Saturday 5 September 2009

Student or Worker?

One of the things that has frustrated me for the last few years has been that I get referred to as a student, especially within SP circles. Now it isn't that inaccurate a description, after all for two years I was an activist at Huddersfield Uni and was elected as the non-sabb Campaigns Officer for one of them.
And then I moved to Bangor. I stopped being a full time student and looked for full-time work - and then got offered a place on a masters course part-time with my tuition fees paid. So I decided to do that as well as work. But what, at least politically, came to the fore was the student part of my life, particularly when I became unemployed and using my spare time helped build up the signatures needed to force a referendum on the issue of tuition fees within Bangor Students Union. Couple that with then going on to win said referendum and on the back of that being the Socialist Students candidate for the NUS Block of Fifteen and you begin to see why people will think of me as a student.
My blogging has reinforced that too. I've found it far easier to write about student politics than about the places I've worked in. And to be honest I'd rather my bosses at work didn't know I was a member of the Socialist Party.
But I don't see myself as a student, in fact, I haven't ever since I left uni full time at Huddersfield. At the moment I only technically count as a student as I haven't finished my masters dissertation yet. And I work full time.
Its not that I see being a student as a bad thing, but there are certain things that I associate with students that just aren't me. For example - sleeping at silly hours, using words most people don't understand, forcing themselves to read books they aren't interested in etc. There's probably other stuff that I can't think of right now too, but the point is that although some people see that side of me as defining me, I feel the complete opposite.
But things are gonna change with this blog, as I'm probably not gonna be in my current job for all too much longer it doesn't particularly matter whether my bosses put two and two together any more. So hopefully in the next few weeks I'll be able to get off my chest some of the observations I've made at work and of my involvement with my trade union too.

2 comments:

  1. interesting post, now I'm a student again I like to refer myself as a student so I can embrance certain parts of the student stereotype but shake of the shackles of other parts of the stereotype at the same tiee.

    Safe in the knowledge that I became known in the party as a shop steward before I became known as a student

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