Committees and working groups

While caseworkers and reps handle individual and department/faculty-level issues respectively, and the overall strategy of the branch is decided collectively at branch meetings, the working groups provide a space for members to work on issues that cut across OU structures. Joining a working group is a way for volunteers to get involved with issues that are core to the OU mission, and those that go well beyond it.

Our groups are always looking for new members – please contact [email protected] if you’d like to get involved. Or see our take part page for other ways to help.

We have groups working on:

Building the union

• Recruitment and organising group

Specific issues

• Divestment and complicit investment
• Generative AI
• Milton Keynes Area
• Research-focused staff
• Workload intensification
• Sustainability and community wealth building
• Retirement
• Policy

Committees

• Rep committees
• Executive committee
• National committees and Congress

Recruitment and organising group

The recruitment and organising working group works to make the branch more visible, stronger, and bigger. The group aims to cover a mixture of strategy and tactics as we think about how to build a larger, more engaged membership overall, as well as how to campaign on specific issues and respond to current happenings at work.

As one of the biggest, most active and most generalist working groups, the recruitment and organising group is a good place to learn more about how the branch works, and to become more active in OU UCU. We meet twice a month, alternating between Tuesdays and Thursdays.

Divestment and complicit investment

Our branch, alongside the OU Palestine Solidarity Group and OU Friends of Palestine student group, is calling on the OU to remove its investments in companies that are complicit in Israel’s ongoing genocide and occupation in Palestine, and to remove arms companies from its student-facing careers events. The divestment and complicit investment group works in support of this campaign.

You can read more about this campaign on the Divestment campaign page.

Generative AI

The Generative AI (GenAI) working group is a space for members from all staff categories to engage with the impacts of GenAI on our working environment and practices. Wider environmental, diversity and reputational concerns are discussed while reviewing university projects, policies and intentions. 

Both potential benefits and drawbacks are explored, with a diverse range of expertise and opinions represented in the group. Anyone who would like to contribute towards providing feedback to both the OU and UCU with regard to GenAI-related issues in the workplace is welcome to join.

Milton Keynes Area

The MK Area Working Group provides a space for members to work on issues of interest to people in the area. This could be anything from issues around campus-based and hybrid working (hotdesking, heating, the Hub), to local community organising, civil society and charity work. With so many of us in the same place, we also have the opportunity to run face-to-face union social events and recruitment events, and to coordinate with our sister UCU branches at MK College, Cranfield University, and HMP Woodhill.

The Working Group will allow us to organise around these MK area-specific matters, while ensuring time in branch meetings and other union forums can be dedicated to issues relevant to all our members across the UK and Ireland. 

Other area-based working groups or one-off events can be supported; volunteers should contact the branch mailbox.

Research-focused staff

The aim of the group is to collate issues faced by research-only and research-support staff at the OU and generate recommendations. The issues and recommendations are then communicated to appropriate channels (e.g. Research Development Concordat Steering Group, Research Committee, etc.). We also get asked to comment on policies and papers affecting research staff, and provide viewpoints of research-only and research-support staff on policies and papers which affect all staff. The group meets on average once a month.

Workload intensification

Our group exists to challenge workload intensification and protect fair workload norms across the university. We focus on the impact of academic time tariffs and the broader time squeeze faced by staff. We highlight how severance schemes, non-renewal of fixed term contracts and casualisation increase churn, insecurity and stress, while undermining research and teaching. By gathering evidence of staff experiences, ranging from coping struggles to structural barriers for researchers, we aim to safeguard rights, promote sustainable practices and ensure that institutional change does not come at the cost of wellbeing.

Sustainability and community wealth building

This working group focuses on the OU and UCU’s actions to reduce environmental harms, achieve a Just Transition, mitigate and adapt to climate change, and ensure that the costs and benefits of the transition are distributed fairly.

Retirement

Open to members still in employment, retired, or any point between, this group addresses issues linked to retirement. It covers in-work questions of flexible retirement and reduced hours, continuing work when over the state pension age, and USS pension queries. The group also provides a hub for our retired and near-to-retired members to plan member activities, including links to UCU’s regional/national retired members structures.

Policy

Whether you’re interested in learning how to write policy, in organising opportunities for members to make their views known, or preparing areas of specialist expertise, this is the group that does it.

Policies under discussion, negotiation or consultation

Due to limitations with the website we can't put borders around the table cells, which makes the following quite hard to read. Hopefully if you're this deep into the detail you'll muddle through, but do email us if you need an Excel file as a reasonable adjustment (borders will show on some web browsers).

The following polices are currently the subject of active engagement between UCU and management. It is not intended as a comprehensive list of all policies that UCU would seek to influence. If you know of anything requiring addressing, please make us aware.  

Rep committees

There are three rep committees that support reps, split by contract type (staff group). These are the Associate Lecturer (AL reps) committee, the Academic-Related and Professional Services (ARPS reps) committee, and the Academic and Research-only (A&R reps) committee. These groups bring together UCU reps from across faculties and units to work on issues affecting their respective groups of staff, and are a space for reps to connect and seek support.  

If you are a rep for one of these staff groups, you are automatically a member of the respective committee. You should have been invited to the meetings for your committee. Contact [email protected] if you think you've been missed off the list, or if you are a member looking to bring an issue to wider attention.

Executive committee

The executive committee is responsible for the day-to-day running of the branch. They are elected once a year in a ballot of the membership. For more information about the executive committee, see the Branch Executive Committee page.

National committees and Congress

The OU branch has always made a strong contribution to the union's national and regional structures, particularly the advisory committees and National Executive Committee. OU members currently on national committees include:

• Gillian Jack – Women members' standing committee, November 2024-2026
• Lesley Kane – National Executive Committee, May 2024-2026
• Lesley Kane – Women members' standing committee, 2025-2026
• Les Levidow – Climate and Ecological Emergency Committee, November 2023-2027
• Shivanti Lowton – Black members' standing committee, November 2024-2026
• Shivanti Lowton - TUC Race Relations Committee, March 2024-2026
• Shivanti Lowton - Disabled Members standing committee, November 2025-27
• Penny Oderberg – Migrant members' standing committee, November 2024-2026
• Saleem Rashid – Black members' standing committee, November 2023-2027
• Peter Wood – Climate and Ecological Emergency Committee, November 2022-2026

The OU UCU is entitled to send observers to the Scottish and Welsh National Executive Committees, the Northern Ireland Regional Council, and the English Regional Committees. Please email [email protected] if you would like to contact the existing observers or to attend the meetings yourself.

Finally, we are entitled to send a number of delegates to Congress, which alternates between the late May Bank Holiday weekend (Sat-Mon) and the week before (Wed-Fri). The process for seeking motions and volunteers to be delegates tends to start in January, to support planning.