Monday 22 December 2014

Memo to all staff: Graduation Deportation Protocol

To: all staff.
From: university security and ceremony directorate
Subject: Graduation Ceremony protocol.

Colleagues, like every university, we have a formal procession at graduation. The students take their seats in the Grand Theatre and we staff march there in pairs from the ivory tower in all our finery, escorted by a chap of military bearing carrying a great heavy mace. The traffic stops as the townsfolk pause to admire us and (hopefully) aspire to one day join us.

Next year, thanks to the Home Secretary and her leadership aspirations, some alterations will have to be made to the pomp and circumstance.
Theresa May to 'kick out foreign graduates' in new immigration plans

  • We will still parade through the streets, but we'll be accompanied by a phalanx of G4S security personnel (Mubenga Division), resplendent in their ceremonial body armour and steel toe-caps. The billy-clubs and handcuffs will be merely symbolic detail and the Mace of Office will be adapted to include a spring-loaded net to ensure full attendance. 
  • Outside the Theatre, gleaming black transport will await our honoured overseas graduates, complete with blacked-out windows on each bespoke, individual cell. 
  • Each bright young student will hear their names called and walk on stage to collect their degree certificates from the Vice-Chancellor. Enclosed in the scroll will be a heavy parchment copy of the student's extradition order, personally electronically signed by the Home Secretary wishing the lucky graduate a safe and speedy trip out of the country. 
  • Before they leave the stage, an accountant in gold-trimmed robes will formally offer each student a card reader to settle any tuition fees and deportation costs while an appropriate song plays to cover the sounds of any churlish and undignified protests. 
  • Staff are reminded that weeping is undignified and that higher education funding is now dependent on informing the authorities on any student or colleague suspected of a) being foreign b) holding unauthorised opinions. (Please note: annual appraisal will now take place in the basement. Please ensure that you bring a signed copy of your Extremism Disavowal form CTCH-22 and warm clothes).
  • As the beaming, freshly-minted graduate leaves the stage, the Mubenga Corps will offer them a congratulatory headlock and escort them into the airport-bound black maria. On arrival any survivors will be given celebratory 'bumps' by their guards of honour and waved off to start a new life using their new-found skills somewhere else.

We trust these minor tweaks to the annual ceremonies meet your approval.