A STUDENT’S VIEW
FOLLOWING another successful year for the student movement in Wales, NUS Wales members have elected Gwyneth Sweatman as president of the National Union of Students Wales. Before coming into office, she was NUS Wales women’s officer and was previously Carmarthen president at Trinity Saint David Students’ Union, where she studied psychology.
I COME into office at a very exciting time for education in Wales. With reforms under way in the funding and governance of the post-16 sector, the delivery of student finance and the make-up of the curriculum, the end goal of an accessible, inclusive and sustainable education system is within Wales’ grasp.
The student movement has a proud history of being a campaigning force all across Wales, shaping what education looks like, fighting for the rights of women, BME people, LGBT+ people, disabled peopled, Welsh-speakers and others, and building a Wales and a world fit for future generations.
Post-16 education reform will remain a priority for myself as NUS Wales president over the coming year. We’re looking forward to submitting our response to the Welsh Government’s technical consultation on post-16 education reform in the next few weeks.
I believe that these reforms hold a great deal of promise in making education a more realistic aspiration for many more people in Wales, and in delivering the parity of esteem that we and others have wanted to see for many years.
My priority in this area of work is making the case for student voice. As in Scotland, we want to see fully funded, fully supported student voice structures to be a precondition of all providers and institutions receiving public funding.
The reforms to post-16 education may well turn out to be the single largest piece of legislation the National Assembly has ever considered. It is imperative that we get this right. This is an opportunity to design an education system which works for institutions and for Wales, but first and foremost for students.
Brexit will also remain a hot topic during my tenure as NUS Wales president. It has become increasingly clear, I think, that there is little certainty about the UK’s future outside the EU. What worries me is that Welsh students will no longer be able to benefit from the opportunities afforded to previous generations because of our EU membership.
I am particularly concerned that our students will no longer be able to take part in Erasmus+. So I will continue to make the case, through our membership of the Education Secretary’s Brexit Working Group, for the UK to continue to take part in Erasmus+ through the transition period and beyond.
Leaving the EU presents many challenges, which, frankly, I would prefer us not to be facing. But I will work with our member students’ unions, using my platform in any fora I can, to raise these issues and argue against any rollback of rights, opportunities, or living and working conditions post-Brexit.