~ Monda’

, March 28, 1988

Other Editorial

 

 

 

WwW
ELECTION

 

 

 

the Other Press _

 

Stickers don’t speak |
the whole truth

Looking around the College, one would have
to try hard to miss the stickers that read "This
class brought to you courtesy of the DKFA" and
"This college is open and running courtesy of

the Faculty”.

Considering the frequency and diligence
with which they are placed, it is assumed they
actually believe what they say.

Can the DKFA really be so short sighted as
to miss the fact that there are 5000+ students on
this campus all of whom paid good money to
attend classes? To pay THEIR salaries?

Myself, I am currently working on having

College."

semester.

stickers made up that read, "This college open
and running courtesy of the students of Douglas

 

Of course, should I wander about the college
absently sticking things to windows, I would
surely be arrested for vandalism, something that
I am certain Len Millis isn’t too worried about.

Although completely unreasonable, I like to
wonder what the college would do if all of the
students decided that they didn’t like the un-
stable atmosphere here and didn’t return next

But I suppose Bill Morphy, the Bursar of the
College, summed it up best when he said that the
college would run much better without students.

Jeff House

 

 

 

A little
explanation

This letter is an explanation of
the ramifications involved with
Student Society elections, and
general meetings. I am writing out
of concern for the obvious lack of
interest of the student body in the
affairs of the Student Society.

As a motivator, each student in
this College pays an average of
$10.00 to the Douglas College Stu-
dent Society. This fee is to support
the society and to pay the member-
ship fees to the CFS. Aproximately
$55,000.00 per semester is the
alotted budget of the DCSS. The
revenues are significantly less
during the summer, and the fees are
proportional to the number of
credits that each student takes.
However with the advent of a sum-
mer semester the annual revenue of
the DCSS will be in the range of
$130,000.

Obviously, the student society
must make many important finan-
cial descisions. They also have the
task of representing the student
body to other bodies outside the
College, and internally to the Col-
lege adminstration.

For these reasons it is vital that a
responsible, upstanding executive

"Agitator"
banned from
college

To the Other Press:

Many readers of this paper and
most people, students or otherwise,
are firm believers in our right as
citizens to freely speak and or-
ganize to express our opinions.
Most of us believe that Douglas
College would support this right to
promote the exchange of informa-
tion required to make our education
broader than books, lectures and
midterms.

You may be surprised to learn
that someone who has attempted to
use this right at the college has been
formally banned from campus with
threats of legal action made against
him from the head of college
security.

I was invited onto campus
several times for anti-apartheid dis-
cussions with various students in
the last two weeks. I received no
complaints from the college about
my campus work for the Campaign
to Stop South African Shipments.
Many of you may have seen our

paper Hot Cargo in various places »

around the college.
The students I met are also con-
cerned about strike support for

faculty as the eleventh month

be elected to the DCSS. The execu-
tive body of the DCSS consists of
President, Vice-President,
Treasurer, and Secretary. Each
member of the executive has a dif-
ferent area that is their respon-
sibility.

The President is a signing officer
and represents the executive, s/he is
also an ex-officio member of all
chartered organizations in the
society.

The Vice-President represents
the student body and executive ex-
ternally, and deals with external
correspondance; s/he also functions
as a signing officer of the society.

The Treasurer drafts the budget
and approves expenditures, thusly
s/he must be a signing officer of the
society.

The Secretary has the same func-
tion as the Vice-President but in an
internal capacity.

The positions of the executive of
the DCSS are very important and

one must clearly judge the charac-.

ter of the people running in the elec-
tion. The executive is responsible
for the reputation as well as the
funds of the society. It is painfully
obvious that the executive have a
vast responsibility and therefore
they must be reliable and account-
able.

The general meetings of the
society are the mechanism for ex-

without a contract begins. They are
interested in building student sup-
port for the teachers as well as
grassroots support with the com-
munity to ensure that the college
does not take a strike lightly.
Banned for crossing out
swastikas

The college has banned me for
seemingly legitimate reasons. On 9
March, Rick Shepard, secretary of
the student society (DCSS), laid a
complaint against me to the college
for writing on the washroom stalls.
In fact, I was crossing out a Nazi
swastika and other facist slogans.
At any rate, this stupid incident
could have been resolved without
police intervention.

The college, however, insisted
on pressing charges for "defacing
public property". The police officer
who was called to scene convinced
Chris Dean, head of security at
Douglas College, to drop charges in
exchange for my apology and my
cleaning of the mess.

The incident seemed to be dead
and buried until 21 March when
security stopped me and informed
me of the banning order. Dean
claimed that my banning was part
of the deal to drop charges. This
was not my understanding when the
police were around. In addition, my
frequent visits to the college since
9 March were observed by Dean
and his staff-who did not interfere

with my movements on campus.

penditures over the sum of
$3,000.00. They are also the
method of impeachment and peti-
tion. In order to have a point brought
up at a general meeting you must
have a signed petition with no less
than 100 signatures. There are two
types of general meetings, annual
and special.

Annual meetings are used to
propagate the business of the
society, namely to appoint auditors
and aprove the audit of the previous
year. They are also the only
mechanism for constitutional am-
mendments, alterations to the con-
stitution of the society.

Special general meetings are
used to deal with business that is
brought up on the spur of the mo-
ment and that must be dealt with
prior to an Annual general meeting.

Attendance at general meetings
is very important because, theoreti-
cally, there must be at least one
hundred students for quorum to be
present and valid. The Chairperson
at any meeting can recognize
quorum and that is legal and bind-
ing, until such a time that someone
asks for quorum to be called. An-
nual general meetings are vital to
the continuance of the society be-
cause the society is legally bound to
provide an audit to Victoria yearly.

Unfortunately, attendance at
these meetings has historically been

Real reason: he’s an agitator!

The real reasons for my banning
go deeper than this cut and dry
story. Firstly, Douglas College, like
any other employer, has a keen in-
terest in stopping any activities
which will potentially strengthen
its employees’ bargaining position.
Bill Day and his college negotiators
have dragged out bargaining for al-
most a year precisely because there
is no organization behind the
faculty’s 88% strike vote. So a
strike support committee, especial-
ly one with a non-student at the
core, is something the college will
stop if it can.

Second, the Student Society
takes the position that they support
the teachers "110%" but they will
not back a strike because they feel
a strike will hurt students.

Defend faculty, defend
education.

The teachers are the very
workers who can defend our stand-
ards of education from the Socred
attacks on social services. If we fail
to build their pickets and keep the
strike solid when and if it happens,
then our education is undermined
by substandard teachers and further
reductions in funds and equipment
for the teachers to teach us with.

DCSS knows that I am telling
the truth about their stand on the
faculty and they would like me to
keep quiet. They too have a keen in-
terest in suppressing strike support

poor. Two years ago the number of-
people at annual general was six,
this year there were thirty-three.

The AGM two years ago
managed to propagate the societies
business but constitutional am-
mendments were not made. The
most recent meeting did not even
manage to do this, due to the petty
aspirations of members of the stu-
dent society. They shall remain
nameless in this editorial because
accusations have been made to the
effect that they are being "picked
on".
Such ends my spiel and with that
I have two closing remarks.

First, I must berate all who fail to
attend, for your lack of concern with
the general meetings. .It is your
money that the DCSS is spending.

Second, elections are important
so take the time to listen to the plat-
forms of the candidates. Third, take
an active role because the informa-
tion is available and important.

Sincerely,
David Mills

P.S. The funds that are paid to
the CFS are non-recoverable. If the
services are cancelled then a flat
rate of $3.75 is removed from the
student fees. The money is not col-
lected and can't be used to support
the Athletics Department.

 

actions because these threaten the
DCSS claim to legitimate repre-
sentation of student opinion. Their
narrow approach to "student con-
cerns" keeps them from seeing that
a mass movement inside and out-
side the college to back the teachers
against Bill Day and the Socreds he
represents will be the best thing for
students.

I am a worker. Many of you are
also workers or have been working
before. Some of you may be train-
ing to be workers in the various
programs offered at Douglas. Many
students such as nurses come in
contact with other workers in their
field who understand the leading
role they can play with others to
stop the cutbacks.

The teachers must have teeth in
their strike threat. the Douglas Col-
lege Strike Support Committee is
now organizing on campus. Every
student who values their education
should pledge themselves to some
activity. While I am formally
banned from attending on campus
events, I will continue to provide
students and workers with a full
range of technical support and or-
ganizing skills to make our actions
effective in backing the teachers.

Thank you for your under-
standing and support.

For more information call 681-
6206 (any time).

Ian Weniger