Notes From Council: Updates on Campus Saint-Jean, Athletics and Recreation Fee, 1984 Sikh massacre

“Notes from Council” is The Gateway’s ongoing series of recaps of noteworthy items from Students’ Council meetings.

AUFSJ updates Students’ Council on Campus Saint-Jean

The November 2 Students’ Council began with a presentation from Chiara Concini, vice president (external) of L’Association des Universitaires de la Faculté Saint-Jean (AUFSJ), the student representative association for Campus Saint-Jean (CSJ).

AUFSJ previously presented to Students’ Council in June, during which AUFSJ representatives detailed budget restrictions constraining CSJ. Concini began her presentation by providing Students’ Council with context on the issues currently facing CSJ, which she described as “chronically underfunded.”

According to Concini, AUFSJ representatives saw a notable development in solving CSJ’s underfunding with the 2021 federal budget.

“We saw a rather major development in April 2021 with the announcement of the federal government’s budget, in which $121.3 million was allocated to post-secondary institution offering instruction in a linguistic minority context,” Concini said. “The funding is mainly supposed to be directed towards French language institutions offering educational programs in a Francophone minority context. By that, I would say the CSJ definitely applies.”

According to Concini it has “not been an easy journey” for CSJ to access this funding.

The federal government relies on a matching dollars program from the provincial government to fund post-secondary institutions. Therefore, the provincial government must match the funding the federal government puts forth towards post-secondary institutions. Concini described this matching dollars program as a large obstacle in CSJ accessing the funds put forth by the federal government.

“In order for CSJ to access that money [from the federal government], the provincial government has to put up the exact same amount,” Concini described. “Where we are running into issues at CSJ is that back in April, May, and June, the provincial government was unwilling to put forward [their] 50 per cent of additional funding for CSJ.”

According to Concini, trying to change that funding structure was a primary goal of AUFSJ over the summer.

“We had two advocacy goals over the summer,” she said. “One being putting pressure on the federal government to have that funding structure changed. The second major goal being putting a large emphasis on student perspective and student voice, especially in terms of how underfunding CSJ is currently impacting students.”

This advocacy took the form of meeting with student groups across Canada — notably in Alberta, Ontario, and Quebec. Concini described this as an opportunity to build solidarity between students studying in French in Canada. She mentioned AUFSJ also meeting with members of Parliament and senators within Canada to put pressure on the federal government to change their current post-secondary funding structure.

Concini described these advocacy efforts as “largely successful” due to the federal government’s announcement in August 2021 of a new post-secondary funding structure.

In this new funding structure, in the first year of funding, the federal government would cover 95 per cent of funding, and the province would only have to cover five per cent. In second year, the federal government would cover 75 per cent of the funding and the provincial government would cover 25 per cent. In the third year of funding, the two governments would each cover 50 per cent.

“To see a deviation from that 50 [per cent] split was a huge win for AUFSJ advocacy,” Concini said.

She described this new funding structure as a “short-term solution” with a long term solution still in the works.

Cocini also touched on the Campus Alberta Grant, which the provincial government provides to publicly funded post-secondary institutions.

“The Campus Alberta Grant is [needs-based] funding the U of A receives and distributes amongst its faculties,” she said. “That need is largely determined based on a quota each faculty has for the number of students… [and] currently CSJ is operating with one and a half to two times as many students as its quota.”

“It’s being obviously severely underfunded given the amount of students that it has.”

According to Concini, this has lead CSJ to decrease its course delivery by 19 per cent, which has resulted in the following issues for CSJ students:

• Limited or improper access to academic counselling services.
• Recognition of CSJ prerequisite courses on BearTracks.
• Not enough options for courses offered in French, forcing many students to take courses in English.
• University communications sent out in only English.

Concini described AUFSJ’s next steps as continuing to work with the U of A in addressing these issues.

Student representatives on council voiced their appreciation for Concini’s presentation, and for the advocacy work being done by AUFSJ.

Campus and community recreation presents to council on Athletics and Recreation Fee

Cheryl Harwardt, director of campus and community recreation, presented to Students’ Council alongside Ian Reade, director of athletics, on the Athletics and Recreation Fee.

Harwardt described presenting to Students’ Council as an opportunity to consult with students at the university.

“From a collaboration and consultation perspective this is one meeting that we attend in order to ensure that we get an opportunity to speak to you and hear from you about the services that we offer,” she said. “We also do a similar presentation with the Graduate Students’ Association (GSA) as well.”

She also described this annual presentation as an opportunity for students to gain a better understanding on what these funds go towards.

“Of course, you want to know what you pay for — that makes perfect sense,” she said. “That’s why we arrive at a presentation like this on an annual basis.”

According to Harwardt, this fee is a source of revenue in support of services including:

• Management, operation, and maintenance of sport and recreation facilities and training spaces at the U of A.
• The management of physical activity and wellness programs including group fitness, intramural sports, dance, recreational, sport and leisure activities, and sport clubs;
• Administrative and coaching support requirements for Golden Bears and Pandas Athletics.

Harwardt explained students pay approximately $5.8 million in athletic and recreation fees, which pay a portion of the funds required to provide sport and recreation services to students.

She described the allocation of the funds and oversight of the providing of services as the responsibility of the Dean of Students, who delegates to Reade, and the responsibility of the vice-president (facilities and operations) who delegates to Harwardt.

According to Reade this fee also allows for the proper management for the 24 Golden Bears and Pandas varsity teams at the U of A, which are comprised of approximately 500 student athletes. Specifically, Reade said the fee allows these teams to remain competitive.

“Competitive results for us are incredibly important because winning is more fun than losing,” he said. “We [want] student athletes [to] have fun and when they lose, they don’t have fun.”

“People enjoy watching winning games, and as the Edmonton Elks are starting to understand — if you’re not winning, people don’t really care who you are. So we need to be competitive, and [even though] it’s very hard to win championships, we want always want to be competitive.”

Rowan Morris, education councillor, questioned what steps are being taken to ensure minority groups feel comfortable using the services offered by campus and community recreation.

“I am transgender and I have a hard time going to the gym because I don’t necessarily feel safe,” Morris said. “I know that many women don’t feel safe going to the gym, and many people just don’t feel safe exercising in front of other people. I’m wondering if there’s an advance to maybe create safer gym space hours, or anything about that for engagement from minority groups?”

Harwardt described current steps being taken by campus and community recreation, but voiced room for improvement.

“First is our survey that is up right now,” she said. “Part of [the survey’s purpose] is to understand who our audience is and how we can engage with them on a greater level. Secondly, we do regularly interact with a variety of agencies across campus, including The Landing as an example.”

“If you have another avenue that we can get connected with to support that, I’d be very happy to participate in that. One of our values [is] inclusivity [and] we want to live that value.”

Arts councillor presents on the 1984 Sikh massacre

In the final presentation, Gurleen Kaur, arts councillor, presented to the rest of council on the 1984 Sikh massacre.

Kaur began her presentation by providing background information on the historical event. According to the presentation, on October 31, 1984, Indira Gandhi, the prime minister of India, was assassinated by her Sikh bodyguards for ordering an attack on “the most revered” historical Gurdwara for Sikhs — Harimander Sahib.

Kaur described the attack on the Sikh community that followed the assassination.

“After Gandhi’s assassination, her son Rajiv Gandhi gathered mobs and lead them to kill Sikhs in the country’s capital,” she said “November 1 to 3 marks the peak of the planned act by the government which was a series of brutal acts including pogrom, mass murder, mass rape, arson, looting, acid throwing, and immolation.”

“Thousands of innocent Sikhs were killed — and we are still craving justice.”

After thanking Kaur for her presentation, Simran Dhillon, science councillor, highlighted the topic as a contentious subject.

“I think that it’s important that we understand where everyone comes from, as I think everyone in this room comes with a very different cultural background and that allows us to empathize with one another a lot more as we understand where we’re coming from,” Dhillon said. “1984 is not that long ago and the traumas remain largely in our families — especially in men. Just to amplify how contentious it is, NDP [federal] leader Jagmeet Singh spoke out about 1984. As a result, he can’t go back to India.”

Rowan Ley, president of the Students’ Union, thanked Kaur for her presentation and mentioned a need for culturally sensitive on-campus supports for students.

“It’s important for us to understand, like Councillor Dhillon said, where we all come from… and the services and supports [students] need on campus as a result of that,” Ley said. “This [need] works into a lot of ongoing issues… for example culturally sensitive and trauma or mental health care on campus.”