Are Canadian universities doing their part when it comes to encouraging debate and cultivating ideas?
student politics
In this week’s edition of On the Hill, reporter Raghad Khalil took to City Hall to meet with none other than Ottawa’s own Jim Watson.
Following an approximately hour-long in-camera session, the board voted via secret ballot to uphold the elections office’s decision to maintain Jeremy Russell’s disqualification.
While Wess will not assume his new position until May 1, he said that in this interim period he will be “starting conversations and negotiations to build the foundation for a smooth transition and a successful mandate next year.”
The votes are in for the 2017 Student Federation of the University of Ottawa (SFUO) general election, which saw a 14.6 per cent voter turnout—a large improvement compared with last year’s 7.8 per cent turnout.
On Feb. 7, U of O student Joachim Finlay raised allegations against SFUO presidential candidate Hadi Wess on Facebook.
Taking part in General Assemblies, BOA meetings, and elections will take up a relatively small amount of your time, and are an easy way to start fixing these problems.
This boring bottleneck is the sole pipeline for improving the SFUO—so let’s make sure it’s not full of garbage.
The 2017 Student Federation of the University of Ottawa (SFUO) general election has 10 candidates vying for the six positions at the highest level of student governance at the U of O.
On Jan. 26, the Student Federation of the University of Ottawa (SFUO) held their third Board of Administration (BOA) meeting of the month, where Faculty of Social Sciences representative Tony Bui raised some “serious concerns” about the upcoming general election.
The comptroller’s position takes its strength from the idea of balance. If the problem is part of the board, then the comptroller can expose it. If the problem is the comptroller, then the board as a whole can see through it.
Adding 10 extra faculty seats to the BOA would bring down our ratio to about 1,000 students per rep—not only giving students more representation, but giving students more chances to get involved.
Feel like running for student government this winter? The Fulcrum editorial staff weighs in on some sure fire ways to maximize the effectiveness of your campaign.
“If you have to choose between running 1848 for a weekend or holding office hours in a sauna, I think it’s pretty clear what the answer is.”—SFUO president Roméo Ahimakin.
If a motion with legal bearing can be shared in a BOA meeting, there is no legal reason it can’t be shared outside of it, since these kinds of gatherings are open to the public.
Now, should a student union wish to revoke its membership from the federation, a petition calling for a referendum on defederation must first receive signatures from 15 per cent of its members.
Until the SFUO is in a better position to have the time and funds to properly manage a student bar, they should take a knee.
Mandatory voting is certainly something to study for the future, but given our current lack of information and resources at the U of O, the discussion should remain theoretical for the time being.
“Lots of these memes have more policy meaning behind them than meets the eye.”—Good Guy Greg McDoge, meme interpreter.
“This might not be enough, the SFUO should seriously consider handing out free puppies and lattes to get students involved at GAs.”—Emily Smith, third-year economics student.
It becomes more and more important that a greater number of students be given an effective voice—that means being able to vote on policy—and not just a passive role every year.
Since the SFUO decided to refuse to work with the GA Outreach Committee and publicly scolded students for taking matters in their own hands, I can not in good conscience continue to serve the SFUO on this committee.
It is often said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. That is unfortunately where we lie now, stuck in the stagnation of our status quo.
“We’re thinking of just not showing up to classes for a few weeks from December to January. That should show them.”
At Sunday’s vote, there were a lot of BOA members who approached me and said that they felt like a gun was put to their heads. This is unacceptable.
