UCL’s Lockdown Entrepreneurs: the UCL Justice Collective
In the second of our articles in the ‘Lockdown Entrepreneurs’ series, which seeks to find and report on some of the student-led initiatives that have emerged at UCL during lockdown, we speak to Noella and Hannah, founders of the UCL Justice Collective.
Image by UCL Justice Collective
On June 19, Noella and Hannah, two second-year Natural Sciences students at UCL, put forth the petition "Five Steps Forward: A Petition on Anti-Racism at UCL" in response to what they describe as UCL’s “lukewarm” statement on Black Lives Matter and the steps the institution has taken so far to address its past (and present) links to eugenics. As they released the petition – which thus far has gathered hundreds of signatures – into the UCL community, they decided it should not be sent out exclusively under their names, and so the UCL Justice Collective was born.
But although it was originally imagined as little more than a name under which to sign a petition, the UCL Justice Collective has since grown into an influential and innovative organisation within the UCL student community. The collective now has well over 60 active users in its group chat, a growing following on social media, and connections with various activist societies at UCL – from the BME Students Network to Liberate the University, which staged an occupation of the South Cloisters in support of striking workers last spring.
The Justice Collective describes itself as a “network of individuals/ activists/ societies/ groups within UCL advocating for change” and aiming to raise awareness of many of the issues within the university, to make it easier for anyone to advocate for justice at UCL, and to bring different activist groups together. Noella and Hannah characterise it as “a sort of coworking space,” where different activists and activist societies can come and work, access shared resources, and draw inspiration from one another.
Therefore, the Justice Collective is emphatically not a society – or at least not as the term is usually understood at university. There is no membership, no joining fee, and most radically, no hierarchy. “We wanted the Collective to be a completely collaborative and horizontal organisation, so there are no leaders; we hope people who join will take initiative and organise amongst themselves,” explain its founders.
This experimental and rather unconventional way in which the Collective is organised has so far been quite successful, even in spite of the obstacles lockdown poses. Although Noella and Hannah admitted that organising as activists during the pandemic has been “quite tricky,” the Collective has been able to set up shared to-do lists, resource packs, Zoom meetings, and different group chats that have kept the group on track.
Since its first petition – which demanded that UCL address many of the manifestations of racism at this university that its official statement neglected – the Collective has worked on a host of different issues. The Justice Collective has drafted and supported several petitions, created resource packs on matters like decolonisation, and used its Instagram to create concise and informative posts on eugenics, outsourcing, widening participation and more at UCL. Still on its to-do list are a number of other actions that might prove crucial in the near future when it comes to holding UCL accountable; for instance, several community members are working on centralising UCL’s statistics on BAME and private versus state school intake, as well as on numbers of permanent and temporary staff.
Besides continuing with the variety of projects that they’ve recently started, Noella and Hannah said that in coming months they will be looking to expand the Collective. They are looking for more writers, editors, researchers, designers, social media curators, and administrators to join the team, as well as new ideas for campaigns – in their words, “no idea is ever too niche.” They will also be looking to host discussions and Q&A sessions on many of the issues they work with, and to continue looking for ways to effectively conduct their activism online.
Born in the midst of lockdown and in the wake of the killing of George Floyd, the UCL Justice Collective is an ambitious attempt to unite the many activists and activist groups at this university, and it is sure to remain in the spotlight in the next academic year.
The UCL Justice Collective is on Instagram and Facebook, and their website has plenty of resources as well as information on how to join the community.