punditry.ca — uncovering DSU elections

This is part three of my series on looking closer at the AGM resolutions (I have resolved [haha] to use the correct term as much as I can).

We turn our attention from SMAC to the NSPIRG motion as made by Daniel Pink.  I’m using the text from here, but it appears to be riddled with typos, so I’ll take it easy on my general bitchiness about good writing.

General comments: Once again we face the problem of campaigning in the WHEREAS clauses, which I fundamentally oppose.  I also in general oppose trying to push things through an AGM by stacking the crowd.

The other problem is that this should actually be a handful of separate resolutions.  The WHEREAS about paying non-students plus the BIRT about stopping this practice should be one single resolution, for example.  This isn’t me being bitchy about procedure: it is tough to debate a resolution when people are jumping all over the map, addressing different but mostly unrelated aspects of the resolution.  I don’t think the other WHEREAS clauses have bearing on the question of whether the NSPIRG should pay a non-student or not.

“Whereas the conduct of NSPIRG conducted at recent events such as the job fair that was held at Career Services in the Student Union Building in the fall, where members were tables and being disruptive, several students were unable to learn about careers that were available, and subsequently lost carrier opportunities.”

Conduct conducted? Why must you hurt me?

Lost career opportunities?  That’s a bit of a stretch.  If anything, NSPIRG drew more attention to a number of employers; more students know about them hiring now than ever before.

If you want to make a point about NSPIRG disrupting events, make the point that the DSU has a history of sanctioning societies who do this, but did nothing about NSPIRG.

“Whereas NSPIRG’s latest display at the Job Fair in February was a total embarrassment, to the Union, its membership, and the University, and many Dalhousie students felt ashamed to say they give $4.00 to said group.”

The first thing I do when I proof-read a paper is search and replace “many” with “I DON’T GET NUMBERS”.  How many?  6, 60, 600, 6000? Have you done polling? 

The display probably was embarrassing, but you shouldn’t bring emotion into this.  Consider using language from the DSU constitution, “conduct likely to bring the Union into disrepute” or so.  It’s from the recall of councillors section, and I’ve enjoyed the phrasing ever since I first heard it at a DSU exec’s impeachment proceedings.  Plus, you get to use the word “conduct” again!

“Whereas NSPIRG does a terrible job, announcing the opt-out period for students to come and collect the $4.00, that is rightfully theirs.”

I shudder at the grammar here, but I gave you a pass.  ”terrible” is a vague adjective, though.  What is the standard, and how are they failing to meet it?

“Whereas NSPIRG has a staff member on their payroll whom is not a Dalhousie student, which goes against their original referendum question.”

 Hmm.  I assume this is a reference to the “will operate as a student run” part of the original referendum question.  I would consider the DSU a “student run” organization, but some full-time staff members are not students.  As long as the NSPIRG board of directors is entirely comprised of students, I can see hiring a non-student to do some administrative work.  The key to me is the nature of the work being done.  If they are answering phones and taking meeting minutes, that’s cool.  If they are managing a bar, cool.  If they are like a much less awesome Craig Kennedy, cool.  However, if they are taking a political role and/or being the spokesperson and/or leading the organization politically, I think this objection is justified.

It WOULD certainly be preferable to hire a Dal student, if there was one to be found.  If it is a part-time position, I think it should definitely be a Dal student.  I see no reason to look outside Dal for expertise in this area.

“BIRT that NSPRIG make an official apology, in writing, to all Dalhousie Students, for wasting their money and outlining the four points in the “Whereas” clauses. This will be submitted to DSU Council by April 1st 2009 to be distributed to the student body.”

I… don’t see the point to this.  But I’ve never been a proponent of apology letters; we know they’d be lying and wouldn’t actually be sorry.  Also, if you succeed in pulling their funding and booting them out of the SUB, what incentive do they have to comply?  They would quite rightly tell the DSU to piss off.

“BIFRT that NSPIRG stop paying their staff members that are not Dalhousie students, keeping them inline with there original referendum question.”

Contractual obligations are not that easily revoked.  I’d like it to be clear that this resolution allows NSPIRG to end contracts in a way that is not unfair to individuals in their employ.  Also see above re: what it means to be student run.

“BIFRT should this motion succeed, this should be used as sufficient evidence for next year’s Council to determine the future of NSPIRG”

I don’t even know what this means, practically speaking.  I also object to limiting Council’s consideration of facts to a single resolution passed at an AGM.  I would not vote for such a resolution, even if the chair allows it to be considered.

“BIFRT NSPIRG shall be served notice to vacate the SUB after thirty (30) day notice has given to them in writing by the Vice President Finance and Operation. This notice shall be delivered within twenty-four (24) hours of conclusion of the AGM.”

Bitchy.  DSU Council actually considered a motion to evict NSPIRG brought forward by their office mates, DASSS.  This was spring 2002, as I recall (or was it 2003?  do I sound like an old man yet?).  The motion failed, barely.  Amusingly we voted by closed ballot because councillors were concerned about retribution from NSPIRG members.

I must admit I am confused by NSPIRG’s special status within the SUB.  In terms of active membership and reach, I put them at equal footing with most E-level societies.  I’ve been involved with societies that are in an endless struggle to find space to operate on campus.  I do understand the desire to have NSPIRG join the same space struggle most other societies face, though a total eviction seems a bit strong.  A little more equality would be cool, though.

BIFRT NSPIRG’s entire funding be held in trust by the DSU for the remainder of the term and their payroll that runs there the DSU will be cut off to the remainder of the term, after consulting with legal council. 

Haha – the author of this motion is well-informed; although the DSU cut off NSPIRG funding this past fall, they neglected to cut off payroll which accounts for some massive percentage of their budget.  

Not sure what is being accomplished here, though.  The end of the term takes you to April 30 – what happens then?

I made it to this resolution before I figured out what was happening: this is a bargaining position.  It’s the used car dealer mechanism of discussion – name an outrageous price, and then try to keep it as high as you can.  In this case, it’s head as far as you can to one extreme, and see how much of that ground you can keep.  It’s an approach to politics I’ve seen before, and have hated every time.  I find it frustrating.  We’ll see if I make it to the rest of the resolutions; now that I’ve realized these aren’t serious positions but were chosen to get a good negotiating position, I’ve kind of lost interest.

But, in the meantime, here is what I had to say about this resolution.

MILITARY MOTION

“WHEREAS in conjunction with major cuts in governmental subsidization to post-secondary education Dalhousie has increasingly sought out corporate, private, and military funding”

I request evidence of these “major cuts” to PSE.  And a timeline for them.  My math puts the 09-10 commitment from the NS government up about $19 million to the operating budget, unknown what change to research funding.

Also, I hate the word “increasingly”, but I can live with it.  And it should probably be noted that Dalhousie spends a lot of time seeking out public funding, as well.

All that aside, the university needs more money.  We can agree on that.

“WHEREAS the presence of these private and military interests influence the content and trajectory of current educational institutions and compromise the university as a site for the development of critical thought;”

My vagueness detector just started smoking.  I’d love to see some examples of what this means, exactly.  What is the trajectory of educational institutions, what should it be, and how is it changing?  Is there a before and after picture I can see?  And how does one compromise the university as a site for critical thought?  Pretty sure I am capable of critical thought regardless of who funded the building I’m in.

“BIRT the Dalhousie Student Union will take an oppositional stance toward private and military funding of university research and classroom content.”

Why “take an oppositional stance toward” instead of “oppose”?  I swear, half the problem with these motions is the bullshit language employed.

I worked 70-100 hours a week every summer, and 20-30 hours a week during the school year, to afford my undergraduate education, and that’s with scholarships.  There is no way I could have afforded a Masters degree on my own, but luckily I was able to receiving funding from IBM.  I don’t know how this fits in with accessibility of education in general, but certainly I needed private help in order to access my education.

Their funding was basically a paper bag of unmarked bills – Dal was paid upfront and no strings were attached.  I got access to data and source code and customers.  I do work on software systems that are relevant to people, which is what I care about: access to real systems is even more important than money.  As an academic researcher, I still need to show generality: my work must advance the state of the art in some area, not just a specific piece of IBM software.  Plus, once I have the funding, I can work on whatever I want for that year.  It’s then up to me to convince them my work is important at renewal time, which until this year was nearly automatic.

One of the major problems in my field is realistic data.  Academics simply cannot access, find, or generate data of any applicability in the real world.  This comes up across the board: software engineers want to make software authoring better; if you limit our test bed to “1st and 2nd year computer science students”, we become irrelevant.  People studying network security rely on network data showing distributed intrusion attempts, botnets, and the like.  The only place to get that and have it mean something is from a large ISP.  This data is the cornerstone of at least one Dal prof’s research, and the students who work with him.  Take away their data, what do they do?

Some small local companies rely on government matching to fund students to do their research and development.  I know of two Halifax companies who have matched funds with MITACS to pay for a student to address a problem they were having.  A very interesting research problem for the student, some funding for the student, and nearly immediate benefit to these companies in terms of innovation.  This resolution would kill such innovation.

I can see a perceived downfall with corporate funding: that people will go where money is, so if a research area is funded work will get done, and less will get done if it is not.  Thus, money appears to direct research.

I understand that perspective, but I disagree with it.  First, as a software engineer I care about making software easy to write, easier to configure, of better quality, etc.  Everyone cares about this issue; I don’t have to change anything to get funding.  Second, there is still funding for areas not of corporate interest – NSERC, NRC, other federal money, provincial funding agencies, provide funding for otherwise neglected areas.  By my math, direct corporate research funding is $4.5 million of about $116 million in total funding at Dalhousie.  Third, taking away corporate funding will not encourage the growth of currently unfunded areas; rather, it will eliminate research advances being made in funded areas.  No money means fewer students, less equipment, fewer programmers.  How does that help anyone?

Wander over to the Dalhousie Faculty Association and see how they feel about the DSU trying to dictate what funding their members can and cannot accept.  Academic freedom is not something Dalhousie faculty members take lightly.

If you want to keep private money out of the university, you don’t start with the DSU.  You don’t even start with Dalhousie.  The best way to get Dal to give up millions of dollars is if you identify replacement money.  If you go do that, I think you’ll be amazed at how much support this resolution would get.  Otherwise, even if the DSU adopted the policy, all it would achieve is to split advocacy efforts.  I can just imagine Shannon Zimmerman filing a BAC response that says “We believe tuition should be cut 5% across the board, and that you should completely eliminate any private income from the budget.”

Finally, where does most of the University’s funding come from?  Oh, the government?  Pretty sure they are the only organization we’ve talked about that has its own military force.  

This has focused entirely on research funding, because that’s my concern… but FYI, such a resolution if passed would result in the DSU attacking Dal’s sports teams (so long, student athletes; your Union cares not for you).  It would also be an assault on all co-op programs and internships, which would in turn kill Engineering, Comp Sci, and most of Management in terms of their national relevance.  Those are only the obvious two.

By the way, only 3 SMAC members have publicly identified themselves on their website.  Are any NSERC students members of SMAC?  Anyone?  Looking for people with the credentials to discuss federal scientific grants if you’d care to identify yourself.

As an aside, here’s a list of computery-ish things invented or developed at universities with military funding or by researchers/programmers funded by corporations:

• the internet 
• the software hosting the SMAC website
• the WWW
• the system that makes domain names work
• HTML
• CSS
• the web browser you’re using right now
• major portions of the operating systems you are using right now
• the hardware of the computer you are using right now

“BIRT that the Dalhousie Student Union will demand more transparency around private and military sponsorship of research and classroom content through visible and open acknowledgment of such partnerships in class calendars, syllabi’s, and in any forum involving the publication or advertisement of activities and classes involved with those private bodies.”

That goes a bit far: “any forum involving the publication or advertisement of activities”.  I don’t think when Dal runs an ad aimed at high school students it should follow it up with “Dalhousie is brought to you by Pepsi, Adidas, and the letter Q.”  But in general I like transparency.

For what it’s worth, most ethical researchers in the various fields list the sources of their funding at the end of every paper.  I’d never publish a paper without letting people know who provided funding to any authors or to the project.  Most research websites list their corporate and government sponsors.  Those that don’t, should.  On the other hand, when someone asks me “Hey, what do you do?”, I don’t give them an elevator pitch followed by “and, I’m funded by NSERC, iCore, and IBM.”

Transparency is a good idea, though.  I approve of transparency.  I just… never saw it as a problem up until now.  The Pepsi machines on campus, as well as the total and regrettable lack of Coca-Cola, make their funding pretty obvious.  The ADIDAS logos all over Dalplex and our athletes’ gear makes that pretty obvious.  Pretty sure I went to class in the Scotiabank Auditorium.  But absolutely, any time a corporation gives money to Dalhousie beyond a certain amount it should be announced. 

Speaking of funding transparency, I liked the SMAC information packages that were being handed out at the event last week… out of curiousity, where did the money for that come from?

If you knew me while I was on Council, you know part of my deal was reviewing  motions before they came up in Council.  It’s still something I do from time to time when the mood takes me.  I fix spelling, address inconsistencies, offer agreement or disagreement to each part individually, make wording suggestions… it’s quite comprehensive when I have the time.

Because I’m a good guy, I’ve done the same thing for the SMAC resolutions.  Well, started, got so annoyed after 2 that I stopped.  (I got annoyed when they tried to tell me my research had been hijacked by an eeeeevilll corporate agenda.)  This is essentially what my feedback would be had a DSU Exec sent the motion to me  for feedback before bringing it up at Council.  (A practice which no longer happens, to the detriment of everyone except me, I feel).

My first PROTIP is that per Robert’s, they are resolutions, not motions.  (resolutions are more formal written motions, typically longer; so you would make a motion to vote by ballot, but you would present a 1-page resolution against war).  The two words are often used interchangeably, but I’d recommend using resolution.

ANTI WAR MOTION

The biggest single problem with this resolution is that most of the WHEREAS clauses are a collection of miscellaneous anti-war campaign points, as opposed to a building set of arguments that motivate the resolution. I like the WHEREAS clause I read in a book on Robert’s rules once:  ”WHEREAS there are 250 stray cats in Cityville, WHEREAS stray cats have been found shredding garbage bags, BIRT the city fund a cat shelter”.  I found these WHEREAS clauses to be the equivalent of saying “WHEREAS there is a heightened crisis with abandoned kittens flooding the streets of Cityville, WHEREAS feral cats are raining doom and destruction down upon us, WHEREAS black cats are unlucky, BIRT the city fund a cat shelter”.

And yes, I am guilty of exageration myself, but this isn’t a resolution.

In short, it reads like someone got angry at war and started ranting, someone took detailed notes, and they were compiled into a resolution.  No problem with hating war; if you want an actual discussion, you want to turn the anger down a notch or fifty.

“WHEREAS we are currently in a state of heightened global conflict in which unjust wars of aggression are resulting in the deaths and suffering of millions worldwide;”

heightened: “To raise or increase the quantity or degree of”

I request evidence that there is more global conflict today than there was yesterday, this year than last year, this decade than last decade, this century than last century, this millenia than last millenia. 

Absent such evidence, “heightened” is a word injected to add drama, immediacy, and/or fear, and has no place in a WHEREAS clause.

Similarly, “global conflict”.  That’s a vague term.  Is war being waged in every country on the globe?  Nope.  By every country?  Nope.   Say what you mean.

“unjust wars of aggression”: are there “just wars of aggression”?  What about when one of them comes along? If they don’t exist, what purpose does “unjust” serve here?

“WHEREAS the last 15 years have seen an increase in tuition fees and decreasing government education budgets as Canadian military spending has skyrocketed;”

1. Nova Scotia’s education budget has increased for 9 of the last 10 years.  http://www.gov.ns.ca/finance/prebudg/pop/budNSExpenses.html

2. Skyrocketed: “To rise or cause to rise rapidly and suddenly.”  I request evidence of an increase in military spending that we can agree is “skyrocketing”.

According to CBC News, “In the 2008 budget, the government pledged to increase military spending by two per cent a year for 20 years, starting in 2011, which would add an additional $12 billion over those 20 years. ”

Surely we can all agree an annual 2% increase is not “skyrocketed”.  That’s obviously a statement about the future, though, so I’d welcome some facts from over the past decade.

Also, if there really are “heightened unjust wars of aggression”, I personally would want Canada to take an active role in fighting against such unjust aggressive acts, and would give them the money to do so.  Just saying.

“WHEREAS the Department of National Defense and war profiteers have been visible as recruiters on campus at the same time that tuition fees and debt loads have increased, extending the mechanisms of financial coercion historically used for military recruitment to the student body;”

“war profiteers” is ill-defined.  It is a buzzword, a slogan-word, and has no place in a whereas clause.

“financial coercion”: Not sure what this means.  Evaluating the terms at face value, isn’t ALL recruiting by ANY organization “financial coercion”?  What’s wrong with offering people money for doing a job? 

“WHEREAS military involvement on campus undermines the university as a place for the development of critical thought;”

“military involvement on campus” is ill-defined.  If you put tanks on street corners, this is probably true.  If the guy sitting next to me has a day job on the naval base, this probably isn’t true.

Pending a definition for “military involvement”, I suspect I disagree with this statement completely.  I am capable of critical thought regardless of who paid for the building I am sitting in, or regardless of the presence of a military recruiting booth. 

Whether you agree or disagree with the statement, it’s not something that belongs in a whereas clause.  Remember what happened with Carleton’s WHEREAS clauses?

“WHEREAS Student Unions have a responsibility to demand that governments provide adequate funding for education so that universities are not forced to seek compromised funding from other sources, including the Department of National Defense and war profiteers;”

I agree with the first 15 words wholeheartedly.

The rest of it confuses me.  Government funding is ok, unless it goes to the DND first?  Since the rest of it adds absolutely nothing to the motion, I’d advise dropping it.

“WHEREAS students across North America have been demanding that military recruitment and military funding be banned from their campuses;”

This is probably true;  unclear, though, that “some guys on our continent want it” is a valid motivation for anything.  I’d like to see a groundswell of support from the Dalhousie campus, beyond a single shadowy organization.

“WHEREAS recent military and arms manufacturers recruitment efforts on the Dalhousie campus have been protested and met with the opposition of both students and faculty members;”

Also pretty meaningless; how many?  And why should the Student Union care about faculty members being present?  

PROTIP:  Less histrionics, more facts.

“BIRT the Dalhousie Student Union is an anti-war student union.”

Why “anti-war”?  Are there really groups that would describe themselves as “pro-war”?  Why not “Dalhousie Student Union is in favor of peace“?  That’s something I think everyone could get behind.

“BIRT Recruitment activities by the military (including all components of the Department of National Defense and the Canadian Forces) and arms manufacturers will not be allowed in the Dalhousie Student Union Building or supported in any way by the Dalhousie Student Union.”

My first objection to this is simple: each student should have the ability to make up his or her mind for themselves.  I am completely uncomfortable with the Union banning government agencies and corporations from campus based on what they do or sell.  If you personally oppose it, fine.  Set up your own information booth.  Don’t bring the Union into it.  

It’s like an uber-liberalized version of McCarthyism.  What other groups or organizations can we ban based on what they do? I bet I could come up with a list…

My second objection is this: the DSU represents SMAC members (well, some of them) just as it represents the members of the military who are students here.  Why should it take up one position over another?  Why should the DSU say “we think it is wrong for our students to work for the military”? Lobby the DSU all you want, that’s your right as students of Dalhousie.  I think imposing your will on the DSU, and all 16,000-some Dal students, by stacking a crowd at the AGM is wrong.

My third issue is this resolution will in no way address the WHEREAS clauses.  What value is achieved by this resolution?  

“BIRT The Dalhousie Student Union will actively oppose the $2 million in funding given by Lockheed Martin to Dalhousie University, and will oppose any future similar contracts between the university and military contractors. Consistent with this position, the Dalhousie Student Union will sign on to the Student Coalition Against War’s letter to the administration demanding an end to Lockheed Martin’s connections with Dalhousie university.”

For me to support this resolution, I’d want to see:

1. Examples of how this money is reducing the quality of a Dalhousie education or any other tangible negative impacts, and
2. Where the extra $2m is coming from if we can’t get it from them.  Does anyone have a trust fund we can tap for that?  Given that you think education funding is being reduced, not sure why we’d give up free money.

My other point here is Lockheed Martin has many divisions, completely separate divisions, that have nothing to do with their military portfolio.  They are for all intents and purposes separate companies, with their own revenue and expenses, the only thing they have in common is their parent corporation.  But apparently they are ALL tainted by this common thread.

My question is this: why doesn’t the same principle apply to the government?  Why isn’t every speck of government money, including money in provincial transfers used for education, tainted by the DND?  Why is it that clawing money out of the DND budget and giving it to Dal instead would be cool, but Lockheed Martin giving money to Dal instead of to whatever divisions develop weapons is unacceptable?

Finally, the first thing an opponent of this resolution should (and probably will) do is strike the WHEREAS clauses, because after Carleton no one wants a piece of that, and no one wants to debate those clauses.  The next thing should (could) be a motion to divide: split the resolution into its three parts and debate each separately.  (Not sure how that would go procedurally – might need to divide first, then vote down the whereas clauses.)

What a few weeks it’s been. 

After a flurry of speculation leading up to nominations, pontification leading up to campaigning, pundit-ification leading up to voting, prediction leading up to results, and elation leading up to a year of victors questioning why they ran in the first place… I’m tired.

Obviously my congratulations to the winners.  You ran great campaigns; I only wish I had more time to complain about them.   All the best in the year ahead; you’ll need it.

This post wraps our DSU Elections coverage this year.  I hope you enjoyed it; I sure did.  punditry.ca isn’t going away; with the AGM coming up on April 1st, I hope you’ll check back here for news and information on that. 

I conclude coverage of the elections with two thoughts to convey: a challenge to the executives, and a note on the tragedy of the DSU Elections.

A Challenge to the New Executives

The big story of this campaign was the AGM, with its various motions that included an NSPIRG referendum motion.  That issue hijacked the campaign. 

Prevalent though it might be right now, that issue won’t be the one that will dominate the term of these DSU executives.  They will each have their own achievements, big and small.  If I were to offer one question to the incoming executive, it would be this: what will you achieve?  The issues you ran on are mostly not new ones.  You talked about a lot of big problems.  Incremental progress can be made on many goals, but substantive progress in one year demands focus.  Where is your focus?

I have a list that is the product of a DSU Council brainstorming session in 2002.  52 ideas in total; any of these sound familiar?  

• “Better Website” (we’ve had 3 total changes since then, each arguably better than the last).
• “Increase 24 hour study space at the university”  (I brought this one up in 2001.  Everything we achieved back then has since been lost.  Thanks.)
• “Review levied “C” societies for accountability” 
• “Improve T-room Food and food service in general”

Some ideas just quietly died – still no live, trained tiger prowling the halls of the SUB, nor have we managed to sell Tom Traves’ house.  On the other hand, substantial progress has been made on other goals; no one deserves sole credit for these, but some people have made notable contributions.  For example:

• Implement U-Pass (yup!)
• Wet/dry Grawood (that was achieved; unsure if it still happens or not)
• Set more policy for DSU (not an exciting goal, but almost none of the current DSU policies existed then in any kind of written form.  Lots of people deserve credit for this; one example is Jen Bond who made great headway with A&E policy)
• More Environmentally friendly DSU and University (always room to improve here, but there are now like 37 sustainability groups on campus)
• Increase voter turnout (From 4% to 24% peak.  You’re welcome.  Still 76% to go, though…)
• Make Dalout a levied society (Lisa B and team, thank you.  Most don’t remember Don Kearney, but in my mind he rescued DalOUT from irrelevance on campus, and deserves a nod here as well.)

Executives, when some political hack looks back on your term 7 years from now, which of your issues will still be coming up, and which will you have made progress on?

On the Tragedy of the DSU Elections

The tragedy of the DSU Elections is we typically send more people away than we keep.  The nature of the executive positions is that many run for them at the end of their degree; if they lose the position, they’re gone.  Some stick around and take other roles on DSU Council, but many don’t.   Don’t get me wrong – I am sure those still at Dal are active in other areas on campus, and undoubtedly Dalhousie benefits from that.  But the DSU as an organization has lost their individual skills and abilities.  We’ve kept a few over the years – John Hillman comes to mind, and anything else he does aside, punditry.ca would not be the same without him.  How different would the Union be today if there was a way that we could keep people like Gault, Ali, Wasko, Cooper, Salmon, Cook, and Jennier for just a few more years?  

The obvious question is: what’s going to happen to this year’s candidates?  I think most would agree the Union would not be in trouble if the guy in second became the guy in first.  Eric Snow has one of the best minds for policy and politics I’ve seen in my time at Dal.  Craig Jennex is one of the most dedicated, genuine people I encountered at Dal; well-known and well-liked, with good reason.  Edgar Burns demonstrated commitment and energy in his campaign, and there’s no doubt the Union could use more of that.  The other three BoG candidates were lauded for their abilities, desire, and campaigns.  Debogorski… well, we’re not going to lose him, which is good because sometimes he asks good questions that need to be asked as he brings a perspective not normally seen on the second floor of the SUB.  

I don’t have a solution or proposal here; mostly I wanted to take a minute to acknowledge the folks who spent the past few weeks striving for a goal they did not attain.  You guys didn’t earn the spot, but you earned my respect.  The next time I raise a glass, it’s to you.

Thanks to everyone for participating!

Individually, mostly we all did a mediocre job of predicting the winners, let alone the point spreads.  Only one person called all three execs correctly:  H. 23 got 2 out of 3, 10 got only 1 right, and 1 missed all three.  No one called all 5 winners.  Lisa B achieved the least error overall.   The median predictions, though, were shockingly accurate…

Definitions: “Error” is calculated by how far off your guess was for each candidate and then dividing by the number of candidates.  So if you called LeForte 51.5 and Burns 48.5, you missed LeForte by 10, missed Burns by 10.  Sum is 20, divided by number of candidates is 10.  (seems overly complicated in a 2-person race, but it’s needed with a 5-way race).  Thus, “Error” is on a scale from “0″ to “100″.  ”Accumulated error” is the error rate over all four positions.  

Lisa B had the lowest accumulated error, 9.7.  She called VP Ed within .5; she missed by about 3.5 points per candidate.  She called VP I wrong, but only by 2.4 points, near the lowest error you could have and still get it wrong.  A very impressive prediction.

Jenniertotheend! was second with 12.1, not far off.  Anon 2 was third at 12.3, just a fraction away.

Here’s something interesting: if you take the median guess of all 40-odd predictions (see predictions post), the accumulated error is only 12.8.  That’s just over 3 points off per race, which is remarkably close, and is better than all but THREE individual predictions.

I came in 15th overall, probably my worst showing ever.

The three best presidential guessers asked to not be published.  Jade was fourth, with Colin H, Stef B, and Jenniertotheend! not far back.  (Me: 17th)

Bengineer’s and A.T.’s astonishing guesses of 50.8 to 49.2 for Hobbs were merely .1 off the actual 50.9-49.1.  Well done!  Hohn Jillman and Bridget R also posted close guesses.  (Me: 10th)

Lisa B and Stef B each missed VP Ed by only .5, also well done.  10 people missed by only 1.5, but that’s too many too list.  (Me: 29th… ouch)

Anon 2 called BoG to an error of 2.9.  Frosty, Hohn Jillman, and Lisa Thicketts achieved error of only 2.98.  (Me: 6th!  I told you that you all needed to have more faith in Janet Conrad…)

The full, unabridged rankings of each predictor follow.  The blanks are people who requested to not have anything published (unless they are at the end, when they might also be people who did not submit predictions for that position).

First thing’s first: Congratulations to Shannon, Mark, Rob, Kris, Janet, Adam, Meredith, Shane, and Glenn, and thanks to all of the candidates for putting so much time and effort into your campaigns and keeping me entertained.

This being my seventh and final DSU Election as a student, I thought I’d compile a personal highlight reel of the past eleven days. Two photos from last night’s results party festivities serve as bookends to this entry.

The Ghost of Executives Past makes an appearance at the 2009 DSU Election Results Party at the Grawood

- Hobbes sticking up for Jennex at the Studley debate: I didn’t really know Mark before this campaign, but he proved himself to be a stand-up guy when he could have taken advantage of his opponent being attacked. Both Mark and Craig ran strong campaigns, which was reflected in the 35-vote difference in the final results.

- I’m still not entirely comfortable with the way NSPIRG became a campaign issue, and, in particular, the way the debate was focused on the presidential race, but it deserves mention given the amount of attention it is getting. I’ll be writing more about this matter in the coming days as The AGM: Part II approaches.

- Janet Conrad’s candidate profile photo: I’ve watched enough America’s Next Top Model to identify when someone knows how to use their angles and find the light source.

- My buddy Eric Snow went from rule-maker to rule-breaker by racking up some post-campaigning fines.

- The Evolution of Debo: Is it just me, or is Greg getting a bit better with each election? Sure, he still has inappropriate outbursts and does silly things like drink five large teas during a debate, but every once in a while when you get past his demeanour, you find a reasonable idea. This seems to be happening more frequently these days. I must say, even though he would lump me in with the DSU “in crowd”, I appreciate what Greg is trying to do and that he has a genuine interest in getting people engaged with what goes on at the DSU. I might not agree with all of his ideas, but I’ve got to admit, campaigns would be a lot less interesting if he weren’t running.

- Shannon’s closing remarks at the Presidential debate are a perfect example of why I supported her campaign. Without any prepared notes, she spoke of the significance of this campaign for her, and of her love for the DSU and for Dalhousie. It was obviously genuine and indicative of why she’s well-suited to be President. Her passion for the DSU is contagious, which is something we need from our Executive if we have any hope of sparking interest in what we do. I anxiously await the DVD release of the debate so I can provide
a transcript of her remarks.

Some post-results dancing at Reflections with these fools (photo: John Hurley)

• The obvious news: results were announced tonight.  Results of the predictions will be posted soon; I can tell you that no one called every single winner, and that my own guesses were well off the mark (but not the worst).   Also, a punditry.ca pundit had the lowest accumulated error!

• 15.9% is not the worst we’ve had (5%), nor is it the best (23%).  How does our turnout compare to others?  It’s comparable to schools like UBC or McMaster; I would say it is at or just below the national average for schools in the same category.  It’s better than some DSU societies – CS Society turnout hovers under 10% even with online voting.  DASSS votes at an AGM, which results in painfully low voter turnout but does make life simpler (I think voting at AGMs sucks).  NSPIRG rocks out with about 100/14,000.   It’s also worse than some societies – the Law Students’ Society just elected their new executive with 57% voter turnout, which is typical.   Comparing Dal to other Nova Scotia institutions is a bit unfair given the size discrepancy, but for the record SMU brought in 21% of eligible voters this year, Acadia boasts 41%, and St FX has an astounding 60% turnout.  (What’s St FX’s story?  According to this article, they do mostly what Dal does, in some cases a few years later: they brought in online voting, used youtube, candidate websites, blog coverage… The thing is, a few very passionate and clearly talented individuals made it a priority and devoted time and resources.  It’s not the role of the CRO – it’s something their Council and Executive committed to.  They do have a smaller, tighter-knit campus which helps, but in general I applaud their efforts.)

• Speaking of comparing… I’m a bit biased, but I really enjoyed the punditry.ca coverage.  Truthfully my posts were the low point of my day.  Obviously it blows past years out of the water, but how does it stack up to other schools?  Some schools have started blogging their elections.  The first year St. FX tried it (2007?) I thought the blog was crap, but this year’s coverage seemed excellent (and was similar to the punditry.ca model).  I can’t find any other coverage like it (links appreciated).  Most appears to be more like Acadia’s blog on the official elections website, and I found that one completely uninteresting.  The only other interesting model I found was UBC’s, and they had to pay $8000 to get it.  

• Ginormous congratulations to the Elections Committee – I’ve seen firsthand the amount of work that they do, and it is daunting.  Special mention to CRO Sarah, who’s great but clearly insane for being willing to do this twice now.

• The Gazette has been breaking its weekly publication cycle all over the place this election, and results coverage is no exception.

• Have you noticed that punditry.ca devoted a lot of its coverage to the presidential race?  I sincerely wish I had spent more time talking about the other races.  Sorry guys – normally I pay attention to balance like that, but missed it this year.  In fact, in an effort to bring new aspects to the coverage (e.g. online debate), I lost a lot of the old staples including what used to be my bread and butter, mocking the candidate profiles.

• SMAC today went after one of the people behind Stop NSPIRG, completely disregarding the issues raised in favor of singling out an individual.  Their problem with him appears to boil down to “he’s a conservative”.  I had hoped they truly were different, and am disappointed.  Apples do tend to fall under trees, I guess, but a man can hope.  I’ve never met Ben, and I certainly don’t agree with everything posted to stop nspirg.  This isn’t a defense of him; it is about principles of debate in civilized society. In focusing on individuals rather than issues SMAC lost my respect.  I’ve been trying to link to Students Mobilizing Against Conservatives any time I talk about them or the AGM or even when I talk about stop NSPIRG, but no more.  I’m done with them, and I’ll be stripping any links to them from my posts on punditry.ca.  (too bad, because I actually enjoyed some of the things posted to their site). 

• Obviously the NSPIRG debate will rage on regardless of my temper tantrum; as always I recommend Stop NSPIRG for the against side, and I recommend this week’s Gazette for the pro side.

• During the voting period, I ran Google ads to bring people searching for DSU elections information to punditry.ca (the idea of the Google ads at the bottom of the page is to offset that cost).  We had about 250 first-time visitors during the elections period, not sure how many of them were reached via Google ads.  I can tell you 1,100 ads were shown to people using computers in Nova Scotia.  This table gives the total number of ads displayed for each set of search terms  (sorted by how many visitors they brought in).