Archive for Jacob Serebrin
Video appears to show Montreal police attacking protesters
Internal investigation launched
From YouTube video by forgedinhatred
Montreal police have opened an internal investigation into the actions of police officers at an anti-tuition protest that occurred on Jan. 27 outside offices of Quebec’s education ministry.
It comes after a video was posted on YouTube and ciculated on Twitter that appears to show an officer suddenly attacking a small crowd.
It’s the latest evidence of tensions over tuition fees that will rise $325 over the next five years. Just last week, activists called for kidnappings, violence and sabotage to prevent the increases.
Continue reading Video appears to show Montreal police attacking protesters
Quebec activists call for kidnappings, vandalism
Student association blames mobilization committee
Anti-tuition poster by AFELC at UQAM
A student group is distancing itself from a pamphlet bearing its logo that called on students to commit acts of vandalism, kidnapping and sabotage to fight against tuition hikes.
The pamphlet, which circulated last week, bears the logo of AFELC, which represents humanities and communications students at the University of Quebec at Montreal (UQAM).
In a post on the group’s Facebook page, association executives claim they first heard about the pamphlet when they were contacted by reporters. They say that the pamphlet appears to have been created by people involved with the association’s “mobilization committee,” which is an informal wing that fights tuition increases.
Continue reading Quebec activists call for kidnappings, vandalism
More students balance school with jobs
New report shows surprising trends in Quebec
A long night at work. By star5112 on Flickr.
More than half of full-time university students in Quebec work while attending school and more than 40 per cent of all undergraduates work more than 20 hours weekly says a new study by the Fédération étudiante universitaire du Québec, a provincial lobby group that wants lower tuition.
On top of that, more than twice as many full-time students aged 20 to 24 in the province work part-time jobs than students did in the 1970s.
The workloads are hurting their educations: 43 per cent of full-time undergraduates say that their jobs have negatively affected their studies and 30 per cent say their jobs mean they’ll take longer to finish. It’s worst for PhD students—six in 10 say work forced them to prolong their studies.
McGill reaches tentative deal with workers
But the bitter strike is not quite over yet
McGill University and representatives of striking support workers have accepted a tentative agreement put forward by a provincially-appointed conciliator, both sides announced on Wednesday.
While both sides have said they won’t be revealing the details of the tentative agreement until it is presented to union members, MUNACA president Kevin Whittaker told the Montreal Gazette that: “The agreement does contain a number of the main objectives we wanted,” including a pay increase that is “well over” the university’s original offer.
Why the student protests won’t move Charest
Nothing to gain
Protest photo by shahk on Flickr
University students in Quebec continued their fight against annual $325 tuition increases on Nov. 10, protesting in large numbers by skipping classes. Classes were even cancelled at Dawson College and students marched in the streets of Montreal.
It was well organized and peaceful. To get a sense of that, consider that marshals in fluorescent vests helped defuse the tense moments between protesters and police outside Charest’s Montreal office where things might have become violent. Although the sight of riot police on campus is always disturbing, there was only a small cadre of roughly 100 students outside the McGill Administration building when police moved in.
But as big and peaceful as the demonstration was, will it change anything?
Although the 2005 student strike ended with the government giving in to some student demands, Thursday’s much shorter “strike” takes place in a much less friendly political climate and a much more uncertain economy. Even as students were marching in Montreal, education minister Line Beauchamp stood up in the National Assembly to reiterate that students must pay “their fair share.”
It’s easy for her to have such bravado. Premier Jean Charest faces no threats on the left who might gain from angry student voters. The Parti Québécois, the only other party to have formed government in this province since the 1970s, is tearing itself apart.
At the moment, Charest’s biggest political threat comes from the right. François Legault, a former PQ cabinet minister, and his centre-right Coalition pour l’avenir du Québec (CAQ) are leading in recent polls. The Action démocratique du Québec (ADQ), a right-wing party with four seats in the National Assembly, is entering into formal negotiations with the CAQ concerning a potential merger.
Legault is on the record saying that students in programs which lead to higher paying jobs should pay more tuition. Considering that kind of thinking, it’s safe to bet that students wouldn’t find a CAQ government any more supportive of their demands.
Is the U.S. tuition system more progressive?
Why Canadian students graduate with more debt, not less
Too much debt? Photo by Zach Klein on Flickr.
Canadians are graduating with more debt than their American counterparts—despite the well-known higher sticker prices south of the border.
In the U.S., average debt at graduation rose to $25,250 in 2010, according to a Nov. 3 report by the Project on Student Debt. Here in Canada, students were graduating with an average debt of $26,680 according to a 2009 report released by the Millennium Scholarship Foundation. If anything, the Canadian average is higher now.
The numbers seem almost impossible: isn’t tuition ridiculously high in the U.S.?
Continue reading Is the U.S. tuition system more progressive?
McGill strike turns nasty
Threats, injunctions and allegations fly. What’s next?
Photo by shahk on Flickr
Two members of McGill University’s student government face a disciplinary hearing related to a rally in favour of striking support staff. One of them says he wasn’t even there.
Meanwhile, McGill principal Heather Munroe-Blum has issued a statement accusing strikers of throwing objects at senior administrators and threatening elderly alumni at homecoming.
And those are just two of the recent confrontations between strike supporters and McGill officials.
The two students facing discipline are Micha Stettin and Joël Pedneault, who are both elected to the Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU). They allegedly took part in an Oct. 11 demonstration at which 30 protesters calling themselves the “Mob Squad” (short for mobilization) sat in an intersection at an entrance to the Montreal university’s pedestrian-only campus.
OpenFile reports that the pair is accussed of contravening two sections of the university’s code of conduct, which state: “No student shall, by action, threat, or otherwise, knowingly obstruct University activities,” and, “No student shall, contrary to express instructions or with intent to damage, destroy or steal University property or without just cause knowingly enter or remain in any University building, facility, room, or office.”
Both dispute the charges. Pedneault, vice-president external of SSMU, told McGill Daily that he was not at the protest. McGill admin. told CBC Radio that they will not comment on the details.
The McGill University Non-Academic Certified Association (MUNACA) has been on strike since Sept. 1. They want, among other things, a “proper pay scale.” McGill said on Oct. 20 that strikers are asking for too much money: a 28.9 per cent pay increase over three years, they say.
The Mob Squad discipline is only one recent controversy. After the university won an injunction earlier this month limiting picketing near campus, members of MUNACA began picketing outside the homes of senior administrators and the workplaces of board members. Strikers also picketed at events during McGill’s homecoming weekend. At one event, 63-year-old Joan O’Malley was arrested for refusing to leave an alumni dinner at a hotel. She was ticketed and released.
Munroe-Blum released a statement saying striker tactics had “moved from reasonable, civil free speech into threats and vandalism.” On Oct. 21, the university won another injunction limiting the size and noise created by pickets near private homes, workplaces and off-campus events.
The previous day strikers had picketed the construction site of a McGill-affiliated hospital. Construction workers refused to cross the picket line, shutting down work for the day. An injunction was issued ordering strikers to remain more than three metres from site entrances and exits.
The university has been especially critical of the hospital construction site picket. Michael Di Grappa, the university’s vice-principal for administration and finance, told the Montreal Gazette that the move was “a contemptible strategy that will bear no fruit.”
MUNACA president Kevin Whittaker fired back, saying the university is more focused “on getting injunctions from the courts to limit our freedom of expression than… on finding a fair resolution.”
Despite the public rancour, the two sides continue to meet frequently with a conciliator.
So what’s next? Possibly more labour strife. The General Assembly of the Association of Graduate Students Employed at McGill, which represents teaching assistants, voted on Oct. 19 to initiate pressure tactics after five months of negotiations failed to result in a new work contract.
Are young Canadians really better off than young Americans?
Why our leaders shouldn’t dismiss the Occupy Movement
Occupy Winnipeg photo by marygkosta on Flickr
Jamie Weinman has a post on Maclean’s.ca suggesting that student debt is fuelling the Occupy Everywhere protests. Weinman quotes this Washington Post article by Ezra Klein who writes that “college debt represents a special sort of betrayal.” He says he began supporting the protests after seeing a photo on the Tumblr site, “We are the 99 percent.” It was of a handwritten sign by a student that said: “I did everything I was supposed to and I have nothing to show for it.”
Their point is this. While many of the people hurt by the financial crisis should have known better—people who took out mortgages they knew they couldn’t afford and bankers who invested in financial instruments they knew were overrated—students who took on debt are different. They went into debt because they had been told repeatedly by parents, teachers, politicians and the media that educational debt is a sure route to higher paying jobs. Now that we know that’s often untrue, can we really blame them for being angry?
Continue reading Are young Canadians really better off than young Americans?
Concordia library to start lending out iPads
But is it a good use of tuition money?
Photo by Rego - d4u.hu on Flickr
Concordia University’s library will lend out iPads to students starting this month. OpenFile Montreal reports that the library has acquired 25 of the tablet computers and they’re almost ready to go.
Concordia, like many schools, lends out laptops. That’s undoubtedly a useful service for students who want to do research in the library instead of carting home a pile of books. And not everyone can afford a laptop, so this improves access.
But while a number of American university libraries lend out iPads to students, Concordia is the first university in Quebec to do so. Some universities, including nearby McGill, offer e-readers, but iPad lending appears to be rare in Canada. The only other example I can find, using an (albeit non-exhaustive) Google search, is at York University’s Steacie Science and Engineering Library. They have a single solitary iPad to lend.
Continue reading Concordia library to start lending out iPads
10 secrets to university success
Advice from an upper-year student
Photo courtesy of Symic on Flickr
10. Pick your major carefully. If your university doesn’t make you declare a major off the bat, don’t. Explore new things. Even if you must declare immediately, remember that you can always change your mind. Quiz people in programs you’re considering. Any regrets?
9. If you need help, ask for it. If you don’t understand something, ask your professor. Many will help you. Another place to find help is the library, where employees can show you how to format your citations or find articles in academic journals. If you’re ever accused of cheating, your student union can help explain your rights.
8. If you’re going to need an extension, ask early. If you ask early enough, many professors will grant extensions. But don’t annoy your prof by emailing and asking the night before it’s due.
7. Develop a rapport with your professors. Ask questions, contribute to the discussion, stay after class for a minute to clarify something that you don’t understand. In university, you’ll need to make some effort to get noticed. Professors who know and like you may help you find jobs, provide references for grad school and will say yes if you ask them to supervise your independent study.
6. Take care of your mental health. University is stressful, especially if you’re moving away from home for the first time. If you feel anxious or sad, don’t be ashamed to ask your friends for support. There’s also formal counselling from the school. Eating well and exercising can also help greatly.
5. Pick your roommates for second year carefully. Think about how you want to live. Your best friend won’t make the best roommate if he or she has different standards of cleanliness, a weird sleep schedule or a higher tolerance for noise. Talk about things like cleaning and splitting bills before you look for housing together. Read up on the laws before you sign a lease.
4. Get involved. If you’re in journalism, write for the school paper. If you’re in fine arts, get your work in student-run shows. If you’re in business, enter case competitions. Participating in degree-related extracurriculars is a great way to network with future colleagues and learn new things.
3. Don’t bring your laptop to class. Sure, you can type faster than you can write by hand. But Facebook is pretty tempting when it’s in front of you. Plus, when you type your notes, you’re trying to take down every word, which means you’re not really thinking. The secret to success isn’t to take the most notes, but to take the most thoughtful notes. This is easier achieved on paper.
2. Know how to manage your money. Drinking every night doesn’t only lead to failing grades, it also leads to debt. Eating out, buying prepared food and getting takeout coffee can also impoverish you, so learn to cook. Keep track of your spending for a month, to see where you’re overspending.
1. Learn to manage your time. This is the most important skill for university. Most of your assignments probably won’t be that difficult, but they’ll take longer than anything you’ve done before. Assignments for different classes will often be due at the same time. If you have several essays due in the last week of the semester, you won’t get them all done unless you start early.
For more advice on how to ace your first year of university, click here.
Quebec government accepts McGill MBA tuition hike
School raised price by nearly 90 per cent
Photo courtesy of bagriton on Flickr
McGill University will be allowed to charge $32,500 this fall year for its MBA program after the university struck a deal with the Quebec government last week.
Before the 2009-10 school year, the program had cost only $3,400. Last year, they raised the price by nearly 90 per cent to $29,500, prompting the Ministry of Education to fine them $2.1 million for breaking regulations. Quebec requires universities to charge domestic (Quebec) students a uniform rate, which is currently just over $70 per credit for most programs. A typical 30-credit school year costs roughly $2,100.
The new deal redefines the program as a “specialized MBA” with a focus on international business and a “mandatory study trip abroad.” Specialized MBAs are not subject to the same strict regulations. Concordia offers an EMBA with tuition at $34,000. McGill and the HEC Montréal offer a joint EMBA that costs $72,000.
Some student groups have criticized the decision. The Fédération étudiante universitaire du Québec, the province’s largest student lobby group, and the McGill Post Graduate Students’ Society issued a joint statement describing it as a step towards two-tiered education.
However, another student group — McGill’s MBA Student Association — supports the school. They condemned the government’s fine and released a survey claiming that 70 per cent of students in the program supported the increase.
Line Beauchamp, the Minister of Education, wrote that McGill is not getting special treatment. “This isn’t an exception, because there are other institutions in Quebec that already offer programs with a similar status,” she said.
McGill’s new price may allow it to better compete with other schools. The University of Toronto charges residents $40,000 per year for its MBA program; the University of Western Ontario’s one-year MBA program has a price tag of $73,500 for Canadians.
Wilfred Zerbe, Memorial University’s Dean of Business, suggested in May that tuition fees there should climb too. Currently, Memorial charges MBA students $4,400 per year. He says the school could attract better students and offer more support with tuition fees closer to $10,000 per year.
Student union’s human rights complaint against Montreal police
“If you do nothing illegal, we won’t bother you,” say police.
Photo courtesy of Yannick Gingras on Flickr
A Quebec student lobby group claims that a Montreal police squad, which monitors anarchists and “marginal political groups,” has violated the province’s Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms.
Now, they’re going to file a human rights complaint.
Four members of L’association pour une solidarité syndicale étudiante, including three of the group’s executives, were arrested in connection with several protests in late March against higher tuition fees. Some of those protests turned violent.
The group claims that those arrested were targeted because of their political views. ”There is no doubt about the political nature of these arrests,” ASSÉ spokesperson Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois said in a press release. “This is clearly an attempt by the [Montreal police] to decapitate the Quebec student movement on the eve of one of its historical struggles.”
Montreal police deny that the arrests were politically motivated. ”When you occupy an office and someone gets a broken wrist and there’s a broken window, that’s not a peaceful demonstration,” spokesperson Ian Lafrenière told the Montreal Gazette. “I agree that people should be allowed to demonstrate. If you do nothing illegal, we won’t bother you.”
The human rights complaint focuses on the police’s Guet des activites des mouvements marginaux et anarchistes (surveillance of the activities of marginal movements and anarchists) or GAMMA squad, which ASSÉ claims conducted the arrests. Police said GAMMA did not make the arrests in question and that the squad was formed as a reaction to increasing levels of violence at protests.
Another activist group, the Coalition Against Repression and Police Brutality, has also filed a complaint accusing the squad of discriminating against people based on their political views.
ASSÉ says it represents more than 40,000 students across Quebec.
Simon Fraser student society locks out employees
Union says $30-per-hour average wage is fair
Photo courtesy of stephenrwalli on Flickr
Labour disputes are common at Canadian universities. And when they happen, student unions often take the side of the workers. But at Simon Fraser, the dispute isn’t between the university and a labour union — it’s between the labour union and the student union itself.
The Simon Fraser Student Society locked out its unionized office workers on Monday. The sticking point is wages — $30.48 per hour on average — which the Student Society wants to lower by as much as $10 per hour, according to a union representative. The average hourly wage for all Canadians aged 25 to 54 in June was $24.71 in June, according to Statistics Canada.
Continue reading Simon Fraser student society locks out employees
Top 10 highest paid university officials in Canada
Click to see who made more than $1-million last year
Here are the Top 10 highest paid university officials in Canada, ranked by their base salaries.*
1. David Johnson
University of Waterloo president (now Governor General of Canada) — $1,041,881
2. Moriarty William
president of the University of Toronto Asset Management Corp. — $697,020
3. Amit Chakma
vice-president of the University of Waterloo (but president of Western as of July, 2010) — $500,000
Continue reading Top 10 highest paid university officials in Canada
How much does your university’s president make?
On Campus shows you where to look
Photo courtesy of Duckie Monster on Flickr
Want to know how much the people running your university make? Is it $100,000? Would $300,000 shock you?
Finding out administrators’ salaries is easy if you go to a school in Ontario, British Columbia or Alberta, thanks to forward-thinking laws. But if you live in New Brunswick or Prince Edward Island, it’s next to impossible. Here’s a province-by-province breakdown of salary disclosure requirements.
Quebec: The information is public, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy to find. Salaries and other compensation paid to senior university administrators must be included in the annual reports that all universities submit to the National Assembly’s Culture and Education committee. Those documents can be found online here. It would be easier if the universities would post them.
Continue reading How much does your university’s president make?
Report finds “culture of contempt” at Concordia
Montreal university needs to clarify its mission
Concordia photo courtesy of Foxtongue on Flickr
Concordia University needs to make major changes to how it’s run, according to a new report on the university’s governance.
The report, released on June 15, says that the university suffers from a “substantial degree of misunderstanding, blatantly deficient internal communications and a lot of distrust, often bordering on mutual contempt, between the various communities of the university.”
The report was written by three outside experts who were brought in after the sudden departure of president Judith Woodsworth over the Christmas break exposed deep divisions between students, faculty and outsiders on the board of governors. Woodsworth’s immediate predecessor, Claude Lajeunesse, was also forced to resign by the board in 2007. As well, the university has seen the departure of a number of vice-presidents.
According to the report, efforts to solicit the opinions of community members found that “everyone seemed quite willing, in some cases even anxious, to think the worst of someone – in some cases, everyone – else.”
While the report acknowledges that the circumstances surrounding Woodsworth’s departure contributed to the “chorus of negative response,” it says that the problems within the university go deeper.
“The depth and even the fury of that response could only have arisen in a context where long simmering governance and internal communication problems between the board and the university community… had neither been addressed nor resolved.”
Part of the problem, according to the report, is the school’s lack of direction which has led to “tension between those who uphold its tradition of accessibility and openness as opposed to those who place greater value on a development model which features research and graduate studies.”
The report recommends that the university deal with this by updating its charter to include a clear mission statement and by developing an academic plan.
The report also recommends reducing the size of the board from 40 members to 25. The smaller board would maintain the current ratio of outsiders to insiders, but it would no longer include representatives from alumni associations. As well, the percentage of faculty on the board would increase while student representation would decrease slightly.
According to the report, “the committee saw no evidence, although there were rumours, accusations and insinuations … that the Concordia board has systematically interfered with core academic or curriculum decision making.”
However, the committee did find evidence that board members had worked “directly with members of the administration in such a way as to bypass and, therefore, weaken the function of the President.” As a result, the report recommends making the president the only point of contact between the board and the administration.
Other recommendations include formalizing the powers of the university senate and enforcing term-limits for board and senate members. The recommendations for a smaller board and firm term-limits are in line with a university governance bill currently before Quebec’s National Assembly.
Despite the problems, the report suggests the university is doing some things right. “What is remarkable… is that under these difficult and adverse circumstances, the core activities of the university, its teaching and research, appeared relatively unaffected,” it says.
The university will hold an open meeting on the report on June 28.
Who are the top 10 highest paid university admins in Quebec?
More than 43 admins make more than $200,000
Late last week, there was controversy after it was revealed that a Université Laval vice-rector had received a 30 per cent pay increase without proper approval from the university’s board. Le Soleil reported that Éric Bauce received the increase on a temporary basis when he took over a sick colleagues duties, but continued to be paid the higher wage even after she returned to work. The National Assembly was told Bauce received a salary of $246,000.*
But a salary that high is not as much of an anomaly as it may seem. In 2008 – 2009, the most recent year for which complete numbers are available, there were 43 university administrators in Quebec with base salaries of more than $200,000 a year, according to the National Assembly’s Culture and Education Committee. The majority of them worked at three large universities in Montreal, with 13 at McGill, 12 at the Université de Montréal and nine at Concordia. Those three schools were home to all 10 of the highest paid administrators in the province.
But bigger student populations don’t necessarily mean more money. The Université du Québec à Montréal, the province’s second largest university, doesn’t have any administrators who are paid more than $200,000. Laval and the Université de Sherbrooke each have only three. And although McGill pays the highest wages, it’s only Quebec’s fifth largest university by population.
In addition to base salary, many senior administrators also receive other benefits, sometimes worth tens of thousands of dollars. Universities are only required to disclose the total dollar value of all perks given to an individual, so details can be hard to find. But some schools have revealed more information. At Concordia, for instance, the president is entitled to housing and car allowances as well as memberships in private clubs.
Here is a list of the 10 highest paid university administrators in Quebec based on documents filed with the National Assembly last fall:
1. Heather Munroe-Blum, McGill principal – $585,481 (base pay of $356,174 plus $229,307 in perks and other compensation.**)
2. Richard Levin, McGill vice principal, health and medical affairs and dean of medicine – $548,929 (base pay of $496,921 plus $52,008 in perks and other compensation.)
3. Judith Woodsworth, Concordia president (Woodsworth was forced to resign last December) – $392,875 (base pay of $350,000 plus $42,875 in perks and other compensation.)
4. Luc Vinet, U de M rector (Vinet’s term ended June 1, 2010) – $362,230 (base pay of $339,031 plus $23,199 in perks and other compensation.)
5. Kathy Assayag, Concordia vice-president, advancement and alumni relations; president of the Concordia University foundation (Assayag left the university for “personal reasons” in September 2010) – $334,323 (base pay of $283,785 plus $50,538 in perks and other compensation.)
6. Michael Di Grappa, Concordia vice-president, services (DiGrappa left Concordia to take a position at McGill in late October, 2010) – $330,042 (base pay of $240,179 plus $89,863 in perks and other compensation.)
7. Rima Rozen, McGill assistant vice-principal, research and international relations – $317,553 (base pay of $226,933 plus $90,620 in perks and other compensation.)
8. Jean-Lucien Rouleau, U de M dean, medicine – $316,174 (base pay of $311,489 plus $4,023 in perks and other compensation.)
9. Peter Allan Todd, McGill dean, management – $310,137 (base pay of $308,129 plus $2,008 in perks and other compensation.)
10. Marc Weinstein, McGill vice-principal, development and alumni relations – $306,185 (base pay of $264,762 plus $41,423 in perks and other compensation.)
Photo courtesy of Duckie Monster on Flickr.
*An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated Éric Bauce’s salary. On Campus regrets the error.
**An earlier version of this article lumped together all non-salary compensation as “perks.” A more accurate description is “perks and other compensation,” because this figure includes royalty payments, bonuses, housing allowances and car allowances.
Supreme Court should support Quebec religion and ethics class
There’s nothing wrong with teaching basic facts about diversity to children
The Supreme Court of Canada heard arguments on Wednesday about whether the parents of school children in Quebec should have the right to pull their kids out of mandatory classes, if they disagree with the content.
At issue is the province’s “Ethics and Religious Culture” course, which is taught at both the elementary and secondary levels. The course is intended to help children “develop an awareness” of the growing diversity in Quebec society.
According to the course curriculum, “students will be encouraged to engage in critical reflection on ethical questions and to understand the phenomenon of religion by practising, in a spirit of openness, dialogue that is oriented toward contributing to community life.”
But some parents don’t like it.
One Catholic couple, who cannot be identified because of a publication ban, sued to have their children exempted from the class. The Quebec Superior Court rejected their arguments and the Court of Appeals dismissed their appeal of that decision. They’re now challenging the Court of Appeals’ decision at the Supreme Court.
According to the Supreme Court’s case summary, the parents have a problem with the course because of the “disruption caused by forced, premature contact with a series of beliefs that were mostly incompatible with those of the family, as well as the adverse effect on the religious faith of the members of this family.”
Yes, that’s right, these parents don’t want their children to know that some members of our society have different beliefs than they do.
But most Quebecers no longer live in parochial ghettos, most likely the children in question have already encountered children from different backgrounds, who are being raised in different religious traditions, either in the classroom or on the playground.
There’s no problem with parents teaching their children their religious views. There’s also nothing stopping religious schools from teaching explicitly faith-based classes.
But at the same time, I see no problem with the state insisting that schools teach that most basic of Canadian values: that in our society all of us are considered equal.
As Supreme Court Justice Louis LeBel put it, “Is there anything wrong with trying to teach open mindedness to students, to make that a behaviour or an attitude?
In Canada, there shouldn’t be.
The parents’ lawyers have claimed that the course will destroy pluralism in Quebec. I’m not quite sure how teaching children that pluralism exists in a diverse society will lead to that outcome.
Part of the problem is that there seems to be a lot of misinformation going around about what the course actually teaches and some of it seems to be rather deliberate.
National Post columnist, Barbara Kay claims that children will be taught that “that Christianity and pagan Animism and tinfoil-hat science fiction are equally true and equally conducive to a life of morality and spiritual vigour.”
But that’s not what the curriculum says. In fact, the course gives prominence to Christian traditions because of the “historical and cultural importance of Catholicism and Protestantism.” It also focuses on Judaism and Aboriginal spiritual traditions because of their long histories in Quebec. The only other religions mentioned by uname in the curriculum are Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism and Orthodox Christianity, though there is some time set aside for “other religions” and “other forms of expression.”
What worries me most is the precedent that a victory by these parents could set. What comes next? Will parents be able to pull their children out of science classes because they don’t want them exposed to the theory of evolution? What if a parent doesn’t like what’s taught in a history class?
Canada is a diverse society and there’s nothing wrong with teaching basic facts about the people who live in this country to children.
Disqualifications reversed for all Concordia student election candidates
Student council makes a reasonable decision to overturn disqualification of opposition slate
The post election kerfuffle at the Concordia Student Union, which saw almost everyone who ran be disqualified, appears to be over.
On Wednesday, in one of their last actions, outgoing student council members voted to allow everyone who was elected take office and to reimburse candidates for election expenses.
The situation began around two weeks after the vote, held in late March, when elections chief, Oliver Cohen, disqualified both of the teams that contested the election.
A couple of weeks later, that decision was modified by the judicial board, who overturned Cohen’s decision to disqualify “Your Concordia,” the team that won the student union executive, a majority on council and most of the student seats on the university’s senate and board of governors.
However, the board upheld Cohen’s decision to deny both teams reimbursement for election expenses and to disqualify the other slate, “Action,” which won several council seats and a spot on the university senate.
The judicial board’s written report, released on Monday, alleges that both slates violated election rules by campaigning after polls had opened and that the winning slate engaged in negative campaigning. Shocking, I know.
According to the Concordian, councillors who supported reinstating the candidates said they were afraid that students in Concordia’s business school would be disenfranchised, as all their representatives remained disqualified.
It’s an interesting argument, but I think the real problem with the decisions to disqualify these candidates is that neither Cohen nor the judicial board attempted to prove that the alleged violations actually affected the results of the election. Disenfranchising every student is a serious action and should only be done in the gravest circumstances.
In “real” elections, it has to be proven that the results were actually affected for the vote to be annulled. As Ontario Superior Court Justice, Alexandra Hoy wrote in a 2011 decision about a Toronto election, “people have exercised their right to vote, and their votes should not be discounted without good reason.”
And the reasons presented here, especially considering the sorts of shenanigans that have taken place in previous Concordia elections, just aren’t good enough to throw out an entire election.
Sure, candidates shouldn’t break the rules, but should wearing a blue shirt after polling starts really be grounds for disqualification?
Some of the rules in this case seem downright ridiculous. According to judicial board member Tuan Dinh, “any rhetoric that refers to an oppositional party, even if through contrast” is grounds for disqualifying an entire team. Goodness. If Dinh was working for Elections Canada, we’d never stop having federal elections.
The “offending” item in question is a “rap” video where “Your Concordia” candidates spit cutting lines like, “nothing rhymes with Concordia except for ‘Action’ we’re sincerely getting bored of ya’.”
Cunning word-play it is not, but this was an election, not an MC battle and this video certainly wasn’t defamatory, slanderous or libellous as was claimed by Cohen and Dinh.
The other big problem with these disqualifications was that they penalized entire political parties for the actions of one or two individual candidates. Imagine if Elections Canada disqualified every Conservative who ran in the last election because one of them showed up at a polling station wearing a party t-shirt. Sounds pretty unreasonable, does it not?
New poll claims youth vote doubled, too bad it’s a poor survey
Historica-Dominion Institute survey has so many problems, it’s impossible to take its conclusions seriously
Youth voting rates doubled on May 2, when compared with the 2008 election, and more than half of those votes went to the NDP, according to a poll released yesterday by the Historica-Dominion Institute.
I’d be willing to believe that more than half of youth votes went to the NDP, but that might be because I live in Montreal and I don’t think I actually know anyone who didn’t vote for the NDP. And while I wouldn’t be surprised if the youth vote-rate increased, I’m a little incredulous about the claim that it rose to 76 per cent, from 37.4 per cent three years ago.
Now, it may be that the possibility of electing some of their peers to parliament drove youth turnout to unprecedented highs. Or it may be that this is just a shoddy survey.
The Canadian Press story about the poll gives some indication of the latter, saying (right at the end) that, “since it was conducted online, it’s impossible to say precisely how exact the poll is.”
But that’s the least of this survey’s problems.
The Historica-Dominion Institute claims the poll is representative of “youth” but that’s not actually the case. The participants are all members of a website, studentawards.com, which claims to help its members obtain university scholarships.
So, in fact, the survey only questioned students and those who intend to go to university in the near future. There’s a big difference between the voting habits of university students and non-student youth.
But even if this survey were being passed off as representative of students, there would be some big problems. The participants were selected from among a group of people who chose to register with a specific website and who opted-in to receiving surveys of this nature. That’s a pretty limited group and one that certainly has some self-selection bias.
The survey also has problems with sample size. Only 812 people across the country participated and while that might sound like a decent number of people, it means some very low sample sizes at the provincial level. In fact, the suvey doesn’t even provide the number of respondents by province for the Prairie (Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Nunavut) and Atlantic regions. Fewer than 60 people were survived in each of those regions.
There’s another big problem with post-election surveys, people tend to over-report voting. Post-election surveys, commissioned by Elections Canada, have found that the number of people who claim to have voted, when surveyed, is usually around 20 percentage points higher than the actual voting rate.
While I’d certainly like to find out that youth turnout increased in this election, we’re going to have to wait a little longer to find out what actually happened.
