Tuition town hall records record turnout
Following the protests over the housing and tuition cost increases this year, we were sure that students would show up in droves to the tuition town hall on Monday, and we definitely weren’t disappointed. Through pure student passion and activism, the roughly nine students who showed up were just able to outnumber the university administrators at the event. That pure dedication from the student body to never stop challenging the university definitely won’t go unnoticed.
Sarcasm aside, yes, the town hall was only for the annual two per cent increase in domestic tuition. But we wish more students would take advantage of the opportunity to talk to some of the university’s top administrators about how much we pay for tuition and why. There aren't a lot of opportunities for students to get up close and personal with those who govern our school, so if people really want their opinions to be heard they should take advantage of them when they appear. If no one shows up, it's easy for UBC to assume that nobody cares -- and maybe nobody does.
New SUB shocker (sort of)
Shocking piece of breaking news here: the April opening of the new SUB might be delayed again. You’d almost think we were making these headlines up for comedic relief, but this news is far from what goes down in those scripted reality shows. While we’re loathe to blame Ava Nasiri entirely for delays that have more to do with fire safety and the construction team than her personal leadership, she was certainly asking for trouble when she said that the new SUB would open in April by any means necessary at last week’s council.
This very surprising (or not) turn of events brings up what we were saying over the course of the year: it’s much, much better to say ‘Hey, the construction team ran into some difficulties and will need another month to finish the new SUB’ and face the music than to promise an early opening to appease people and then have to go back on it again and again. You’d think that the AMS would have learned this by now. We hate to sound like a broken record, but we've moved passed the point of ridiculousness with this. Going back on your word time after time makes you look worse than being honest from the outset -- even if it's being honest about uncertainty.
Composter concerns
The composter located in the basement of the SUB finally got a fan to help disperse the stench that emanates from it -- kind of. Really, it still smells -- just not as bad.
As basement dwellers, we're pretty pleased that now the only strong aroma in the basement will be the smell of sadness and body odour radiating off all the students cramming for their exams. Though we'll be the first to admit that our office has it's own unique perfume, nothing could be worse than the smell of rotting garbage.
While we congratulate the AMS for doing good by the environment, they clearly weren't ready to handle the stinky consequences of the composter. Then again, they mostly have their offices on the top floor, where distance and several walls separate them from the olfactory torture we've suffered for the past few months. But we're optimists; at least it's not as bad as it was before.