GFTU BGCM Minutes 2017

another great thing that happened in the course of listening to the

presentations and so on was one of my former students, Edda, had the

experience of being supported by me in the first year of her Open University

degree and it is fantastic to see the achievements of Edda and she is going

strong and will progress and do a PhD and so on and so forth, so it is

absolutely superb to see that.

Ruskin College’s challenges and opportunities 2017. What is Ruskin College

all about? In some ways it is like a national treasure, Ruskin College, in terms

of its clear historical identity. It is a kind of con really of the Labour Movement

and there are many, many events. The second wave of the Women’s

Movement was launched at Ruskin, we had the Callaghan speech in ’76. We

have had many, many Labour Deputy Prime Ministers and Prime Ministers

gone through its doors and have been given a hard time, so it has always had

this very, very radical edge that you are all very aware of.

Another key feature of Ruskin is its place within the trade union movement, of

course, and that is very evident today and we will ensure that it remains that

way going forward. Ruskin is always about equality, it is always about

advancing equality. We are celebrated for our exemplary practice in terms of

widening participation. We have a beautiful campus in Headington and we also

are on the cusp of opening a new classroom in the old Ruskin College, so we

are going back to the future in some ways, in the centre of Oxford in what was

the old Walton Street site for Ruskin which has now been revamped and is part

of Exeter College of the University of Oxford. We have a room there that we

can use going forward. That is an absolutely fantastic asset for the college.

We are a beacon of practice. We do well in all our inspections. We comply

with all the rules. In fact we excel at teaching and learning and that is what the

reports say about us. Where is Ruskin? I have already said we are exemplary

for widening participation. These are some of our results really. We were

commended by QAA for student support, we are recognised for good practice

for the strategic direction, 97% success for further education provision, 87%

success for higher education. We do a good job. We are open, we are

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