Students have always been an important focal point for the Nationalist Party. It was very palpable last year during the general election campaign and it is still today, a year down the line. Investment in education continues to augment, although we all know that no investment is enough in the sector producing a fine segment of Malta’s future workforce.
Last week I had the opportunity to be on campus to meet students during the KSU Election Campaign contested by SDM (who were elected in KSU for the past two years) and ACT (a coalition of 12 student organisations). As I said to both teams, it is very important that the campaigning is done in a constructive way in order to ensure that all is done in the students’ best interest. What I also noticed was that both stands were jam-packed with runners and with students asking about the teams’ respective manifestos, showing that although we constantly hear about the apathy university students possess, KSU is still of relevance to the student.
I had the opportunity to encounter some of the outgoing KSU executive members who presented me with their annual report outlining KSU’s main achievements during the past year. When reading this report carefully, one can see that KSU’s contribution to the betterment of student life and students’ rights is immense – the lecturers’ collective agreement dispute, the University Ombudsman Report, Freshers’ Week, Careers’ Convention, academic complaints campaigns, cultural and extracurricular activities among many other initiatives.
The outgoing KSU executive went in office without having to contest an election. The natural question here would be – how come? There is currently a noticeable lack of student participation in extracurricular activities and the reason for this is definitely not straightforward to ascertain. Personally, I think that the main reason attributed to this problem is that most students are present for their course lectures but they head home as soon as their lectures are over.
I suggest that an extra effort should be made to think and consider new options that would attract and induce further student participation. I also encourage all students who are not active in student organisations, NGOs, local clubs et al to start involving themselves in order to acquire certain interpersonal skills and also to positively contribute to different causes. I suggest this in the light that in today’s world, the absolute majority of the employers in Malta but more importantly in Europe, deem this extracurricular involvement as distinguishing between potential employees. Leading European universities list involvement in NGOs and student organisations as an asset when applying for postgraduate degrees.
Last Thursday was the day when the students had the opportunity to elect their own representative council – the council that, come any problem which could affect the student population, would eventually represent them. Although the turnout of eligible voters was considerably low, (a mere 2,800 students out of the eligible 13,000) I was told that a good number of students remained on campus during the night, serving as good company to the candidates and the team leaders while impatiently awaiting the election results.
In the early hours of Friday morning, the Electoral Commission gave its first indications of the electoral outcome. The democratic process handed victory to SDM for the third consecutive year showing clearly that the students who voted are satisfied with the good work already performed, and as the SDM slogan read (Ingeddu l-Kwalità; Insahhu l-Opportunità), the students are confident that with SDM in KSU, their best interests will be safeguarded.
SDM’s manifesto for this year’s election had several initiatives that were focused on addressing the students’ primary needs. The main proposal that dominated the campaign was the establishment of an Opportunity Fund, where e25,000 will be allocated to refund 75 per cent of students’ costs who attend international conferences or go to carry out thesis-related research abroad. Besides, SDM confirmed that stipends are a necessity for University students, and thus will make sure that stipends won’t be decreased as SDM believes that it’s an investment in tomorrow’s workforce.
In fact, SDM presented a report to Parliamentary Secretary Jason Azzopardi comprising a detailed study compiled thanks to a good representative student sample. I congratulated SDM for taking this initiative, more so when keeping in mind the educational reform which is about to take place.
After Friday’s NCHE conference on the Education Strategy for Further and Higher Education 2020 a strategy document was presented providing a case for investment of over e1 billion over the coming decade in the formation of human capital in Malta. I encourage all parties, including KSU, to sound all their concerns at this early stage to make sure that excellence is achieved in the sector which has always been a pillar in the PN’s political agenda – education.
David Casa is a Nationalist MEP
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www.davidcasa.eu