Results tagged “education”

Enduring bouts of rain and hail, about a thousand students, workers, and community members marched through downtown Toronto yesterday as part of the Drop Fees for a Poverty Free Ontario campaign. At 4 p.m., they arrived at Queen’s Park to demand that the provincial government start "investing in the people, 'cause we are the solution," as the chant went.

Last year, the Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities unveiled a new program that gave out $150 to any and every full-time post-secondary student in Ontario who applied for it, no strings attached. More than half a million students province-wide qualified for the Technology and Textbook Grant, or TTG, intended to help cover the "added academic expense related to textbooks and technology and other academic supplies," as John Milloy, Minister of Training, Colleges and Universities, told the Queen's Journal last year.

U of T's flat fee proposal for Arts and Science students—the one that would force new students to pay for 5.0 courses, regardless of how many courses, from 3.0–6.0, they actually took—has barreled over the final administrative hurdle at the University of Toronto, and was passed this evening by the university's Governing Council at a meeting held at the school's Mississauga campus.

Two weeks after the University of Toronto got one step closer to passing a contentious proposal that would force many new students to pay a flat fee regardless of the number of courses they were actually enrolled in, the University of Toronto Students' Union (UTSU) and the Arts and Sciences Students' Union (ASSU) have—according to a press release sent out by them this morning—"filed an urgent application asking the Ontario Superior Court of Justice to stop a flat fee proposal from moving ahead."

It's amazing that no-one involved seems to think that this might be a bad idea: Future Shop is donating $50,000 each to make over the computer labs of two as-of-yet unnamed Toronto high schools that are within seven kilometres of a Future Shop store, in exchange for branding the labs with the company's colours. Future Shop has "some design element[s] that they would like to see common to all labs," notes the Globe. "The labs are to be painted a light grey with a red border, Future Shop's trademark colours. The possibility of naming the labs after the company has yet to be discussed." Great. It's not that Future Shop's philanthropy is in and of itself bad; it's more that it absolutely shouldn't be necessary to help schools grow, and that schools really shouldn't be accepting paid advertising, in any form.

Following Wednesday's announcement by Ontario culture minister Aileen Carroll, six GTA cultural institutions will receive an additional $43.4 million in funding that recognizes “the innovative programming and collections that attract millions of visitors and help Ontario compete on the international stage.” The beneficiaries of this one-time surge of $18.6 million and total annual operating increase of $24.8 million are the Art Gallery of Ontario, the Royal Ontario Museum, the Royal Botanical Gardens, the Ontario Science Centre, the Ontario Heritage Trust, and the McMichael Canadian Art Collection.

Subway six-inch Cold Cut Combo: $3.29, 460 calories; Pizza Hut 1/2 Pepperoni P-Zone: $4.50, 710 calories; Swiss Chalet Garlic Cheese Loaf: $7.99, 860 calories.

U of T's Faculty of Arts & Sciences has passed the flat-fee proposal that we slammed last week as being disastrous for student life. Whether or not the proposal—which would force all students taking anywhere from 3.0 to 6.0 courses, regardless of how many courses they actually took, to pay for 5.0 courses—is implemented for all incoming students as of next school year is now in the hands of the school's Governing Council, where, after passing through the council's boards, it will be decided on at a meeting on May 20 [PDF]. University of Toronto Students' Union President Sandy Hudson confirmed the ruling to Torontoist over the phone tonight, and she told us she is "less optimistic" for the proposal's death "the higher up we go," but told us that, with the Arts & Science Student Union and students on campus, "we're gonna keep fighting it."

The University of Toronto—apparently anxious to catch up with York in how alienated, poor, and frustrated students have been made there—is weighing a proposal disastrous for the bulk of its future students, all in the name of a fast buck.

Yes, there are Torontoist writers who remember York's 2000/01 CUPE walkout a little too well. So when 2008 rolled around, and students were once again barred from classes for the duration of a ridiculously protracted strike, certain impressions of a scholastically bereft university flooded to mind: lots of beer, lots of hangovers, tumbleweeds blowing through Vari Hall, and a gleeful student body celebrating sweet, hedonistic sloth.

Love padlocks are, if nothing else, the most secure way to symbolize keeping what you love safe. And while Posterchild's love locks can't stop cranes from knocking down each piece of our precious Sam's structure, they'll likely be outlasted by the sign: the chair of Ryerson's Experts Advisory Committee for the Master Plan, Linda Grayson, told us this week that the two oversized records won't be going too far. While they haven't decided on an exact location yet, she said that, after chatting with "the man" Sam Sniderman himself, the marquee will go either on the south or west side of the new Student Learning Centre being constructed in Sam's old spot, as to not block the east and west windows. And if it's not on the building itself, it will be nearby, says Grayson, noting that Sniderman is pleased with that idea, too.

Nobody could rightly accuse Sheldon Levy, Ryerson University's president, of lacking ambition. In his first term (the board recently confirmed his reappointment) he has shepherded the university through the early stages of an ambitious bricks-and-mortar expansion program, one that will ultimately reshape several city blocks. And in a sold-out speech before the Empire Club yesterday [PDF], Levy laid out his vision for a new phase of expansion, one that goes far beyond physical space and extends far further than Ryerson itself. Levy has a gleam in his eye, and its name is Silicon Valley North.

CUPE Ontario's university workers are now officially like the awkward kid no one wants to play with at recess. As we reported earlier, that branch of the union passed a motion a few days ago calling for an academic boycott "aimed at Ontario universities and any institutional connections pertaining to research that help the military of the state of Israel." Today, in letters to both the National Post and the Globe and Mail, and in a statement on the union's homepage, CUPE's president Paul Moist did his best to distance the national organization from that move, saying that "The views expressed in the resolution are those of a small number of CUPE Ontario members. The resolution does not represent CUPE National policy." This is the second time in two months Moist has had to publicly chastise CUPE Ontario, currently operating under the contentious leadership of Sid Ryan: an earlier version of the boycott came in for even harsher criticism, with Moist saying that it would have violated CUPE's own anti-discrimination standards. No word on whether Ryan has also been uninvited to Moist's birthday party.

In a startling and uncharacteristic move, CUPE Ontario has done something controversial. Even more unexpectedly, they've gone about it in controversial fashion.

Are you a stupid parent interested in embarrassing your child? Why not follow in the footsteps of Robert Edwards, who complained that Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale—a novel that his seventeen-year-old son was reading in English class at Lawrence Park Collegiate—was "rife with brutality towards and mistreatment of women (and men at times), sexual scenes, and bleak depression" and contained "profane language" and an unfair treatment of Christianity. Edwards filed a formal complaint with the Toronto District School Board in December, telling the Star he was "looking for justification as to why this is an appropriate book," even though the novel's Wikipedia page would have mostly taken care of that job for him. And now, the Star is reporting today that Edwards' formal complaint to the Toronto District School Board was roundly rejected by the board's book review panel—they're "very supportive" of keeping Atwood's Tale in the classroom.

After eighty-five bitter days, government back-to-work legislation has brought the CUPE 3903 strike at York University to its ignominious end.

It took a few days, but just moments ago back-to-work legislation finally passed at Queen's Park to force an end to the York University strike, with the Globe reporting that classes will resume Monday. Way to go, CUPE.

The University of Toronto has purchased the McLaughlin Planetarium from the Royal Ontario Museum for $22 million, with plans for "academic use." The Planetarium, which we profiled in detail last March, was, since its closure, transformed into temporary offices for ROM employees and a temporary warehouse—one of the most amazing ones imaginable—for ROM artifacts. But the more time that passed after its closure, the less it seemed possible for the museum to be able to develop the land that it was on: the ROM was met with widespread opposition to a proposed condo project in 2005, and though they were still planning a tentative new development last year, we wrote then that "as impractical as it is now, the Planetarium still stands on hallowed ground, and it is hard to imagine that another fight over its future is not on the horizon." U of T and the ROM, regularly at odds over the Planetarium's fate, have seemed able to agree on that point: U of T President David Naylor described the purchase in a press release as a "win-win-win for the U of T, the ROM, and the public," and the Globe summarized the situation nicely: "The museum gets $22-million to help pay off the $84-million left owing to the provincial government after its $270-million expansion, the university gets badly needed room to grow and the public gets relief from a persistent threat to despoil a treasured landscape."

Dalton McGuinty announced this morning that he is a little over a day away from introducing back-to-work legislation to immediately force an end to York University's strike. According to a statement released on the Ontario premier's website, McGuinty feels that "there is no reasonable prospect of a negotiated settlement between York University and CUPE Local 3903. The sides are in a clear deadlock, and despite our best efforts to bring the sides together, that has not changed." "Having exhausted all other options," McGuinty writes, "I will be recalling the legislature as of Sunday at 1 p.m. for the purposes of introducing back to work legislation. I am asking MPPs from all parties to provide unanimous consent for immediate passage of the bill so that students can get back to school this week." [via 680 News]

The ROM has latched onto the one sure-fire way to attract new customers amidst an economic crisis: they're giving stuff—that is, admission—away for free. To children. Actually, sorry, scratch that—to one child. This weekend, and every subsequent weekend up to, and including, February 8, every paying adult, senior, and student can bring along that one special daughter/son/grandchild/sibling, while the other pesky little tykes take care of themselves at home (that's what TV's for, right?).

York University administration had hoped that a supervised vote of CUPE 3903 members yesterday and today would result in an acceptance of the school's settlement to end the months-long strike. But results from the vote just came down the wire from CUPE, and all three voting units have declined the offer, with 61.7% of the first unit, 59.3% of the second unit, and 70% of the third unit voting "No." The university quickly responded, quoting York President and Vice-Chancellor Mamdouh Shoukri, who said that “The clock has run out on CUPE...I will be working with the deans and Senate Executive to prepare plans to further extend the academic calendar to ensure that students complete their fall and winter terms. This will mean reducing or, if need be, cancelling the summer term.” Tick tock.

It shouldn't really be news to anyone (except for maybe Maple High School's guidance head Joanne Brown), but the Star is reporting a 10.8% drop in overall student applications to York, and a 15% drop in the number of students who ranked York as their first choice for schools they wanted to apply to. Which is sorta funny, because U of T—which saw an increase both in number of applications and number of those applicants ranking the school their first choice—is the school that's trying to cut their undergrad numbers. The most impressive rise in first-choice applicants, though: OCAD. Applications to the school are up 5.5%, and the number of first-choice applicants is up 20.8%. Maybe this wasn't such a bad idea after all.

In the war of attrition that is the strike at York University, York officials have played their trump card: they have requested that Ontario's minister of labour direct a supervised CUPE 3903 membership vote. According to the university's website, school officials believe the union's management has created an unnecessary stalemate and that it refuses to offer any conciliatory terms its members might accept. York has stated that it has opted for this measure because CUPE 3903 has refused to take all outstanding contract obligations to binding arbitration, which would end the strike. Separate votes will be required for each of CUPE 3903's bargaining units (contract faculty, TAs, and GAs) and a voting date has yet to be determined by the minister of labour.

Despite today’s announcement that 34,000 Canadian jobs were lost in December, the Elementary Teacher’s Federation of Ontario has scheduled a strike vote for February 13. The Federation has been in contract talks with the Ontario government since May of last year, and it claims that the two groups can’t find a middle ground. Negotiations are ongoing, but a strike could arise as soon as the end of March. Should it happen, parents of the province’s 800,000 elementary students could find themselves in quite the babysitting dilemma.

As has been widely reported, York University has presented CUPE local 3903 with a new settlement offer, and asked the union to put the deal to its membership for a vote as soon as possible. Unfortunately, any hopes that this may signal the beginning of the end are misplaced. In an interview with Torontoist this evening, a representative of CUPE 3903 said that "bargaining is ongoing" and that any talk of a deal is premature. The union has a regularly scheduled membership meeting tomorrow at which the latest developments will be discussed, but there are no plans to put the administration's proposal up for ratification at this time. While some progress has been made in this most recent round of talks, union leaders feel that not all issues have been fully addressed—prime among these the need to provide job security for contract faculty. The union representative described the administration's decision to publicize the offer as "disappointing," and an unfortunate media ploy. CUPE 3903 plans to present York with a counteroffer later this week.

This stupid. [via BlogUT]

Graduating from university or college is supposed to be a celebratory event. Sadly, given all of the recent layoffs and hiring freezes in Canada, spring convocations probably won't be so merry. Although this annual passage into quasi-adulthood is often regarded as a struggle for grads with generic arts degrees and diplomas, even business students will suffer in 2009.

Hunger—which we caught at TIFF and again at the European Film Festival—is perhaps the most tactile movie we have ever seen. The impressionistic docudrama chronicling the prison hunger strike by IRA soldier Bobby Sands and the conditions leading up to his decision to take such extreme action, is all about the body and the things that go into, come out of, and are done to it. The film, the feature debut by British artist Steve McQueen (not that one), thoroughly deglamourizes the notion of deliberately starving oneself, by forcing you to confront the physical consequences of the act; it does for this method of suicide what 2:37 did for wrist cutting.