Student Action Involves You

It has been argued by many university students that the unusual position of students in the community enables them to be "their country's conscience." Student views are not susceptible to economic pressures, yet students have the intellectual ability and the time to consider the world's problems and local questions of importance and take a stand upon them.

This is disagreed with by other students— past surveys at Victoria show that those in disagreement are a minority here—who take the narrower view of students as people with one aim only—graduation. Student views, they argue, are matters of personal and not of group significance, and students should not speak as a group.

Whichever view you take, student action will continue to exist, and it is important to know something about it, if only in order to be able to explain it to non-students.

Student action takes two forms. The first is the policy pronouncements of the Student's Association. These may come from the Executive — in which case they probably originated as a recommendation of one of the ten sub-committees; or as a direction from a general meeting of the association. Most often they concern matters of direct importance to students, such as bursaries or acommodation, but statements of broader political or social significance are made from time to time.

An example of this first sort of student action occurred late last year when the Association became one of many New Zealand organisations to sign an open letter to de Gaulle on nuclear testing.

The second type is the personal protest. This is of particular significance in New Zealand because, unlike in many of the more nationalistic countries of the world, organised student demonstrations are not a common part of the political climate.

The Left-wing has always had a greater tendency to demonstrate than the Right, and Victoria is no exception. 1964 demonstrations included protests at South African racial discrimination and various aspects of nuclear testing.

Other examples of student action may be found in the resolutions of N.Z.U.S.A. and of Congress. The resolutions of the latter will be making news in student papers just as most students begin the year.

Some demonstrations have been spontaneously remarkable — the best example being the 1962 protests when university fees were tripled.

The idea of Student Action is one which often create one of the first problems of the new student. Coming from an environment where ideas are given to him, not asked of him, he finds a new freedom which may puzzle or bewilder him at first. Apathy may not for him be a useful choice.

Yet the question is not one which is forced upon any student. All he is asked to do is judge the controversy in the light of his information and act accordingly.