Correction: Ferreras explains impeachment error

In the Monday issue of The Ubyssey, we described the error in which the Election Committee announced that President Blake Frederick had been impeached, only to retract the announcement the next day, as due to a “miscalculation” of results.

Elections Administrator Isabel Ferreras has informed us that there was no miscalculation. They simply read the results of the referenda questions incorrectly.

“We assigned the correct values to the wrong questions,” said Ferreras.

The Ubyssey regrets the error.

UBC and Emily Carr students design Olympic furniture

UBC students have teamed up with Emily Carr students to create the outdoor furniture at the athletes’ village.

Emily Carr students designed the chairs and tables, while UBC’s Centre for Advanced Wood Processing made the designs whole using the blue pine that was destroyed by the mountain pine beetle.

Trinity Western under scrutiny for faith affirmation

The Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT) has stated that Trinity Western University does not meet the standard of proper academic freedom, reported The National Post.

The university is being scrutinized because it requires its faculty members to sign a statement affirming their Christian faith before they are hired. A few of the points that the statement makes is that there is one God, Christ is God incarnate, and the Bible is the Word of God.

“A school that requires its faculty to subscribe to a particular religious belief or ideology cannot be practising academic freedom,” Executive Director of CAUT James Turk told the Post.

Trinity Western President Jonathan Raymond said that it is not a violation of academic freedom. “There is no topic…that can’t be raised,” he said. “We assume faculty will have their thinking informed by their Christian faith, but we don’t influence it.”

Three other Christian universities are being scrutinized by CAUT.

UBC plan to buy Island land stalled

UBC has been negotiating with Western Forest Products (WFP) to purchase up to 12,000 hectares of forestation on Vancouver Island, reported The Vancouver Sun. However, talks have slowed down for a variety of reasons, making the possibility of a UBC-owned research forest remote.

The area, which stretches from Sooke to Port Renfrew, has been on sale for over a year. UBC planned to do light forestry on the area, without touching old-growth areas, but the economic climate and provincial government’s lack of interest in buying the land has slowed the deal.

In addition, intense logging has since occurred in the area, and UBC VP External, Legal and Community Relations Stephen Owen told the Sun that “conditions on the ground are not as they were two years ago.”

“I think the situation would have to change dramatically for us to be in discussions now,” he added.