Thank you enormously to everyone who has signed the petition. I want to avoid clogging your inbox but I do have a few things to update you on.
Today is the official deadline for staff comments on the proposal to close UWAP. Thanks to all of you, staff will be able to say ‘almost 10 thousand people’ signed the petition. Keep sharing though, today is still only just beginning in Western Australia ! Perhaps we will get the extra 375 signatures we need by the end of it ?
For those of you in Perth, the #SaveUWAP Pop-Up Arts Festival is today at 1pm on campus at UWA, in Whitfield Court. There will be readings from UWAP authors and more.
The two Open Letters that have been circulating have both been published – one in the Saturday Paper on the weekend (including Helen Garner, David Malouf, Christos Tsiolkas and Melissa Lucashenko - pictured), and one here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/uf4puo70silp6wm/An%20Open%20Letter%20Against%20the%20Closure%20of%20UWAP%20%28official%20version%29.pdf?dl=0 (including J M Coetzee, Kim Scott, and Thomas Keneally)
The Academic Board of UWA meets tomorrow to prepare for the December meeting of the UWA Senate (the governing body of the University). All of your signatures and comments will be printed out and provided tomorrow to help the Board marshall their arguments to the Senate for saving the Press.
Finally, UWAP staff themselves are incredibly heartened by the response to this petition. In fact, to say THANK YOU, UWAP would like to offer petitioners a 25% discount across its back and frontlist by applying the discount code SAVEUWAP in the final stage when purchasing from uwap.com.au. (They cannot guarantee delivery before our Christmas closedown, but if orders are placed up to 12 December they’ll have the best chance of arriving in December).
While you are on the UWAP site, please consider signing up to their mailing list. You will get updates on the doings of the press and upcoming titles. To sign up, go to the home page at https://uwap.uwa.edu.au/ You may get a pop-up inviting you to subscribe straight away. If not, scroll to the bottom of the home page and click the blue ‘subscribe’ icon at bottom right (under the Follow Us heading and the Facebook, Twitter and Instagram icons). Provide your name and email address and you’re good to go.
That’s it for now. The mood is cautious optimism. Indications are that the UWA admin has been taken aback at the size of the public outcry: the noise we have made so far has made a difference! Keep up the pressure, keep sharing and talking about this issue and this petition, and when there is more to know, l’ll try to update you. Thank you !