Even the most hackish of student union hacks would find it difficult to dispute that engagement with the SU is, well, patchy. This academic year, a record number of students ran for class rep positions, yet Council is still peppered with vacancies – one of which I myself was co-opted to fill. The hustings on the 1.5 constitutional amendment had maybe 30 people in attendance, the referendum had no organised campaign against the proposal, and only approximately 3.6% of the student population even cast their ballots. There is a mismatched level of engagement across faculties, too, with AHSS students being far more likely to vote or run for higher office in the Union than their STEM and health-science counterparts.
Unfortunately, herein lies the depressing, open secret that underpins the SU – that despite its best, often tenacious efforts, it still holds little to no relevance to the vast majority of students. I say this as someone who, up until the end of last year, had no idea what the Comms Officer did until I was ambushed by a prospective candidate during election season in the Arts Block. The visibility of the SU’s elections are no bad thing – it would be hard to miss the flurry of leaflets and Instagram posts that make up campaign week – but I found myself wondering, as a student not highly engaged in Union affairs: where are they during the rest of the year? Emails ping in my inbox and posters go up around campus, but I’ve never felt like the Union has struck a particular chord of relevance with me.
I can’t help but feel, however, that these thoughts are somewhat unfair. Behind the scenes of these attempted connections are a group of hardworking sabbatical and part-time officers who seem to genuinely care about the welfare of the students they represent. Their campaigns to counter College’s brutally inefficient and inadequate systems, especially with regards to LENS report compliance and the overnight guests policy, are, in fact, both effective and admirable. So why does the Union still feel so distant to us?
Maybe we need to start recognising that statistics like the 3.6% turnout in the recent constitutional referendum don’t exist in isolation, but instead as a tiny fraction of a much broader trend of youth disengagement with politics in Ireland. Trinity students aren’t uniquely apathetic, and our students’ union isn’t uniquely lacking in relevance to us. Half of all young people in Ireland aren’t voting in national elections, let alone SU ones, and Ireland has the single biggest age-based turnout gap in Europe – meaning older people are far more likely to vote than their younger counterparts. If young people aren’t voting for the people who make decisions on their rent, rights, and wages, it shouldn’t be a surprise to us when they don’t turn out for SU elections and referendums. In short, our students’ union’s efforts to engage us is a symptom of broader political apathy.
This disillusionment isn’t entirely unjustified. Successive Irish governments have failed to meaningfully address the core concerns of young people – the housing crisis foremost among them – leading many to believe that politics simply will not work for them. I am politically active, and I viscerally understand this exhaustion. It feels like we are constantly throwing mud at the wall to see what sticks, and I get why many feel that it is just not worth their time.
The danger is that the SU can, in the minds of students, also become boxed into this category of “distant institutions that don’t work for me”. Students are exhausted by College’s lack of action on accommodation shortages, by their systems failing to function as they should, by the bureaucratic nightmare that is the understaffed Academic Registry. Yet, as limited as the SU is by its one year term limits, these problems have persisted year after year, campaign after campaign. The lack of continuity means that on these large-scale issues, officers can be left with little to show for their hard work.
This is probably why the SU’s focus on broader political issues that don’t directly affect the majority of students hasn’t driven up student engagement with the Union. With the passing of the 1.5 amendment fully politicising the SU, future administrations are now free to do more of this than ever before, if they so choose. The jury is out on what, if any, impact that will have on the SU’s perceived relevance. While I believe that our Union should always focus on student welfare first and wider issues second, I also don’t think a laser-focused pivot to this approach would radically change engagement levels. The far larger and more concerning issue is that much of our generation no longer believes in the power of institutions—whether they be student unions, national governments, or political parties – to improve their lives.
Ultimately, the question is not whether the SU is relevant, but whether it feels relevant to the people it’s supposed to represent. From the Union’s side, achieving this means continuing to prove, through visible and practical action, that they are more than a platform for those already engaged. It needs to acknowledge the low level of interest from the student body, and consistently meet students where they’re at. At the same time, it would be both unfair and naïve to place the burden of change on the SU alone. This has a lot to do with the national political environment, and a lot to do with our own unwillingness to engage. The decisions of our Union are relevant to us, even if we don’t care about what goes on at Comhairle (Council). As the old saying goes, you may not care about politics – but politics cares about you.
One inescapable truth in all this is that the everyday issues facing students are not going away. We will still have to grapple with accommodation shortages, broken systems, and College valuing its prestige over its students. Yet an overwhelming majority of us are neither turning to our Union for help, nor electing people to do so, and that is, sadly, a damning indictment of its overall relevance to the student body. At the same time, the SU is operating in a climate of growing political disengagement, which no one in national politics has successfully countered. The SU can and should ensure it keeps a laser-focus on student welfare, but it can only do so much in what looks to be a perpetually uphill battle to secure the engagement of young voters. In the words of one Junior Fresh student: “Are they the ones who give me their discounts? In their email? Well, that’s their relevance to me.” And maybe it’s that simple. Relevance is a two way street. We will only ever get as much out of the SU as we give to it.
