Editorial – Do Nothings Need Not Apply
By B. White
People close to student government at this college complain that student activism is dead on the campuses — however, the truth is that it has been stifled by a pointless bureaucratic mentality. Three years of student government ranging in ability from confused to incompetent have driven all but the most patient students away from the political scene.
Election time again
Elections for next year’s Student Association are coming up in just over two weeks and these elections will determine whether next year’s Association will be a body of helpless do-nothings or a genuine force at the college.
Students contemplating running for the Association should ask themselves the following questions:
1) What can be done to improve John Abbott?
2) Why isn’t the present Association working? (or is it?)
3) Why am I running?
If these three questions can’t be answered it may be best if potential candidates reconsider running.
To the first question, John Abbott needs improvement anywhere a student chooses to work. Registration, limited course offerings, overcrowded labs and classes and many other problems could be improved if the college would simply hire all the teachers the government will allow it to. It is in the interest of every student to push for this; this year’s Association hasn’t. Will next year’s? The college will be undergoing a renovation in the fall and the administration will be trying to use student office, lounge and study space for classrooms. This year’s Association hasn’t even whimpered about the prospect. Will next year’s do any better? Or will it be too late?
Why it hasn’t worked
The next question (Why isn’t the present Association working? Or is it?) will likely be the most difficult for most people in the college to answer. This is because the Association has done a poor job in getting students interested in the college. They have stifled several projects with their petty bureaucracy and haphazard policies. These include the Radio station (but it can’t be said that they didn’t fight back), a debating club, a guitar club, a Biology club. Others such as the Camera club aren’t anywhere near their potential. The Shelter, an Association-run coffee house in Brittain Hall hasn’t been open since November. The reason, we contend, that the Association doesn’t work is that most of the members don’t know where to begin and a complete lack of leadership has simply turned off the membership. Nine executive members have resigned since September, most of them because they felt they were wasting their time.
If the potential candidate can’t think of an answer to the last question (“Why should I run?”) after having read this, then he should do the rest of the college a favour and not run. On the other hand, students who feel that they have a good reason to run should — we need all the help that anyone would care to give.
Issues do exist
Issues, something traditionally lacking in S.A. campaigns do exist at this college and students should refuse to vote for any candidate who won’t face them. The college wouldn’t give space to the day care centre in the fall; the administration is threatening to take control of the $22 activity fee away from the Association because of past mismanagement; the college is one of a handful of Quebec CEGEP’s or universities where the student body doesn’t belong to ANEQ and the association didn’t even send a delegate to ANEQ’s founding convention or seriously discuss joining the body; this year’s Winter Carnival lost as much as $2,000 (when they projected a profit of $500) and imputations of bad management and corruption have been made as a result; we spend $10,000 a year for the use of the Centennial Centre yet the only parts of the building we use (the cafeteria, the bar and the bookstore) make a profit. However the biggest scandal of them all is that the present Student Association has failed to take a strong stand on any of these issues.