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UBC ends McGill’s strong season

by Steven Lampert on

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ubyssey.ca

After a season of RSEQ dominance, the McGill Martlets were hopeful and confident about their chances at the CIS women’s basketball championship in Calgary, even though they faced UBC, Canada’s second-ranked team. Unfortunately, the ThunderBirds, led by their top-ranked defence in the country, defeated McGill 65-43 in their opening quarter-final matchup. 

The Martlets had a difficult time attacking UBC’s defence throughout, and shot an abysmal 18 per cent (11-60) from the field. The T-Birds were in control just a few minutes into the game, forcing McGill into tough and contested shots, while attacking the rim on the offensive end. By the end of the quarter, they had built a nine-point lead after converting on a pair of three-pointers. 

One of McGill’s strengths in the RSEQ was their rebounding. UBC had a strong front line and tall starting lineup, which translated into a huge rebounding advantage (59-39) for the T-Birds. Moreover, the Martlets’ most effective rebounder, Anneth Him-Lazarenko, was nagged by back pains, and was limited to just 19 minutes of action. 

McGill continued to struggle on the offensive end, as they were forced to take perimeter shots, and were ineffective in the paint. On the other hand, UBC dominated inside, outscoring McGill 14-0 in the paint in the second quarter, and the combination of UBC’s Zara Huntley and Leigh Stansfield put pressure on the Martlets on the defensive end. 

The injury afflicting Him-Lazarenko was the key in the game, as the Martlets had continuously employed their offence during the year from an inside-out approach-they would establish Him-Lazarenko inside, which freed up open shots for their talented perimeter players. This strategy was denied by the T-Birds, and they led by 14 at halftime. 

The second half was no different for McGill, as UBC continued to dominate the glass, translating into 11 second-chance points in the third quarter. McGill managed just six points in the frame, while Huntley added to her game-high 18 points. By the three-minute mark of the quarter, UBC had amassed a 20-point lead, which didn’t dwindle for the rest of the game. 

McGill played their best in the fourth quarter, as they were more aggressive on the offensive end and hit a couple of outside shots, outscoring UBC 16-15. Neverthless, the Martlets never challenged the T-Birds’ large lead, as it was too great to overcome. 

Point-guard Dianna Ros, who was awarded for her outstanding season with all-CIS rookie honours on Friday night at the CIS women’s basketball awards, led McGill with a team-high eight points. 

McGill was relegated to a consolation matchup against the Saskatchewan Huskies, in which they played a much better game, but lost 58-53. They led throughout the first half, building a lead as large as 12 points. The Huskies cut down the lead to seven by the half, as McGill got cold from the outside. 

The Martlets held their lead in the third, thanks to some costly turnovers by Saskatchewan, which amounted to four McGill buckets. Part of McGill’s success was due to their ability to establish Him-Lazarenko inside, who finished with 14 points in the game, and had a much stronger performance compared to the quarter-final against UBC.  

However, the Martlets were outplayed in the final quarter and lost their lead with just under two minutes to play due to some poor execution on the offensive end. The Huskies carried their momentum with them in the final minute, and converted some key free throws to ice the game. 

While the Martlets must be disappointed with how the championships turned out, they should be happy with their overall success this season. They claimed their first RSEQ championship since 1996, and showed major improvements from the beginning of the year. The team will lose two of their best players to graduation this year, Natalie Larocque and Him-Lazarenko, but the lineup still contains many bright young players who will look to build on the strong foundation developed this season. 

Opinion

An open letter from SSMU

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To the AUS Executive Committee:
 
We would like to congratulate you on an extremely well-attended General Assembly last night. We would also like to express our extreme disappointment and frustration concerning the poor communication, organization, and attitude which shaped your response to the unexpected numbers and thus took a toll on SSMU staff, clubs, services, executives, attendees, and other students using the building.
 
Because of your lack of contingency planning for the high turnout, the SSMU Executive and full-time staff had to neglect their other responsibilities to intervene in the crisis. When we asked your volunteers and members of your Executive Committee how to help, there was little to no direction provided and most seemed clueless as to any plan of action.
 
Our Security Supervisor had to call in extra agents on short notice, as well as calling on other staff members to stay overtime in order to ensure the security of the event. Our Executive and staff were outside communicating to your frustrated and confused members about what was going on. The AUS harassed our clubs, most notably the Muslim Students’ Association, to move out of rooms in order to accommodate your needs. After initially rebuffing their desire to livestream the event, you demanded that TVM-a volunteer-run student service-give you “tech support” and accommodate your needs at a moment’s notice.
 
While we are happy to work with the AUS to help you run events that are relevant to your members (who, after all, are all part of SSMU as well), such a partnership requires responsibility sides. Such failures reflect poorly on both of our organizations.
 
In short, we are not only disappointed with your poor planning, but also disgusted by your sense of entitlement and disrespect for the space, time, and resources of others.
 
Due to these concerns, the SSMU Executive Committee has decided to take the following actions:
 
  • The AUS Executive may not book any more space in the William Shatner University Centre until the term of the current AUS Executive Committee has expired, except on a case-by-case basis at the discretion of the Building Managers. Groups which normally book space through the AUS are invited to contact VP Clubs & Services Carol Fraser directly (cs@ssmu.mcgill.ca).
  • The AUS will be billed for all security agents, staff overtime, services (including TVM), and cleaning costs incurred by last night’s event.
  • We demand that the AUS issue a public letter of apology to the affected clubs and services, our Security Supervisor, our staff, and all attendees-who are also SSMU members-who were in any way frustrated by the General Assembly.
  • Concerning the AUS’s Nuit Blanche event on March 22, we have changed the booking to “pending” status. The booking will only be accepted upon receipt of a complete, thorough, written document about the event, which will outline all activities and their locations, all volunteers and coordinators involved and their contact information, a detailed timeline including setup and clean-up, and a crisis management plan in the event of whatever mishaps may arise. This document must be submitted to the SSMU General Manager no later than noon on Monday, March 19.
We look forward to rebuilding our relationship into a more productive partnership.
 
Sincerely,
 
Todd Plummer (Vice President, Internal) and Carol Fraser (Vice President, Clubs & Services)
on behalf of The SSMU Executive Committee, 2011-2012

News

EUS President Josh Redel wins SSMU presidency by 23 votes

by Kyla Mandel on

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The position of president of the Student Society of McGill University (SSMU) was decided by just 23 votes in the winter referendum, announced on March 14 in Gerts. With 40.9 per cent of the vote, Engineering Undergraduate Society President Josh Redel defeated Shyam Patel, current SSMU VP Finance and Operations, who received 40.5 per cent of the vote.

“I feel very happy. It was an extremely close race and I think that speaks [volumes],” Redel said. “I have a lot of work to do but I’m really excited that I had a big support group out and a really awesome campaign team, and obviously it made the difference.”

Voter turnout was 29.1 per cent, eight per cent higher than last year.

“I’m glad we had a good turnout, it’s better than last year … and better than even two years ago which was the last time it was more contentious,” current SSMU President Maggie Knight said. “It’s good that we had so many candidates [and] no uncontested positions.”

“I thought it would be close, I didn’t think it would be that close,” she commented on the race between Redel and Patel.

The position of VP Internal had the most candidates, with seven in the competition. Michael Spzejda won the position with 18 per cent of the vote. Christina Sfeir came in a close second, with 15 per cent of the vote.

Robin Reid-Fraser was elected VP External with 37.8 per cent of the vote and Haley Dinel won the position of VP University Affairs with 33.8 per cent of the vote. JP Briggs won VP Finance and Operations with 37 per cent of the vote, and with 46.5 per cent of the vote, VP Clubs and Services went to Allison Cooper.

Winning candidates seemed overjoyed and the crowd cheered with each winner. Cooper appeared overwhelmed by the results. When asked how she felt, she only said, “That’s a good question.”

“I’m feeling pretty rotten about it because throughout this campaign [to] which we gave everything there was not a single articulated voice of opposition,” Niko Block, chair of the ‘Yes’ committee and undergraduate representative to the Board of Directors of CKUT, said of the result.

“It means that we’re going to have to continue struggling with deficits, we’re going to have to struggle continuing to pay our employees a fair living wage at CKUT, [and] we’re going to struggle to meet our basic expenses for the next little while,” he said.

The option to run a referendum question in the next fall semester is a possibility; however CKUT has yet to discuss what its next step will be.

News

Motion to strike defeated at AUS GA

by Erica Friesen and Carolina Millán Ronchetti on

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Sam Reynolds / McGill Tribune
Sam Reynolds / McGill Tribune

Arts undergraduates voted against entering an unlimited student strike at a special General Assembly (GA) held on Tuesday, March 13. The motion, which was defeated by a vote of 609 to 495 and included 16 abstentions, would have allowed the Arts Undergraduate Society (AUS) to join the Quebec-wide student strike against tuition fee increases.

The GA was scheduled to begin at 6:00 p.m., but was delayed for three hours because the SSMU cafeteria, originally scheduled to hold the event, did not have the capacity for all students who wished to attend. By 6:30 p.m., the lineup extended from the Shatner University Centre to the Schulich Library of Science and Engineering.

In the ensuing hours, the AUS opened the SSMU Ballroom, EUS Common Room, and Thomson House to accommodate the students. Many students waited a few hours in the cold before they were relocated.

“I think it was a bit disappointing because [people] keep saying that they want more students to participate democratically, but then we realize that they don’t have the means in place,” said Colleen Alkalay-Houlihan, a U1 math student in arts who arrived early at 5.45 p.m. and waited for three hours.

At about 8:30 p.m., students lined up outside Shatner were moved to Leacock 132, which can hold 600 people. Students in the EUS Common Room and Thomson House were then relocated to Leacock 132.

AUS president Jade Calver said that the AUS had not expected the huge turnout.

“We had considered [the possibility of needing more rooms], but we honestly were not expecting this much of an overflow … I was thinking 500 or 600 [students] would come,” Calver said.

The AUS GA officially began at 9:00 p.m. Debate was held in the SSMU cafeteria and was livestreamed to the SSMU Ballroom and Leacock 132 through TV-M.

After the agenda was approved, the movers of the motion to strike presented their motion and addressed its implications for the McGill community.

“We’re not fighting with the McGill administration over this one, we’re fighting along with every other Quebec student against the tuition hikes, and we’re fighting against the [provincial] government,” Amber Gross, co-mover of the motion, said.

Afterwards, the assembly heard three students in favour of the motion and three students against. Student Brendan Edge said that the students who attended the GA were not an adequate representation of the upwards of 6000 arts undergraduate students, and that voting in favour of a strike would be a misrepresentation of the students’ will.

“I am not going to put my education on the line,” Edge said. “I am not going to put my summer job on the line for this.”

Those in favour of the strike, however, pointed out that an unlimited student strike in Quebec has never caused the cancellation of a semester, and that a SSMU Solidarity Fund would give financial aid to students affected by the strike.

“This is our only option, and this is our only opportunity to say “We’re going to stand up: McGill is not going to be the only institution that doesn’t care enough, [that] is not aware enough, to get involved,” Jamie Burnett, U2 Economics and Women’s Studies and co-mover of the motion, said.

Another student, who could not be identified, argued that a general strike was financially impractical for students who would have to pay for rent and lose time at summer jobs if the strike resulted in an extended semester.

Following the speakers for and against, Speaker Ben Lerer received five amendments to the motion, but soon after heard a motion to end the debate and vote on the question. Students in all three rooms voted in favour of voting on the motion to strike without further debate.

“I thought a large part [of why] they voted to cut debate was because everyone who was at the GA had already made a decision,” Alkalay-Houlihan said. “I didn’t really think the debate was going to be convincing that many people.”

Students then voted on the motion to strike. The results from all three rooms were pooled. Shortly before 11 p.m., Lerer announced that the motion had been defeated with 495 students for the strike, 609 against, and 16 abstentions. After the motion was defeated, all three rooms holding the GA quickly emptied. Although there was a motion to remove speaker Lerer, the motion failed because Lerer had not violated the voting procedure.

Students then voted against adjourning the GA, and the remaining students relocated to the SSMU cafeteria. However, the GA’s attendance dropped to 119 members, less than the quorum of 150 people, which meant that further motions could only be passed by the assembly as a consultative body. The assembly finally moved to adjourn the meeting at 11:30 p.m.

Jérémie Duké-Laviopre, a student at the Cégep Vieux-Montréal and member of the Coalition large de l’Association pour une Solidarité Syndicale Étudiante (CLASSE), the main organization behind the unlimited student strike, who attended the GA as an observer, said that general assemblies in French institutions were different from what he witnessed at the AUS GA.

“[Debates in French institutions] are more structured. We take more time to discuss the motions,” Duké-Laviopre said. “[This] result is pretty sad for the movement.”

Alkalay-Moulihan suggested that the large turnout was due to student concerns with the practical aspects of a student strike.

“I think pretty much everyone who voted no would have gone to class [if the strike motion] had passed. People were upset by the idea that they might be physically blocked from going to class,” she said. “Furthermore, I think a lot of people don’t feel the GAs really do represent them. That’s why so many people came out tonight, because there’s this idea that all the radical students are going to the GA … so the votes that are passing through aren’t really representative.”

Gross said she was frustrated by the lack of coordination between the different rooms and the AUS’ unpreparedness for the large number of students who attended.

“Obviously it was disappointing… that the vote was so close and it ultimately failed, but 44 per cent of arts students voted in favour of striking,” she said. “I was really excited to see how many people came out. The fact that we had a line stretching all the way across campus was the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen on McGill campus.”

Opinion

The return of the Jets

by Johanu Botha on

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Any self-respecting columnist writing on Canada cannot let this year saunter by without spending at least one—I pitched ten, but my editor emphasized one—column on the Winnipeg Jets. This story of prairie power should be trumpeted from the rooftops, but given the country’s current milieu of potential election fraud and economic perturbation, it’s tough to get in a word for a hockey team. And so, here’s a personal trip down memory lane for all those readers aching for some honest scribbling on the return of the Jets.

I swept into Winnipeg, Manitoba on the threshold of teenagerdom, staring stupefied at the flat land that stretched forever into the horizon. It was a far cry from the mountainous South African countryside of my childhood, and if I had not just finished a 32 hour plane journey, I might have hopped on the next flight back. But Manitoba was home now. Greasy John Deere baseball caps bobbing inside combines during summer, and kids who couldn’t yet walk, somehow skating through winter, would become part of everyday life. 

Although the process of understanding and appreciating a new culture was a steady one, there are two things I learned after roughly 24 hours in Manitoba: it is very, very cold, and the Jets are coming back. If the elderly gents in the diners weren’t talking about how low temperatures would plummet come November, they would be chatting about how inevitable it was that the Jets—cruelly relocated to Phoenix in ’96—would come back. Like a mourning but ever-hopeful father awaiting the prodigal son, Manitoba was in perpetual preparation for the return of the Jets. 

And so when it came to pass, in 2011, everyone was ready. Rumors had made their way through the fields, across the lakes, past the polar bears, and into the urban heart of Winnipeg since 2009, but now everyone knew for certain. And such a celebration ensued, the likes of which had not been seen since homegrown rock band The Guess Who were making international waves. Crowds gathered at the famed Forks, policemen smiled misty-eyed, and ‘tobans stuck in other parts of Canada stared longingly at the TV screens broadcasting the welcome tidings. 

The second half of this story is just as invigorating. Everyone expected that tickets to Jet games would fly off the shelves at twice the speed of limited edition Tim Hortons’ role-up-the-rim cups, but nobody was certain how the Atlanta team would perform in its new home. Commentators and columnists took one look at the team on paper and became stock market analysts. There seemed to be no way that the product could live up to its hype. Like the Blackberry playbook of the sports world, the Jets could turn out to be all glistening cover, but few stellar parts below the surface. 

But oh, how the naysayers weep now! There is a lot of hockey to be played, to be sure, but the Jets have excelled in their new home. As the Leafs and Habs saw their earlier successes nosedive into a whirlwind of coach replacements and disillusioned fans, the Jets have delivered strong performances that exhibit a good-looking whole, even if it is greater than the sum of its parts. It’s official: the Jets are back. 

Student Life

Bathroom break

by Colleen McNamara on

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After four long years of an abusive relationship with McGill campus public restrooms, it’s time for me to speak out about the frustration, the repulsion, and the anger they have caused me. Too many times have I entered the facilities on the ground floor of Redpath across from the fishbowl and found myself wanting to just go home and douse myself in bleach. 

It’s undeniable that the McLennan-Redpath complex bathrooms are the most offensive on campus. Toilets covered in garbage bags, carelessly constructed out-of-order signs, and toilet paper that would even be deemed unfit for jail cells characterize each stall, from the most frequently visited in the basement outside of the Cybertheque, all the way up to the illogically miniscule facilities on the sixth floor. Discovering that only two of the five stalls in the basement are working while florescent lights scream at your eyes only enhances the usual library frustration levels to a new degree. And you can’t help but feel extremely uncomfortable on the sixth floor as anywhere from two to seven people are quietly waiting outside of the single stall listening to your every move. 

In other campus bathrooms, one can’t help but feel that there was an utter lack of logic when the blueprints were being drafted. Highlighter yellow doors in the Education Building to match the brick walls? Why not. Seven hundred and fifty stalls in the quiet basement of Leacock? Sure. Two-hundred students eat lunch at Bronfman every day? Two stalls will be fine. In all of these, though, the most striking facility I have come across is the women’s bathroom on the second floor of the Otto Maas Chemistry Building. Upon entry, the first thing I noticed was a formerly-used urinal covered up by the typical bathroom fix-it tool: the garbage bag. Regardless, I admired the soft pink tiling surrounding the entire bathroom, reminding me of some sort of ideal early’90s bathroom a teenage girl would have. 

Unfortunately, the widespread gender separation of washroom facilities has reduced my knowledge of men’s correspondence with McGill’s bathrooms to myth, hearsay, and stories of personal experience. One of the most prevalent bathroom commentaries is the story of “Sean Turner,” a student who had his name plastered over stalls across campus as a practical joke, sparking a widespread bathroom graffiti epidemic, and ultimately elevating this elusive character to campus celebrity status. That’s about as far as my knowledge goes for the men’s rooms, but I can assume they don’t have marble floors, gold sinks, magazine racks, or silk couches.

 McGill finds new and exciting ways to perplex us every day. Maybe the unruly bathrooms are just another one of those character-building exercises to prepare us for the big, bad, harsh world out there. If we have problems tolerating a stinky bathroom, then we will have problems in the professional world too, right? Maybe, maybe not, but one thing’s for sure: I won’t be returning to the second floor bathroom of the Otto Maas Chemistry Building anytime soon. 

Student Life

Becoming fond of ski-du-fond

by Richard Martyn-Hemphill on

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Strolling past the McGill gym window last week was a deeply unsettling experience. The sight of weightlifters was worrying enough, with each lifter solemnly hulking over vast weights, staring themselves down in the mirror for lengths of time that would have impressed Narcissus. But what really disturbed me was the haunting spectacle of all the  treadmill runners—each runner looking both bored and determined, with earphones lassoing round their faces as they jogged mechanically, sweatily, and ceaselessly. They reminded me of hamsters in a wheel, wired up for lab tests. The saddest part was that it was actually a lovely day outside.

It got me thinking that there had to be better ways of exercising during the Montreal winter, another means of keeping all those midnight poutines from making themselves at home around one’s waistline. The best way to exercise, I’ve always thought, is outdoors with the fresh air and changing scenery for company. Yet the idea of outdoor exercise during the Montreal winter, for obvious reasons, appears preposterous: the golf courses, the tennis courts, and the football fields are all covered in thick layers of snow; the sidewalks are devilishly icy, and far too treacherous to run on with any kind of certainty. 

Fortunately, some family friends provided the simple, brilliant answer to my conundrum: cross-country skiing.  Or ski-du-fond, as the Quebecois call it. Extracting me from the warm comfort of the McGill bubble, my friends took me over to Gatineau National Park, just outside Ottawa, where we competed in the Gatineau Loppet, a 51 km ski marathon of 2,300 cross-country skiers. The abilities of the competitors ranged from Olympians of the sport to babies being dragged along by their parents in sleds. My fear, since I was a complete novice, was that I would end up finishing neck-and-neck with the latter group. But as we set off, my expectations changed; my fears became centered around whether I would finish at all. 

The beginning of the race was utter carnage. It was -14 degrees at the starting line, and we all set off in a sprint to warm ourselves up. There were over 2,000 of us skiing side-by-side, with the less able of us occasionally tumbling down into our fellow competitors’ paths. Survival instinct was not enough to keep myself from falling numerous times. In a moment of delirium, I began to see myself as a noble Lion King, doing his best against the odds not to tumble into the antelope stampede. It was a strange moment.

Then came the grind, which thankfully brought with it a bit more space to manoeuvre. Cross-country skiing is hard, especially over 51 kilometers, but it is rewarding in so many ways: the distance covered gives you a chance to glimpse some stunning views of mountains, lakes, trees, and wildlife. Getting up some of the hills, though a true test of grit which can make you want to call the rescue helicopter, is always worth it for the exhilarating downhills that follow. 

When I skied past the finish line after four and a half hours of non-stop skiing, with my legs as stiff as an Englishman’s upper lip, my first reaction was that I would never do this again; yet the moment I arrived back in Montreal, I missed it dearly. I was addicted.

Fortunately, I soon found out how easy it is to satisfy one’s addiction right here in Montreal. It is extraordinarily cheap and easy to rent a decent set of cross-country skis, boots, and poles from the McGill sports centre (just $10 for the whole day, $30 for the entire week), and give it a go on Mount Royal. It is the ideal place to learn. The pathways are not too steep, and it is incredibly beautiful round the Lac Aux Castors. The technique can be picked up quickly; it is pretty much the motion of ice skating—a motion Canadians are supposedly born with. Besides, according to Fitness Magazine, cross-country skiing even burns more calories per minute than running on a treadmill; what more could you ask for? So with an early spring on the horizon, and thoughts of beach volleyball beginning to take shape in our minds, take the opportunity to give cross-country skiing a try. Or, keep it in mind as a new activity to test out next winter.

News

Office of Sustainability launches Vision 2020 project

by Jimmy Lou on

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This winter, McGill’s Office of Sustainability launched a year-long project, Vision 2020, to ensure sustainability on campus and to promote student participation and awareness in sustainable initiatives. The idea behind this project is that interactive planning and intra-community collaborations will make long-term sustainability more effective and feasible. The project also presents an opportunity to work towards a common goal and reform how the administration consults students.

“Consultation around sustainability issues has become increasingly strong in recent years on campus,” Maggie Knight, president of the Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU), said. “Ideally this will provide an example of best practices in collectively shaping our campus. As with most projects, it could use some more people hours to get it to where it needs to be. However, there are several clever people working on this, so I have high hopes that it will produce strong results.”

The project will include an external consultant, Sustainability Solutions Group, offering its expertise in sustainability planning as well as a Vision 2020 Steering Committee which aims to draw a vast range of opinions and perspectives from McGill’s students, academic staff, operational staff, and administration.

Jim Nicell, McGill’s Associate Vice-Principal, will chair this Vision 2020 Steering Committee and jointly select members for this committee with SSMU Sustainability Coordinator and the Office of Sustainability.

“I feel this is an idea with real potential,” Daniel Perrett, U1 geography, said of Vision 2020’s creation. “We need to be forward thinking as we engage with today’s environmental issues, such as the lack of awareness for appropriate means for composting on campus. There are obvious concerns regarding the long-term fruition of the project, but I feel that with sufficient leadership and student engagement, future McGill students can feel as passionate as we do about these projects.”

This project will involve three stages. The first involves a situational analysis of McGill’s on-campus sustainability performance, the second aims to set goals and objectives for sustainability within a 10-year timeframe, and the third will implement the concrete action items of a five-year action plan.

As a part of the project’s effort to achieve an open, consultative, and interactive planning process, students will be able to easily access the planning process and offer their opinions through online social mediums such as Facebook and IdeaScale, a website for posting and rating suggestions. Some popular ideas emerging on IdeaScale include “Encourage Sustainable Procurement Practices” and “Collaborative Student Research.”

“This project matters for students because they are really getting a chance to share their opinions about what McGill will look like in the year 2020,” Sean Reginio, an intern at the Office of Sustainability, said.

Reginio added that members of the administration have proposed that, if successful, this initiative could become the new model for student consultation at McGill.

“With all the events this year that have caused disagreement and turmoil on campus, I feel that a shared vision towards the future is something important to discuss,” Reginio said. “More importantly, though, I believe that this shared vision is possible, very possible. I truly believe in this community. It’s really time to collaborate.”

/- The first Vision 2020 event is a community conversation that will be held this Friday, March 16 in the RVC dining hall at 2:00 p.m. To contribute your ideas to Vision 2020, visit http://mcgillvision2020.ideascale.com /

News

SSMU hosts second annual Forum on Undergraduate Education

by Chris Lazaris on

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Last Tuesday, SSMU hosted its second annual Forum on Undergraduate Education . The forum allowed students to propose and discuss ideas about the role of undergraduate students at McGill.

“This is the second year that we’ve had the event,” Emily Yee Clare, SSMU VP University Affairs, said. “It was started last year [in order to] create a forum where [students] would come together and talk about academic issues and how undergraduates [at McGill] are basically placed within a research-intensive environment.”

As a research-intensive university, McGill emphasizes the involvement of graduate students, who are able to engage in original academic research. This raises questions about how undergraduates fit into the process. Not having been properly trained to contribute to research, it may be difficult for them to contribute to the research.

The forum began with two public speakers who discussed how undergraduates can be more effectively integrated into the world of real academic research.

“The opportunities for undergraduate students to have some engagement in research provides opportunities really to engage in [certain] fundamental [aspects of research] … that are really important outcomes of an undergraduate education, [and] can be difficult to get within the standard course structure,” speaker Laura Winer, Associate Director of Teaching and Learning Services, said.

Speakers discussed the necessity for undergraduate students to have the opportunity to engage in authentic academic research in order to develop certain skills necessary to make real contributions to future research.

“When you engage in research, you understand how knowledge is created and refined,” Winer said. “People have to learn these skills and how to apply them in such a way where the fruits of their labour will have a certain validity.”

During the second part of the forum, students had the opportunity to put forward their own ideas about how McGill could better integrate the average student into more advanced levels of research. This raised topics such as the allocation of study space on campus, the quality of lectures, and the practicality of undergraduate degrees in general.

The forum differed in structure from the previous year’s. Rather than having a long period for students to make comments and ask questions to the speakers, students chose this year to sit at one of five tables, with each table focusing on a different issue of discussion while SSMU representatives wrote down points that were raised. After fifteen minutes, students were asked to move to another table to talk about a different issue. After three rotations, the forum was over.

“We found that the format of round-table discussions … really allowed for students to have a good understanding of the issues,” Clare said. “It really allowed us to get some concrete ideas from students and allowed students to be very honest about how they felt about different issues.”

While the speakers focused specifically on how to promote undergraduate engagement in research, the table discussion period allowed for a wider range of issues to be discussed without drifting very far from the general theme of research and how it can be facilitated.

Although organizers of the event felt that they received a lot of information to work with in order to improve undergraduate research at McGill over the next year, some students who attended did not receive the impression that much is actually going to be done for them.

“It was nice to get my feelings out, but because I’m in my second [to] last year, I don’t feel like any of the things that I’m saying are really going to be effective for me,” Mathura Ravishankar, U2 arts and science student, said. “To be honest, we raised a lot of issues but did not come up with practical solutions.”

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