The coffee campaign after three weeks

Wow! What a campaign month!

After the first week, the Coffee Campaign's petition had almost 1500 signatures. Now, as the third week draws to a close, we have passed 2500. We knew before the campaign that there was widespread dissatisfaction with coffee prices at Uppsala University, but the turnout we have received has exceeded all expectations.

One of the important messages we took to campus was that Uppsala University has the highest average price for a cup of brewed coffee among comparable universities. This fact did not surprise many students. On the contrary, students were well aware that there is something wrong with the prices of campus cafés. Many said that they refrained from buying coffee on campus because of the prices, others came crawling with cold coffee that they had dragged with them from the Pressbyrån bought in central Uppsala.

So... what happens now? What's the next step? What happens to all the signatures? 

Well, we'll tell you! The next steps in the campaign are as follows:

1. Continued campus presence - We are not done with campus visits. For example, we will be holding our first Student Forum on 30 November at Blåsenhus - an opportunity for students to talk directly to the union. The first event will take place in the first week of December and will have the theme 'My Campus' and more information can be found in our calendar.
   
   
2. Dialogue with Uppsala University - Next week, we look forward to resuming dialogue with Uppsala University to look at how we can work together for student-friendly services and lower prices. We have all the signatures with us, which shows how big the dissatisfaction is among students and how important the issue is.
   
   We are also looking forward to getting a clear answer from the intendants [campus area managers] regarding the exclusive rights that campus cafés have long been said to enjoy on campus; which has stood as a barrier to student activities that want to serve or sell coffee on campus. Our conversations with university stakeholders indicate that this exclusivity may not be as self-evident as it has long seemed.
   
   Updates on our work with the university can be followed on our social media channels. Stay tuned there to see how the fight for better coffee prices develops!
   
   
3. Making demands on the campuses - Next week we are getting ready to hand over the petition and present our demands to the campuses. Of course, we hope that the cafés will realise that it is unreasonable for Uppsala's students to have to drink more expensive coffee than the rest of Sweden's students. If the cafés are willing to cooperate, we are convinced that Uppsala University can go from worst to best when it comes to student-friendly coffee prices!

Handing over the petition to the campus cafés does not mean that the petition is over. The fact that more names are rolling in helps us show that the issue is alive. So keep spreading the word among your friends and sign the petition if you haven't already!

Support the campaign!

Finally, you may be wondering what you, as a signatory, can do to reverse the campaign. The first thing you can do, of course, is to become a member of the union. Being a member of the union strengthens our ability to influence the university and other stakeholders. A larger union is harder to ignore than a smaller one!

If you have signed the petition, shared it, are already a student union member and are still wondering how you can get involved in the issue, here are some tips: one of the most direct ways to have an impact on the university is to take up one of our student representative positions. As a representative, you sit in on the evaluation and development of courses and programmes, make suggestions and opinions on the content and design of education, and participate in the recruitment processes for teachers. Among other things! An exciting assignment with direct relevance to the coffee campaign is to speak on behalf of students as student representatives on the Indenture Council - the assembly that decides on the study environments at Uppsala University's various campuses. All student representative assignments are remunerated (you are reimbursed for your time) and can be found here: link

If you are involved in a student association and would like us to visit your events or meetings to talk about coffee prices, just write and we will arrange it.

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Woho! Now we lower the prices!