Vote Kieran Minto

If you want a representative that holds the university to task, represents your views, works with you and campaigns passionately not just for all postgrads but the whole student body, vote Kieran. We are the 25%!

Policy focus.

Postgrad Funding:

Queens is supposed to be a “research-intensive” university; however funding, scholarships and grants are hard to come by and even harder to live on. How can the university continue to claim to be a bastion of learning and a promoter of education when it treats its highest level students as badly as it can. I pledge to:

• Lobby the university, funding bodies and local government to provide more funding for master’s and PHD positions.
• To decrease the massive workload many postgrads are saddled with for meagre pay and improve working conditions. Postgrad students should not be used simply as low wage labour for the university.
• To create a more vibrant research environment through better investment in facilities and technology.

Tackling the rising cost of living:

Students are one of the most economically vulnerable groups in our society, saddled with exorbitant tuition fees, debt, high rents and poorly paid employment. We are supposed to be part of a university community however instead we are treated more as customers; The university should be a place of higher learning not an organisation designed to extract money from those it is supposed to serve.

Students feel the brunt of the current cost of living crisis, Queens needs to do more to tackle these issues. I will campaign to force the university to:

• Fund bus and rail passes for students.

• Provide more financial assistance to all students and especially those struggling to even feed themselves.
• Pledge to freeze planned rent increases. I fundamentally appose and have fought against the attempts by the university to increase accommodation rent fees, which frankly is shameful to propose during the current crisis.
• Provide long term food assistance, a few mornings of free breakfasts (while stocks last!) is not going far enough.
• Oppose any increases in tuition fees and to campaign for the rollback of current fees.
• Provide more scholarships/funding and to increase the size of current grants. Completing a PHD should not resign you to years of poverty.

Campus sustainability:

I have always been a keen environmental advocate, and believe the university could be doing much more to make the campus more sustainable and pleasant to spend time in. The university should lead the way in making Belfast a more sustainable city.

• Queens owns large tracks of land in Belfast, this land is poorly utilised and should be used to provide recreational spaces, improve biodiversity and even to produce food through student run co-operatives.
• Queens is an institutional leader within Belfast and must follow the example of other universities to become energy self-sufficient.
• The creation of biodiversity rich gardens on campus, helping Belfast become a greener city.
• The SU building incorporates little in the way of plants, with plenty of unused roof space that could be turned into bio-gardens.
• Th promotion of cycle lanes around campus and to campaign for more around the city.

Improve student involvement:

With all these issues is it any wonder that postgrad involvement in wider university life is so low? How can you join a club or go to an event when you must juggle classes, research, teaching, work and a family as many of us do. Improving conditions for postgrads will go a long way in allowing them the opportunity to take part more widely with the university.

However, postgrad students can often feel left out from clubs and societies, or as if events and services offered by the students union are not for them, this needs to change. We have as much right to take part in university life as everyone else. I will push for:

• More postgrad cantered events, not just at the start of the year but all year round.
• The promotion of Clubs and societies as places for postgrads to feel welcomed.
• The greater inclusion of Clubs and societies within the SU structure. Too long have clubs and societies felt ignored by the SU.
• The further utilisation of the graduate school as a place for clubs, meeting, and evens.
• To make it easer for students to plan and host their own events on campus.

About me:

I am currently studying a masters in ecology. I am a keen climber, fencer, and surfer. Though I may be new to Queens, I have always been a passionate advocate for students’ issues, serving as a faculty, school, and course rep; taking part in strikes and campaigns to oppose rent increases and protect lectures pay. I have first-hand experience of how difficult the transition into postgrad can be for anyone, especially when you have been out of university for a while or are coming to Queens from a different university.  

My focus is to make student life better at Queens for all postgrads; after all, we now make up more than 25% of the student base, isn’t it time the university paid more attention to our issues? However my proposals aim to make the university better for all students, both undergrad and postgrad.

What I stand for:

• Listening to the issues that are important to you and getting them resolved.
• Greater resources to be made available for postgrads and increased funding.
• Holding the university to account where it fails us.
• The promotion of sustainability on campus
• Promoting postgrad centred events, initiatives, and opportunities
• The streamlining and centralising of the scholarship system within the university, to ensure you don’t miss opportunities you deserve.
• Programs to provide a warmer welcome both for students from outside Queens and returning students.