We have been running dayschools as part of a university rank-and-file network since March 2024. They have been a space for university workers to come together and share resources, skills, and plans for building rank-and-file power. The dayschools are open to anyone who works in the university and are focused on collective discussions and producing materials that can be used beyond the event. Together, we’ve been trying to build a cross-branch, cross-union reps network in higher education.
This “how-to” guide covers what we’ve done so far and why. We hope it will be helpful for workers considering running their own events. There is no one way to do this, but we’ve found this model useful for bringing people together to have collective discussions that lead to shared activities. The “Trade Dispute with Secretary of State for Education over Funding” campaign and UCU Congress motion developed out of these dayschools.
We’ve called them “dayschools” because they were long meetings in which we wanted to share and learn from one another. They have been quite a different experience from other kinds of union meetings in higher education. The aim is to bring people together, regardless of role or position in our workplaces and unions, to discuss what we do about the crises in higher education.
The dayschools have been open spaces to discuss collectively. While there is plenty to complain about in higher education (and our unions) we’ve framed these as a starting point for organising together. This means having an open agenda, participatory sessions, an openness to new ideas, and different ways of doing things. There are many union spaces in which we’re told what to do or have things presented with an already decided plan. We want the dayschools to be different.
The increasing local disputes and campaigns have brought lots of new people into our unions. We want to share what we’ve learned and support others to take action in their own workplaces. Through the dayschools, we have produced a few things together so far. Some of these are hosted on the university rank-and-file website:
Empowering Rank-and-file University Workers: Organising Against Redundancies
A survey of what’s happening in different universities and union branches
A working document on organising against casualisation
The idea with these was to share the knowledge that some of us had developed in our union branches and organising. Instead of keeping our expertise to ourselves, we want to create things that can help develop the skills and confidence of other rank-and-file members.
We also wrote a collective call for contributions on strategy: Diagnosing the crisis in higher education: a call for contributions on what next. This was intended to provide the starting point for a discussion at a dayschool. It is where the “Trade Dispute with the Secretary of State” campaign was first discussed.
We deliberately didn’t organise the previous dayschools in a university. Instead, we’ve used different kinds of spaces, including a social centre, an arts space, and a union office. We’ve tried to make sure the space works for collective discussion, including the possibility for breakout space to work on materials, somewhere to eat together, and access to tea and coffee.
The dayschools we’ve run previously have been on a Sunday, every month or two. They have started at 11am and run until around 4pm. This gives enough time for 4ish sessions - 2 before lunch and 2 after. Eating lunch together has been an important part of the dayschools, sharing food and getting to know each other.
Here is an example agenda:
11.00-11.30: The funding crisis in higher education
11.30-13.00: How to organise against redundancies workshop
13.00-14.00: Lunch
14.00-15.30: Palestine and international solidarity
15.30-16.00: Building rank-and-file power at your university
16.00- Social
Some of the dayschools were specifically themed - for example, on casualisation - while others had a combination of different issues discussed throughout the day.
Usually volunteers will lead sessions by delivering a short presentation followed by a few framing questions. Sometimes the conversations were focused on a theme but unstructured. On other occasions, time in the meeting was used for the group to carry out practical work together: e.g. formulating questions for a survey. We have invited organisers from sister unions to discuss their organising on related campaigns, for example organisers at PCS who represent workers in the civil service, including at UKRI.
Generally, the ethos of the dayschools is that everyone has something to contribute to the conversation, and space should be made to hear from as many people as possible. We try to orient the discussion towards identifying common issues that cut across our institutions and unions, and practical responses we can action as a group or that individuals can take back to their branch activity. The dayschools are a way to collectivise activist experience and knowledge, supporting branch-level organising and fostering strategic thinking across the sector.
At the end of the dayschool, we set aside a bit of time to discuss the date and plans for the next event - including asking for volunteers to organise the next one with this rotating for each meeting. They find a venue, set up the lu.ma page for signing up, take on outreach, organise the food, and share the agenda.
The dayschools had a hybrid option via Zoom. While we encouraged people to come in person, we made sure that online participation was facilitated. This means thinking ahead about the tech available and having a volunteer make sure it works on the day. We also provided a way for people to communicate accessibility requirements and ran an informal creche for some of the sessions.
We ran an informal pooled fare to help people attend from outside London. We asked people to indicate if they needed support with travel costs to get an estimate, and then conducted a collection among those based in London to pool the costs. Similarly, we contributed to the costs of food on the day in the same way. It is good to have a volunteer to organise this.
We started organising the dayschools by inviting people we had met in our organising. We shared the lu.ma invite with rank-and-file members and union branches. A dayschool doesn’t have to be big at first. Meeting with a smaller number of people could provide an opportunity to map out which universities there are and who people already know. Starting something new is always a challenge, and even bringing together a few like-minded people for a collective discussion is a significant step forward. Creating a space like this is part of the process of developing a rank-and-file. The progress won't always be linear and we might need to change how we do things along the way, but taking the first steps is the most important thing.
If you want support organising a first dayschool, please contact us here.