The gigs, the Gitanes: students have been denied the life they deserved | Jonathan Wolff

This year’s graduates may never even know what they have missed – and it’s not the lectures

The birds are singing, the sun shining and flowers are poking through the soil; suddenly we are in the second half of what has actually started to feel like the spring term. Even better, university teachers can dare to dream of once more accidentally writing on a whiteboard with permanent marker. Many have been expressing their deep yearning to get back into the seminar room. What about our students? They want to be on campus too, of course – but not necessarily for the same reasons.

Think back to your school or university days. What are your fondest memories? My guess is that you are not reminiscing about a lecture. Formal contact hours are typically only a small portion of time spent at university. For me, my sharpest campus memories are heated discussions about the failures of capitalism and the inevitability of nuclear war, hazily mingled with badly kept keg beer and the fog of Gitanes, or the night my band played a gig on the fourth floor of the student union.

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