Author: Chantal Bellefeuille

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Concordia Student Union News

Concordia students’ access to legal services on campus threatened

Archived photo by Catherine Reynolds / The Concordian

Without notice, the Concordia Student Union (CSU) executive team motioned to terminate Concordia University’s Legal Information Clinic (LIC) and replace it with a private plan provided by the Alliance pour la Santé Étudiante au Québec (AESQ) insurance association on Jan. 26. This decision will drastically affect students’ access to legal information and support, creating significant barriers for women, English-speakers, immigrants, racialized individuals, and people living with disabilities.

“I think this is one of the worst ideas I’ve seen coming out of the CSU. Students will be losers if this proposal goes forward,” said John Hutton, the former CSU Finance Coordinator of 2018-2019.

The weeks following the CSU’s decision were met with intense backlash from supporters of the clinic from organizations such as the Center for Research-Action on Race Relations (CRARR) and Concordia University’s International Student’s Office (ISO), along with lawyers, volunteers, and students. 

The LIC put forth their counter-motion on Feb. 14 to be voted on and a settlement was not met. A resolution putting the clinic in a state of limbo was put into place and the CSU has yet to publicly release its response, leaving the clinic’s fate up in the air.

According to Ken Downe, who represents the Concordia Arts and Science Federation of Associations (ASFA) on the CSU’s council of representatives, the CSU executives were asked on Feb. 14 why they decided to opt for a privatized plan and quickly brushed concerns and questions aside.

“They didn’t ever answer what their intention was, originally. They hadn’t prepared anything official,” they said. “The CSU isn’t acting in good faith, there’s no transparency and we don’t know what their exact proposal was going to be. We don’t know their reasoning for that.”

Many holistic services provided by the current LIC won’t be included in the new ASEQ insurance. This will make it more difficult for students to navigate their legal issues, especially for non-French speakers. CRARR Executive Director Fo Niemi says that people who file claims to immigration or the Commission des normes, de l’équité, de la santé et de la sécurité du travail (CNESST) without the LIC’s help could be rejected due to poorly drafted complaints.

“A lot of students don’t understand the language, structure, law, system, and worse than that, there’s a lot of pressure to get a quick settlement,” Niemi said. “Under this new plan, students won’t be properly advised. They won’t get much out of these processes.” 

The LIC has helped and referred students to CRARR several times over the past 15 years, such as in the race and gender-based discrimination, and sexual harassment case of Mei Ling, a former ASFA vice-president. In the ASEQ plan, sexual harassment cases aren’t covered. This furthers CRARR’s concern about society’s trend of the increased industry takeover of privatizing public services.

“It has an impact on who gets access to justice,” Niemi said.

The LIC is a free service that gives students access to legal information, referrals, and accompaniment in both French and English. Their team strives to provide students with the best possible resources and options that will aid individuals in making the most suitable decision regarding legal issues. The LIC’s goal is to inform students on how to get the fairest treatment available under the law.

“The LIC doesn’t offer representation, that’s not our mandate. It’s to offer information and support to empower students as legal actors. When we are being asked to compare ourselves to a private insurance plan, it’s false equivalency and it’s not fair to what we do,” said Hannah Deegan, a lawyer who supervises the law student volunteers on a part-time basis at the clinic.

“The clinic is about helping students in the moment and taking the time to help them develop better reflexes about how the legal system works because nobody teaches you how to do that,” Deegan said.

Esther Chu was one of the many students that the LIC empowered. Last September, the LIC reached out to inform her that she wouldn’t be eligible to apply for a permanent residency anymore via the Programme de l’expérience québécoise (PEQ) due to the National Assembly of Quebec’s drastic language requirement changes to the program.

The LIC took swift action, gathered students to contest the Quebec government’s decision and invited Chu to testify. Because of this, students like Chu who were part of the PEQ program and didn’t meet the new language requirements, remained eligible until November 2024. 

“I was very touched by the LIC’s proactive solution-oriented support to the international student community in Concordia. If the LIC closes, it will be a devastating loss,” Chu said.

Downe says that due to the ambiguous nature of CSU’s policies, the CSU executives thought it was in their power to make this kind of decision. However, to remove the fee levy that funds the LIC, there would have to be a referendum to remove the clinic. 

“Within the CSU policy it’s unclear whether the executives can change the services without removing the fee levy and holding a referendum, and there are gaps in the policy that allow things like this to happen,” Downe said. “The bureaucracy of the CSU is its downfall. It’s not well connected to students and direct democracy isn’t there.”

The current fee levy for the LIC is $0.28 per credit or about $8.40 per academic year per undergrad student. The ASEQ Studentcare Legal Care Program’s first proposal to Concordia, which was rejected in March 2021, had a price of $25.00 per academic year per student. Former CSU Executive John Hutton believes that if the ASEQ plan is adopted, the LIC won’t be the only non-profit service to go. 

“Students will be paying more, get less and be very poorly served because community non-profit legal clinics have fundamentally different approaches than for-profit insurance companies. I see this threatening all the service centers,” Hutton said. “The ASEQ’s proposal mentions things like supporting students who face tenant issues. That’s the HOJO’s [Housing and Job Resource Centre] territory. Why wouldn’t ASEQ be like ‘Hey, we can do the work of HOJO too’?”

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Opinions

Project 2025, the dystopian political agenda you need to know about

Graphic by James Fay @jamesfaydraws

As the United States elections draw closer, the right-wing has a plan up its sleeve to undermine democracy and backtrack the country by decades.

The American political landscape is grim. As an American watching her country become increasingly more and more divided, unravelling into policy-making mayhem, I can’t help but worry for the safety and wellbeing of my family in the swing state of Pennsylvania.

Even though I voted for him in 2020, I’m worried about Biden’s ability to govern for another four years. Donald Trump currently has a significant lead in the polls, and it looks like he’ll become   the Republican Party nominee for the 2024 election. To me, voting for Trump is out of the question. So, I toyed with the option of not voting in the next election. But since I was told about Project 2025, I think every American needs to go to the polls and vote for Biden to prevent this horrific vision from becoming reality. 

If Trump is elected into office, I think Project 2025’s manifesto will become his main handbook. He’ll sign off on the majority of its proposals and will reverse the progress that the United States has made by decades. 

Project 2025’s 920-page manifesto Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise is spearheaded by the right-wing organisation The Heritage Foundation which aims to “unite the conservative movement and the American people against the elite rule and woke culture warriors.” Its goal, backed by several dozen right-wing think-tanks, is to establish a stand-by government that will be ready to implement their ideas and power on day one of the next Republican president’s administration. 

In a nutshell, their goal is to return to fundamentalist traditional values. They intend to bring back the “picturesque” 1950s nuclear family as the centrepiece of American life, dismantle the administrative state, and return the country to a self-governance state. They want to further the definition of Article II, which establishes the power of the Executive Branch of the government, meaning they would implement the unitary executive theory that would give the president exclusive power. This could override congressional and judicial review and grant the president more power than ever before.

Their desire to turn back the clock on LGBTQ+ and women’s rights by more than half a century includes proposed policies such as making it criminal to even help someone get an abortion, stating a “robust agenda to protect the fundamental right to life, protect conscience rights, and uphold bodily integrity rooted in biological realities, not ideology.” 

Another notion of theirs is to “maintain a biblically based, social science-reinforced definition of marriage and family,” essentially making all LGBTQ+ marriage invalid. This, along with heavy Evangelical Christian ideals presented throughout the manifesto, starts to sound like a watered-down version of Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale. If you want to know more, I highly recommend YouTuber Leeja Miller. She breaks down their entire plan, and it’s terrifying.

Trump’s base will be Project 2025’s secret weapon. Trump’s Make America Great Again  (MAGA) movement has been identified by scholars as a quasi-New Religious Movement—a kinder way of saying it’s a cult. Project 2025’s initiative aligns perfectly with his fear mongering strategy which states, “The federal government is a behemoth, weaponized against American citizens and conservative values, with freedom and liberty under siege as never before.” 

Trump’s rhetoric preys on the middle class by telling them the answers they desperately want to hear, which has indoctrinated people so deeply that their undying loyalty to Trump will deploy them in droves to the polls. 

The U.S. is so divided, but the least we can do is to try to prevent the Great American Experiment from falling into a religious-based fascist dictatorship. Awareness of Project 2025 needs to be mainstream. It isn’t getting the media attention it deserves because people think it’s too fringe. But wasn’t the idea of Trump becoming president of the United States fringe at one point? 

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Concordia Student Union News

CSU holds its fall by-elections debate

Student candidates attended the CSU council by-elections to share their ideas for the university's future. Photo by Chantal Bellefeuille / The Concordian

The CSU’s fall by-elections debate focused on tuition hikes and student engagement.

On Wednesday, Nov. 1, the Concordia Student Union (CSU) held its fall by-elections debate on the seventh floor of the Hall building, where referendum committees and CSU council seat candidates were given the chance to present their platforms to students.

Students will be able to vote for campaigns such as Dave Plant’s advocacy of not renewing Concordia’s 2026 contract with Aramark, Kendra Downe’s promotion of anti-colonial solidarity with Palestine, and the Kahnistensera Mohawk Mothers, Giancarlo Laurieri’s pledge of enhancing student accessibility to CSU services, and Ryan Assaker’s intention of establishing a solid push back against tuition hikes.

These four council seat candidates were in attendance along with one referendum committee member. The candidates discussed issues such as the Coalition Avenir Québec’s (CAQ) tuition hike for out-of-province students and the disconnect between the CSU and Concordia’s student body during the debate.

“The CSU is looked upon as this demagogical society that exists above the student body when, in reality, the CSU is the representation of the students’ thoughts as a unified thought,” said Laurieri.

Laurieri proposed that the council get more involved in student media so that students could be more informed about what the CSU is doing. He also suggested that the union establish public Q&A events to give students more opportunities to bring up their concerns to the council. 

“A lot of people don’t know that the CSU is reaching out to fight against the tuition hikes, or that this source is available for students to use,” he said.

Concordia President Graham Carr stated on Tuesday that the university could lose up to 90 per cent of its out-of-province enrollment due to the tuition hikes. As the policy threatens implementation, the CAQ maintains that it’s aimed at protecting the French language by limiting the number of anglophone students in Quebec.

Students, however, feel differently. “It’s not a question about protecting the language, it’s a question about abusing the students. There are better ways of protecting the French language” said Assaker.

At the debate, referendum committee member The Link’s editor-in-chief Zachary Fortier, presented The Link’s fee levy increase campaign to increase funding to the student newspaper. The campaign asks to raise the current fee of 19 cents per credit to 40 cents, in order to meet inflation.

“Investing in The Link is investing into student life, and making sure there’s a dynamic and prospering community that gets amplified to the -nth degree,” said Fortier. “We’re a necessary presence on campus. I have a deep fear that we’ll cease to exist if we cannot make enough money to pay people a livable wage.”

Fortier highlighted the importance of the student newspaper’s coverage history, like giving Palestinian students a voice during Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s 2002 visit to Montreal. “The Link has always been a place of advocacy for underrepresented students to have a voice,” he said. 

The CSU by-elections campaigning phase will end on Nov. 6, and students can cast their ballot from Nov. 7 to Nov. 9.

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Briefs Concordia Student Union News

CSU hopeful for a successful by-election

Photo by Catherine Reynolds/ The Concordian

The Concordia Student Union starts its campaigning phase aiming for a significant turnout at the polls.

On Oct. 30, the Concordia Student Union (CSU) started its campaign period for its fall by-elections. The by-elections serve to vote on referendum questions and fill empty seats on the CSU’s council of representatives. This year, the CSU has 22 seats available on the council. The campaigning period will last until Nov. 6.

According to Simply Voting, the online platform that hosts the CSU elections, the turnout in 2022 was only 5.7 per cent. CSU Loyola coordinator Talya Diner blames COVID-19 for last year’s low participation. She is hopeful that more people will be interested in casting their ballot this year. 

There are two referendum questions being presented to the committees in the fall by-elections. They are about whether or not to increase the student services fee by $0.85 per credit, and to propose the introduction of an anti-islamophobia policy to CSU’s Section 5 by-law entitled Anti-Racism, Diversity, and Inclusion. 

“The by-elections are super significant. This is the best time to get involved in the CSU,” said CSU student life coordinator Tanou Bah.

A public debate is scheduled for Nov. 1. This event will allow candidates and referendum committees the chance to introduce themselves to students and present their ideas concerning Concordia University and the CSU. The public debate will take place at 6 p.m. on the 7th floor of the Hall building.

“Being on the council is a way for students to get directly involved in the democratic process that governs how the CSU spends the money that students give to the union. It’s really important that students get involved so that the CSU can represent students honourably,” said Diner.

The polling phase will start on Nov. 7 and end on Nov. 9. Students will receive an email from the CSU encouraging them to vote. The CSU will also have polling stations at the Loyola campus on Nov. 7 in the SP building, and at the SGW campus on Nov. 7 through Nov. 9 at the Hall building mezzanine to help guide students through the online voting process.

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Concordia Student Union News

CSU’s Transitional Housing Project’s second phase unanimously passed

Photo by Catherine Reynolds/ The Concordian

Concordia Student Union continues its program to help students and community members transition out of homelessness.

In their last meeting, the Concordia Student Union (CSU) successfully greenlit the continuing development of the CSU’s Transitional Housing Program. This project was intended to last only until Nov. 2. However, due to its success, it has been prolonged into a phase two until Aug. 2024. The second phase is the continuation of the first phase but with a bigger budget to assist more people.

The Transitional Housing Program gives struggling unhoused students and community members the opportunity to have temporary housing for up to three months while looking for a permanent place to live. 

CSU sustainability coordinator Maria Chitoroaga, who ran for her position because of this project, proposed this program’s second phase in the council meeting. The motion was passed unanimously. 

“This project is very close to my heart. It’s one of those projects that directly impact students’ lives,” Chitoroaga said.

The Transitional Housing Program’s first phase had a high success rate. Half of the people who have been housed have already found a permanent place to live and have graduated from the program. Several people did not need the full allotted three months to find permanent housing. The remaining individuals who need help just recently started the program.

“Our projection was that people would stay for three months, but one person stayed for just under three months, and another only stayed for half a month,” said Chitoroaga.

These people exceeded the CSU’s expectations and became independent faster than expected. However, the CSU’s Housing and Job Resource Centre (HOJO), anticipates an increased demand in the upcoming months because of the housing crisis.

“I would like to keep seeing ways in how we can enshrine this project so that it is permanent,” said CSU External Affairs and Mobilization Coordinator Hannah Jackson.

The CSU owns three furnished apartment units located close to Concordia’s Sir George Williams campus. Since the start of the program seven people have benefitted from the project’s help. These people either lacked stable social networks and were faced with dangerous sleeping spaces or relied on friends, where they could only stay for a few weeks.

“What has been done with the Transitional Housing Project is pretty exciting and unique in terms of what student unions are doing to substantially make a difference with students in precarious housing, which we know is getting worse,” Jackson said.

Students who wish to apply for this program can book an appointment at the HOJO to explain their situation. HOJO’s housing search director then interviews candidates on their situation. Those who do not qualify for temporary housing can still request additional help.

Phase two’s approved budget is $30,000. This will be funded through the Student Space, Accessible Education and Legal Contingency Fund. The proceeds go to funding the housing search director’s salary, furnishing, operating and groceries for the apartment units.

Towards the end of the meeting, the council touched upon a student-led class lawsuit against Concordia University. This issue is regarding the transfer of information for the purpose of administering Concordia University’s student health and dental insurance plan. This case is still ongoing and has yet to be resolved. 

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Community

K-pop dance workshops help students with self-acceptance

Club member Sooah Kil (Left) Dancing with Amanda Beronilla, K-Pop Club Communications VP (Right) - Chantal Bellefeuille / The Concordian

Members of the Concordia K-pop Club gain the confidence to express themselves by dancing to their favourite K-pop choreographies

The crowd is excited, the stage is lit, and K-pop is blasting through the nightclub’s speakers. For first-year Concordia University student Lana Masselon, this memory makes her eyes sparkle with joy as she talks about K-pop events that she has attended around Montreal. 

Dancing to K-pop has given her the confidence to overcome her fear, go up on stage, and dance in front of a large audience. This is thanks to the Concordia K-pop Club, which holds several dance workshops throughout the fall and winter semesters. They invite members and non-members to learn choreographies from the community’s favourite K-pop groups and to be true to themselves through dance.

Club member Sooah Kil (Right) Dancing with Amanda Beronilla, K-Pop Club Communications VP (Left) – Chantal Bellefeuille / The Concordian

Masselon attends most of these dance workshops and sometimes even teaches them. She has a modern-jazz dance background but fell in love with K-pop when she learned choreography to the song ‘Kill This Love’ by Blackpink. This inspired her to take a K-pop dance class. 

However, since starting university, she has not had the time to keep up with weekly lessons. She said that the workshops sprinkled throughout the school year provide her the opportunity to get exercise and give her a sense of accomplishment. 

“If I’m active, I’m happy. I know I need to be active, and K-pop helps keep sports in my life,” Masselon said.

Club member Sooah Kil (Left) Dancing with Amanda Beronilla, K-Pop Club Communications VP (Right) – Chantal Bellefeuille / The Concordian

She said she has found her identity through being accepted by the K-pop community. It has allowed her to break free of society’s status quo. 

“Before K-pop, I felt like I didn’t have a style. I just followed what everyone else was doing, and I wasn’t really myself,” she said. 

As a taller person, Masselon hid behind clothes she hated, such as jeans, when she wanted to wear clothes like skirts and knee-high socks. One of her favourite K-pop idols, Kim Hongjoong from the group ATEEZ, inspired her to feel more comfortable in her skin. 

“I was uncomfortable and scared about what people would think of me,” Masselon said. “Hongjoong says you can wear anything, as long as you feel confident in it, so I don’t try to hide myself anymore.” 

She believes that dance brings the K-pop community together, allowing people to meet new friends and bond over common interests. 

Other club members feel the beneficial effects that the dance workshops have on their lives too. Concordia K-pop Club President Inas Fawzi strongly feels that the dance workshops have built her confidence more.

“After learning K-pop dances, I started liking my body. It gave me a love for my physical being. Before I was just floating, I wasn’t attached to it. Now I’m like, ‘Wow, I look cool,’” Fawzi said. 

Amanda Beronilla, the club’s vice president of communications, also teaches dance workshops. She says that dancing to K-pop is one of the main ways that she can express herself. 

“Ever since I was small, I have always loved dancing. I wanted to go into ballet, but I was never able to. With K-pop dance, it feels like I’m able to do something that I’ve always wanted to do,” Beronilla said.

The dance workshops are fun and inclusive. Unlike a K-pop dance crew with high standards, these dance workshops are very welcoming. There’s little pressure, and people are encouraged to come and join in, regardless of their dance skills.

Each two-hour dance workshop is held at Concordia University’s Sir George Williams Campus on the Hall Building’s seventh floor. 

You can follow the Concordia K-pop Club on Instagram to learn about upcoming events.

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Features

CREW’s campaign to ditch TRAC met with positive response 

CREW campaign pizza party, Chantal Bellefeuille/ THE CONCORDIAN

Concordia University’s teaching and research assistances stand together as they accumulate signatures to create a new union before the April 3 deadline that advocates for better pay and benefits

On March 24, the Concordia Research and Education Workers Union (CREW) held a pizza party at the university’s Loyola campus to bring together TAs and RAs to express their support for leaving the Teaching and Research Assistants at Concordia Union (TRAC). The CREW campaign is optimistic about change thanks to the overwhelmingly positive response of TAs and RAs who are choosing to make the switch.

As people started to trickle into the meeting room in the Richard J. Renaud Science Complex, the overall attitude of attendees as they started eating was that they were done with TRAC. The Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC), the parent union of TRAC, failed to support its members in meeting their demands for a collective agreement with Concordia University that included a pay raise above inflation, better benefits for international students, improved protection against overwork, paid training, and better job security. 

The main topic people discussed was their unfair salaries. According to the TRAC 2023 Demands Draft Points on the CREW website, TAs and RAs at Concordia University are paid by tier, making between $17.24 to $29.81 an hour. TAs in other universities like McGill make a minimum of $33 an hour. CREW wants to abolish the tier pay rate and establish equity amongst their members. Biochemistry TA and RA Frances Davenport emphasized that PSAC doesn’t have their back. 

“PSAC didn’t even try to refute the salary issue. One of the talking points that they put on their website was that McGill students technically do more work, so TAs at Concordia don’t deserve more money. That’s so wild to me because there are people on CREW’s campaign team who say, ‘I TA at Concordia and my partner TAs at McGill. We have the exact same job,’” Davenport said. 

CREW is confident that its new potential parent union, the Confédération des syndicats nationaux (CSN), will help them win their fight. They’ve seen CSN’s support for the Association of Graduate Students Employed at McGill (AGSEM), McGill’s TA and RA union, who is a local union of theirs. 

“AGSEM has been helping us campaign as well. We have come together to compare job descriptions and responsibilities and they are the same. The only difference is that for AGSEM, it is outlined in a contract, PSCA won’t even give us a contract.” Davenport said.

Alex Engler (left) biology delegate for TAs and RAs and Frances Davenport (right) Biochemstry delegate for TAs and RAs, Chantal Bellefeuille/ THE CONCORDIAN

Former TRAC President Sam Thompson was also in disbelief at PSAC’s response. 

“It’s an amazing illustration of how little understanding PSAC has of the valuable work that the teaching assistants do at Concordia. We are absolutely essential to the very functioning of the university,” Thompson said.

“Without us, it would simply fall apart. So, the idea that our work is less valuable than what McGill does is laughable.”

CSN allows their unions to be autonomous, meaning that if CREW officially signs with them, they will be able to have the final say when CREW brings their issues to the bargaining table. PSAC’s diplomatic structure doesn’t provide this. 

Joey Ricardo, a research assistant in Concordia’s biochemistry department, thinks that PSAC has neglected its members in the past and didn’t try to help TRAC negotiate for a better salary and benefits. This is the fundamental reason behind the switch, giving TAs and RAs more control over their situation. 

“CSN is less involved as a parent union and will let CREW do what they want to do. TRAC was at the mercy of PSAC. Now if someone is saying, ‘No, you can’t negotiate pay,’ CREW will be able to decide whether they want to renegotiate or not. CSN will only be there for support,” Ricardo said.

This is why CREW believes that for real change to happen, they need to put the pressure on. They think they deserve a better deal than what PSAC is willing to offer. 

“PSAC has made the claim that CSN comes and raids their unions, bringing PSAC’s unions over to CSN. CREW’s campaign team did their research and reached out to CSN for help. This movement is a grassroots movement, started by graduate students,” Davenport said. 

She says that CSN supports CREW’s principles, like how CREW stresses that TAs and RAs are university employees. According to Davenport, Concordia University emphasizes that they are students first, denying TAs and RAs employee benefits.

Thompson says that the CREW campaign has spoken to thousands of TAs and RAs who have made the switch from TRAC to CREW. The relationships that the TA and RA community has formed over the last couple of weeks have never been in a stronger position. They have received support from every single department at Concordia University.

“It’s so amazing to see members so excited by a project that fills them with the hope that contains the promise of real dignity at work,” Thompson said. 

“It’s also been an incredible opportunity to build momentum in the lead-up to negotiating with the university. Members look at the deal that they’ve had for 15 years and know that it can be better. They want the opportunity to fight for that positive change.”

For the switch to officially comply with Quebec’s labour union laws, CREW needs to have 50 per cent of TRAC members sign a petition stating that they want to resign from TRAC to join CREW. 

Towards the end of the pizza party, Ph.D. candidate Victor Quezada, who’s been working as a graduate student for Concordia since 2019, commented that he thinks the switch will officially happen. He has noticed how the TA and RA community has become more tight-knit because of CREW’s encouragement and people have been participating to get the word out. 

“I have good expectations. We have good representatives who are fighting for change. CREW are very involved, engaged, and have put everything that they have into this,” Quezada said. 

PSAC was contacted for comment but didn’t respond in time for publication.

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