News

 

First in Canada, Last in Douglas?

by Earle Gale

“| omething is rotten at the heart

of Douglas College.

Our administrators are treating
First Nations students like garbage and
simply sweeping them under the
carpet. At least that is the opinion of a
student who contacted the OP recently.
_ How else do you explain the
pathetically cramped First Nations
office hidden away from prying eyes
at room 2202? And how do you
explain the lack of a mention of First
Nations services in the 1996/97
Douglas College Calendar? Worse
still, how do you exptain-the complete
absence of a First Nations office at all
at the new David Lam Campus?

Betsy Bruyere, First Nations
services coordinator, is well aware of
the facts and worries that First Nations
students are getting the wrong
message from college administrators.
But Bruyere pulled up short of directly
criticizing college authorities.

“I'd really like to share,” she said,
“because that’s the culturally
appropriate thing to do. But I feel that
I can’t because I’m afraid I will
compromise my job position and then
I won’t be any use to the students.”

But she admits it is very difficult
counseling students one-on-one in her
tiny office while other students are

waiting in the corridor outside. Still,
it’s better than it was in the early days
of her job when she worked out of a
mail box. Bruyere said she has heard
students refer to the current facility as
“another little reserve.”
But Wilma Clearsky, a second-year
Political Science student, goes further.
“T feel discrimination,” she said.
“There’s apathy about First Nations.
We’re left out. Every other group has
facilities and needs met.”

Clearsky said she would like to see
a bigger facility for First Nations
students, with a waiting area where
she could socialize with other First
Nations students. She said it should
also be part of the Student Services
area. Clearsky said she feels First
Nations students have poorer facilities
than other visible minorities, women
and the disabled.

“Life has been nothing but a big
struggle,” she said. “Now we’re trying
to get an education, we’re still
struggling. We’ve become assimilated
and now we’re trying to do it the white
man’s way and we’re still struggling.”

According to the Aboriginal Post-
Secondary Education and Training
Policy Framework, “responsibility for
eliminating barriers to successful
participation (of First Nations

students) should reside not just with
the Coordinators, but with all
institutional personnel.”

But First Nations students at
Douglas say the institutional personnel
here just don’t care and they continue
to feel discriminated against.

Despite this, Bruyere said First
Nations students are “healing through
education” and the numbers who
enroll in college programs are
booming.

Across Canada in 1977 there were
just 2100 First Nations students; Today
there are 21000.

Bruyere is delighted with the
increase and said at Douglas the boom
has been even more pronounced with
88 “status” First Nations students in
1995/96 nearly doubling to 163 this
year. In addition, there are many non-
status and Metis at Douglas for whom
statistics are not available, so the total
population is actually much larger.

Bruyere has developed a glossy
resource guide containing advice and
contact numbers to help deal with the
boom but admits she might soon need
a full-time assistant to help her deal
with every student who needs her help.

Betsy Bruyere has been First Nations Services Coordinator at Douglas since January 1993.

The office has organized First Nations awareness presentations and workshops. They have also
hosted a Land Claims forum named Keegatoewuk (is speaking), and presented speakers from the
Gustafson Lake Stand-Off.

In addition, last year 762 people visited the office for drop-in counseling and a further 112
attended pre-booked sessions.

Upcoming events, to which everyone is welcome, will include;

For further information on the work of the First Nations Student Services Coordinator, or for

details of upcoming events, please contact Betsy Bruyere on 527-5565.

 

 

 

 

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Support staff
stage strike vote

by Paul Andrew

upport staff at all three Douglas
S College campuses have been

advised by BC Government and
Service Employers’ Union to sign up
for a strike vote so the union can find
out of there is sufficient support to
give strike notice to the management
at the college.

The bombshell came on Thursday
when BCGEU members at the college
held the vote at the campus in New
West, the David Lam campus in
Coquitlam, and the Thomas Haney
Centre in Maple Ridge.

Soren Bech, communications officer
for the BCGEU, said negotiations have
been proceeding with the college for
about six months, but’they have now
reached an impasse.

“Eventually you get to the point
where you have to play a different
card,” Bech said.

Tom Childs, who works for the
Learning Resources Centre at
Douglas, said the vote is in response to
some “mean spirited language that
management wants to put into the
contract.”

“They want to have faculty installed
as a supervisor instead of a BCGEU
supervisor in an instructional area,”
Childs said. “That will probably
double the cost to taxpayers, because
support staff make about half as much
as faculty,” he added.

The strike vote, which involves 300
BCGEU members, will effectively
close the college if the support staff

College contemplates Premier’s promise

by Paul Andrew

ne of the promises Glen Clark

made prior to his election
campaign last spring was to freeze
post-secondary tuition. Another
promise he made at that time was that,
if colleges and universities did not
come through with 104 percent
registration, he would cut government
funding accordingly and shift it to
institutions that have reached those
government directives.

“What they’re asking us to do is put
out 104 percent service on a 100
percent budget,” said Linda Holmes,
president of Langara College in
Vancouver.

Peter Greenwood, vice-president of
finance and administration at Douglas
College, said he has the impression the
provincial government will give post-
secondary institutions some leeway
this year, because at this stage most
colleges can’t prove they have reached
the required 104 percent enrollment.

“The issue is that the government
was going to ensure any student in BC

would get access this
year. Currently,
enrollment at
Douglas is strong,”
he said. But when it
came to pinpointing
how Douglas will
make up the extra
four percent,
Greenwood said he’s
unsure if it will be
achieved by the first
week of October, when late
registration ends and all full-time
students (FTEs) are accounted for. At
the end of last April, Douglas only had
97 percent — a deficit of seven
percentage points that must be made
up if they are to receive full
government funding.

“One percent represents 50
students,” Greenwood said. “We have
a program called Centres 2000. It’s a
unit of the college that provides
workplace training where we will go
right into the field and provide training

 

for people on the job,” he explained.
“Tt’s something that we would be able
to claim this year that we couldn’t
claim last year.”
Cj. said the work program
should generate around three

percent more enrollment if the claim is
allowed, and added that a youth to
work program, which is part of the
B.C. Benefits Initiative, will probably
supply an additional one percent. That
will bring Douglas to 101 percent
enrollment.

“We hope we will pick-up that three

percent through normal enrollment,”
Greenwood said. “Faculty and
administration were recommended by
(mediator) Jim Dorsey last spring to
work together and enhance
productivity,” he explained. “But we
weren’t able to do that because our
faculty rejected those
recommendations.”
Douglas, which is expected to have
a combined total of between 5000
and 6000 FTEs between the new
David Lam campus in Coquitlam and
the New Westminster campus, might
be able to split the difference and
report that they have achieved 104
percent registration. even if one of
those campuses falls short of
government directives.

“We’re in a unique position here at
Douglas,” said Brad Barber, director
of communications and marketing.
“Because we are trying to fill anew
campus on time and on budget, so
we’ve been maxed out with our energy
there,” he said, referring to the 1200

agree to take action during the first
week of the fall semester, Childs said.

The vote is stemming from a
meeting held last Wednesday that dealt
with sensitive issues like the role of
seniority in promotions and transfers,
evaluation reports from students
regarding the performance of support
staff, and faculty administrators taking
the place of support staff supervisors,
who up until now have supervised
their own departments.

“That means senior staff will be
using their seniority to move into other
positions,” Childs said. “And that
means layoffs at the college.”

Also, unconfirmed reports from
union members say a support sta
worker at Douglas was fired last week
on the basis of one student’s
evaluation of that worker’s job skills.
However, Bech said it’s too early to
confirm or deny any details that led to
the vote, and that union officials will
be making statements after all the
votes are tallied.

“If we can’t resolve these issues, we
may have to go on strike,” Bech said.

Al Atkinson, who is currently the
acting president of Douglas, is
representing management at the
negotiating table and could not be
reached for comment. 3

At press time the unofficial vote tally
was 75% in favour of a strike. There
has been no comment from BCGEU as
to the what possible job actions, if any,
will be taken.

students that will fill the Coquitlam
campus for the first time in September.

Lisa Simpson, communications
manager for education skills and
training, says the funding for colleges
is based on the number of FTEs that
each college estimates for a given
year, and those payments are sent to
the college every two weeks.

“What we do is, if they haven’t met
the targets we agreed upon together,
then they are penalized, or funds are
held back for next year,” she
explained. “That’s the system we have
always used.”

Simpson went on to say the ministry
might incorporate a system based on
performance ranges where a college
will either be given extra funding for
achieving an enrollment that is above
pre-set targets, or funding will be
reduced if enrollment targets are not
achieved.

“That hasn’t been formalized yet,”
she said. That’s something that’s being
examined.”

 

The Other Press September 31996 3