracts as external examiners for taught courses at Leicester
refusing to collaborate on new research projects with Leicester.
Academic boycott is a weapon of last resort and has only been used a handful of times in UCU's history but that is a measure of the seriousness with which we take this threat to our members’ jobs at Leicester and the level of intransigence of the employer that has left us with no choice.
David Michael Roberts (May 18 2021 at 06:43):Do we know what happened to Julia Goedecke, Simona Paoli and Teimuraz Pirashvili? Andy Tonks got made redundant (I don't know any of the other people there that might be doing category theory. The whole thing is a tragedy, of course, but you can forgive me for looking out for our "own")
David Michael Roberts (May 18 2021 at 06:47):The Deputy Head is the only permanent female academic staff member, and I can't find out who that is. If it is not Simona, and I think Julia is too junior, then they are both gone.
David Michael Roberts (May 18 2021 at 06:52):Simona doesn't list being Dep Head on her staff page, so I fear she may be gone too.
Peter Arndt (May 18 2021 at 10:10):Some 3 months ago Julia told me that as a "teaching fellow" she is not paid for frivolous research, and thought she would still be deemed useful for teaching maths to undergrads of other departments. I hope that didn't change in the meantime.
John Baez (May 18 2021 at 14:27):I don't know what Simona Paoli is doing, but she told me that if she was expected to do only teaching she would look for a job outside of Leicester. So she is probably busy looking for a job.