Other Press

September 26, 1989

 

 

Faculty To Take Strike Vote
by Tamara Gorin Douglas College faculty ciation has been fighting for Hopefully, our decision to ment as to the direction the
make less than New West- some sort of clause in their have a strike vote will be society wants to take.
The Douglas College minster Public School teach- contract which would see geen as an indication to the “The administration is
Faculty Association has de- ers and the college admini- Contract Faculty who have _— administration that we are wrong,” Student Society Vice
- cided to take a strike vote stration’s final salary offer © workedfortwoormoreyears serious aboutourdemands.” President Internal, Laura
_- sometime in mid-October.In wouldincrease the gapeven at thecollege get priority for The Student Society was Ziegler stated emphatically,
a meeting held Wednesday more. Ranked13outof16in the classes they have been gupposedtomeetwithBurry though.
September 20th, the faculty terms of B.C.’s post-secon- teaching. and Peacock to discuss the Ross Cameron,

voted 76% in favour of a
motion to go to a strike vote,
in response to what Pam
Burry, D.C.F.A President,
says is the college’s contin-
ued “rejection of faculty
demands.”

If the strike vote goes
through, Douglas faculty
could be on strike as of No-
vember 6th.

Ever since the advent
of the so-called “restraint”
years of 1981-1982, faculty
has faced constant cuts in
their contract language, and
as aresult, cuts in their secu-
rity. With more students per
class, per course, per semes-
ter, workloads have gone up
and the faculty are angry
that this hasn’t been recog-
nised.

dary teachers, they have

consistently lost buying .

power, down 17% since 1981.

Also, the college has
arbitrarily decided some
classes will be taught on
weekends, without any type
of contract language specify-
ing faculty consent, or spe-
cial considerations, such as
wages, or added benefits. This
could be a major blow for
their standard of living, and
is one of the major concerns
of the Association.

Another is the precari- ,
ous position of Contract
Faculty, who make up al-
most 50% of campus faculty.
Hired by semester, or year,
these teachers are basically
on call, and there is no job
security for them. The Asso-

Women's
Committee Active

 

 

by Tamara Gorin the focus is on taking away
Women oncampushave the mystery surrounding
a new voice. these products.

The Douglas College
Women’s Steering commitee
held its first meeting of the
semester last Wednesday.
Open to all female members
of the Student Society, the
committee met to decide its
goals for the upcoming year.

The Committee exists
as an “affirmative action
measure aimed at promot-
ing awareness of gender
equality issues and counter-
ing the lack of gender-equal-
ity on the Douglas College
campus and the Society as a
whole.”

With the National Day
of Action on Abortion coming
up on October 14th, one of
the major decisions made at
the meeting was to focus on
getting the Choice mandate
recognised on campus.
Members will be organising
a major educational cam-
_ paign, aimed at getting in-

formation about contracep-
tion, abortion and sexuality

tostudents. The hope is
that more openness around
these isssues will pave the
way to a greater understand-
ing of them.

They are also looking
into getting a supply of tam-
pons, sanitary napkins and
condoms for the Student
Society office. There is only
one condom dispenser in the

_entire college, and that is in
one of the women’s bath-
- rooms. Most of the “feminine
hygene” dispensers on cam-
pus are usually empty. Again,

 

ONG! WE DEMA
ND Te BE HEAR

PINT

\ / iy ‘ ae ;

 

“The college (admini-
stration) has taken the posi-
tion that they don’t negoti-
ate,” states Adrienne Pea-
cock, the Faculty Associa-
tion’s Chief Negotiator.

“They sent us a letter
on May 30th saying they
wanted no mediation, they
had given us their final offer.

situation on Friday, but as
quorum was not obtained,
the meeting had to become
informal. Afterward, society
President Aias Perez, was
careful to point out that the
society had to stay neutral at
this time, because the entire
representative committee has
to come tosome sort of agree-

the administration’s chief
negotiator, is on holiday, and
his replacement Rob Corbett

stated that as he had “not
received any official indica-:

tion from the association

about their intentions,” and -

could not comment at the
time of publication.

Students Get A Cheap Ride

 

by Marion Drakos

 

WE ARE STR

D! WE ARE WONeN

 

 

“Such items are neces-
sities and should be treated
as such,” said Jennifer
Whiteside, Resourse Co-or-
dinator for the student soci-
ety, and committee member.
“The more open people are
about things like this, the
easier it is for the truth to
get out.”

Another ongoing goal
of the committee is to work
with the women of the fac-
ulty association to get a strong
sexual harrassment policy
implimented on campus.
Presently, if anyone is har-
rassed, they have to go
through the same procedure
as someone would who was
appealing their marks. The
committee members feel that
this is not enough and the
procedure is not sensitive to
the needs of a victim of sex-
ual harrassment.

Providing a feminist
perspective to the issues af-
fecting women on campus,
the Women’s Steering Com-
mittee will be meeting again
on Wednesday, September
23rd at 3:00.

Thanks to the Student

‘Transit Advisory Committee,

(S.T.A.C.), full time students
are getting a break from B.C.
Transit.

Students with a sixty
percent course load can pur-
chase a “Fast Trax” decal for
their student cards that will
allow them to go through all
fare zones for the price of
one. The sticker costs two
dollars and will save students
up to forty-eight dollars a
month.

According to Christina
Steinmann, D.C.S.S. Vice
President External, “This is

only a firststep in our long |

range plans for full conces-

sion fares for students.”
The battle for conces-

sion fares for post-secondary

students has been going on
since 1982, when B.C. Tran-
sit first introduced zone fares.
In the summer of 1988 the
student societies of Douglas,
Capilano, Kwantlen, SFU,

 

 

 

 

 

UBC, VVI, and BCIT joined
forces in the campaign and
created S.T.A.C..

S.T.A.C. began meeting
with the Transit Commission
and by March 1989 two pro-

posals went forward. One
specified that all full time

students receive concession .

rates. The second proposal,
that full time students be
zone exempt, was accepted.

“Education is expensive

_ enough as it is, and it is our

assumption that the govern-
ment will relieve this and
give students a fare deal,”
says Steinmann. She also
says that “S.T.A.C. members
plan to meet at some point in
the near future with Minis-
ter of Advanced Education
and Job Training, Stan Hagan
and Minister of Municipal
Affairs, Rita Johnson to dis-
cuss further the issue of full
concession fares for students.
We tried in mid-summer, but
both parties declined.”

Telereg Blues At UBC

by Rick Hiebert

VANCOUVER (CUP) —
Graduate student John Spark
transferred from Queen’s
University to University of
British Columbia expecting
to find his student loan wait-
ing for him.

Instead he spent his first
week of school penniless and
found he was no was no longer
registered.

Spark’s bank loan was
held up and he was unable to
pay a $100 deposit to secure
his courses. UBC’s one-year
old computerized telephone
registration system Telereg’
deleted his record.

Last week about 700
students at UBC faced the
same problem. Last year, the
number was 800. According
to UBC registrar Richard
Spencer, three or four
hundred of these students
had to re-register to get in.

The university grants
deferrals to students who
foresee their inability to pay

 

 

  

 

 

o

the deposit, but students must § “simply didn’t pay their fees |

submit an application for in time.”

deferral by August But even if only 350 of
“When students read _ the students were cancelled

the registration material,
there’s fine print,” said fi-
nancial aid officer Dan Wor-
sley. “If you choose to apply
late, we don’t grant fee de-
ferrals.” About 1800 students
took advantage of the defer-
ral system this year.
Worsley said many of
the de-registered students
may not have had loans and

due to lack of funds, the sys-
tem has to be more fair to
students with loans student
council external affairs co-
ordinator Vanessa Geary
said.

“I think there are stu-
dents who are victims of
circumstance who shouldn’t
be victims of Telereg,” she

_ anid.

Je ict