UNBSU votes to eliminate voting position of international student representative | NB Media Co-op
Posted by Faiz on December 2nd, 2009
“The change was recommended by the [UNB Student Union's Governance Review Committee], allegedly to address the issue of what it called “over-representation” of international students on council. … VP Academic Shannon Carmont noted that there, “are a ton of marginalized groups on campus,” such as student-parents and First Nations who do not have a voting representative on council.”
Instead of expanding council to include all constituencies represented within the undergraduate population, the UNBSU have chosen to restructure in a discriminatory way.
December 2nd, 2009 at 7:22 pm
Hi there,
In short, while this proposal was made with the best of intentions, I think that it has essentially missed the mark that it intended to hit. I’m currently working on finding an alternative way of addressing the issues surrounding our council structure.
Stay tuned for details!
–
Ryan Brideau
VP External
UNB Student Union
December 7th, 2009 at 3:56 pm
I’m not registered on the NB Media Co-op site yet, so I’m posting my comment here.
I find it extraordinarily distressing that the SU has *even* considered taking the vote away from ostensibly the only non-white/non-Canadian student representative. The shocking thing for me is the logic of many of the Councilors that voted in favour of the motion and posted comments on the Media Co-op’s page. Specifically, these Councilors have argued that there is more power in a “voice” than in a vote. What makes this troublesome for me is thinking about checks there are on any of these Councilors from calling the question should the international liaison put her- or himself on the speakers list.
“Having a voice” is by no means any guarantee that the liaison can make an argument, especially if Student Union Executives are willing to call the question on a debate. That is an even more egregious transgression of fairness and equality.
Let’s think hypothetically: let’s say the Business Administration Councilor and the International Student Liaison disagree fundamentally on all issues. Let’s say that these two people cannot and will not ever see eye to eye on any issue before Council, for whatever reasons these two may have for their disagreement. Let’s further say that the Business Administration rep is on the speakers list and notices that the International Student Liaison raises her or his hand to also speak. When it comes time for the Business rep to speak, that Councilor then decides to call the question instead of making her or his original point, simply to prevent the International Student Liaison from making an argument.
You see, the Liaison has in this hypothetical situation been denied a voice. Therefore, no liaison can rely on making a “well-reasoned argument to sway votes,” regardless of this hypothetical situation being true or not.
If the Governance Review Committee had any sense whatsoever (and to be frankly I’m honestly not seeing that they do), they would be granting a vote to the Residence Liaison, and they would create an Off-campus Rep., and create a Vice-President Equity to represent–in a catch-all fashion, mind you–the UNrepresented minorities. Many universities have a VP Equity and it would seem that the UNB Student Union is in dire need of one.