Category: News

Ralliement etudiant Haiti-Canada (REHC), a club that is housed in one of the annexes on Mackay Street, may find themselves out on the curb despite the clubs commissioner’s best attempts to accommodate them.
The REHC’s offices are housed in the second floor of the P-annex on Mackay Street, in a space that is comparatively much larger than space allotted to other clubs, said CSU clubs commisioner Chris Schulz. It was decided that another club, the Concordia University Tamils, would move in and share the space with them as of November.
“Ralliement was active at the time as far as we knew, they had re-registered and applied for money,” Schulz said.
He added that with space at a premium and many clubs searching for a larger space or any space at all, addressing this issue was important.
In the fall, Schulz and REHC president Thierry Dominique had come to an agreement on what needed to be moved out and specifics for the shared club space. A deadline was given for the club to re-organize the space.
As of February, none of the items had been moved, despite ultimatums and correspondence from the student union. Schulz also discovered that Dominique was the only member of the club. Since there were no other members, he determined the club no longer required its allotted space.
“He was very belligerent in his manner and he said he’d get back to me, but he didn’t,” Schulz said.
Despite repeated attempts, the Concordian was unable to contact the REHC through their offices.
A motion was passed at the last CSU council meeting, requiring the club’s only member to see Schulz in person or move out of the space effective Feb. 28.
“When you’re asking an association or a club to leave a space, they should have the opportunity to speak on their behalf,” Schulz said. “But they haven’t had that option because they’ve refused to contact me, so I felt this [case] required the legitimacy of a council resolution.”

The unpleasant situation of switching from one program to another can be avoided if students know more about themselves and what they are getting into, says Robert C. Boncore from the Counseling and Development department at Concordia University.
According to Boncore, students should have “the necessary adequate information on available programs and have a great sense of who they are.”
Most students in university who eventually change their major may not have the necessary information on all programs and careers such programs would lead them to. They may also not have an understanding of themselves before making their decision, Boncore said.
A person with a decent level of self-awareness is able to compare their strengths and abilities against the kind of career they may have after graduation, Boncore said.
“An informed decision can only be made through this awareness,” Boncore added.
To help students make the right program choice, a career and educational planning model has been designed by Boncore’s department, where individuals are tested in an attempt to assess certain traits about themselves.
Individuals are taken through two types of tests: the personality test and the vocational interest test. The model is aimed at helping students make a comprehensive personal assessment – get sufficient information regarding available programs and the external realities related to the job market, he said.
After having been taken through this assessment and other informational sessions, students entering Concordia from cegep or other institutions get all the needed information. “(This allows students to be) more focused with a clearer idea of themselves and their career goals that they score high in and can subsequently make a good decision,” Boncore said.
For students who have already made a decision regarding their program of study, the department’s career resource centre is the place to learn about job opportunities in the world of work in relation to their careers, Boncore added.
Sheelah O’Neill, an academic advisor in the Communication Studies department, said course descriptions in the academic calendar give students a good sense of a particular course. However, they are also generic because various courses will be adopted by the professor teaching individual courses to “suit his specialty or interest, unless a course has a specific mission to accomplish.” This is the case of multi-sectional courses.
She advises students to visit the various departments and talk to the right people to learn more about course content before choosing them. This would save students the trouble of hopping from one course to another every time they later discover that a particular course is not what they had expected, O’Neill said.
Both Boncore and O’Neill said students who are influenced by their parents tend to choose programs in engineering, communication studies and the sciences, partly due to a perception that job opportunities will be guaranteed upon graduation.
The students only realize afterwards that they were in the wrong program all along.
As much as parents should influence their children’s decisions on what to study in university, both emphasize that a student’s decisions should be respected. Children should not be forced into programs against their will where they cannot be successful in their education. According to O’Neill, it is of great essence that cegep advisers encourage students preparing to enter university to visit the schools and departments of their choice to become acquainted better with their future.
Most students interviewed said they usually drop a course for another if the course load is more than they can bear or if they don’t like the nature of a course.

It is clear that leaders from all three major student associations are in agreement that all members should pay into the Concordia Student Union. The only question is to determine how much.
The CSU, now the official representative of the entire undergraduate population after it legally accredited this past fall, is currently collecting fees from about two-thirds of its members. Students enrolled in commerce, administration, engineering and computer science currently do not pay any fees to the student union.
With the student union’s accreditation signed, sealed and delivered, now comes the task of bringing the student union’s funding back to levels it enjoyed when all members paid into it.
A motion was put forward at the last meeting of the CSU council on Feb. 14 to ask for a fee of $2.00 per credit from the entire student body at the upcoming referendum — coinciding with the annual student union presidential elections.
CSU President Rob Green contends that an increase in the current CSU operating budget is necessary now more than ever, in light of the more than $193,000 that the union was defrauded of and the ensuing costs that come with it.
The student union is currently plagued with a myriad of dilemmas, including inadequate funding for clubs, limited services and a lack of presence on the Loyola campus. Green also said that money earmarked for student union special projects and new projects like Green’s own CSU human rights office are generally the first one on the chopping block when there are financial difficulties.
A lack of presence at Loyola is also a concern to Green. “There’s no question about the university’s revitalization of Loyola, and the CSU needs to be prepared for that. This is a two-campus university and we are a one campus union.”
Green said the CSU will likely add a full-time accountant, which the student union’s legal staff estimates will cost at least $50-60,000 per year in salary alone.
Accountant: unnecessary expense
The Engineering and Computer Science Association (ECA) and the Commerce and Administration Students Association (CASA) have both said they have no problem with paying a fee, but getting to that dollar figure will require some give and take at the negotiating table.
“Before their budget is raised, I think they need to show that they can do a good job with what they have already,” said ECA president Mario Ciaramicoli.
At the last CSU council meeting, CASA president Rabih Sebaaly suggested that an increase of $2.00 across the board was unnecessary. He also said such an increase would also represent a one-third increase in the union’s budget.
As an alternative, CASA’s president suggested that the fee be lowered for all students to $1.33, thus maintaining the CSU’s current budget while giving students’ pocketbooks a break.
“This way, everyone would pay the same without increasing the CSU budget,” Sebaaly said. “For CASA, it is not an issue that every single student should pay fees. The issue is whether the CSU needs and deserves a 33 per cent increase in its budget. That is the only issue.”
He said the CSU need to outline where any extra money will be spent before he agrees to an increased CSU budget. He also said new monies should not be applied to costs related to the recent case of internal fraud.
Both Sebaaly and Ciaramicoli have questioned why the CSU needed a full-time accountant.
“Fifty-thousand dollars [for an accountant] is too much for an organization that barely has a $1-million operating budget. Many companies don’t have one. What they do is they hire the service of an accounting firm, where someone works part-time. Why not hire a student? After all, we produce the best accountants in Canada at Concordia.”
“This money shouldn’t be going to something [like an accountant],” Ciaramicoli said. “It should be going to the clubs and student groups.”
ECA’s current president added that he also supports putting aside a certain amount of money for clubs, citing ECA as an example. Fifty percent of ECA’s budget goes directly to societies and groups that fall under it.
The CSU has pledged to put 20 cents of each dollar aside for clubs.
“I’m optimistic that we can deal with this by the end of the week,” said Ciaramicoli. “Personally, I want to get this over with by the end of this week so that we can concentrate on our respective elections.”
“I don’t want this to be confrontational,” he added.

With the Concordia Student Union’s accreditation signed, sealed and delivered, it was only a matter of time before the major sticking point of student fees would come up.
It was the sore point during past accreditation runs—executives from the Commerce and Administration Student Association (CASA) and the Engineering and Computer Science Association (ECA) refused to agree to pay service contracts or per credit fees to the CSU.
The CSU, now the official representative of the entire undergraduate population at Concordia University, is only collecting fees from approximately two-thirds of its members. This is because students enrolled in commerce, administration, engineering and computer science currently do not pay any fees to the student union.
A motion was put forward at the last meeting of the CSU council to ask for a fee of $2.00 per credit from the entire student body at the upcoming referendum. This referendum will coincide with the annual student union presidential elections
While the student union is just now starting to recover from the internal fraud that shed the union of more than $193,000, CSU President Rob Green contends that an increase in the overall CSU operating budget is necessary now more than ever. He said an increase in overall budget would mean an increase in the level of campus life.
Green said the student union is currently plagued with a myriad of dilemmas, including inadequate funding for clubs, extremely limited services and a lack of presence on the Loyola campus.
He also noted a constant slashing of the student union special projects budget—generally the first one on the chopping block when there are financial difficulties.
There is also the case of the CSU Human Rights Office—one of Green’s campaign promises—which could not be realized due to a lack of funds
With the university’s commitment to revitalize Loyola, an added CSU presence is needed, Green said. “There’s no question about the revitalization of Loyola, and the CSU needs to be prepared for that. This is a two-campus university and we are a one campus union.”
The student union will also be adding on a full-time accountant, which the student union’s legal staff estimates will cost at least $50-60,000 per year in salary.
Green stressed that if the motion is passed, there will be negotiations to follow.
“As the motion is worded, it is meant to return to the CSU to what it had before CASA and ECA stopped paying,” Green said. “Not coincidentally, those executives (with larger budgets) had a larger presence at Loyola.”
At the same CSU council of representatives meeting held Feb. 14, CASA president Rabih Sebbaly suggested that an increase of $2.00 across the board was unnecessary.
Instead, CASA’s president suggested that the fee be lowered for all students to $1.30, thus maintaining the CSU’s current budget while giving students’ pocketbooks a break.
“This way, everyone would pay the same without increasing the CSU budget,” Sebbaly said, emphasizing that the question was not whether students should pay, but whether the student union’s budget should increase.

A referendum question could increase student fees for members of the Commerce and Administration Students Association (CASA) and the Engineering and Computer Science Association (ECA).
The CSU said that the fees are necessary in order to cover increasing costs, but some ECA students disagree.
“I am surprised that the CSU came up with the motion without prior discussion with us,” said Mario Ciaramicoli, president of ECA.
At the CSU Council of Representatives meeting on Feb. 14, the referendum question will be up for approval by council, along with other questions.
This particular question asks that the membership fee of two dollars be “applied equally to all CSU members.”
This means that students in Commerce and Administration and Engineering and Computer Science – who do not currently pay the two-dollar-per-credit fee to the CSU – will have to now pay a fee to both the CSU and their faculty association.
“Our student fee is two dollars and five cents and with the two dollar fee from the CSU it will cost ECA students four dollars per credit,” said Karim Ibrahim, vp external for ECA.
CSU president Rob Green said that it is only fair that all CSU members, which include all undergraduate students, pay for CSU services. “Arts and Science, Fine Arts and Independent students currently pay for CSU services and CASA and ECA students use them and do not pay for them. Other anglophone universities in Canada have higher fees per credit than we do,” added Green.
“The ECA would be willing to pay for certain fees, like the health plan. I am open for discussion and I am willing to make a compromise. Students feel that the CSU does not represent us. I do not think that the CSU is making a sincere effort to have closer ties with us,” said Ciaramicoli.
CASA president Rabih Sebaaly had no comment.
“The reason why the CASA and ECA presence is not felt in the CSU is because they chose not to be a part of the CSU. I would encourage them to run on a slate [in the upcoming elections],” said Green.
Green said that the CSU needs more funding since there has been an increase in the number of clubs in the last two years and the funding that the clubs currently have is not enough. “We are cutting the pie into smaller and smaller pieces and clubs don’t have the funding to pursue projects,” added Green.
“We want to revitalize the presence of the CSU at Loyola, so that Loyola will have more of a presence. We would like to have a presence, but their are no funds,” he also said.
The CSU also wants to hire a full time financial staff in order to run a “tighter ship” and to ensure that there will not be another fraud. The salary that will be paid for an accountant will be $50,000.
“The CSU does not need to have an accountant. We run the ECA without an accountant and without paying our exectutive,” said Ciaramicoli.

University and college student groups across Quebec want more proof that the provincial government will inject new money into the education system.
This message comes in the shadow of a public feud between Education Minister Francois Legault and Finance Minister Bernard Landry over rumoured cuts to education spending.
Although the Quebec government said it will not cut funding to education and the two ministers appear to have patched up their differences, some student leaders are still unsatisfied.
The row centred around promises of new spending in education made during the last provincial election and at last year’s Youth Summit.
Christian Robitaille, president of the Quebec Federation of University Students (FEUQ), said no one has made it clear how the government will keep its promise for more education funding.
“Francois Legault reassured me that there will be no new cuts and that he will keep all his promises [for new spending], but Bernard Landry hasn’t,” he said.
He also said it is unclear Legault will keep his promises by using new cash infusions or by cutting back in other areas of education spending.
Mistie Mullarkey, chair of the Quebec component of the Canadian Federation of Students, and CSU vp academic, said she thought Legault’s public outcry against education cuts was mostly genuine.
“There is a certain degree of truth in his actions. It would have been a PR nightmare for him [had he done anything else].”
She also said Legault’s public backing for education funding was very positive, adding that “pressure needs to stay on them until the budget this [spring]. What happened last week was an example of what can be accomplished when there is public pressure.”
Although the Quebec government promised an new $1-billion injection into education last spring, students at the time were asking for as much as two or three billion, Mullarkey said. “One billion dollars is not enough.”
She also suggested the whole affair may have been a trial balloon to gauge the public’s response to a reduction in funding for education.
Robitaille agreed: “What reassures me is that if this really was a balloon, we popped it.”
He also said he does not care about the Parti Quebecois political intrigue that may have been the root cause of the tug-of-war over education spending.
“[Legault] did what he had to do as a education minister,” he said, adding that ministerial solidarity is not his concern.

Want to know what it’s like to manage $1 million?
Ask a group of students in a new investment program recently established at Concordia. A select group of eight students from Concordia’s John Molson School of Business made their first professional trade and launched a new investment management program funded by a $1 million gift from former alumnus, Kenneth Woods, MBA ’75.
The students bought five different stocks on Feb. 1 and plan to be fully invested with a diversified portfolio by April 1.
The students are the first in the Kenneth Woods Portfolio Management Program (KWPMP), a two year, extra-curricular program that combines practical experience with mentoring. It is designed to give business students a ‘hands on’ experience in day-to-day investment management.
The primary purpose of the portfolio management program is to allow students in investment management to be responsible for the selection and management of an investment portfolio using actual funds.
Expanding on theory
“In the classroom, we teach a lot of principles and a lot of theory which is very important for practical use, but we are going one step beyond this. In this program, we are saying let’s put theory into practice and have students run real money and have them manage a portfolio with the objective of maximizing returns with a minimum level of risk,” said Lorne Switzer, Chair of the department of finance.
Students have access to three mentors each, drawn from a group of highly qualified professionals who have diverse areas of expertise in the investment management community. These professionals are drawn from companies such as the Caisse de Depot (Quebec’s public pension fund), CIBC World Markets, Formula Growth, Goodman and Company, Jarislowsky Fraser, Nesbitt Burns, Scotia Capital, Standard Life and TAL.
Despite the mentors’ busy schedules, the students work and meet with them on a regular basis.
All the students interviewed were very enthusiastic about the mentor relationship and felt it was extremely valuable to them. “They give us the benefit of their experience and the knowledge they have acquired through their own successes and failures. They are a great asset in helping us, in providing a support system and guiding us with future career decisions. The contacts we are making now are invaluable and the network is incredible,” said 22-year-old student Alka Patel.
Mentoring remains an important aspect of this program. Woods, co-founder and vice-chair of a major Canadian investment counselling firm, made the donation in memory of his own former professor and mentor at Concordia, Dr. Calvin Potter. Accordingly, graduating students from the program will be referred to as Calvin Potter Fellows.
Free to choose
Besides their mentors, students work closely with faculty in the department of finance and a client committee who oversee the funds.
Members of this committee include the chief investment officers from major investment funds, including CN Investments and BIMCOR Inc.
The students are totally autonomous in their choice of the funds within the portfolio and are subject mainly to criteria they themselves established prior to the program launch.
They were also required to develop an investment philosophy describing their style of investing and to establish investment policies which set guidelines for their choices in the portfolio. These were approved by the client committee who act as consultants and “keep us on track and oversee the direction we take,” Patel said.
“We have to support our decisions with arguments, show our research and basically prepare reports for each company we select. They read through the reports and question us. We just have to prove we’ve done our ‘due diligence’. They wouldn’t stop us unless it doesn’t comply with our own criteria and guidelines,” said Andreea Constantin, age 22.
Every year, eight students will be selected to join KWPMP for a two year period. “The idea is to keep the program small, because in the real world, that’s how portfolios tend to get managed – by small intimate teams of bright minds,” Switzer said.
Entry level students to the program must have successfully completed their first year in Concordia’s Bachelor of Commerce degree or Bachelor of Administration degree program and have completed the Canadian Securities Course. They are students with excellent academic credentials who have undergone an interview process to demonstrate their communication skills. They will act as research associates assisting the second year students who will be the portfolio managers.
Each student in the KWPMP is expected to give a significant amount of time to the daily management of the portfolio. Time is a big factor and is best explained by Constantin. “You have to be prepared to put a lot of hours into it and should really think about this before getting into the program. I would ask people first if it’s their passion, because for me it is a passion. I think it is for most people in the group… so it already is part of our life.”

The television screens in the Hall building have been blank for an entire semester now. Most students barely notice the black boxes that hang precariously above their heads as they dash from class to class.
But Chris Schulz sees them.
“Concordia needs a student television station,” said the Concordia Student Union clubs commissioner. “Everyone will benefit from having an open media at the university.”
Concordia University Television (CUTV) has existed at Concordia for over a decade and a half, promising to bring students the news and views of the day, with original programming in between. The goal of the station was to keep students informed, while giving club members hands-on training in television production.
But, according to the CSU, the station has been plagued by problems in recent years, ranging from mismanaged funds to stolen equipment. The most recent scandal to rock CUTV was the dismissal of Olivia Gottlieb from the position of executive producer by the CSU judicial board.
New elections are slated for this Friday, Feb. 16, as the club plans to install an entirely new executive and erase the mistakes of the past.
“CUTV was under investigation last year by the judicial board after a complaint by a student,” said Schulz. “There, they uncovered a number of disturbing things. [CUTV was] not able to account for missing money, and they were contracting their equipment out to the private sector and keeping the returns.”
Former members banned
The report by the board, tabled on May 30, 2000, states that all of the executive be revoked from their positions, and banned from becoming members of CUTV again. The report also placed the club under stewardship of the clubs commissioner for a period of two years. All of this, according to the report, was done in an attempt to restructure the club, and avoid any further problems.
“It was a pattern,” said Patrice Blais, CSU interim financial manager. “This goes back about 7 years. One group accuses the other of being corrupt and taking things, new people get in, and then things go missing once again. And all the financial records go missing or are never handed in.”
A first set of elections for the executive was held on Oct. 17, 2000. Gottlieb was re-elected as executive producer, breaking the judicial board’s previous decision. Repeated attempts to contact CUTV went unanswered, but Gottlieb stated in a recent interview she was unaware of the board’s decision, and ran for executive in a legitimate manner.
Schulz doubts this. “This is extremely unlikely. The decision was well published throughout the school, and copies of the decision were available,” said Schulz. “Copies of the decision were again available at the first judicial board meeting of the year, and she was also given a copy of the decision when she became executive producer.”
“If your club was being investigated, wouldn’t you want to know what was being decided? It was the same crowd in control again.”
By December, however, Gottlieb had been executive producer for 2 months, without the knowledge of the judicial board. It was discovered when Gottlieb entered the CSU offices in late December to pick up a $10,000 check for new equipment.
Judicial board concerned
“Pat Gilmour (a member of the judicial board) was very concerned with who was executive producer at the station, ” said Schulz. “When Olivia came to pick up the check, I took it out of her hands, and she screamed and yelled at Patrice and myself.
“I found out to my dismay that she had entered the office later on, spoke to (CSU President Rob Green), yelled and screamed once more, and was then given the checks. It was a mistake.”
But the station was in desperate need of this money in order to get CUTV off the ground. The station had not yet started broadcasting, and the school year was half over.
All of this culminated in last month’s decision by the judicial board to remove Gottlieb from the CUTV offices. Schulz, flanked by VP internal Sabine Friesinger and two security guards, entered the CUTV offices and told Gottlieb to pack her things.
Station never shut down
“We never shut down CUTV,” said Blais. “We made sure that all the equipment was accounted for, and then we removed it. In May, after the judicial board’s decision, an $8,000 digital camera went missing, as well as other equipment. We were taking precautions. And then we had the locks changed.”
Both Concordia security and the CSU say the locks were changed as a result of a missing key, believed to be still in Gottlieb’s possession. Gottlieb maintains that the key was lost.
“Olivia felt attacked, but it was nothing personal,” said Blais. “We were just making sure there was no repeat of last year. It’s in no one’s best interest to lose an $8,000 camera that students [through the Media fund fee] have paid for.”
“The cycle of people ripping off equipment then not getting charged had to come to an end.”
Now, with all the equipment accounted for, and a new executive in power, Schulz is eager to see the club get back on its feet.
Already at work
“We have a fresh new group of students who are eager to put this issue behind them,” said Schulz. ” They are enthusiastic about getting this together, and they have already started production on segments for Canal Savoir.”
Concordia students are also awaiting CUTV’s return. Commerce student Jessica Lao said it would be a nice change to see the television screens lit up.
“When I have a break, it would be great to be able to watch television-especially shows done by Concordia students,” said Lao, 22. “Not many universities have this advantage.”
Sociology student Jason Walker echoes this. “Concordians need to know what’s going on in their school. They can read the papers, but usually they don’t have the time,” said Walker, 23.
“If they could get their information from the television screens as they’re studying or eating, it would be good for everything from school spirit to an informed student population. I’m all for it.”

Rushing up to a Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) information table in the mezzanine last week, a group of students flipped the table over and grabbed a box of pamphlets that was hurled out onto the terrace next to Java U.
The CSIS table was one of many tables that was part of a career fair for Arts and Science students that took place on Feb. 1.
“A gang of 15 to 20 people walked up to the table and they shouted ‘Let’s get the spies off campus’ and ‘Go home big brother’. It happened so quickly. A few of them were trying to get the box of pamphlets from under the table,” said
Caspian Kilkelly, an assistantco-ordinator of the safety patrol who happened to be at the fair.
Paul Aub