Senate meets for first time in 2010

The McGill University Senate convened for the first time in 2010 last week to discuss pertinent issues affecting the university. Principal Heather Munroe-Blum, the senate’s chair, offered her remarks prior to the questions and motions period. Munroe-Blum first discussed McGill’s participation in an upcoming research relationship between Quebec and India.

MY POINT … AND I DO HAVE ONE: A disingenuous debate

The American health care “debate” has been doomed from the beginning. Rooting their campaign in blatant lies, the American Right came out swinging the moment the massive profits of certain special interests – namely the Medical Insurance/Pharmaceutical Industrial Complex – were put into question.

New fee: it’s complicated

In an effort to close a multimillion-dollar shortfall in the university’s budget, the McGill administration has introduced a small charge on all revenues received by the university’s self-funding units. These units, which include Students Services, Athletics, Food & Dining Services, and the residence system, operate semi-autonomously from the rest of the university, at least in a financial sense.

AUS, Caribbean Students’ Society respond to Haiti earthquake

In response to the massive earthquake that struck Haiti last week, McGill student organizations and the greater Montreal community are rapidly organizing to raise money and contribute to relief efforts. With over 100,000 Haitians currently living in Montreal, the disaster has mobilized the city’s student community.

More students take LSATs, GRE

Reluctant to head straight into the current lacklustre job market, an increasing number of American students are taking the tests required to pursue post graduate degrees. According to the Educational Testing Service, 19 per cent more Americans took the Graduate Record Examination in 2009 than in 2008.

Queer McGill executives resign

Four new Queer McGill executives were elected on Friday evening to fill some of the vacancies left by the five executives who resigned from the organization in December and January Queer McGill’s volunteer, policy and equity, political action, and publicity co-ordinators resigned from the group, along with one of the organization’s co-administrators.

Suicide: it’s everybody’s problem

On November 18, a revision to the Criminal Code that makes it illegal to “counsel a person to commit suicide” or aid or abet them in doing so, regardless of whether they are successful, was passed unanimously in the House of Commons. The revision, which was proposed by Kitchener-Conestoga Member of Parliament Harold Albrecht, was a response to the March 2008 suicide of Nadia Kajouji, a first-year student at Carleton University who drowned herself in the Rideau River.

LETTER TO THE EDITOR

An open letter to Students’ Society Vice-President University Affairs Rebecca Dooley by former student Senator Nick Wolf regarding his resignation. Dear Ms. Dooley, I would be less hesitant to bring my resignation to SSMU if I were not afraid of what SSMU would do with my vacant seat.

MY POINT … AND I DO HAVE ONE: Bring it on, 2010

2009 was a wretched year. On a personal level, it was full of injury, emotional rollercoasters of human interaction, far too much time spent on academics, and the deaths of some very special people to me. And for the world, 2009 saw the entrenchment of superficially humanized global American military domination with the coronation of Emperor Obama.

McGill students awarded green project funding

Two McGill undergraduate students received a total of $8,500 in funding for sustainability projects last week after applying for the funds at a sustainability conference in September. Amélie Marsolais-Ricard and Jonathan Glencross were among 180 Canadian university students who attended Impact!: The Co-operators Youth Conference for Sustainability Leadership in Guelph, Ont.

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