Tuition Dispute

But this time, the university administration and the students' union are on the same side.

A recent press release from CFS Ontario claimed that a number of universities in Ontario were poised to raise tuition fees well above the 5% limit set by the provincial government in March 2006. Among the universities cited were the University of Toronto, Ryerson University, and Lakehead University.

However, in a joint press release issued by the Lakehead University Students' Union (CFS Local 32) and Lakehead University, the Presidents of Lakehead and of it's Students' Union refuted this claim. They said that Lakehead was only planning increases in the range of 3.9% to 4.5%, "well below the 5% average cap established by the McGuinty government." The issue has also come to the attention of the local media.

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UPDATE (2006-07-25): LUSU has since issued a press release with the title "Lakehead University Student Union Stands in Solidarity with the Canadian Federation of Students." Seeking to "clarify" its earlier joint press release, LUSU reaffirmed its "alliance" with the Federation and noted that while they continued to believe that "Lakehead University is doing the best job it can under this difficult provincial regulation," LUSU nonetheless supported the Federation's goals of "lowered tuition fees." This press release also questioned the use of the term "market value" to characterize tuition fees, even though this term was used in their original joint press release.

Questions of Affiliation

I had a look through the websites of the various national and provincial organizations that represent students' unions' (and presumably, students') collective voices to government. And what interesting things one can find! Here are just a few gems:

• The Acadia Students' Union (ASU) is claimed as a member of three such organizations: CASA (Canadian Alliance of Student Associations), CFS (Canadian Federation of Students), and ANSSA (Alliance of Nova Scotia Student Associations). A model of pan-student cooperation and unity, perhaps? The only problem is that the ASU only claims to be a member of one such organization, CASA.
  
  
• Ever heard of the Graduate Students Association of Canada (GSAC)? Unless you've attended a recent meeting of the Canadian Association of Graduate Studies, probably not. They claim to have four full member students' unions and two associate members. However, the Graduate Students' Association of the University of New Brunswick has no mention of their membership in GSAC on their website. They do, however, link to the CFS - both on their main page and on their links page.
  
  Similarly, GSAC's ability to continue to claim the allegiance of the Dalhousie Association of Graduate Students (DAGS) may be in doubt. They are prospective members of the Canadian Federation of Students. Further, a recent report from DAGS' VP External casts doubts on GSAC's capabilities, noting its small size and its location in far-away Edmonton, in comparison to the Federation's large size and its location in Ottawa.
  
  
• The College Student Alliance - which represents college students' unions in Ontario - lists 23 members on its website. But look closer: the Students' Administrative Council, Cambrian College (Sudbury, ON) is listed twice. Furthermore, the Northern College Students' Administrative Council is listed three times - once representing all Northern College campuses, once representing the Haileybury campus, and once representing the Kirkland Lake campus - even though all three links point to the same website.
  
  
• Lastly, the Fédération Étudiante Collégiale du Québec (FECQ), the main organization representing Québecois CÉGEP (college) students, seems to exist presently in a state of flux. The news on its homepage consists largely of news regarding the results of referenda to leave or join the organization. According to its website:
  
  • one referendum to leave FECQ has failed
  • one referendum to leave FECQ has succeeded
  • one referendum to join FECQ has failed
  • one referendum to join FECQ has succeeded
  All of this may have something to do with the Association pour une Solidarité Syndicale Étudiante (ASSÉ). This organization, which has as slogans "For a militant student unionism!" and "For an education that is public, free, secular, high-quality, accessible and non-discriminatory!", has been in hot pursuit of FECQ members. Supporters of ASSÉ have held anti-FECQ rallies in Montreal, while one partisan has established a website (www.rocklafecq.info) solely dedicated to the promotion of disaffiliation from FECQ.

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UPDATE (2006-06-26):

• I have been informed that the ASU actually is a member of ANSSA, notwithstanding its (apparent) reluctance to claim such affiliation on its webpage devoted to telling people which organizations it is a part of....
• The DAGS (Dalhousie Association of Graduate Studies) executive appears nonplussed to the idea of being a member of either GSAC or the CFS. They officially requested that their prospective membership in the CFS be "dissolved" in April 2005, and they voted to withdraw from GSAC in January 2006. More recently, the 2005-2006 exit report of the outgoing Vice-President External recommends that DAGS not join either organization - GSAC due to its limited profile and lack of communication, and CFS due to "strong ideological differences with their policies." However, the same report also encouraged developing a "positive open relationship" with the Federation's National Graduate Caucus, and encouraged a stronger push for graduate student representation within CASA.
• As has been noted in the comments, the College Student Alliance's double-counting of members is a web site error.
  

Compensation Updated

My Compensation of Student Union Officials page has been updated for Summer 2006. Three student unions have removed information from their webpages, necessitating a reducation in the size of the table. If your student union is not listed, please feel free to contact me with compensation information, and it will be quickly added to the table.
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UPDATE (2006-06-21): The figures for the Federation of Students, University of Waterloo have been updated. In addition, I have added a table listing the equivalent annual compensation for the various students' unions, for better comparison purposes.

Purely Factual News

In purely factual news:

• Amanda Aziz is the National Chairperson-elect of the Canadian Federation of Students. Unless the bylaws have been changed, her term technically began at the close of the 2006 Semi-Annual General Meeting (i.e. on May 28), but the CFS web site has not yet been updated to reflect that fact
  
• Penny Beames' struggle to win a second term as Chairperson of the University of Victoria Students' Society (UVSS) has succeeded. At the May 4, 2006 meeting of the Board, the following motion was passed:
  
  "WHEREAS the appeal process involving Mike Waters and Penny Beames has already cost the society thousands of dollars; and
  WHEREAS Mike Waters has requested that no further action be taken on this matter so as to prevent further losses to the Society; therefore
  BIRT although the Board finds highly suspect the conduct of the previous Board in regards to the disqualification of Mike Waters, this Board does not wish to pursue the issue any further."
  
  Ms. Beames is now in charge of the UVSS - notwithstanding the fact that a majority of the members of its Board of Directors were part of an opposing slate, the fact that that slate's candidate for Chairperson received more votes than her before being disqualified, and the fact that the Board of Directors officially considers "highly suspect" the process that lead to Ms. Beames' acquisition of the Chairpersonship for 2006/07. All of which leads to the inevitable question: how will the UVSS survive this year?
  
  

Gemma Tumelty Elected President of National Union of Students of the United Kingdom

So in case you thought Canadian student politics was too factionalized...

In the United Kingdom, the National Union of Students is so influential that the Guardian publishes a series of articles on their recent elections. For 2006, there were seven candidates for President of NUS UK, three running with slates and four running indepentently. Of these, a few were running purely as protest candidates, such as the Marxist Daniel Randall or the young Conservative Dan Large. But two candidates stood out from the crowd: Pav Akhtar and Gemma Tumelty.

Gemma Tumelty, outgoing National Secretary of NUS, ran with the support of the oxymoronic student group "Organised Independents." The Organised Independents (OIs) are a centrist faction that operate within the National Union of Students. In the past they operated in cooperation with Labour Students, the youth wing of the Labour Party that also runs candidates in NUS elections. This is not surprising, given the fact that many OIs are, in fact, members of the Labour Party themselves (though not officially supported in NUS elections).

Pav Akhtar, outgoing Black Students' Officer of NUS, ran as an independent. You can have a look at his election platform by checking out his campaign website (yes, NUS candidates have websites...). He was generally considered to be the more left-wing of the two main candidates. According to this blog, Mr. Akhtar ran with the support of the Student Broad Left.

In the end, Gemma Tumelty was elected President. For more information on the election, which has been extensively covered in both the national and student media, check out these articles/posts:

• Adding their voice to the debate: Has better organisation or extremism made Islamic groups the biggest faction in student politics? (The Guardian)
• They might have won the battle: Gemma Tumelty, the new NUS president, is determined to turn the union around and keep up the fight against fees, she tells Alexandra Smith (The Guardian)
• Leader's Time-Wasting Tactics (Socialist Students faction)
• Mayor of London accused of interfering in NUS elections
• Jo Salmon's post on the next NUS President
  
• NUS Conference (perspective from a Conservative delegate)

Now, all this raises the obvious question: why aren't we seeing anywhere near the same open debate concerning the direction of Canada's student political groupings? Whether it's CFS or CASA, one gets the distinct impression that this sort of democracy in action simply doesn't happen here in Canada.

Canadian University Press Threatens to Incinerate 'Annoying' Student Associations

Are you a student politician? And is the student press on your campus independent of your student association? If 'yes', then you may very well have come in for a lot of criticism from your local campus media. The student press in Canada is very famous for asserting its independence, and for insisting on ruthlessly reporting on the shenanigans of on-campus organizations, including student associations.

The intentions of the student press, however, may have taken a darker turn. To cite a resolution that was passed in January 2005 by Canadian University Press, the alliance of Canadian student newspapers:

WHEREAS once upon a time, CUP had an awesome idea of building a Death Star, and decided to put money toward making it happen, and
WHEREAS student unions are evil and should be eliminated from the galaxy (toasted like flaming marshmallows), and
WHEREAS we have serious engineers who support the idea and are willing to work pro bono on this project, and
WHEREAS late during plenary at CUP 66, some people put forward a motion to loot the Death Star Fund in order to build a houseboat, and
WHEREAS a houseboat seems silly and unrealistic, like much of what comes out of the Gateway, and
WHEREAS a Death Star would still totally rock!

BIRT CUP change the houseboat fund back into the Death Star Fund, and
BIFRT the fund continue to be contributed to at the rate of $π ($3.14) per year, until such time that funding is sufficient to research, design and build a full-scale Death Star to be used as a negotiating tool for CUP members with student associations and university administrations, and
BIFRT CASA and CFS are nerdy geeks, and
BIFRT the Death Star also be used to acquire revenge on student associations or other unpleasant groups of individuals who annoy anyone in CUP, for any reason, and
BIFRT the Death Star be used to extort money from large multinational corporations, where such activity is not against the law, and
BIFRT we acknowledge that the Death Star is very important to many members of CUP, and therefore not try to replace it with any other vessel or vehicle of destruction.

So... are the nerdy geeks in charge of your student union capable of piloting X-Wing fighters?

(This motion, and many other of a similarly hilarious nature, were discovered on the weblog of local SFU campus media baroness Amanda McCuaig.)