On the Topic of VPI
There has been quite some conjecture made about VPI in the last few days. The pundits have made a few predictions and the people commenting on this website have said a few things. There have been scandalous rumors surrounding one candidate in particular and in my opinion this is THE race this year.
Really the presidential race is sweet Sexton candidate with the cute smile vs sweet Sexton candidate with the cute smile vs the legend of Debo. It’s a little boring. I don’t have to restate the VPSL race being a snore and the VP Ed race seems to be a case of the juggernaut the underdog and the mystery man. It could almost be a Scooby- Doo episode really. The Senate race is a good one to watch but seems to be pretty devoid of drama or scandal so I feel if you really want some entertainment or shock value out of this campaign you should turn your attention to VPI. Not to say that the other candidates, their platforms and their issues should be ignored, I am simply saying this one will be the most interesting in my opinion.
Not only that but I feel I want to break down these candidates and this portion of the campaign personally since I have had quite a year with the current VPI. I worked on half of the committees Mark chaired and I drafted and noticed the motion for his re-call, which I will explain briefly later.
Tim Hiltz- Current societies commissioner. Mark was a commissioner when he ran as well. That does give a person experience but really it is in one area of the job. His platform has a lot to do with Societies and ratification; probably because he has a lot of experience there and really that is the bulk of the job. Even with all his experience in that area his improvements to SRC seem to be the same old thing every VPI candidate ever says and they are completely vague. Scheduling regular meetings? Yeah I hope you would do that as it is what you are supposed to do. I hate when candidates use parts of the job description to campaign. Believe me if it’s in the constitution I know whoever wins will be doing it or they will get a lot of backlash. I agree with what he says about grants but realistically meeting more than the committee currently does(which when I was on it, it was once a week) is excessive and will likely not solve the problems that have been popping up this year. Handbook, Handbook, Handbook…that word gets thrown around every year. There weren’t enough this year and there was an issue with ads. I don’t actually think it warrants a whole point in the platform. Maybe a sub point of societies and groups. Foodbank: good to have, good program again maybe not enough for a whole main point. CAMPUS RELATIONS – First of all the current gap between Sexton and Studley is not the only gap. Carlton feels disconnected too. Don’t forget about the whole section of voters. They rallied around Adam Harris last year and he won a spot on BOG. Next problem with this is I find it hard to believe he knows anything about the gap between Studley and Sexton. As the current Sexton Campus Director in all the times I have seen him around the SUB not once have we had a conversation about it and really the gap has become a lot less of a problem than it had been maybe even as little as 3 years ago. I think now it would be a good thing to promise maintaining and building on the bridge that has been constructed. Many people don’t know this but there has been a surge in DSU involvement from Sexton in the past few years. A prime example of that very fact is the presidential race. Not to say there aren’t problems I just hate when people vaguely bring up Sexton just to get Sexton votes. I do however appreciate that he is trying and may genuinely want to try to work with Sexton. He just needs more research and needs to include Carlton.
Kayla Kurin- I have seriously seen this girl everywhere. She is a lady about town like no other. The thing is I haven’t heard her talking to anyone. Her platform has three key points and she has sub points and promises under each. This particular one is huge though and I am surprised no one has brought it up on this site yet:
I will support the new contracts policy that is currently being drafted regarding student consultation when enterting into new contracts. As VP Internal I will ensure that this policy is enforced and the lines of communication between the student body and the executive stay open.
I believe her. She has had something to do with an alternative motion that was put forward and is concerned about the issue. My problem with this is while I believe it does fall under communication she is treading dangerously on VPFO territory and should maybe not rely to heavily on this during her campaign. I’m not sure it’s a promise that should be in the VPI portfolio. I do have to applaud her for taking a stance and direction on this although I did say I didn’t think it was a solid thing for anyone to campaign on. If she could spell entering correctly it would be better though.
Work with DSUSO to create a sustainability policy for societies to be inculded in the society policy
Sorry Kayla the DSU VPI is no longer on DSUSO and we tried to make their part smaller simply because it has it’s own policy person, it is more of an operation of the DSU and the DSU VPI portfolio is too heavy as is. Again she is kind of creeping on the DSU VPFO portfolio. Her promise does connect societies and sustainability but I am not quite sure how that would work. I guess I am curious as to what that would entail and how she would enforce sustainability policies in society policy.
Use Tiger Patrol vans to shuttle between Studley and Sexton several times a day
That’s not sustainable considering we have a Metro-Transit….She has a whole block of ideas for communication and DOES NOT have anything about communication between campuses, I am afraid I have to say as a student from Sexton I am pretty disappointed. At least Tim tried. The Tiger Patrol thing would be good especially with the big move of 300 second years supposedly coming down to Sexton and the refusal of DUES to amalgamate with DSEUS thus creating several society issues. However I think the tiger patrol thing is just another small grab at Sexton votes.
Ok so you have Communication, Leadership and Accessibility/Campus Relations however a lot of it seems to be a little redundant and you seem to be crossing over portfolios a bit with the VPFO which is fine (and realistic) however I think you need to expand on this as the portfolio is the largest one.
Glenn Blake-He has had a run of bad luck with his website but it is now up. I read through his platform. Diversity, Communication, Website, Societies, Food. Yup he has it all covered. Categories with specific ideas! Get out of town! I will admit I am friends with Glenn and I have a hard time saying mean things about him especially with his Old School Nintendo themed platform, but that won’t stop me. Seriously I think he has some good ideas but some are unrealistic. Only meeting once to talk about insurance probably won’t happen. They will be beating that dead horse all year. More inter society events sounds a little VPSL ish. Food on Sexton-legitimate problem but alas there is not much the DSU can do as they actually own no property at Sexton. I am glad he went out and obviously found a legitimate Sexton problem but related it to everyone. There are some students who have days where they have at most a half hour for lunch and there is one place to get food and sometimes the “Good Stuff” from Cafe Connects is just all gone. Plus it closes at 4:30. All in all I actually think Glenn is underselling himself a bit and it reminds me of Craig Jennex last year. I felt like Craig was a likable all around great candidate but he wasn’t campaigning enough and that may have been his only downfall.
Henry Whitfield- So the drama. Reminds me of the day we met, when he beaned me in the back of the head with a dodge ball. After I was already out Henry! Seriously! This guy has been working really hard. I have personally met with him a few times at his request. He is definitely genuinely concerned about connecting with Sexton. He is definitely trying to identify issues and connect with students. He is personable and he is the one who is getting a lot of flack on the campaign trail. He was apparently dinged for pre-campaigning but he has been fined from what I hear and it’s in the past. Honestly the whole pre-campaigning rules make it difficult for students who have not been involved before specifically with the DSU and council to go and find out issues but I digress. Henry’s platform is quite frankly too short though. Again I think this is a case of another candidate underselling himself. There are two points in the platform on your website, there are 16000 students at Dal with varying issues. You do the math. Again there are a few specific ideas which I like for a VPI candidate since you have to let me know how you are going to handle the gong show that is DSU VPI’s portfolio. DSUtube is pretty solid. I find there are a lot of mixed reviews when it comes to Henry. I think however if he doesn’t win we may see him again in the future.
Now, here’s the deal. I tried to impeach the current VPI. I sat on Grants, Sexton Campus Advisory Committee and DSU Sustainability Office Board with Mark last semester. Mark came into the job and I feel he had tunnel vision towards one topic which was the website and communication. I did not feel Mark was fulfilling the obligations listed in all parts of the portfolio. That being said, I do think this position is the most work of them all. If anyone were able to do it all I have not seen it. I think both Dan Boyle and Rosalie Hanlon who I personally saw do the job first hand, did great things but there are those who would disagree I’m sure, as you can not please everyone in this position. The job is too big. That being said don’t ever admit that you can’t do it and don’t cut things out because it’s overwhelming. VPI candidates should understand that taking this job makes you responsible to the students as outlined in the constitution. They must understand all the work they will be doing and they must be organized and find the time to have meetings with all 7 committees they chair plus the board of ops plus the exec. That is a lot of work. I would never take away from what Mark has done. The impeachment motion topic comes up now and then but Mark and I have both worked through it. Just be aware this is not a joke and this position is immensely important. It’s the glue that holds the societies and campuses together and should be taken very seriously.
I have been informed Whitfield has updated his website.
Ahhh, the dodgeball! Its sad because I was aiming the other direction… not the best arm i’m afraid!
tl;dnr
He has indeed, and appears to have had a good read at Glenn and Kayla’s platforms beforehand.
@Eric Snow
quitter
@Zhindra Gillis
I’m totally lying. I read the whole thing almost right away.
There is no such thing as “bad luck with websites”. You do it right or you do it wrong, there’s no lighting candles and praying to the gods of DNS.
I noticed that, too – I also noticed he took down his open and frank discussion of the allegations against him. I probably would have posted it to a punditry.ca comment (where the readers probably know about the allegations) and not to his site (where the readers may not) in the first place so it’s probably a good call on his part. Anyone have a copy?
@Zhindra Gillis
A few things I would like to say about this post. They mostly all regard the VPI and VPFO portfolio. The first one to do with contracts, I believe that as a signing officer of the Union, a good line of communication should exist between the VPI and the student body before signing a contract. I would hope no one would expect the VPI to blindly sign any and all things proposed by the VPFO, especially not with contracts that effect students daily lives.
I am fully aware that the DSUSO office is no longer under the portfolio of the VPI. Perhaps I was not clear enough as to what I am trying to achieve here. In my time at DASSS, I heard a very specific complaint from a society hosting a large event and were having a hard time trying to incorporate the costs of using a far more sustainable practise (dishes over paper plates). I think that including a sustainability policy within the society policy would achieve a few things: making societies aware of sustainability issues, connecting societies with DSUSO and using them as an effective resource to address issues like this particular society were having. This is not creeping on the VPFO’s portfolio, because I am simply suggesting that we make use of the DSUSO office to assist societies, and promoting green practises at the same time. Perhaps a policy for societies would be hard to enforce, but I think that societies would be happy to abide by a policy that benefits the whole community.
Regarding Tiger Patrol and Sexton. I think that this is something that could at least be explored. If there were set times throughout the day that TP would arrive at each campus it would benefit students. Metro-transit is good, and I am especially excited about the new Hybrid buses, but it is often unreliable, especially in winter. This would not necessarily increase the amount of trips the vans make, but just give them a specific use, and therefore not be any less sustainable than they are now.
I think the Sexton communication issue is better now. This year was a tough year for the VPI’s office, but I can assure you I intend to fulfill my constitutional duties with regards to Sexton in a way that will be more than more than satisfactory.
If there are any other questions you have about my platform, please do not hesitate ask!
I don’t understand why my response is credited to Guy X?
Guy X == Kayla? Who knew?
No, but I could have sworn when I posted it said something else?
@Kayla
I understand now I was confused as to who that was. There is a security problem with Dalhousie public computers lately in that if you are using a computer in a lab and you exit the browser but select save and quit that your logins can be used by the next person that logs on even if they log on as a different user.
That being said, I don’t think a signing officer of the DSU should NOT be concerned with contracts I just said I am not sure it belongs in your campaign. I did commend you for taking a stance on it and I was sincere about that. I’m sure everything i say on this site appears to be dripping with sarcasm by it’s very nature.
When I think about society policy it makes me think of rules that societies must conform to. Between forcing them to make sustainable choices versus encouraging them I would choose encouraging. Simply for the fact that it would make more progress. Education from DSUSO seems like it would do more good for societies than writing a policy that would be hard to implement and may take many man hours and I still don’t understand exactly what it would accomplish or how it would be accomplished. Sorry that’s my opinion. I think it’s great to be sustainable and i like sustainability policies, been reading quite a few lately being on the DSUSO board, I just don’t necessarily think the DSU VPI has to be hands on in that. I think the DSU VPI has to delegate and not take on more responsibility from other portfolios until they handle the issues in their own portfolio and there are a lot! That’s where I was coming from with Mark and he and I discussed it and that’s why we took him off DSUSO. Because the time could be spent better in other places.
Regarding Tiger Patrol on Sexton more often throughout the day. As someone who worked for Tiger Patrol and as someone who is on this campus I can tell you it is going to cost a lot of money to train even more drivers to have working all day.(They need a special license) Also if students are moving between campuses especially with this new thing of having second year engineering students down here they will be in groups way to big for the Tiger Patrol van which means either the van will be making several direct trips or the majority will be taking the bus anyway. There used to be a bus that drove between campuses every 20 minutes but they got rid of it when we got the bus pass. Just FYI.
@Every candidate ever:
Nothing you do will ever effect me, as a Dal student. Although signing your name to something laced with poor grammar on my behalf may affect me.
@Unwon Voter
I think every candidate will have an impact somewhere at Dal whether they win or not. Look at what Debogorski has done in the past few years. He may have pulled some wild stunts but he got people talking! If you truly are an Unwon voter I encourage you to still vote and spoil your ballot as that in itself makes a statement.
Short version: no, Kayla is not necessarily Guy X. I’ve updated the comment starting with “A few things I would like to say about this post” to be attributed to Kayla.
@Kayla
Your response is credited to Guy X because that was the last name used to make a comment from whatever IP address you had, and probably the same browser. Like Zhindra said this can happen in computer labs. If you did not explicitly type your name, you may not have noticed the text above the comments field that looks like this:
“Logged in as Guy X. Logout »”
After the AGM traffic last year took the site down, I added what we’ll call “aggressive” caching. Generating a page from scratch every time takes a second or two, so punditry generates a page once and stores it until it is updated. So if a logged-in user (and if you’ve ever commented, you are considered “logged in”) visits the page twice in an hour, or twice in a minute, they are viewing an identical copy of the page, something the web server can send them cheaply and quickly. (Don’t worry: new posts and new comments will always show up right away).
So if you borrowed someone’s computer, congratulations – you figured out who Guy X is.
Of course, it is also possible that WordPress – the power behind punditry.ca – has a bug (or the caching plug-in I am using has a bug). That’s not exactly unheard of, but it is strange it hasn’t come up yet.
Finally, it’s also possible that you also post as Guy X, either intentionally or perhaps in some sort of dissociative personality episode. I have no evidence to indicate this is true.
Haha. Good one. *I* think that history shows some number of societies, often a large number, bitch and moan with the fury of hell itself for weeks, months, or years about every new society policy. An unfunded mandate would almost certainly produce another such conflagration.
I agree with Mike. It’s especially true with respect to sustainability policies for societies. Consider what the “typical” DSU society actually does. They go on trips, they hold infrequent events at which food or drinks are served, and… that’s about it in my experience. Maybe they bring in a speaker once in a while. So, what can they do differently?
- Trips: I’ve never been on a society trip that wasn’t either busing or carpooling. To make this greener would require not going on trips, or biking/walking. Bluntly, neither of these as requirements is going to be met with cheers.
- Food: Plates could be replaced with dishes, but that would require lots storage space if they’re going to host all but the smallest events. Even with stack-able/plastic dishes, trying to convince 3 or 4 volunteers to clean up and wash 200+ glasses or plates after a successful event isn’t going to be easy, and crowd-sourcing means filthy dishes for at least some of the next people.
- Food again: Vegetarian food is more sustainable, but also a requirement that will never be accepted by the student body, even if it did somehow get passed. People love their meats too much.
- Speaker: Speakers aren’t going to drive, train, or bus it when they can fly, and they aren’t going to make a 14 hour detour to stop at Dal if they can’t. While the “local” movement has something going for it, local speakers aren’t exactly of the same caliber as those we could fly in.
- Carbon Offsets: Raise revenues or cut services. Not exactly the favourite choice of any society.
So, to sum up, I’m doubtful there _can_ be a sustainability policy for DSU societies. The only one that seems viable to me is: DSUSO estimates carbon emissions from all society activities, and then the DSU charges all students a carbon flat tax as part of their fees to purchase offsets. Anything else is doomed to failure.
This is my favourite subpoint in Kayla’s platform.
“1-2 minute video shown on the first day of every first year class introducing the DSU executive, and the services the DSU offers.”
This would never fly. Lots of first-year classes take place in rooms that don’t have AV equipment, and profs definitely would not be down with the extra effort of finding some.
But it’s not a big deal. Just wanted to throw in my two cents.
@Zindra , had you been more attentive and less reactive you would have realized I was not calling into question the potential “impact” of candidates and elected executives. Rather, I was making note of the fact that a plethora of candidates (including Kayla, in this thread’s case) are ignorant to the difference between the meaning of the words “affect” and “effect”.
For example:
A candidate may affect a student’s experience at Dalhousie, or a student may feel the effect of the candidates efforts. But a student won’t ever be effected or have an affecton someone else.
I’m with Mike.on the grammar-spelling supervisor train. Writing comes first, then comes leadership. I may be a tad harsher a critic in this respect though!
@Unwon Voter
Sorry, engineer, honestly did not pay attention to that subtle joke. I am curious to know if you spelled my name wrong in this last post to be ironic though.
just wondering…
I think it’s great that we’re getting down and dirty about the VPI race and tearing apart their platforms before they have the chance to even try to implement them BUT I just wanted to point out that Kayla is the only candidate to have anything on Accessibility…
In my understanding this is actually quite an important piece to their portfolio. It’s also such an easy part to go unnoticed. I feel it’s commendable and speaks to Kurin’s understanding of the position and initiative to be truly inclusive. Why is no one jumping on this train?
just sayin’…
@curious:
Looks like you just did.
I feel like Zhindra never intended to be exhaustive, and no one else has claimed to be either. But since you asked, I’ll take a look and see what I think.
First, the section header is just plain inaccurate, and somewhat bizarre. “All students are able to access the DSU services regardless of physical, mental or psychological disability, cultural background, beliefs, or campus location”
I will say it amuses me that she’s lumping students on Sexton in the same category with students with physical, mental, or psychological disability, but that’s a strange mix. More to the point, many of the planks of this section have nothing to do with access to DSU services. In fact, exactly one of seven is about that issue.
“To create a resting space in the SUB for students with physical or psychological disabilities”
I can’t speak to this as I haven’t seen this need expressed by anyone, but if there is a need for it, kudos.
“Investigate the accessibility of Tiger Patrol”
Yay, Google search! Took me 30 seconds: “Unfortunately the Shuttle Service is not accessible to persons using wheelchairs.” Investigation complete.
Maybe she should consider going beyond investigation. If I can knock off a platform plank in 30 seconds, it shouldn’t be a platform plank.
“Lobby the administration for better lighting in classrooms”
Which classrooms? All classrooms? What do you mean by “better”? Don’t a lot of classes just turn down the lights and fire up a projector anyway? Isn’t that a bigger problem? Does investing millions in upgrading light fixtures make more sense than other solutions? How would increasing the lighting (and therefore power consumption) in hundreds of classrooms fit in with your energy conservation / sustainability platform planks?
“Work with the VP Student Life to include information on accessibilty services on campus in orientation packs.”
SPELL CHECK. IT’S NOT HARD. THE WAVY RED LINE MEANS IT’S SPELLED WRONG.
Also, this is another 30 second task. Compose new mail. Attach SAS.pdf. “Dear Hannah, Attached is the SAS handbook in PDF form. Please include it on the orientation USB key. Thanks! KK”
“Promote a closer working relationship between counsellling services and the Student Accessibity Centre to help the accessibilty centre better accomodate students with psychological disabilites.”
Once again, SPELL CHECK. IT’S NOT HARD. THE WAVY RED LINE MEANS IT’S SPELLED WRONG.
Seriously, that’s *5* words spelled wrong in ONE sentence, including spelling the same word two different ways. FIVE. WORDS.
“Have a cultural event on a monthly basis, exploring different cultures every month”
Would this be in addition to the many outstanding cultural events at Dalhousie already? Africa night, Indisa’s night, International night, La Velada… Oktoberfest… just to name a few! I’m fairly sure most of the groups you’d ask to participate in this already share their culture with students in many excellent and wonderful ways.
Also I feel like this would encroach pretty heavily on the VP SL’s portfolio.
“Use Tiger Patrol vans to shuttle between Studley and Sexton several times a day”
I feel like Zhindra covered this one fairly well.
And your host of Crossfire, Mike Smit!
Can we stop using the word “sustainable” already?
@Mike Smit
well thanks Mike — it’s been covered
I do still think that while there might be lots of spelling mistakes and some of the planks might be moot/extremely easy to accomplish, even bringing them to the table to discuss and proposing action is a win in itself…
@curious
Sure, but you’d already covered that part. I do try to not be overly repetitive.
Something interesting for the VPI race; Considering that the VPI is the communications maestro of the DSU, it is interesting to see that Glenn Blake’s DSU Blog for keeping students updated with council goings on, has been neglected, and not updated since Dec 3rd.
Considering this was one of his ONLY Senate campaign promises, and something he has used as a “success” during his campaign, I thought it was interesting for your readers.
First website available, http://dsusenaterep.blogspot.com/ and the second, http://yourdsu.blogspot.com/….
Just thought this was something juicy and ‘punditry’esque” for your team to work on