The McGill Tribune Vol. 04 Issue 22 by The Tribune

Volume 4, Number 22

Published by the Students’ Society of McGill University

Tuesday 26 March 1985

DU Shines at RMC by John Moot The McGill Debating Union turned in another strong perfor mance at the Royal Military col lege In v ita tio n a l D eb a tin g Tournament held March 15-17 in Kingston. McGill sent three teams to the tournament, which is perhaps the most prestigious on the Canadian circuit aside from M cGill’s own Winter Carnival tournament. T h e te a m o f L in d s e y S la u g h t e r and G opal Sreenivasan placed second, los ing a closely-fought final to Harvard, the McGill team had to argue the Government side o f the resolution “ Be it resolved that all that’s yours is mine and all mine yours.” They inter preted the resolution such that they had to argue in favour o f Canada-U.S. free trade — All college debates involve wacky interpretations).

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McGill was 1964ed on Friday. See page 8

Beleaguered ASUS Fights Back by Gopal Sreenivasan The McGill Arts and Science Undergraduate Society (ASUS) has been in the spotlight a fair bit o f late, what with their elec tions and all. However, not all o f the light has been favourable. A Daily article last week claimed that A SU S events are marked by a lack o f student in terest and enthusiasm. The arti cle generally portrayed the A SU S as an inept organization which does very little at all. There has also been some discussion on campus that the A SU S has been plagued by dif ficulties at the VP (Finance) position, which is the number two position at the ASU S after the President. Apparently, this year’s V P (F in a h ce), Ben Mikula, didn’t work very hard: he missed meetings and general ly did the bare minimum re quired. The ASU S made an un successful attempt earlier this year to impeach him. In an interview with the Tribune, outgoing A SU S presi dent Jack Vincelli responded to some o f the questions hanging over the A SU S. Contrary to Daily belief, Vincelli charged, the A SU S is very much involved in com bat ting student apathy. “ A SU S does a pretty good job o f arous ing student interest,” he said. “ I think we had a good year this year. A lot o f people put a lot o f work into events this year.” When asked what the ASUS

accom plished this year, Vincelli m entioned the co-sponsorship o f W elcome Week and o f Winter Carnival, the funding and supervision o f 32 depart mental associations, the fun ding o f 15 student journals, and th e sp o n s o r s h ip o f g u est sp e a k e r s su c h as R o b ert Bourassa, Billy Hays, and Peter N ew m an .' Vincelli said that when the Daily reporter had asked him the question, he had been “ o ff guard” and very tired because he had been working late on the Grad Ball. Consequently, the impression was created that the couldn’t name very many things that the ASU S had done. With respect to student in terest, Vincelli suggested that it isn’t fair to compare the level o f interest and involvement in the Arts and Science faculties with th at o f fa c u lties such as Management o f Engineering. T h o se fa c u ltie s are m uch smaller and their students have som ething very particular in c o m m o n , V in celli argu ed . A SU S is the largest faculty group on campus, he continued, and it is much more diverse than other faculty groups. “ What does an art history major have in com m on with a biochemistry student?” he asked rhetorically. Vincelli said that this lack o f cohesion is just a fact and isn’t anybody’s fault. V incelli was cau tiou s in responding to questions about the difficulties with the VP

Sreenivasan explained that they had wanted to argue a case in favour o f the redistribution o f income, but that they had refrained because that case had been already used in the final at the World Championships, held here at McGill. Although the audience was hostile to the free trade proposi tion, McGill managed to keep the audience vote close (Har vard 83, McGill 67). McGill lost the judges panel 3-2. Individually, McGill also did very well. Matthew Mendelsohn was the third place speaker and Bruce M orrison placed tenth. Mendelsohn and M orrison also place fifth as a team. In previous tournaments this term, M cGill’s team o f Suzanne Mehmet and Mark Warner placed second at Dalhousie and M en d elsoh n and L aw rence Zuckeer won a tournament at Concordia.

(Finance). He admitted that there had been problems, but declined to be specific on the record. He attributed the difficulties in part to an internal power struggle in the A SU S over the past few years involving the Alpha Delta Phi (A D ) fraterni ty. Quite a few A D s have been involved in the ASUS in the past, Vincelli explained, and the A D s have com e to view the A SU S as “ theirs to run” . Last year’s VP (Finance), Peter H offm an, was an A D , Vincelli said. And although he “ worked very hard” and “ did a good jo b ” , he was obstructive at times and tried to run things his own way, Vincelli com mented. — The current VP (Finance),

Mikula, is also an A D . Vincelli suggested that the difficulties this year stemmed from at tempts by the A D faction in the ASUS to exert their influence. However, he wanted to play down the extent o f the problem. All the work was done anyhow he said. Next year for the first time there will be no A D s at all on the A SU S executive, Vincelli observed. Although three ADs stood for election, none o f them were elected. Similar problems should therefore not arise next year according to Vincelli. Said Vincelli: “ There’s a good council in place for next year. They’re all experienced and have already started to w ork and to fa m ilia r iz e themselves with their jo b s.”

by Adeeb Khalid

The Students’ Council met in a Special session last Thursday to discuss the restructuring o f the Program Board. The matter had been held up from last week’s regular meeting. Tabled were two proposals for the new terms o f reference o f the Board. The StudSoc ex ecutive called for the replace ment o f the position o f over-all chairman by six independent Chairmen directly responsible to StudSoc V .P. (Internal). Yat K. Lo, the mover o f the pro posal, hoped this decentraliza tion would promote healthy com petition among the com m it tees and result in better services. Drew Young o f the Program Board came to the meeting to present an alternative set o f pro posals since he “ found the ex ecutive proposals unrealistic” . His version preserved, to a great extent, the status quo, since in fairs Director o f the Medical his opinion, this year’s Board Research Council will all be pre has been very successful and sent. there is no reason to tamper Each Council will be given an with its structure. opportunity to speak and, In order to better discuss the follow ing, there will be an open matter, the meeting dissolved question period during which itself into a Com m ittee o f the the audience may address the whole for half an hour o f pro representatives. found deliberations. The W orkshop will take place G in n y B arton w on d ered at Thom pson H ouse, the Post- whether the executive proposals G ra d u a te C en ter at 3650 would not strengthen the Stud McTavish Street (north o f Dr. Soc vis-à-vis the Board. “ It Penfield). For this special event looks pretty bureaucratic to the H ouse will be open to all m e,” she said. Andrew Dia members o f the McGill com m ond doubted that the competicontinued on page 10 munity;________________________

PGSS Funding Workshop Wednesday March 27th, 1985 R 8:00 pm the Post-Graduate Students’ Society is presenting a F u n d in g W o r k s h o p w ith representatives from the three major Research Councils. Dr. G .M . M acNabb, Presi dent o f the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council o f Canada (NSERC), Heather S t e e le , D ir e c t o r o f th e Fellowships Division o f the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSH RC), D r. E va K u sh n e r , V ic e President o f SSHRC, and Dr. Francis Rolleston, Public A f-

Council