Business Glass to Promote GM Car

Agnes Gulbinowicz, The Peak (Simon Fraser University)

BURNABY, BC (CUP)—Students in a
marketing class at Simon Fraser
University are excited about an opportu-
nity to work with General Motors, but
others on campus have reservations about
the program.

The class, along with students from
Douglas College, is the first in the
province to participate in the automobile
company’s marketing internship program,
which will allow them to plan and throw a
promotional event for the Chevrolet Aveo
car.

The

EdVenture Partners, a company specializ-

Opportunity arose when

ing in coordinating partnerships between

educational institutions and_ businesses,
approached the university’s business fac-
ulty.

“When they said, “Would you like to
participate?’ I said, ‘Sign us up,” remarked
Colleen Collins-Dodd, an associate. pro-
fessor in the faculty.

Collins-Dodd says the in-class intern-
ship will give students valuable experience
they might not otherwise have the chance

"to receive.

“The students have the opportunity,

within 13 weeks, not just to design a pro-

motion program, but actually implement a
promotional event and then measure the
she said. “So,
that’s something they don’t usually get to
do.”

Greg Lam, a student in the class,

effectiveness afterwards,”

agrees.

“I do see it as part of an increasing
trend to integrate public institutions with
the private sector,” he said.

Hunsdale maintains career preparation
should not be the primary goal of the uni-
versity.

“We’ve gone from a liberal arts institu-

 

“The students are getting quite a good
real-life application. This is something
they can go to employers with later on
and say, ‘Look, I worked on this real-life
program,” he said.

But Shawn Hunsdale, a student-union
executive, says the class represents a

growing and worrying academic trend.

tion, where people will end up developing
a rounded education, to, effectively, indus-
try-ready training grounds,” he said.
Catherine Murray, a communication
professor specializing in cultural studies,
says she sees the program as a great
opportunity for students, but agrees stu-

dents should also be exposed to a

rounded perspective on marketing,

“It seems to me that insight into a real-
world marketing problem can do nothing
but enhance the learning experience of
these students,” she said. “However, my
concern in a course of this nature would
be becoming too much in the pocket of
one existing case, without really being able
to balance the case.

“It seems to me that there must be
some opportunity in the pedagogical
design of the course to better balance per-
spectives on the
marketing and advertising in society
today,” Murray added.

Collins-Dodds responded to criticisms

important role of

of public-private educational partnerships
by saying they make sense in a business
faculty.

“We have a business school on this
campus. I don’t think we need to apolo-
gize for that,” she said. “In biology they
go out and examine bugs and birds and
animals and plants. In chemistry they look
at chemicals in the lab [...| this is no differ-
ent.

“This is students doing a business
project for a business course on a busi-
ness. That’s what we do in the faculty.”

 

Pharmaceutical Imbalance: Study shows drug plans much better in some provinces than others

Sarah Bourdon, The Ubyssey (University of British Columbia)

VANCOUVER (CUP)—Researchers at
the University of British Columbia have
found prescription drug coverage varies
widely across Canada’s provinces.

‘The study, conducted at the universi-
ty’s Centre for Health Services and Policy
Research, evaluated the differences in
what Canadians pay for pharmaceuticals.

“What we were looking at in particular
were catastrophic drug costs,” said Megan

Coombes, a research associate at the uni- cut

versity and leader of the study.
Drug costs are considered catastroph-

ic if they exceed a certain percentage of
annual household income, but this per-
entage has not been officially established,

 
 
  
  
  
 
 
 
 
 
 

The ou Se cata trophic
sts tobe o over 4 percent of household

The research “was ultimately to say [...]
which province would provide people
with the best protection,’ said Steve
Morgan, an assistant professor at the cen-
te. “If you adopted any province as the
national system, which would be the
fairest?”

The study found provinces with meas-
ures ect against catastrophic costs,
. Manitoba, and Saskatchewan,
| Brovide the best drug plans,
while the Maritime provinces fall far
behind.

“The drug plans in Atlantic Canada
offer sometimes limited benefits even for
seniors which is, in Canadian context,
rather unusual,” Morgan said. “They offer
or no benefit for non-seniors who

   
  
 
  
 

ove welfare levels.”
Public debate in Canada has focused
on bringing Atlantic Canada closer to the
rest of the country in coverage quality.
However, this may be difficult with each

see some new money
r systems, not just into

h- Acai Canada, and therein lies the poli-

 

of the debate, ” said Morgan.

    
  
   

province wanting increased national fund- _

One factor driving up drug costs for
Canadians is the emphasis placed on
prescribing “the latest and greatest medi-
cines,” said the professor.

“We tend to use more expensive drugs
to treat the same conditions we treated
with relatively cheaper drugs just a year or
two years before,” he said.

“We have a tendency to believe that
because it’s new it must be better, when in
fact that’s seldom the case in the drug
industry. Of all the drugs that have been
approved in Canada over the last 15 years,
approximately 93 percent of new drug
products patented and launched in
Canadian marketplace have been deem
to offer little or no benefit over existing
treatments in the market.”

Independent evaluations of medical
treatments would be beneficial to the sys-
tem and to individual consumers, but very

difficult Le in the investment-

   
  

friendly climate that exists within drug
research, he added.

“You can imagine the politics and the
confrontation that comes out when you're
suggesting that we be more critical. We
evaluate and we scrutinize more.”

With recent discussions among
Canadian premiers about the possibility of
a national Pharmacare program, more

 

balanced provincial drug coverage may
not be far off.

As for what kind of coverage would
meet the objectives of a national
Pharmacare system, the jury is still out,

hat we recommend is
maintain provincial drug plans
some cost sharing with the federal gov-
ernment to make sure they all meet
national standards, but we let the
provinces run them,” he said. “It’s impor-
tant really to have decision-making closer
to the population being served so that the
decision-making can best meet the needs
of that population.”

  

  

 

 

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