University of Reading slammed over science cuts

The university council voted in favour of axing up to 33 posts from a number of courses, including computer science, electronics, cybernetics and chemistry.
 
The union described the move as a 'huge blow' to the university's scientific reputation and 'the latest in a long line of shoddy decisions by management.' The news comes less than a year after the university closed its school of continuing education and its highly-regarded school of health and social care, despite warnings that the move would result in a shortage of social workers, nurses and counselors in the local area.
 
This latest blow to science at the University of Reading follows the closure of the university's award-winning physics department in 2006. UCU says the university failed to give any coherent academic reasons for making the cuts and accused the vice-chancellor of 'taking a wrecking ball to the sciences'. The union has called on the university to introduce a voluntary redundancy scheme instead of pushing ahead with compulsory job cuts.
 
UCU branch chair at Reading, Timothy Astin, said: 'After the shambolic closure of the physics department in 2006 we hoped we had seen the last of cuts to vital subjects but it would appear that we were mistaken. It seems that no subject at Reading is safe from the axe. The university is taking a wrecking ball to the sciences at time when science and technology graduates have never been more important to Britain's knowledge economy.
 
'Today's decision is another huge blow for staff and students from a management that has failed to give any coherent reasons for the cuts.  If the university is intent on making savings it should look first to a voluntary redundancy scheme instead of pushing ahead with compulsory job cuts.'