The President of the Graduate Students’ Union (GSU) has been granted full membership of Trinity’s Finance Committee, after years of sitting as a non-voting member.
Oisín Vince Coulter, the President of the GSU, will now have a vote on matters discussed by the Finance Committee. Previously, the President of Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU) was the only voting student representative on Finance Committee. The move comes after a year of tension between the Finance Committee and the GSU, following the introduction of an unexpected rise in postgraduate fees.
Speaking to The University Times, Coulter called the change “an important, if not massively significant, step”.
Coulter said: “I think it’s good to have a second voting student member, and particularly one that represents the postgraduate community”.
“I think a lot of issues that people have had over the last few years with some of the decisions that have been made at a high level in College have originated from decisions that have been made by the Finance Committee”, he said.
Coulter said many people have “raised questions about how it is that this relatively small and not hugely representative sub committee of Board has quite as much power as it does”.
The Finance Committee consists of 10 full-time members, including the Provost, Vice Provost and the Chief Financial Officer. Last year, the College Board granted the committee full agency to increase postgraduate fees.
A fee hike of five per cent, passed last November, was widely condemned by staff and students, prompting Trinity’s postgraduates to consider strike action. Fee certainty – whereby students would be told upon entering College about any fee increases they would face throughout their course – for postgraduate students later became a key demand of the Take Back Trinity campaign.
Describing the difference between sitting as a full-time member as opposed to a non-voting member, Coulter said: “I think really comes down to a question of recognition by the College of the importance of the student voice in a formal way, and particularly the importance of the graduate student voice.”
“In terms of the practical capacity for that extra formal seat on the committee for myself, will it effect a big change? I wouldn’t overstate it. It doesn’t massively change the make-up of the committee but again as I said, particularly in a symbolic way it is fairly important, that recognition of graduate students.”
The Finance Committee came under scrutiny after a decision made to increase postgraduate fees by five per cent bypassed Board, the College’s foremost decision-making body. Decisions such as these would never normally be made by Finance Committee without final approval from Board. The fee increase would have brought in an extra €2.6 million for the College.
At a meeting of the GSU’s council shortly after the fee increase was announced, President Shane Collins warned that “certain segments who don’t appreciate the stress they’re putting students under”. In an angry address to students, Collins called out Trinity and the government and for their lack of concern for postgraduate students.
“This is an absolute disgrace”, he said. Impassioned and angry, Collins called on students to join him in taking more serious action against the college.
“Postgraduates students are not going to be the cash cow for this issue any longer”, he told students.
