An online declaration calling for support from Concordia’s faculty in the fight against tuition hikes has already gathered more than 160 signatures in less than three weeks.
The Concordia Declaration was drafted by the Concordia Student Union, the Graduate Students’ Association and a number of faculty members consulted in the process. It was posted online on Feb. 17, asking university professors, research assistants and teaching assistants to accommodate students who may miss class or assignments due to their involvement in a potential general strike.
“The declaration was a response to faculty talking to [the CSU] and saying they wanted a way of making sure students know that they support them,” said CSU President Lex Gill. “Since we put the declaration online, signatures have been growing really fast. It’s really exciting, we did not expect so many signatures.”
Gill explained that the declaration could play a crucial role in influencing the provost’s decision to grant an amnesty as “it shows faculty members on Senate that [a general strike] is something faculty, research and teaching assistants clearly support.”
Gill added that there were more signatures pending approval on the website’s account.
Concordia spokesperson Chris Mota, however, pointed out that an academic amnesty could not be granted by the provost, nor the Senate, “because no one and nobody has the authority to require that [faculty] abide by one.”
“When I spoke with [Graham] last week, he was of the same opinion that he was in the time of Nov. 10, even after knowing about the declaration,” said Mota. “The situation is very clear: faculty are expected to teach and professors are expected to come in and do their jobs. We need to keep providing services for those who choose to continue studying.”
Graham could not be reached to comment directly on the declaration.
Mota added that for those who choose to “boycott” classes, some individual accommodations could be made “for a day or two,” but something at the level of an academic amnesty is not being considered right now.
The Concordia Declaration, which can be found on http://concordiadeclaration.wordpress.com, asks for every signatory to leave name, position and comments if desired.
Teaching assistant and GSA President Robert Sonin said he signed because he did not want to see Concordia turn into a university “in name only, a for-profit diploma mill with no academic integrity or legitimacy.”
“The strike against tuition fee increases is not merely about money,” Sonin said. “It is a struggle against a trend that is cheapening what we do, that is undermining the seriousness and value of higher education and academic research, and that can only value things — including human beings — in terms of money.”
CLARIFICATION: In a previous version of this article, Concordia spokesperson Chris Mota indicated that the decision for imposing academic amnesty was solely up to Provost David Graham. After following up with Graham, Mota later told The Concordian that no one has the authority to grant a ‘blanket’ amnesty. Instead, faculty members, as long as they are abiding by regulations set by Senate, can deal with individual cases in their class themselves.
A resolution proposing accepted terms between student associations to improve common action against tuition hikes triggered a heated debate during the Concordia Student Union council meeting last Wednesday.
After CSU VP external Chad Walcott and councillor Irmak Bahar went off on a lengthy exchange of arguments about the pros and cons of what is known as the “minimum agreement,” the motion to support it failed to pass, with 11 councilors voting against, three in favour and one abstention.
The minimum agreement was a proposition brought up during a national conference in May 2011 and consists of three clauses: solidarity, non-recommendation and non-denunciation.
The minimum agreement would have required, among other things, that the union not negotiate with the government unless all umbrella student groups were present, and that it not criticize the actions of other student associations in the fight against tuition hikes.
At the beginning of last week’s council meeting, Walcott read a recommendation to the council pointing out the inability to reach consensus over the three clauses and the outdated aspect of the resolution.
“Since the Nov. 10 protest, national student movements have developed parallel campaigns, and collaboration on a single campaign is no longer needed,” said Walcott. “There is a conflict in the goals of national associations and the minimum agreement is no longer an issue in the student movement.”
On the other hand, Bahar insisted the resolution would help student associations coordinate their efforts on a national level without necessarily hindering each association’s goals.
“I think we have different perceptions of the level of autonomy stated in the minimum agreement,” said Bahar about Walcott’s point of view. “The resolution is an act of good faith to show solidarity, to stand united in the movement and avoid denouncing each other’s actions in the media.”
The Association pour une Solidarité Sociale Étudiante is in line with Bahar’s point of view, saying the three clauses would help students all go in the same direction.
“The question of autonomy has never been an issue for us, as we understand each association’s autonomy in the strike,” said ASSÉ press officer Mathilde Létourneau. “It was a resolution created to establish a sense of harmony in the movement.”
During Wednesday’s meeting, Walcott used the example of a group of students who, two weeks ago, used a UQÀM student association’s name and logo to jokingly promote kidnapping and infrastructural damage. Walcott explained that the CSU and other student associations should be able, in a similar situation, to have the ability to speak out against such practices, something the minimum agreement would prevent them from doing in his opinion.
“It’s not meant to censor anyone,” replied Bahar. “It’s not a binding contract to stay quiet about other student associations’ actions but its purpose is to show we’re on the same page.”
At last May’s national meeting, the three clauses received a majority support by the associations present. Three out of the four associations that represent Quebec students on a national level still support the minimum agreement. Concordia is affiliated to the fourth one, the Fédération etudiante universitaire du Québec.
The FEUQ, a group representing 15 student associations, declined to comment or to take position on the minimum agreement resolution. They said they wanted to respect each student organization’s sovereignty as the decision came within the competence of local associations.
“We will take position whenever we get the final word of each association,” said FEUQ press officer Mathieu Le Blanc.
Interim Concordia University President Frederick Lowy adresses students' call for broadcasting Board of Governors meetings - Photo by Navneet Pall
Interim Concordia University President Frederick Lowy adresses students’ call for broadcasting Board of Governors meetings – Photo by Nazli Bozoglu
Last Friday’s Board of Governors meeting ended abruptly even before its open session began. The meeting came to a halt toward the end of its hour-long closed session, when three student governors, undergraduates AJ West and Cameron Monagle and graduate student Erik Chevrier, walked out in protest over a motion to discuss the presence of cameras in the meeting. The representatives said they felt the discussion should have been held in the open session, when members of the audience would have been able to observe. With the absence of the three student governors, the BoG did not have quorum to continue with the meeting.
While the majority of governors already voiced their disapproval of the idea in January when they voted down a motion put forward by Chevrier that would have mandated the BoG to offer live broadcasts, it remains unclear if individuals should be permitted to film the meetings with their own cameras.
The question will likely be brought up again at the board’s next meeting on April 19.
Concordia Student Union President and student governor Lex Gill has gone on record saying that allowing cameras in the boardroom would greatly contribute to upping transparency at the BoG, indicating that as it stands, “the board operates in a way that it’s accountable to no one.”
One person who disagrees with that statement, and who believes that the BoG is “as transparent as it should be,” is Concordia’s interim President Frederick Lowy, who was brought in last year to put out the political fires following the BoG’s ousting of Lowy’s predecessor, Judith Woodsworth. The Concordian recently sat down with Dr. Lowy to get his thoughts on cameras in the boardroom and on what can be done to bridge the disconnect between Concordia’s Board of Governors and the student population.
What was your reaction to the Feb. 10 board meeting ending the way it did? Could something have been done to bring about a different outcome?
Well I’m disappointed. The board is an important part of our operation. It has a job to do, and if it can’t do its job properly, things slow down. The outcome, as you know, was a lack of quorum forcing the meeting to stop. That lack of quorum was caused by three out of the four student representatives [Gill remained in the boardroom] walking out and thereby depriving the meeting of legitimacy. If the students had not walked out, the meeting would have continued, so ask them [about other potential outcomes].
Do you have a personal position on broadcasting board meetings live?
I do. Although cameras are appropriate in courts of law and in parliaments, they are not appropriate at universities. And I know that my opinion is not an opinion that is in the minority. Every single university in Canada, that we know of, does not permit filming or broadcasting of board meetings.
The issue of filming and broadcasting is also related to our ability to keep volunteer board members. Obviously they’re interested in the university to start with because they accept to be board members, but we have to persuade a number of people we want on the board to be on our board, because they have other boards to go on as well. So when there is a concern on the part of some of them that they’re not going to be able to speak freely in board meetings without their words being taken out of context, well, that’s an ongoing problem.
Most of the people who come to the board are not politicians, they don’t choose to be in a public forum. So there are two goods here of positive value: on the one hand, you have the good of transparency, and on the other hand, the good of free speech, so it’s a question of balancing both of them.
But some would argue that BoG meetings are already being recorded, such as by journalists who use tape recorders.
We count on members of the press to be responsible reporters. What they’re likely to do, as they’ve done in the past, is report decisions, but they don’t report who said what, and with what tone of voice, and so on. Those things are private. Unless somebody is actually being interviewed, reporters don’t pick up these kinds of nuances, people taking to each other in an unguarded fashion. Because what we want is for people to be able to talk in an unguarded fashion, rather than to measure all their words and be politically correct all the time.
Then in your opinion, is the board as transparent as it can be?
I don’t think it’s as transparent as it can be, but I think perhaps it’s as transparent as it should be. There’s more transparency than there has been before. And so long as there’s transparency that doesn’t at the same time inhibit people from doing what they’re there to do, then that’s a balance that I think is appropriate. Whether we’ve got the ultimate best, I don’t know. I’m not saying it can’t be improved, and if it can be improved, it should be, but we must find a way to improve without turning off people from becoming board members.
It’s become painfully clear that there is a disconnect between the student governors and most of the rest of the BoG. What can be done to bridge this gap?
We need to continue what we’re doing right now, namely talk to each other. I’m hoping, and other members of the board I’m sure are hoping as well, to talk with student governors and other students about this and work out a way of handling our different opinions. It is in nobody’s interest to see the board come to a halt.
CSU President Lex Gill has said that the “board operates in a way that it is accountable to no one.” What is your reaction to that statement?
I don’t agree with her statement. I agree with her on a lot of things, but that’s not one of them. First of all, board members are responsible to each other. The board is not a single monolithic bloc of people who all think the same. There are sufficient differences within the board to ensure this doesn’t happen. The board is ultimately responsible to the public through its representatives. The board issues reports on its activities each year, its open sessions are open to anybody and anyone who wishes has access to the board’s minutes online.
The board has developed quite a negative image in the eyes of students who have become increasingly frustrated with its operations. How can the board improve its standing among the student population?
I know they’re frustrated; it’s clear that many students don’t hold the board in high regard. That doesn’t mean that board members aren’t trying. In fact, a tremendous amount of them are graduates of our university and have an important stake in the university. The board is changing. The membership, the composition is changing. And I think the board is aware of the problem [negative image among students] and I think they’re trying to fix it. Certainly it’s in everyone’s best interest that not only the board do its job properly, but that it be seen to be doing its job.
Reggie's may be forced to increase drink prices to cover outstanding deficit - Photo by Navneet Pall
A grim report of Reggie’s financial state exposed at last Wednesday’s Concordia Student Union council meeting could possibly result in increased drink prices at Concordia’s student bar.
CSU VP finance Jordan Lindsay and CSU President Lex Gill reported that CUSACorp, the union’s for-profit subsidiary that runs the bar, held a deficit of more than $40,000 for the last four months. According to Lindsay, this deficit will most likely double by the end of the winter term.
“Right now we have to find a way to go from $121,833 of semester sales to nearly $300,000,” said Lindsay, who is also on CUSACorp’s board of directors. “The situation is fairly grim and we need to tighten finances. We are going to do all we can to avoid increasing prices, but there is a 25 per cent chance that it will happen.”
Lindsay added that if such a scenario were to present itself, the increase would be minimal; “a matter of 25 cents here and there.”
During the meeting, Gill spoke of a worrying situation where, despite having no rent to pay for the bar and despite collecting a rent from the Java U café located next to Reggie’s in the Hall building, CUSACorp still managed to run constant deficits.
“Historically, Reggie’s has lost an awful lot of money,” said Gill.
Lindsay said the situation has been going on for years and that the bar has often been “eating up” most of the Java U rental profits. Gill explained that the losing money pattern was mainly due to “very poor” internal control, shifting management and high administration costs.
“Reggie’s is a fairly vulnerable institution,” said Gill. “It has a mix-mandate which is to be a bar, sell beer and make profits, but simultaneously to provide services and a community space for students. Therefore, the goal is not always to make money.”
Lindsay said that CUSACorp has not only planned to tighten expenses by controlling inventory and entertainment costs, but also to increase sales through better marketing campaigns, involvement of professional companies, use of social media, better lighting on Thursday nights, increased beer selection and organization of more theme nights.
Lindsay also insisted that Reggie’s was not condemned to bankruptcy, as he was confident the situation was fixable with better management of finances and increased sales campaigns.
However, the price increase seemed to be a concern for several students informed of the possible outcome.
“One of the major draws that Reggie’s has for students is cheap drinks,” said communications studies student Michael Czemerys. “I think they’re going to lose a lot of business if they increase prices.”
Simone de Beauvoir Institute supports general strike
The last CSU council meeting began with a presentation from two representatives of the Simone de Beauvoir Institute, a Concordia college dedicated to studying feminism and questions of social justice. The institute announced its full support for the fight against tuition hikes. The representatives said the institute “as a whole” decided to support the general strike set to take place by the end of March.
The two representatives said it was the first clear feminist approach to the general strike.
“What we really wanted to bring to the forefront was the impact of the tuition increase on women,” said SdBI representative Gabrielle Bouchard. “Women today still make less money than their male counterparts so the impact of the tuition increase on women will be significant.”
Bouchard added that the stance will make the institute’s job easier to openly side with the students and to encourage other departments to join them in supporting the general strike. Several councillors congratulated and thanked the SdBI for their decision.
Two fee levy questions approved
Two new fee levy questions will appear on students’ ballots during March’s CSU general election.
CSU council approved the fee levy questions of Le Frigo Vert and the 2110 Centre for Gender Advocacy. The former is asking for an eight-cents increase in its fee levy, from 25 cents per credit to 33 cents, while the latter is asking for a jump from 29 cents per credit to 39 cents.
Le Frigo Vert said they were delighted by the council’s decision to put their question on the ballot, as they are currently struggling with increasing rent and other fixed costs.
“We don’t get a university space and our landlord keeps increasing the rent every year,” said collective member Bronwen Agnew. “The CSU’s decision is a big relief.”
During the meeting, CSU VP finance Jordan Lindsay said the anti-mainstream food industry cooperative offered “the best food on campus.”
New appointment procedure adopted for BoG student rep
The CSU adopted a new procedure for selecting the two representatives on Concordia’s Board of Governors. CSU President Lex Gill, who currently sits on the BoG, reported that the student body at large will not have its say on the selection anymore. Student representatives will be appointed directly by CSU council, but will not necessarily have to be councillors. “The representative could also come from the student body at large,” said Gill. The BoG voted in September to decrease the number of undergraduate student governors from four to one, with an “alternate” governor being added with speaking rights only. The changes come into effect July 1.
February’s Board of Governors meeting abruptly ended on Feb. 10 even before its open session began.
The meeting came to a halt toward the end of its hour-long closed session, when three student governors, undergrads AJ West and Cameron Monagle and grad student Erik Chevrier, walked out in protest over a motion to discuss allowing cameras in the meeting. All student representatives, including CSU President Lex Gill who remained in the boardroom, felt that this transparency-related motion should have been discussed during the meeting’s open session, when members of the audience would be able to observe.
With the absence of West, Monagle and Chevrier, quorum, which is 21 governors, was no longer met, effectively prohibiting the rest of the BoG members from voting on motions, and ultimately cancelling the meeting.
The majority of governors already voted down a motion in January put forward by Chevrier that mandated the board to offer live broadcasts of its meetings. The motion presented on Feb. 10 in closed session, according to West, dealt with transparency at the BoG level, including the potential use of cameras by individuals in the boardroom.
“This is still something that has yet to be clarified, and I imagine this is something that will be brought up again,” said West, who had implored students at a Concordia Student Union council meeting in January to bring their cameras to the BoG meeting. There were as many as fifteen to twenty students waiting outside the boardroom on Friday, some of them indeed carrying cameras.
“This was a discussion [during closed session] that the student representatives thought should have happened in open session, so we refused to take part,” added West.
Speaking to reporters outside the boardroom, Gill, who indicated that she could not touch on specific discussions held during closed session, spoke more broadly about the need for cameras during the BoG’s open session.
“The rationale for why people should be able to film and broadcast the open session is that first of all, we’ve always done it anyway,” she said, mentioning the fact that journalists, for example, are allowed in the boardroom with tape recorders. “I think everyone should have the right to film these meetings and have the right to see what’s going on. This university is publicly-funded, financed by your tuition fees and tax dollars. […] The reality, I think, of this situation is that [the BoG] has to be accountable to someone. Right now they operate in a way that they’re accountable to no one.”
Gill spoke vaguely about the possibility of bringing forward a proposal regarding the use of cameras at the BoG’s next meeting on April 19. All other items that were on the agenda for the Feb. 10 meeting will, in all likelihood, also be discussed during that meeting.
Student representatives who sit on Concordia’s highest decision-making bodies are imploring students to bring their own cameras to offer live broadcasts of Board of Governors and Senate meetings.
At last Wednesday’s CSU council meeting, student governor AJ West and student senator Michaela Manson strongly urged students to bring their cameras despite the fact that the BoG has said no to live broadcasts, while Senate is still mulling over the idea.
“I don’t see why you couldn’t do this,” West said at the council meeting. “If they kick you out, well, we’ll cross that bridge when we get there. If all else fails, I’ll bring in a camera myself.”
The BoG shot down a motion by a large majority at its January meeting to allow for live broadcasts of its deliberations. The motion had been on the table for quite some time, having first been added to the agenda at the September board meeting by Graduate Students’ Association governor Erik Chevrier, who could not be reached for comment by press time.
The motion had been part of a larger attempt by the GSA, and supported by the Concordia Student Union, to increase transparency at Concordia’s top decision-making body. Other measures that had been included in Chevrier’s motion, and that were ultimately voted down, included more seats for audience members, and a question-and-answer period between the audience and the governors at the end of each meeting.
According to Concordia’s VP institutional relations Bram Freedman, the vote taken by the BoG on live broadcasts also applies to audience members.
But West said that isn’t the case. “The motion voted down was mandating the BoG to film meetings. So if they don’t want to do it, then [students] should just do it themselves,” he said, indicating that he will definitely be bringing a camera to the next BoG meeting.
Freedman pointed out that members of the campus community who don’t manage to get their hands on one of the 20 coveted tickets for seats in the actual BoG meeting room still have access to an overflow room where the meeting is broadcast on a large screen.
But at the council meeting on Wednesday, CSU president Lex Gill mentioned that she has heard of several complaints from students that the audio and visual quality in the overflow room was often poor. In an interview with The Concordian, she said she found it difficult to imagine what would actually happen to a student who brought a camera into the BoG meeting. She also said she would definitely consider bringing one in herself.
“The question of having cameras was so vehemently opposed by the BoG, but we’ve never really had a frank discussion on this,” she said.
A motion for live broadcasts of Senate meetings was presented earlier this month, and is currently being analyzed by its steering committee, which will make a recommendation to Senate at its next meeting.
Freedman said that in the meantime, there is no policy that governs the use of cameras at Senate, but indicated that “should members of the Senate audience choose to bring in cameras to a Senate meeting before a decision has been made, one of the Senators could make a motion to deal with the issue immediately if he or she so wished.”
CSU council meetings have been broadcast live by CUTV since 2010, despite initial opposition by some councillors. CUTV station manager Laura Kneale said in an interview with The Concordian earlier this year that CUTV is definitely interested in also filming BoG and Senate meetings.
“WHEREAS president Lex Gill orchestrated the illegal dismissal of the Chief Electoral Officer;
WHEREAS in an interview to the Link, president Lex Gill publicly attacked the competency of the ASFA executives of the last 3 years;WHEREAS under Lex Gill’s presidency, there was a record number of councillor resignations”
And the list goes on.
Concordia Student Union president Lex Gill addressed, at last Wednesday’s CSU council meeting, the long list of “whereas” clauses on the recently-launched website, www.stoplexgill.com.
The website was made public on Wednesday, the same day former CSU councillor Tomer Shavit, Arts and Science Federation of Associations president Alex Gordon (ASFA), and Commerce and Administration Students’ Association (CASA) president Marianna Luciano announced their intent to release a petition that could lead to Gill’s impeachment.
Gill said that the clauses were “rife with conjecture, misinformation, logical fallacies, defamatory statements and straightforward lies…I stand by my team’s work, dedication, leadership and courage, and implore him not to drag the rest of them into his personal problem with me.”
Gill suggested that Shavit wait until March 1, at which time the new CSU bylaws would allow him to collect signatures for a petition that could trigger a general assembly to remove her from office. The current bylaws would require a petition to impeach the entire executive. She even added that if a petition was made and validated according to the rules, she would be happy to call the general meeting, book the room, and move the motion herself. “That is, after all, how democracy works,” she added.
Shavit responded that he would continue with the petition regardless and that he believed that waiting until March would be “counterproductive,” whereas if it is done now, it would be easier for someone else to replace Gill “and to pick up the pieces.”
The creators of the website cite alleged inappropriate behaviour on Gill’s part, a lack of transparency and professionalism, and the “illegal” firing of CSU CEO Bram Goldstein, as their central complaints.
“Lex Gill’s behaviour brought controversy and shame to the CSU,” reads a section of the website.
Website co-founder Shavit said that “discontent with Lex Gill has been going on for a while.”
He said that the website, which contains a number of documents critical of Gill’s actions and those of her executive, was created so information would be accessible. There is also an interactive component in the form of a Facebook page. “Students need to feel like they are being informed,” he said.
As Wednesday’s CSU council meeting heated up, many members of the executive stepped forward to defend Gill, including VP external Chad Walcott, and CSU councillor and student governor Cameron Monagle.
“She [Gill] is doing an excellent job…we do not need controversy and petty insults, we need a stable student body and we need to deal with serious matters,” said Walcott.
Cameron Monagle called Shavit’s allegations unproductive. “We have bigger fish to fry right now,” he said. Monagle proposed a motion that expressed the council’s support for Gill, which was passed unanimously.More updates to come.
March 7 will be the day that undergraduate students decide on Concordia’s role in the province-wide battle against tuition fee hikes in Quebec.
The Concordia Student Union has passed a motion setting March 7 as a date for a general assembly for a strike mandate expected to last from March 26 to 29.
“This is pretty much, the only card left that the students have in their hands in Quebec,” said CSU president Lex Gill at at last Wednesday’s council meeting. While Gill admitted that a strike will not be easy, she described it as a necessary step against tuition fee increases in the province.
This week, the CSU will renew their campaign against the hikes, launching an information campaign leading up to the assembly in March about the pros and cons of going forth with a strike, including flyers, posters, booklets and speeches.
“It’s really important to us that moving towards March 7, each student is fully aware of what they are going to be voting on and what impacts it will have on them,” said VP external Chad Walcott at the meeting.
Other events in the campaign include a one week sleep-in at the library to raise awareness about the tuition increases, fax and phone jams and F#ck Tuition Tuesdays at Reggie’s Bar in the Hall Building.
“To talk about a strike at this point, frankly if we weren’t I would be really worried,” said Gill, who reminded council that there are other student unions in Quebec planning strikes as early as February.
Walcott said strikes are proven to be effective in putting pressure on the government.
“We’re in a position to have a serious impact on our province,” he added in an interview.
During the meeting, some concerns were raised with regards to international students, and the potential consequences of their participation in long-term demonstrations. The CSU, however, insisted that international students who choose to strike will not run risk of being deported.
Concordia’s Mob Squad is also planning for future demonstrations, and teamed up with McGill to hold a winter training camp for interested activists last weekend.
Concordia students first protested the hikes on Nov.10, joining tens of thousands of students marching against the extra $1625 worth of tuition fees proposed by the Jean Charest government. The province currently plans to increase the cost of university tuition $325 yearly over the next five years.
The next province-wide demonstration is set for March 22.
The Board of Governors approved Concordia’s new academic plan by a unanimous vote at its monthly meeting last Thursday.
Spearheaded by Provost and VP of academic affairs David Graham, the plan will serve as a strategic guide for university growth. The objective of the plan is to have Concordia recognized as a top five comprehensive university by 2016 by improving research performance, teaching and academic programming.
“I feel great,” said Graham, who’s been developing the plan for over two years. “I’ve invested a lot of time and energy on it, so I am pleased to see the work that came into it is paying off.”
The presentation at the meeting broke down where the majority of the plan’s $25 million budget will go: $7.45 million for improving research at Concordia, $6.16 million to graduate students programming, $4.5 million towards new acquisitions for Concordia’s two libraries.
The academic plan passed with two abstentions from undergraduate governors Laura Beach and Cameron Monagle.
Graham had presented the plan to Concordia’s Student Union council in November but it was turned down by student councillors, their main objection being that it was formed without much student input.
“As part of senate, I voted against it two months ago, I felt that there was more time needed, more cost questions needed to be answered,” said CSU president Lex Gill. Gill ultimately decided to vote for the plan at Thursday’s meeting.
“Even though I personally opposed the plan, Senate decided to adopt this document, and out of respect for the senate, at the BoG meeting on Thursday, as a student governor I decided to vote in favour,” she said.
Monagle said the plan represents a step forward for Concordia in theory, but he was not entirely sold on some of the more “troubling components.”
“It wobbles between the vague and the bizarrely specific,” Monagle said. “Also, there is a flagrant disregard for undergraduate students, who despite being Concordia’s bread-and-butter, were hardly even mentioned in early drafts. Most importantly, I can’t support a plan funded by tuition hikes that simply cannot be implemented.”
Looking ahead with the academic plan in effect, Monagle said that the CSU will need to continue to work with the senate and faculty to make sure that the plan’s implementation is done in a way consistent with its broader goals.
“The CSU needs to keep a close eye on what’s happening, and pick a fight when necessary,” added Monagle.
THE FACTS: Come April, Concordia may have a final candidate to replace interim President Frederick Lowy as president and vice-chancellor of the university. The presidential search committee is scheduled to meet again before the end of January to review and finalize a short list of candidates. The committee’s work is confidential, so no names have been released. However, university spokesperson Chris Mota wrote in an email that “a recommendation will be ready for the Board of Governors for April 2012 with the candidate to take office, ideally, as of August 1, 2012.” The university hired consultant Laverne Smith & Associates Inc. to pre-interview candidates.
WHY IT MATTERS: Other than being the highest ranking position at the university, the president’s office has seen enough controversy in recent years to deserve a critical eye. Concordia’s previous president, Judith Woodsworth, was dismissed by the Board of Governors in 2010, while her predecessor Claude Lajeunesse left office halfway though his five-year contract due to conflicts with the administration.
A general student strike vote
THE FACTS: The Concordia Student Union plans on continuing where last semester left off, launching a new campaign to protest the Quebec government’s tuition hikes and addressing the possibility of preparing for a vote to strike sometime this semester. While last fall saw some student participation in protests and rallies against tuition fee increases, CSU VP external Chad Walcott said “a student strike could be the next step in a Quebec-wide protest.”Walcott added that before anything can be done, “the movement will have to regain momentum” lost over the winter break. A demonstration set for March 22 is already in the planning stages and members of the CSU have put together a document outlining tentative plans to be presented at council on Wednesday.
WHY IT MATTERS: Tuition in Quebec is set to raise $325 a year over five years for university undergrads, and whether or not you agree with the increase, it’s ultimately up to students to decide whether Concordia’s undergrads will be going on strike for more than just a day.
A whole lot of general elections
THE FACTS: Break out the posters and in-classroom speeches: Concordia’s student associations will be gearing up for another round of general elections this spring. The Concordia Student Union, the Arts and Science Federation of Associations, and others will all be holding elections to fill their executive positions.
WHY IT MATTERS: Spring general elections should be anything but uncomplicated if last semester’s byelections are anything to go by, between the accusations of electoral violations, mistakes caught at polling stations, and the firing of two separate chief electoral officers. Not to mention the fact that last year’s CSU general elections resulted in the CEO disqualifying both parties, only to have his decision later overturned by the judicial board and CSU council.
Ceejay Desfosses replaced Cassie Smith as judicial board chair in November.
Ceejay Desfosses replaced Cassie Smith as judicial board chair in November. Photo by Navneet Pall
The Concordia Student Union council reaffirmed their confidence in their chief electoral officer Ismail Holoubi last Wednesday at a special meeting held midway through the byelections and amidst ongoing controversy.
With a vote of 13 in favour and two abstentions, the CSU passed the motion at a special council meeting which was held to discuss the impartiality of Holoubi and of judicial board chair Ceejay Desfosses, which was called into question by former CSU councillor Tomer Shavit.
“I think the council really didn’t take my accusation seriously,” Shavit said in an interview. “They really didn’t come to this meeting with the intention of taking it seriously and of really discussing it at length.”
Shavit suggested that Holoubi was biased and therefore unfit to be CEO because he allegedly ran in last spring’s elections with the winning Your Concordia slate alongside CSU president Lex Gill. Holoubi, however, told the council that he ran independently, but never campaigned.
“If you read the CEO report you should see that I wasn’t affiliated with any of the slates,” said Holoubi.
When pressed by councillor Nadine Atallah about the fact that he misrepresented himself during his pre-appointment interview by not mentioning his involvement in previous elections, Holoubi stated that he had only worked as a clerk in past elections and reconfirmed that he ran independently last semester.
“I ran independently because I didn’t want to be on any of the sides, because honestly I had a lot of friends running from both slates and both of them were amazing slates and amazing people,” explained Holoubi.
VP finance Jordan Lindsay also pointed out the lack of evidence supporting the claims against Holoubi.
“I was on Your Concordia and I know that he was not on our team,” said Lindsay. “Also, on the affiliation papers that were submitted to the [former] CEO, he is not included on that and there are no affiliation documents that he submitted that have anything in relation to us.”
Council also voted not to overturn the judicial board’s recent ruling regarding the invalidation of former CEO Bram Goldstein.
“In order for council to overturn this decision it must be manifested unreasonable and/or one of those things regarded as racist, sexist and bribery,” said VP external Chad Walcott. “The decision made was none of those things.”
Shavit has been publicly critical of both Goldstein’s firing and of the JB hearing itself, filing an appeal with the board in November alleging procedural misconduct, a lack of impartiality, and collusion between the JB and some CSU executives.
“No one at the meeting addressed the fact that [JB chair Ceejay Desfosses] did not address my appeal within the allotted five days, said Shavit in an interview. “No one addressed the fact that she broke the code of procedures multiple times by first sending [the appeal] to council for anything but an overturn. I have no confidence in the judicial board.”
The JB said their three-week delay in responding to Shavit’s appeal was due to the fact that they were awaiting a response from CSU council, which they consulted for advice regarding how they should go about treating the appeal.
In an email, Desfosses described the idea of the JB judging an appeal of its own decision as “redundant.“ She wrote to CSU council asking for the creation of “a 3 person panel whose sole purpose is to hear appeals” in order to establish some sort of procedure for dealing with complaints against the JB itself.
According to emails exchanged between Shavit and JB member Nadim Kobeissi, the board met for three hours on Sunday Nov. 4 to consider the appeal.
