The UCU branch at De Montfort University Leicester
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The UCU branch at De Montfort University Leicester
@ucudmu.bsky.social
130 followers 210 following 45 posts
Defend DMU!

ucu@dmu.ac.uk
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here's our branch banner at De Montfort Square
DMU UCU banner depicted in De Montfort Square in Leicester during a UCU rally
November 12, 2025 at 1:11 PM
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More photos from the rally today
Wide panoramic photo of the UCU rally in Leicester
November 12, 2025 at 1:04 PM
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DMU UCU is proud to stand with our colleagues at @leicesterucu.bsky.social
DMU UCU member speaking to the rally in Leicester
November 12, 2025 at 1:04 PM
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Private Eye once again reporting on the DMU leadership. Credit to the Leicester Gazette @leicestergazette.leicester.news who first broke the story.
October 1, 2025 at 1:37 PM
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Our branch is proud to stand with our colleagues at @leicesterucu.bsky.social
Image of a UCU protest at the university of Leicester featuring a number of picket signs image of a protest at the University of Leicester featuring a student banner reading "students and staff unite and strike"
September 24, 2025 at 12:51 PM
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Our friends at @leicesterucu.bsky.social are holding a rally tomorrow at 1pm. All DMU UCU members who are in the area, please consider stopping by to show solidarity!
September 23, 2025 at 8:37 AM
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The university deserves better. Leicester deserves better. DMU’s staff and students demand better. The performance of Katie Normington and her executive team can only objectively be defined as a failure, for which the university, its staff, its students and the city of Leicester have borne the brunt. It is a level of incompetency that has been exposed elsewhere, as was the case at the University of Dundee, where their leadership were obliged to resign. Without question, therefore, the time has come for the DMU leadership to do likewise and for an independent inquiry to take place before further damage is done to an institution that staff and students are invested in. It is, after all, our obligation - whether we are staff, students, Alumni or the public who benefit from the university or rely on it for the economic wellbeing of the city - to protect our valued institutions if those tasked with doing so have abrogated that responsibility. DMU Townhall Meeting 16th July 2025
July 17, 2025 at 8:54 AM
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The University has failed to maintain the previously hard-won Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF) Gold award and decimated the university’s research capacity—undermining whole academic units to the point of collapse, and rendering them non-viable. While imposing “essential spend” restrictions on academic departments, the University Leadership Board (ULB), with the consent of the (remunerated) Board of Governors (BoG) has embraced indulgent spending, racking up business-class expenses on a scale comparable to the entire budget of DMU’s much-lauded research institutes. Student-staff ratios have surged to unsustainable levels—we are now ranked 116th nationally — largely due to a weaponised redundancy programme that has demoralised staff, degraded the student experience, and driven the university into an avoidable doom-loop. The imposition of “block teaching”—a pedagogically regressive model was pushed through with no proper consultation or due diligence—has been a demonstrable failure. The continued denial to recognise that the introduction of that system has not produced positive outcomes, not least for student recruitment, shows a reckless disregard for educational standards. In a time of uncertainty and the need for prudence and careful, considered planning, the ULB has gambled university finances on high-risk ventures, particularly in London and Dubai, and now face potential multi-million-pound legal action from a former partner, Study World—yet another example of strategic failure by former academics cosplaying at venture capitalists and ‘global leaders’, with money generated primarily from student fee income. Concerns raised by students about investing in Dubai, where LGBTQ+ staff and students would not be safe working or studying in, have been met with anodyne responses. The creation of Innovative Educational Partnership (IEP) Ltd, a shadow employer for international franchises and the DMU London ‘campus’, stands as a shameful attempt to circumvent fair employment terms and pension rights. It betrays not only the staff but the values that once underpinned this institution and the values of Leicester, a democratic, decent, multicultural city - a city of sanctuary. Most grievously, DMU’s leadership has failed in its core duty: to serve the City of Leicester and its people. The university’s civic mission has been all but abandoned as governance has been centralised and purged of meaningful staff or student participation. After four formal votes of no confidence, the verdict from the DMU community could not be clearer. Katie Normington and the ULB no longer possess the trust, legitimacy, or moral authority to lead the university, but by prioritising their own careers and not insignificant salaries, they have become an existential threat to it. The BoG, which is supposed to act as the guardian of the institution, has failed to hold the leadership to account, instead their chair sends threatening emails to staff. This is demonstrative of a system of governance that no longer functions in the best interests of the institution and its many stakeholders.
July 17, 2025 at 8:54 AM
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A statement from the recent DMU Town Hall (with alt text - apologies for past omissions)...
A Reckoning with Failure: Five Years of Catastrophic Mismanagement at DMU In August 2020, in the wake of the scandal that led to the resignation of Dominic Shellard, the previous Vice Chancellor of De Montfort University (DMU), Katie Normington, a Deputy Principal (Academic) at Royal Holloway, University of London was appointed. After the reputational damage caused by Shellard’s removal, it was hoped that the appointment of Normington would herald the beginning of a more positive era for DMU Five years on, the evidence shows clearly that this has not happened. On the contrary, matters have worsened considerably under her leadership. After five years of mismanagement, decline, and lost opportunities, the time has come to confront the bitter realities of her tenure at the head of DMU. The evidence is overwhelming and damning: Normington’s tenure has been defined by strategic incoherence, risky investments, indifference to staff and student welfare, and a dereliction of the university’s civic and academic responsibilities. That she has presided over a precipitous fall in academic standing, abandoning the institution to the lowest reaches of national league tables and now languishing at 120th is undeniable. Worse still, there has been no discernible recovery strategy—no aspiration, no plan and no hope. https://www.thecompleteuniversityguide.co.uk/universities/de-montfort-university/clearing The so-called “student experience” has been hollowed out by chronic underinvestment, while physical assets of the university have been sold off, not to reinvest in our mission, but to be squandered on franchise operations in wealthy cities such as Dubai and London. Executive appointments have been made in defiance of internal opposition and the recommendations of boards comprising senior academics, with these staff representatives overruled in the recruitment processes, further eroding trust and confidence.
July 17, 2025 at 8:54 AM
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Today we sent an open letter to DMU Leadership asking, once again, for them to engage in a good faith consultation process.
July 1, 2025 at 11:24 AM
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"De Montfort University is part of Leicester. Do not let us lose this."
July 1, 2025 at 11:21 AM
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"Maths and economics and business are clearly not Normingtons strong points"
July 1, 2025 at 11:20 AM
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"as a student from a poor family...my De Montfort fees in Leicester are paying for a campus in Dubai that has state of the art facilities"
July 1, 2025 at 11:19 AM
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DMU has made it back into Private Eye's latest edition thanks to the legal situation around its Dubai campus. As noted by @privateeyenews.bsky.social the apparent lack of due diligence on this matter is deeply troubling.
June 26, 2025 at 9:45 AM
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Thank you to all who attended our protest against DMU cuts held at Trinity House this afternoon, students, staff, members of the public. The message was clear: #DefendDMU
June 25, 2025 at 1:50 PM
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Students pay attention to how much the university leaders are making whilst making drastic cuts to teaching. DMU leadership seems not to be interested in moderate pay reductions to help contribute to "necessary" cost cuts.
June 18, 2025 at 3:00 PM
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As our students have pointed out, responsibility comes with the title of "best university for LGBTQ"
June 18, 2025 at 2:57 PM
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Engagement from our students is deeply encouraging: we are fighting these cuts because staff working conditions are student learning conditions. #DefendDMU
June 18, 2025 at 2:56 PM
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June 17, 2025 at 9:19 AM
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Fantastic to see this kind of solidarity from students!

#DefendDMU #NoConfidence
June 17, 2025 at 9:18 AM
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DMU UCU members should have received their ballot to vote in the motion of no confidence in the Vice Chancellor and the University Leadership Board. Please check your email!
June 9, 2025 at 3:43 PM