Sasha Andresier & Tomos Millward
The University of Nottingham recently announced plans to cut Jewish studies from the Theology department, effective September 2025. This comes as part of a wider move from the university to cut modules and staff. In 2023 and 2024 alone, the University of Nottingham spent almost £14 million on severance, ‘far more than any other University in the Russell Group’.
Jewish studies specifically has been targeted especially hard. As a result of this, Stephen Ballentyne (below), who began to run and offer courses on Biblical Hebrew whilst studying for his PhD, reached out to Impact so that we could tell his story. Stephen regards the cuts made to the Language Centre as resulting in the “eradication of Jewish studies” at the University of Nottingham.
Reasons cited by the university include a changing demand (presumably from the students, but this remains to be seen), lack of financial viability, as well as fundamental changes to resource allocation. This is vague, and naturally dismisses the great lengths lecturers like Stephen, as well as students I personally know, have gone to in order to prove this demand. Some have even offered to contribute their own resources and funding to the upkeep of the program, a number of £50,000 in Stephen’s case. But this goes largely unnoticed by the university, who arguably have made logistical moves towards reducing Theology studies altogether in the institution. This was clearly demonstrated at the end of last academic year, when all Theology students were made aware of the combination of their department with the Philosophy department – potentially an early sign of the university’s plans to minimise Theology as a discipline available to Nottingham students. Stephen discusses the danger of this kind of departmental change, citing not least the loss of over 200 jobs university-wide. Beyond what Stephen calls ‘the victimisation of those in the least stable jobs’, he states that the plan to modernise the university of Nottingham module choices achieves nothing but, ‘the swindling of students and the oppression of minorities such as those of Jewish race or faith.’
Beyond the cuts themselves, Stephen accuses the university of conducting these in a dishonest and opaque manner. He claims that the university set him a quota for the academic year 2024-25 to have 10 students signed up for his modules, a quota he met. With his ability to market the course properly for the next academic year, Stephen expected this number to increase. Stephen and his colleagues were told in May that, come September, all six Jewish Studies modules would be cancelled.
The lack of warning behind this decision, cutting September modules in May of the same year, has blindsided both staff and students. Many students feel aggrieved as they have made academic decisions, whether it be wanting to take a module or studying at the University of Nottingham at all, based on the existence of these modules. Rebecca* claimed that the university falsely advertised Jewish Studies modules before her arrival only to remove them in the middle of her degree. She would not have chosen to study at Nottingham if she knew this was going to be the case. Beyond this, her long-term educational plans have also been destroyed: “I had the intention of pursuing [a] masters. While self-directed learning is imperative, I am not learning from experts. I am not getting a foundational level of understanding. I am not getting an opportunity to learn something I never thought to pursue. With the loss of experts, I feel like we’re getting the bare minimum university education.”
Another student, Jack*, cited the current political climate when expressing frustration with the decision and claimed that the cancellation of all Hebrew Language and Old Testament modules “sends a message (whether intended or not) that Jewish perspectives and scholarship are not equally valued or supported in our [UoN’s] academic community.” Jack added that the modules were critical to the identities of Jewish students. Jack’s parents went further, invoking the current political climate and claiming the decision “smells of antisemitism.” On this issue specifically, Stephen did not believe a clear conclusion could be drawn, but described the decision as, at best, “culturally insensitive”.
In response to the cuts to the Language Centre, a rally was held on Wednesday 18th June outside the Trent Building. 70 people attended and the rally concluded with Professor Cecilia Goria, Head of the Language Centre, entering the building and presenting an official complaint letter to the university. In response, the university agreed to a meeting between themselves and Professor Goria to take place at a yet-to-be determined time. Stephen hopes that this meeting will result in the reinstatement of the modules and continues to maintain the affordability of himself, other staff members, and the financial benefits of the modules themselves. In spite of this belief and the action that has been taken, he remains despondent and views the reinstatement of the courses as highly unlikely.
In response to this article, the University of Nottingham’s Press Office offered the following statement:
“Higher Education in the UK is managing significant financial challenges, and like most universities, we have been affected by a fall in revenue across the sector.
The decision to withdraw any of our inter-faculty modules is not taken lightly, and we understand the disappointment this will cause to some students. The financial picture means having to make tough choices to reduce costs. As a result, we are no longer able to offer some modules in subject areas with low student demand, including Biblical Hebrew. This decision impacts multiple language programmes and is not specific to any one field of study, including Judaism.
However, there are opportunities to study other modules related to Hebrew and Judaism, and we continue to review provision when our new curriculum comes into effect in the 2026/27 academic year.”
*Names changed for anonymity
Sasha Andresier & Tomos Millward
All images courtesy of Stephen Ballentyne and used with his approval.
This is so ugly. All hell is breaking loose in the Middle East and the uni responds like this? They keep making these diplomatic gaffes, like when they timetabled Hebrew classes for Friday afternoon, right when so many Jewish students are preparing for the Sabbath! It just goes to show how little they care and how unplugged they are from their charges (no pun intended). Also, language classes DO make money. The uni pretends they don’t by adding £200,000 to the amount that Language Centre staff cost the uni. In fact, this same amount of 200k is added to the tab of every uni department as a way of distributing the uni’s debts. But the Language Centre doesn’t create these debts in the first place, it helps pay them off. You don’t need a degree in Economics to twig this. Nottingham has Lord Petyr Baelish as their Master of Coin, making the numbers behave on paper in order to keep his job, making it seem like culling Language Centre staff will save money, when in fact he’s only banking up further problems for Future Nottingham.