Welcome to our first National Liberation Conference!
Led by the Decolonise Collective, LibCon 2026 is the first National iteration of Liberation Conference.
Liberation Conference (LibCon) is a student-run and student-led conference dedicated to empowering student campaigners, encouraging political engagement and, strategising for the future, taking place on March 20–21st at the Oculus and FAB on campus. This year’s theme, “Forging Solidarity,” focuses on what it means to stand in solidarity with people, movements and causes, exploring ways solidarity can extend beyond traditional activism. As the first national conference of its kind, LibCon creates a space for students and academics passionate about liberatory praxis to convene and co-create entirely on students’ terms. The conference is organised around three main streams which are political education, culture and practical skills, these streams are the main foundation for our workshops and events. This year’s LibCon will feature workshops and panels in collaboration with our Liberation Societies, Warwick academics, alumni who are now activists and campaigners, external organisations executed by our student-staff team, the Decolonise Collective. It is a space to know about how and why it’s important to be involved with activism as students and this conference is the perfect space to do so. Tickets will go live on the 24th February, follow this link to secure yours: Liberation Conference 2026
This year's programme
Friday 20th March
Time: 10:30am-12 midday
Brunch and Welcome with Cllr Grace Lewis
Location: OC0.03
Time: 12:00-1:00pm
What Came Before Us
Location: OC0.01
To start off the conference, Eden from Leeds Students’ Union will deliver a talk on the recent history of the student movement across the UK.
Time: 1:00-2:00pm
Imagining the Revolution: Community Organising as Abolitionist Praxis
Location: OC0.04
Student Rent Strikes: Past, Present, and Future
Location: OC0.01
Elliott, a student officer from Manchester SU, will give a talk on the housing conditions in Manchester and how this led to the student rent strikes. With discussions on housing issues here at Warwick (first years being unable to be provided on campus accommodation and the shutting down of Whitefields), this session will provide insight into the housing issues across different UK universities and how students have organised against this in Manchester and at Warwick
Time: 2:00-3:00pm
Connecting Campus-based Climate Campaigns to real-world Communities
Location: OC0.05
Climate Justice Society will then deliver an event on the relationship between climate activism on campus to solidarity with countries and people across the world affected by climate change and climate migration. Relating international struggles in places like Palestine, Colombia and Nigeria to climate activism and organising on our campuses. Ultimately, making sense of how climate activism is not isolated and can be situated and showing solidarity within other struggles
Poetry Workshop with Black Untitled, Maureen Onwunali, and John Bernard
Location: OC1.09
A session held by Black Untitled and in collaboration with poets, Maureen Onwunali and John Bernard, will discuss the significance of poetry and how to construct poetry. People will then have the opportunity to write their own poetry and share it at the end.
Time 3:15-4:30pm
Essentials of a Student Organisation: Lessons from the Palestine Movement
Location OC1.09
A talk on lessons regarding student organising fromt the Palestine Movement.
Time: 4:30-5:15pm (Break and Relaxation)
Picnic and Praxis
Oculus Fields
A break to bring people together before joining the panel and will create a space for various different student organisers and SU officers across the country to discuss what they have been up to over the past year, to share strategies and and tactics and to create solidarity between students from different campuses.
Time: 5:15-8:30pm
Panel and Townhall: What Comes Next in the Student Movement
Location: FAB0.08
A panel made up of activists and Warwick Alumni discussing past activism, how to get involved in the student movement and the importance of community. Creating a space to consolidating the ideas around solidarity and intersectionality throughout the day. Ending the first day of LibCon having provided political education on solidarity across different student movements and struggles.
Saturday, 21st March
Time: 10:00- 3:00pm
Food and Stalls
Location: SU Atrium
Food and stalls will be available on the second day in the Atrium space, please convene here on Day 2 and volunteers will guide you to your sessions.
Time: 11:00-3:00pm
Breathing Space (Space to chill out and take a breather when needed)
Location: FAB3.33
This room will be available for those who need a space to relax.
Time: 10:00-11:00am
Campaigns, Coalitions, and all things Collective Struggle
Location: FAB 3.28
Following a year of Warwick Anti-Racism's Kick Coke Campaign, WARSOC will discuss how to build a campaign as students, how to make international struggles such as worker’s rights localised on campus and the importance of boycotting in a movement. In turn, WASS and People and Planet will discuss their collaborations on the Kick Coke Campaign, Divest Borders Campaign and so on and how these campaigns can be interrelated across societies focusing on different struggles and demonstrating wider student solidarity on campus.
Can the Student Movement do more for Sudan?
Location: FAB 3.32
East African Society and North African Society will provide a discussion on the genocide in Sudan and how it can be contextualised and understood in relation to wider struggles how students on campus can show solidarity and raise awareness through organising.
11:00-12:00pm
What Does it Mean to Show Solidarity with Congo?
Location: FAB 3.26
In collaboration with Professor Adyeeri from the Warwick History Department, this event will be a talk on the current genocide in Congo, how to raise awareness on campus as a student and the ways in which we can show solidarity and uplift Congolese voices.
Building Power Beyond the University with Climate Vanguard
Location: FAB 3.32
Climate Vanguard, a youth movement focusing on ecological breakdown in relation to racism and genocide, will discuss the historical role of youth in the struggle for liberation and the scope for students to build power beyond the university.
12:30-1:30pm
There is No Student Movement without Trans Solidarity
Location: FAB 3.26
TBC
The Decolonial Histories of Palestinian and South Asian Art
Location: FAB 3.32
Warwick Action for Palestine and BRWN Space will hold an event discussing different kinds of culture and art that acts as cultural resistance and its own form of decoolonisation. WAP will focus on the cultural significance of tatreez (Palestinian cross-stitching) and BRWN Space will focus on the history of the South Asian Art and its relationship to decolonisation. The second half of the session will be a workshop that will allow people to learn and practice tatreez as well as create their own art as well.
Time: 1:30-2:30pm
The history of Arab Jews with Warwick Kehillah
Location: FAB 3.26
Warwick Kehilah will give a talk on the history of Arab Jews and the ways in which this history has often been forgotten or erased.
Combatting Campus Militarisation
Location: FAB 3.32
TBC
Time: 3:30-5:00pm
Forging Solidarity through Performance!
Location: SU Atrium
Bringing together all the ideas shared throughout the day, and the things learnt across the conference, this open mic will allow people to share music, poems, comedy and art in a celebration of decolonisation and solidarity across cultures.