Key stories from this week

Stark pay gap for BME academics

A Varsity investigation revealed this week that black academic and research staff earn up to £12,000 less each year than their white counterparts, and those from Chinese backgrounds around £10,600 less. The investigation looked at the earnings of staff at the university who disclosed their ethnicity. The pay disparities in academia are likely attributable in part to few BME staff in the highest ranks of academia – 91.9% of Cambridge professors and readers are white, of the 84.5% who disclosed their ethnicity. Dr Manali Desai, equality officer at the Cambridge Universities and Colleges Union, said that “the University is aware that there’s a race problem” and that it is trying to make progress.

Cambridge staff will not strike

Cambridge staff will not be striking later this term after there was an insufficient turnout at the UCU ballot. The ballot saw 629 out of 1,308 eligible voters decide on whether or not to take strike action over pay issues, failing to meet the 50% turnout mandated by trade union law. Of those who voted, 88.4% voted in favour of strike action. 

NUS delegate election begins

Following the announcement of the candidates for the Cambridge delegates for the NUS conference, the candidates began campaigning on Friday. Overall there are 12 candidates, one more than the 11 last year, and more than double the five of the year before, making this election one of the most contested in recent years. Evie Aspinall has an automatic place as this year’s CUSU president, so the candidates will campaign to be elected to the remaining five places. The group of six delegates has to be gender-neutral, so two elected candidates need to be female. Voting opens on Tuesday, 30th October at 9am, and closes on Friday 2nd November at 5pm.

CUSU passes remembrance motion

A motion stating that it is “important to remember those who made the ultimate sacrifice, in particular during the First World War” was passed at the CUSU council on Monday. The motion, proposed by the CUSU executive team, passed with no votes against and seven abstentions. The motion comes after a fortnight of media controversy and targeted online attacks toward several Cambridge students – Aspinall stated that “in light of recent media scrutiny, we believe it is important for CUSU to provide clarity”.

On the lighter side…

Flat earthers do the rounds in Cambridge

Flat earthers set up a stand in Market Square on Wednesday, attempting to prove to the people of Cambridge that the globe is not in fact a globe. The display was decorated with posters telling the onlooker that “YOU ARE BEING LIED TO” and “THE GLOBE IS A LIE”. The information on the stand claimed to have “200 reasons” why the earth was in fact flat.

Liberal Cambridge

An investigation into national attitudes published last week found that the Castle area of Cambridge, which contains over a third of colleges, was the most liberal area in England. The investigation was carried out by the political action group Hope not Hate. In February this year, however, a report by the Centre for Cities named Cambridge as the most unequal city in the UK in terms of wealth and income. The report names the Castle area as an exemplar of its ‘confident Multicultural’ category stating that “the area surrounding St John’s College in Cambridge emerges as the most liberal” in England partly as a result of the high number of “highly educated graduates or postgraduates who see immigration and diversity as hugely positive, both economically and culturally”.