Students Drop 37,000 Signatures on Gordo's Doorstep (New Plan in Works to Replace Petition with Flaming Bag of Poop) Brandon Ferguson, News Editor Representatives from the Canadian Federation of Students stood on the steps of Victoria’s Legislature on October 20th to present the government with 37,000 col- lected signatures from students across BC calling for reduced tuition fees. “These tuition-fee hikes have hurt BC’s most vulner- able students,” said Vancouver Community College student representative, Aixendora Castro (no relation to Fidel). “Now with the student grant program cut, the ris- ing cost of post-secondary education has made earning a son for Lam in the ways of government posturing and (to quote Jon Stewart) “media douche-baggery.” The Douglas College Treasurer and CFS member now sees how critical media coverage is to both the presentation and obstruction of truth. “Quite honestly, we wanted to put forth some truth. Not to say that the Liberals have been lying in their par- tisan ads, but they have been having a field day with funds from the taxpayers of BC, and there’s been absolutely no counterpoints being offered. The only way we can really get our message out is through the media.” This is the new world order. Students can no longer get outraged and have a sit-down smoke-in to protest the shitty tuition fee increases and expect to make a differ- ence. Suddenly we require press junkets to package an appetizing version of the truth, which is inevitably refut- ed by the government’s pre-packaged version of the truth. Tonight on Crossfire: educational viability versus bureaucratic autonomy. Lisa MacLeod, BC Chairperson. for the CFS, sees the truth this way: “The government is now reporting a $865-million budget surplus outlook for this year, but the outlook for BC’s students is bleak. $452 million of that surplus was raised through tuition fees, and it’s time stu- dents got a break.” Preach on, sister. Jason Harmon, a student representative from Okanagan University College who was in Victoria for the press conference, summarized the plight and the point nicely. “T hear many students saying that if tuition fees go up any mote, they will have to drop out of school. We’re here at the legislature today asking the government to make sure no one in-BC is denied the opportunity to receive a post-secondary education.” For their part, Lam and the DSU are just doing what it takes to represent the students. “We’re very vocal here (at Douglas). And I’m very lucky to be elected by a bunch of students who are not only smart but hardworking, students who are intelligent and look into both sides of the story and will develop their own opinions from what is presented to them.” Umm...Gordon Campbell was unavailable for com- ment, despite my blindingly bi-partisan news coverage. Ahem. So, if someone comes up to you asking for a signa- ture, looking for an opinion, or offering a pamphlet, give it, give it, and take it. It’s your right and there are kids out there fighting for it. degree impossible for thousands of British Columbians.” On hand for the media event was our very own Treasurer, Ryan Lam, who stressed the importance of offering the public a bal- anced portrayal of post-secondary life. “The Liberals have had a lot of nice ads paid for by BC taxpayers that were complete- ly partisan,” Lam said, “and we just thought we'd bring to the media’s attention that there are students in BC who are not very happy with the way things are going as far as tuition is concerned.” “We've had $50 million in grants removed completely, and we’re appalled to hear that the Liberal government is toting around a surplus of $865 million. And $452 million of that is attributed to—and I quote—‘tuition revenue. That’s ridiculous because it’s all from tuition increases. Tuition has risen 104 percent on average, since the lifting of the tuition freeze. So you’ve got a 104-percent average increase in tuition, then $452 million in surplus, and the Liberals go ‘whoop-dee-doo, That’s crazy.” For their part, the BC Liberal machine made sure to dangle the right carrot in front of the BC media to woo their attention away from the students. On the same day as the CFS press conference, the Liberals gained all the media attention (and the cover story in the following morning’s Province and Sun) by announcing a 0.5-percent reduction in the Provincial Sales ‘Tax. The reduction will save double-income families about $50 a year, while the average BC student pays $2,000 more per year in tuition fees. Whoop-dee- doo. ; The trip to Victoria was an amazing les- Hovember 8/2000 Dictionary Editor Makes Case for Canadian English Trevor Miller, Intercamp (Grant MacEwan College) EDMONTON (CUP)—Did you have a jelly donut for lunch? Or was it a bismark? A jambuster? Or maybe a Burlington bun? Chances are, unless you’ve traveled across Canada, you didn’t realize these are all the same thing. “Donuts are a crucial part of the Canadian diet,” said Katherine Barber, editor-in-chief of the Canadian Oxford Dictionary, speaking at Grant MacEwan College October 13. Barber said difficulties understanding one meaning from many words may be common in a country as large and unique as Canada, where the English language “is not homogenous.” The second edition of the dictionary was released earlier this year, following the success of the first edition. The first edition—on top of spending more than a year on the Globe and Mail’s bestseller list—won the Canadian Booksellers Association’s Libris Awards for non-fiction book of the year and specialty book of the year in 1999. Barber also spoke of the difficulties of being a lexicogra- pher (“one who writes, compiles, or edits a dictionary,” according to an Oxford rival, the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language), including the bad rap that comes with the job. People call her all the time to complain about words being in the dictionary they don’t know about. Her reply: “Every day of your life, you’re going to come across words you’ve never heard. What’s the point of a dictionary if it only has the words you know?” There are also problems with the validity of English spo- ken in Canada, in the eyes of both others and us. During a flight, she told someone she was compiling a dictionary of Canadian English, and he asked her why she wasn’t involved with a publication of proper English. “We need to realize,’ she said, “that our English is a valid variety, and we don’t need the British to validate us, and cer- tainly not the Americans.” The dictionary doesn’t only contain Canadian words; it combines information on English words as they’re used worldwide and as they’re particularly used in Canada. One of the major problems in using other bases of English words is space. With a database of 75 million words, the editing and publishing teams have to carefully restrict what they put into the dictionary. “We have a rule that we have to have 15 (uses) for a word before we put it in,” Barber said. If they tried to put in words with only four uses, or only four quotations of a word, the dictionary would be twice as thick, she added. This doesn’t mean words that only have four quotations aren’t words, she hastened to say, but rather that they aren’t used commonly enough yet to be placed in the dic- tionary.