It was a victory that students will savour for years: Provost Patrick Prendergast, Vice-Provost Chris Morash and the members of the College Board traipsing out into Front Square after overturning a decision that they’d passed only weeks before, seemingly certain of only a subdued student response.
How wrong they were. The Take Back Trinity campaign, which not only saw off plans for a €450 fee for supplemental exams, but also managed to secure fee certainty for postgraduate and international students, has achieved something nearly unprecedented in College’s history: reversing a diktat of senior management. By achieving that, they’ve shown what’s possible to students and staff, who have their own share of gripes about a College at the centre of a funding crisis.
Of course, Prendergast tried to present it as a victory snatched from the jaws of defeat. With a Take Back Trinity badge pinned to his lapel and a wide smile across his face, you’d nearly have thought it was his idea to scrap the fees in the first place. In fairness to Prendergast, it’s hard to imagine any other university president who’d have the adroitness to navigate a public relations crisis that culminates in an appearance before a group of angry students.
Yet students can’t forget, now that summer edges closer, how much power they held for a heady few weeks in March. It was a campaign that surged with all the force expected after years of cuts and commercialisation. It’s an anger that every staff member could associate with too.
It was heartening then to see the campaign look beyond this battle against fees, towards the wider problems facing the higher education sector. Words were put into action quickly too, as the Take Back Trinity joined students in Dublin City University (DCU) to protest against extortionate hikes in rents.
It’s a sign that the campaign could grow into something bigger, offering a much-needed boost for an issue that has fallen to the periphery of public concerns. If Trinity hasn’t been taken back, it’s certainly been given a good jolt. Let’s see what happens when the anger moves beyond Front Square.
