Point of Inquiry is a column written by AMS Columnist Quyen Schroeder about our student union’s governance and policies. It seeks to analyze the AMS with a critical — but constructive — eye.
Quyen Schroeder (they/she) is a fourth-year student studying English language and computer science, and they’ve been a committed observer of almost all AMS Council meetings since February 2023. She also ran as “Barry ‘Bee’ Buzzword” in the 2025 AMS Presidential election. They can be reached at q.schroeder@ubyssey.ca.
A few weeks ago, I received a message from AMS President Riley Huntley, asking what executive goal I would write for him. During the AMS Council meeting a couple of days later, I recognized Huntley’s preliminary goal 2E as my suggestion.
The preliminary goal’s description is as follows: “Foster stronger, purpose-driven engagement with AMS Resource Groups by enhancing collaboration on advocacy initiatives and areas of shared strategic interest.”
Indeed, in my response to Huntley, I wrote that I believed that establishing and maintaining relationships with resource groups and other student organizers — such as Sulong UBC or Climate Justice UBC — would be mutually beneficial.
In past years, the relationship between the AMS and student groups has been dysfunctional, often leading to outright antagonistic interactions — including screaming, yelling and crying during Council meetings — that negatively affected the mental health of AMS councillors, executives and student organizers.
One instance of the relationship between the AMS and student groups degrading is from 2023, when the UBC Trans Coalition (not technically a resource group but closely related to the Pride Collective resource group) organized alongside the AMS to include gender affirming care in the AMS/GSS Health and Dental Plan. After six months of collaboration on this with members from the Trans Coalition, the AMS notified the Trans Coalition that they would not be including gender affirming care in the Health and Dental Plan — just two hours before the AMS Council meeting.
Though ultimately gender-affirming care was added to the Health and Dental Plan, it took two meetings filled with irate students (I should disclose: I was one of them). Even then, it was voted on as a separate referendum item, including language that the leaders of the UBC Trans Coalition claimed would increase the risk of violence against trans students on campus.
This is just one instance in a pattern of the AMS failing to consult with and listen to its resource groups and other affiliated institutions.
The year before, in 2022, the AMS introduced a referendum that made some fees easier to opt-out of — specifically, fees that fund direct student services like the Resource Group, the Bike Kitchen and The Ubyssey. The sum of these fees when this policy was enacted was $24.86, just 3.2 per cent of the $776.84 annual AMS fees at the time. The groups affected by this change were not consulted on this referendum — nor were many in support of the heavily-advertised opt-outs.
Because of repeated actions like this from the AMS, some students felt that engaging with the AMS as-is was ineffective, given the institutional hostility towards them.
As such, in 2024, student organizers under the banner of solidarityubc advocated for three referenda items. One of these referenda would have dramatically restructured the governance of the AMS, introducing over 90 unelected seats to Council distributed among resource groups and other student organizations. At the time, AMS Council had 27 voting councillors plus 5 executives, meaning that this unelected block would have had enough representation on Council to remove any elected representative or bar any student from accessing AMS services.
When these three referenda items were presented to AMS Council — each with more than the required 1,000 signatures to be a referendum — they were struck down on purely procedural grounds.
Following this, resource groups that had advocated for these referenda items distanced themselves from it rather than taking accountability, claiming to have only seen a previous version that had far fewer than 90 seats.
At the zenith of poor relationships last year, the AMS amended code to allow the union to investigate and deconstitute a resource group. Not only did many leaders of resource groups claim not to have been consulted, but the appointed Interim AMS President Ben Du dishonestly misled students in the room, saying that the change was not to “deconstitute any one resource group.” Moments later, Du moved to investigate — and potentially deconstitute — the Social Justice Centre.
I share this historical context to ground my recommendation. I don’t believe that Resource Group Relationship is going to be the AMS’s guiding theme this year. But it is still important as both the AMS and student organizers benefit from collaboration — especially at the start of the executives’ terms.
For the AMS, establishing and tending to these relationships allows them to lessen the divide between the union and student groups. Student organizers have shown a remarkable ability to mobilize at Council meetings. When they do so, Council has historically engaged only superficially before hiding behind an in-camera session — where neither students nor press are allowed in. This limits transparency as students are unable to know what their representatives’ positions are or the reasoning behind Council’s decisions. Further, this stifles campus conversation as when Council feeling threatened, they default to a conservative status quo.
I believe that regular, good-faith communication can reduce the likelihood of engagement turning to hostility. The AMS can identify and address hot-button issues before they boil over.
For the rest of us: at the moment, our union’s goals are malleable. Though the executive presented their proposed goals at the June 11 Council meeting, they are just that — proposals.
In my eyes, this administration has shown a genuine desire to engage those outside the AMS in its goal-setting and decision-making. While simply engaging with students and student organizers is far from sufficient to create an equitable AMS, I hope this collaborative energy continues and bears fruits throughout the year.
To those who are frustrated with the AMS and hesitant to engage with the system, I share that frustration. But I will say this: to change an organization, someone inside the organization must agree with your goals and want to work towards them. Ultimately, no one can say if Huntley — or for that matter any executive or councillor — will be that person for any one cause. But right now, our union seems willing to listen and commit to action.
The AMS is a large, difficult-to-maneuver ship. It isn’t agile enough to respond immediately to every student interest, so we must influence our union’s direction one degree at a time with effects only being felt months or years down the line. Right now, we have an opportunity to put some pressure on the wheel by ensuring the AMS executives knows your priorities. I encourage you to do so, respectfully and in the spirit of collaboration.
Working together to chart a course now will be easier than fighting against institutional inertia in the months to come.
This is an opinion article. It reflects the contributor’s views and does not reflect the views of The Ubyssey as a whole. Contribute to the conversation by visiting ubyssey.ca/pages/submit-an-opinion.
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