What a great time to be alive, so proud of the Youth of Today. #FeesMustFall
Students protest during #FeesMustFall
The youth of today stood together to fight for their basic
human rights of education to change the country’s education structure and stop
it from increasing insanely so they can accommodate those that cannot afford to
pay for their tuition fees. #FeesMustFall was started by students from
different Universities aimed at the same goal of not being excluded from
studying.
Brands did react to the movement, and there are negative and
positive responses to the movement. Some brands could have come out in support
of the movement and placed their resources and all that might be essential in
assisting the movement.
The negative results of the #FeesMustFall movement
Companies did not look after the interest of their customers
which resulted in lost productivity; brands are there because of people of
their community and public, so they could have given back by helping students
with at least bursaries, reducing their sales or giving them resources. It was
time consuming for brands to up and monitor activity on what is happening and
being said in order for them to respond to the situation and keep up with
current trends. Mr. Blade made a mean comment saying “Students must fall” and was
used against him and resulted in loss of credibility from students
Without a doubt there were many positive results
On the positive side, students used social media like
Facebook and Twitter to target a wide range of audience and this allowed
organizations and students to discuss ideas, post questions, post news and
share links about their way forward and celebrities supported the movement. Organizations were able to communicate
with their audience like Mo’Flava from Metro FM radio station announcing that
they will provide buses to the union building for free, giving water to
students during the protest and free wifi. Also their channel of communication allowed organizations to respond quickly to negative comments directed to them and address issues, many brands discovered and delivered more information on social media
Benefits of brands responding.........
When brand respond to such issues they will get exposure and
also they will garner support from society as their contribution would have
been seen as a form of a social investment. I.e. Increased revenue, and to the
students especially those who come from unprivileged backgrounds. I.e. The
University of Pretoria ensured that poor students will get to register for free
and UJ raised R30 million from fundraising.
The power of social media proved that a hash-tag can bring
people together aimed at the same goal and do everything in their power to
achieve it.
Students at UCT fighting for their basic human rights
I like how you showed us the positives that came out of this movement. A lot of other media mediums only showed us the bad things that happened during the protests.
True, the reason they decided to continue is that some students come from really unprivileged backgrounds and they have the potential to study but can't afford the tuition fees.
the fees must fall was probably the strongest movement of 2015
Anonymous said…
Only right that you support the movement seeing as you are part of that segment, the youth. I think the topic was covered well and in a way that didn't put me to sleep, I also want to comment on the blog's layout, very creative. Magnifique!
Very powerful post. I love how social media actually managed to bring together a bunch of students who had the same vision to stand together to fight for their basic human rights of education.
What a great post indeed. Students have the right to protest because everyone have the right to quality basic education and not everyone can afford to pay the fees.
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