volume
11 number
24
UNIVERSITY
OF WATER,LOO,
Waterloo,
Ontario
tuesday
27 October
1970
Health Services
ent needs suffer torship postponed by Hilda Eastern chevron staff
I
Are student needs being met by delaying the hiring of a full-time director for health services? In the spring of last year, the health services committee composed of appointed and ex-officio members with nine student representatives, considered the possibility of hiring a full-time director. Pat Robertson, director of academic services and then chairman of the committee, investigated and found the full-time directorship financially feasible. A full-time director would work a full 40 hour week doing administration and attending meetings. The remaining time would be spent on medical practice within the health services. A reliable source suggests a full-time director would have the time to implement further liason and communication between present services. This would compliment and broaden the services available to students and meet the needs more adequately. Helen Reesor who was director at the time of the proposal, then offered to increase her hours to three hours daily at the beginning of September and then to four hours during the school term. Subsequently, some committee members received a memorandum from Robertson recommending Reesor as director. The memo was set prior to the committee’s consideration of Reesor’s suggestion. The committee decided to keep her as director and to open the
directorship next year. Reliable sources say she has only sometimes met her hourly committment. Ron Eydt, warden of the village said Reesor had often been on call after hours. There has been some question as to the availability of a qualified practitioner, for the directorship. Guelph university had twentytwo applicants to its advertising of a full-time director. Two of the following sources suggest some direction : l The health services committee of the student council on april 22, 1963, said, “The policies (general) adopted from this report (recommending the need of a health services) will change as the need arises. ” l Dana L. Fransworth, director of the university health services of Harvard university suggested a “social worker in charge of its student health services...” “....For this person has the insight and intuition for dealing effectively with students, meeting with members of the faculty and administration, and for interpreting what is taking place far better than any of our non-psychiatric physicians. This has tended to improve the communication among the various branches of the university. ” Reesor sees her duties as director as, “doing spot checks on physicians, administering the budget and treating critical illnesses in the infirmary. ” She cited the hypothetical example of a student coming down with the flu and a director trying to trace it to prevent further infection. She said students might see this
as interfering and paternalism. Among the committee’s terms of reference is “to recommend to the medical director on general policy matter regarding the operation, staffing, equipment and physical resources of the health services, and on appropriate programs of health information, education and preventive treatment for the university community.” From the committee came a policy of “sick” and “well” to determine who would get treated. People who may have wanted the pill or a physical, fell under the category of “well” and weren’t treated\. . “Group insurance now covers costs for doctor’s fees specifically for prescribing birth control devices and examinations,” said Robertson. The policy of “well” has since altered. Two doctors have been added to the staff who specifically deal with physicals and birth control information, examinations and prescription of devices. Appointments of the latter, Dr. W. Nurse, a gynaecologist, have been booked till december at health services. How many girls are going to get pregnant waiting for this token service? Bad drug trips will be treated only in the day time when a doctor is on duty. University lawyers suggested the university would be legally responsible for anything which may go wrong when no doctor is present. The suggested use of local hospitals is out of the question. Since when, has the K-W hospital been receptive to bad drug trips?
-Pete Wilkinson,
the chevron
A syn thesizer, a generalist is the answer to inter-disciplinary education according to Burton Claire Matthews, administration president. He spoke at convocation last friday afternoon,
500 convocate
-bob robertson,
the
chevron
An unidentified university of Waterloo student was involved in an accident early friday afternoon. While crossing the tracks at University avenue, the car she was driving was struck by the Elmiry express and carried five hundred feet down the tracks. s
Amidst great pomp and circumstance 500 students received their degrees from the university on friday afternoon. At the same time Burt Matthews was installed as president and vice-chancellor of the university. Former president Gerry Hagey was installed as president emeritus. In his convocation address, Burt Matthews outlined the university’s areas of concern for the seventies. Autonomy was one of these problems. As the major funding .agency of the university, the government is now in a position to dictate university policy in the name of the general public. So far the government has only demanded the right to approve the establishment of new programs. The question of who will teach what, how it will be taught and to whom is still determined by the university. However this last vestige of university autonomy could be taken from the university if it does not justify the allocation of its resources to the general public. Another area of concern mentioned by Matthews was the administration of the university. The role of the administration is
to provide and maintain the optimal environment for learning in which the faculty can teach and do research and the students can learn. Decision-making in such an environment must come from a meaningful relationship among the several parts of the university. This relationship is needed to give the university a wholeness in the academic matrix. This wholeness is threatened by the way the university is fractured into disciplines. Each professor relates to the members of his own discipline and not to the members of other disciplines within the university. Matthews suggested that the university-solve this problem by creating a new type of professional for our society - a generalizer, a synthesizer capable of transferring ideas from one field to another, capable of functioning across disciplinary and professional lines. In this way the university could come closer to the community and would be more capable of taking on the job of continuing education and re-education, especially of those older students who will be coming to the university in the future.