January 29, 2018

Vol. CXXXVIII, No. 16 January 29, 2018 thevarsity.ca —— University of Toronto’s Student Newspaper Since 1880

SCSU elections set to begin following week of unrest After protests, multiple injuries, a resignation, and a delayed campaign period, Scarborough’s students’ union plans the road ahead

Video footage from last week’s all-candidates meeting.

Jack O. Denton News Editor

The Scarborough Campus Students’ Union (SCSU) elections spent the last week marred by scandal. An all-candidates meeting held last Monday was interrupted by a protest that resulted in two injuries and a delay to the campaign period. On Wednesday, the Chief Returning Officer (CRO) resigned, citing fear for personal safety. A new CRO has been hired, and another all-candidates meeting is set for January 29 at 4:00 pm.

The Chair of the SCSU’s Elections and Referenda Committee (ERC), VicePresident Campus Life Nafisa Mohamed, said that a new CRO was hired

after the ERC conducted interviews with applicants. Mohamed declined to name the new CRO as of press time because they had yet to sign the employment contract.

The January 22 all-candidates meeting was interrupted by roughly 50 protesters, seemingly led by Deena Hassan — the current VP Operations of the union — and Ray Alibux. Both Hassan and Alibux were disqualified from running in the elections; Alibux’s disqualification has since been reversed, and he is now running for SCSU President.

SCSU, page 3

Resignations, poor attendance records highlight UTSU BoD meeting

Anti-abortion group faces off in court against UTMSU over club recognition

Some board members doing a “disservice” to themselves, says union Executive Director Josie Kao Associate News Editor

A series of resignations and discussion of poor board attendance records comprised the latest UTSU Board of Directors’ meeting.

Directors debated with each other over why the attendance for meetings was always very low, as well as how to improve engagement. The board also accepted the resignations of four directors at the meeting and filled five other director vacancies.

In December 2017, The Varsity found that 29 per cent of the board had missed enough meetings for them to have effectively abandoned office.

This is based on the UTSU’s Bylaw X, which covers abandonment of office. According to the bylaw, a director “shall be deemed to have

delivered their resignation” if they have failed to send regrets for two missed meetings, failed to attend three consecutive meetings or any four meetings regardless of sent regrets, or failed to attend any three committee meetings.

Mathematics and Physical Sciences Director Wilson Wu began the meeting by proposing a motion to automatically accept any resignations from board members who have been deemed to have abandoned office. Wu’s motion did not receive enough support to be added to the agenda.

“I triggered Bylaw X for the sake of accountability,” Wu told The Varsity. “I felt that it was important we were active in applying our few measures of accountability, especially seeing that engagement had degraded to the point that over a dozen directors have effectively

Court also hears cases against UOIT, Durham College, Ryerson students’ unions

abandoned office.”

However, the agenda did dedicate time for discussion on attendance, after UTSU Vice-President Internal Daman Singh noted that “there was will from the board to have some sort of discussion on attendance more generally.”

High turnover of high concern Numerous UTSU board resignations threaten the union’s democratic mandate

EDITORIAL

page 11

The discussion focused mainly on why directors were missing meetings and how to solve the problem for future boards.

Trinity College Director Nish UTSU, page 3

Tom Yun Managing Online Editor

Three lawsuits involving student clubs suing students’ unions, alleging they were improperly denied funding, were heard by Ontario Superior Court Justice Paul Perell on January 24 at Osgoode Hall. The eight-hour-long hearing included the suit against the University of Toronto Mississauga Students’ Union (UTMSU) by three members of UTM Students for Life (UTMSFL).

UTMSFL is an anti-abortion student group that filed a suit against the UTMSU in January 2016. Diane Zettel, Cameron Grant, and Chad Hagel are the three UTMSFL members listed as the applicants of the lawsuit.

The court simultaneously held

hearings for two similar lawsuits.

Speak for the Weak, another antiabortion group at Durham College and the University of Ontario Institute of Technology (UOIT), is suing the Student Association of Durham College and UOIT, while the Ryerson Students’ Union (RSU) faces a suit from members of the Ryerson Men’s Issues Awareness Society.

Marty Moore is the lawyer representing the three clubs and is a staff lawyer with the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms (JCCF), a non-profit advocacy organization tasked with “defend[ing] the constitutional freedoms of Canadians through litigation and education,” according to its mission statement.

It has also represented Trinity Western University in its lawsuit against the Law Society of Upper Canada.

UTMSU, page 4

FEATURE

SCIENCE

SPORTS

Battling bots

Pikas and water hyacinths

Truth and reconciliation for athletes

Fighting ticket scalpers is difficult despite new innovations

BIO120’s beloved Barret and Thompson to retire

KPE Task Force’s anti-racism and Indigenous inclusion report delayed

page 12

page 17

page 20

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A letter from the editor

For a student newspaper, there are few experiences as humbling as having over 250 people deliver repeatedly unsparing assessments of the quality of your work. If nothing else, it’s an exercise in taking criticism well.

I spent the better part of the weeks following the launch of our 2018 reader survey with my eyes glued to the survey response sheet, bingeing on the swaths of commentary sent our way. Some of the feedback was predictable. A few people called us SJWs, and another labelled us “briefcase centrists.” Someone lamented our “neoliberal agenda,” while another claimed we were so far left it would make Stalin blush.

Others, though, were less predictable — and particularly valuable. A strong majority of the comments we received dealt us criticisms that will surely serve to improve our paper.

I wanted to engage with some of these responses in this letter. Many appeared to overlap with ideas floated by other respondents, so I wanted to address them as a whole.

Ideally, the feedback loop initiated with this survey doesn’t need to end here. Consider this a response to your responses; if you care to keep this going, give us a response to this response to your responses.

In any case, thanks for filling out the survey.

It helps a lot.

Tri-campus coverage A number of you told us to improve our coverage of campuses besides UTSG. This is valid, and it speaks to an age-old problem The Varsity has faced.

Our office is situated in the heart of downtown

Toronto. We’re surrounded by a city buzzing with stories, and as a consequence, we sometimes miss the stories further away. But we want to change this.

It goes without saying that the Mississauga and Scarborough campuses carry the same public interest as St. George. More importantly, to cover these two extensively is simply to fulfil our mandate. We’re considering how we can improve our coverage of the UTM and UTSC campuses — what we need in order to do so, and how we can do that soon.

For now, if you have the time, read this week’s cover story on the SCSU elections or the Students For Life legal case against the UTMSU. We’ve been covering these stories since their outbreak, and we’ll be following them closely as they unfold. While there’s always room for improvement, we hope these stories serve as a testament to our commitment to tri-campus coverage.

The political spectrum There is a tendency to judge the political leanings of a newspaper by its opinion section.

When flipping through the weekly issue, a reader who discovers a majority of left-leaning opinions might assume these opinions to be a reflection of the views of the staff who work there. Some of the responses we received in this survey appear to support this notion.

I’d like to offer a slightly different perspective: the opinions offered in our paper are merely a reflection of those who bother to volunteer with us.

I want to assure you that, as a paper that values debate and free speech, we have no

intention of producing opinions that prescribe to one ideology or another. We publish those who strive to write us well-written, substantiated arguments.

In total sincerity, I’d highly encourage you to write for our opinion section. If you think there’s an important perspective that’s missing in our paper, consider writing it for us. This is obviously not convenient for everyone, but these sections are comprised of volunteers — anyone who has written for us has put their studies aside to present our readers their opinion.

Resources Many of you asked for more ‘resource’-related articles in our paper. You wanted to know what events were happening on campus, what courses to take, and as one respondent put so eloquently, how to get a job after graduation (spoiler: we don’t know).

We can do this. If you’re reading the print version of this article, look below. On a weekly basis, we’ve been posting a listing of weekly events happening around town. As we’ve been doing since the beginning of the year, we’ll continue writing explainers and breakdowns in our News section. I’d suggest flipping to page 7, where our Deputy News Editor explains the function of Governing Council in light of its upcoming elections.

“Less poor humour” To the respondent who wrote this: we hear you, loud and clear.

—— Jacob Lorinc, Editor-in-Chief

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Sugary Eats: Cinnabon Cinnamon Bun Sale

Guest Lecture by Professor Joseph Wong on Ending Global Poverty

Location: UTMSU Office, Student Centre

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Time: 10:00 am –5:00 pm Price: 1 for $2, 6 for $10, 15 for $20

UTM Archery Sign ups and Beginner Lessons Location: RAWC Time: 6:45 –9:00 pm Price: $20 for new members, $10 for returning members

In Conversation with SBA: the Mandated Leave Policy Location: Multi-Faith Centre Main Activity Hall Time: 2:00 –4:00 pm Price: Free

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St. George

Screening of ‘Sleeping Giant’ with Andrew Cividino Location: Innis Town Hall Time: 7:00 –9:30 pm Price: Free with registration

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The Crucible Location: Hart House Theatre Time: 8:00 –10:30 pm Price: $12 – $28

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Book Launch: When The World Seemed New: George H.W. Bush and the End of the Cold War Location: 315 Bloor Street West Time: 6:00 –8:00 pm Price: Free with registration

Price: $5 for Rotman students, $10 for general public

The Varsity Design Introductory Workshop (that’s us) Location: Suite 302 21 Sussex Ave Time: 5:00 –7:00 pm Price: Free with registration

JANUARY 29, 2018 • 3

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SCSU, from cover Alibux had been disqualified for not collecting the requisite number of signatures to be nominated as a candidate. The ERC “decided to accept the enrollment list from the university at the start of the nomination period rather than the end of nomination period, which overturns Ray’s disqualification,” wrote Mohamed.

According to the ERC, Hassan was disqualified for abusing her position on the union while campaigning, after the CRO received multiple photos of her wearing a sweater indicating her position in the union while collecting nominations.

The protest at the January 22 meeting turned violent: SCSU Internal Coordinator Arthi Velupillai sought medical attention for an injured arm, while former CRO Mahir Zuber says he was thrown onto a table and punched in the face.

The protest followed a widely circulated online petition called #FREEZESCSUELECTIONS, which brought damning allegations against the executives of the SCSU. This petition, which has over 600 signatures as of press time, alleges that SCSU executives and staff interfered with the nominee selection. The chants of the protesters, “Freeze the SCSU elections!” echoed the rhetoric of the petition.

Nicole Brayiannis, the other candidate for the SCSU presidency, said that what’s happened so far has “definitely” shaken her confidence in the elections process. Brayiannis was also one of four students who approached the SCSU Board of Directors last year at their November 22 meeting with concerns about Hassan abusing her position on the union in the spring elections.

“The SCSU has not kept in touch with us, or any of our members running,” said Brayiannis. “Other than general

statements they’ve put out online, we’re completely in the dark about what is happening.”

After the resignation of Zuber, Brayiannis said that there was no one to ask for definitive answers about the status of the elections. With the stalled campaign period and the election dates apparently fixed for February 6–8, Brayiannis relayed concerns from her team that they have already lost one week of campaigning opportunities.

“I definitely believe there is something wrong with the electoral process,” said Alibux, echoing Brayiannis’ concerns.

Speaking about the confusion over members’ signatures that led to his disqualification, Alibux said that in the process there remains a “need to provide us with a way to confirm that the signatures are valid ahead of time.”

Conflicting narratives of the January 22 protests There remains a lack of clarity about the events of the January 22 protests, though emerging video evidence is providing clues.

Zuber’s statement of resignation reads, “During the All Candidates Meeting, I was grabbed by students, thrown onto a table, and punched in the face,” though other accounts of events suggest that Zuber’s characterization of events is not entirely accurate.

Video evidence shows that, as the protesters made their way into the room, Zuber confronted them and appeared to make an attempt to physically block people from entering.

While locked in a verbal confrontation with a protester, in which they seem to be grabbing each other, Mohamed put herself between Zuber and the protester. It appears as

though, in the scuffle, Mohamed’s hand did make contact with Zuber’s face as she tried to separate them. Mohamed was not one of the protesters.

Ahmed Shanqiti, a UTSC student who was present at the protest, aligns with this interpretation of the videos. “As we went in, the CRO, who was inside the room, came to the door and tried to use his frame to stop anyone from going in. Someone evaded him from the side and he just grabbed them,” claims Shanqiti. “Another SCSU member tried to grab him and push him away, and during that scuffle, her hand did fly towards his face, hitting him twice.”

Brayiannis, in her own account of the events leading up to the disruption, said that two members of Hassan’s slate left the all-candidates meeting before the protest under the pretense that one of them was going to the washroom. Shortly afterward, according to Brayiannis, there was a knock at the door, and another member of Hassan’s slate went to open it.

At that point, Brayiannis claimed, the Internal Coordinator Velupillai went to close it, but before it was closed, the door was charged by the protesters outside and the disruption began.

Don Campbell, a spokesperson for UTSC, confirmed that “Campus Community Police were called by the SCSU and responded immediately.” He said that the investigation into what transpired is ongoing, and that it was “too early to comment on specific details” of the incident.

Hassan has not responded to The Varsity’s requests for comment.

— With files from Abhya Adlakha

UTSU, from cover

The board accepted the resignations of four more directors at the January 26 meeting. STEVEN LEE/THE VARSITY

Chankar said that although she didn’t “have the best attendance this year,” she and many others often missed meetings for work obligations.

“I don’t skip meetings for fun. I skip meetings for work, for other commitments I have. But the problem I have is that I’m really shit at replying to emails,” said Chankar. “I think that an easy fix to this problem is people not sending in their regrets. I can’t be the only one on the board who repeatedly forgets to send in their regrets.”

Wu also spoke at length about the issue, saying that although he understands “everyone has busy lives,” board members also made a commitment to the UTSU and should therefore follow through.

“When we signed up for this we took on a commitment to show up to all of these meetings,” said Wu. “So saying that, ‘Oh, we’re bad at responding to emails or we don’t want to commute all the way down to campus for a meeting’— these are all issues, but just by us signing up, we’ve agreed to deal with them.”

Tka Pinnock, the UTSU’s Executive Director, agreed that directors had other engagements but said that board members were doing a “disservice” to themselves by not being engaged.

“Your goal as directors is not to come to the board meeting and to stamp everything the execs have done,” said Pinnock.

“Your goal as directors is to come to the meeting and to ask the execs to explain what they’ve done, to defend what they’ve

done.”

She claimed that this year’s Division III directors, who represent the University of Toronto Mississauga Students’ Union, were less engaged than in previous years, which in turn leads to St. George directors becoming disengaged as well.

“St. George directors should not take the position that you’re only engaged when you think people from UTM are engaged so [that] you have this challenger, this enemy that you have to bolster yourself against,” argued Pinnock.

Pinnock also mentioned that last year, “there were things that execs got away with… [that], had there been an engaged board, they would not have been able to get away with.”

Resignations At the meeting, the board also accepted the resignations of Aidan Swirsky, University College Director; Gaby GarciaCasanova, General Equity Director; Rebekah Tam, Faculty of Music Director; and Hamboluhle Moyo, Victoria College Director.

Of the four, Tam had missed enough meetings to have effectively abandoned office.

In a statement posted on Facebook, Moyo said that he was resigning because he felt that he had not used his time on the board to the fullest extent.

“When one does not attend the council and commission meetings... it is rather easy to feel detached and become more

disengaged,” he told The Varsity. “Most of the responsibility of disengagement is on us directors though it is fair to point out I don’t know the state of most of the directors’ lives.”

“It’s a shame that we’ve lost so many directors,” UTSU Vice-President External Anne Boucher told The Varsity.

Boucher wrote that though some resignations were due to “personal reasons and they’re 100% valid... We need to rethink how we engage our board and membership.”

The board subsequently appointed five new directors to empty positions. Aron Sankar and Jeff Dryden were appointed as Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering Directors, replacing Danja Papajani and Andrew Sweeny, who both resigned last year. Victor Cheng was appointed Faculty of Music Director, replacing Tam. Justine Huyer was appointed Transitional Year Programme Director after the previous director’s term ended last semester. June Marston was appointed as General Equity Director, filling one of the vacant spots for that position.

The board has also struck a Shortlisting Committee to hire directors for any vacant positions for the remainder of the year. Jones, Sankar, and UC Directors Kshemani Constantinescu and Anushka Kurian were appointed to the committee.

They will serve alongside UTSU President Mathias Memmel, Singh, and one other executive.

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UTMSU, from cover

UTMSFL presented its suit against the UTMSU at Osgoode Hall on January 24. LOOZRBOY/CC FLICKR

The UTMSU and RSU are being jointly represented by Alexi Wood and Jennifer Saville of St. Lawrence Barristers LLP. Woods and Saville previously represented the RSU in Grant v. Ryerson Students’ Union, 2015, another case involving a anti-abortion student club denied recognition from its student union. The judge sided with the RSU in that case.

Legal questions While defending the clubs, Moore spoke of the close relationship between student unions and the publicly funded universities to which they are attached.

“If the University of Toronto Students’ Union decided to adopt the Bahá’í Faith and expressly made it a part of its documents in accordance to its letters patent, I think we would understand that its relationship with the publicly funded institution would begin to have to jeopardy there,” argued Moore.

“The reality is that public institutions and the common law, which applies to public institutions, should take into account the fundamental values that apply on that campus.” “[These are] not the arguments that I’m putting forward today, but I do recognize that that is one of the possible approaches that a court could take,” said Moore. He cited Rakowski v. Malagerio, 2007, a case also presided over by Perell,

in which it was decided courts had the authority to intervene in student union policies.

Saville told the judge that student unions are private corporations, regardless of the fact that they operate on public university campuses, citing the Grant v. Ryerson Students’ Union case, where the judge ruled that student unions aren’t subject to public law. Wood expanded on this, adding that all UTMSU members, including those involved in the UTMSFL, had the right to vote on or run for the UTMSU Board of Directors and shape the union’s policies if they disagreed with them.

Perell responded, “There are some things where democracy is not the answer. Hitler got elected, with due process.”

UTMSFL’s case Moore forewent any allegations of ideological bias; the crux of his submission was the allegation that the three unions went against their own policies and bylaws.

The UTMSFL members allege that the UTMSU informed them that the club would not be granted official club status due to its anti-abortion stance. In his submission, Moore told the judge that the UTMSU subsequently changed its reasoning and attempted to deny the club for technical violations. It is alleged that the UTMSU told the club, which only had three

executive members, that it needed four executives in order to qualify for official club status and that it had to amend its constitution to be compliant with the UTMSU’s requirements and elect a fourth executive at a general meeting. “[Then-UTMSU Vice-President Campus Life Russ Adade] kept on coming up with new requirements, including, at the end, ‘I have to be present at your meeting when you vote.’ The applicants said, ‘Fine, come to our meeting. We’ll do a re-vote.

We’ll re-enact our constitutional amendments,’” Moore told the judge.

The applicants also allege that Adade brought five people who were not members of UTMSFL to attend the meeting and vote against the election of the fourth executive.

Wood pointed out that in cross-examination, Adade denied allegations of stacking the deck at that meeting and actually tried his best to help UTMSFL meet the UTSMU’s requirements to qualify for clubs funding.

“We have an affidavit from Mr. Adade, who says he doesn’t do that, and we asked him on cross and he denied it on cross.

He said that these members attended on their own,” Wood told the judge. “They had come to him, they had talked to him about [UTMSFL] and he said, ‘If you have issues with [UTMSFL], go to the meeting on the 23rd and talk to [UTMSFL] there.’”

Wood also told the judge that UTMSU-recognized clubs are required to be open to all UTMSU members and that all UTMSU members can therefore vote in the club elections.

The only exception, Wood said, is if the club lays out different voting rights in its constitution. “[UTMSFL] did not put into their constitution any restrictions on who could vote,” she continued.

According to Wood, Adade sent an email to UTMSFL after the general meeting, explaining the next steps and expressing willingness to continue working with the club to get its club status approved. The student union board then received an email from Moore saying that UTMSFL was commencing legal proceedings.

It is unknown when the court will reach a decision, although the decision for Grant v. Ryerson Students’ Union came out nearly 10 months after the hearing.

Cost of deferred maintenance at U of T drops slightly from last year UTSG’s delayed repairs rise to $478 million Alex Tough Associate News Editor

The university’s annual report on deferred maintenance reveals that the total cost of repairs required on U of T’s buildings is $549 million, down $2.5 million from last year.

The cost of deferred maintenance represents the amount of money in repairs that the university is delaying, typically as a cost-saving measure.

The majority of the liability for this year is at UTSG, which accounts for $478 million, up by $4 million since last year.

About five per cent of this figure — approximately $24 million — represents deficiencies that must be addressed within the next year, while approximately $287 million represents deficiencies that must be handled in the next three to five years.

UTSC’s deferred maintenance repairs this year totalled $42 million, down $2

million from last year. UTM accounts for $29 million of the total cost of deferred maintenance, down $4 million from last year’s figure.

The report also stated that the university’s combined facility condition index (FCI) — a number obtained by dividing the cost of repairs required by the cost of replacing the building — stands at 13.4 per cent, higher than the 11 per cent the Council of Ontario Universities last reported in 2015, but 0.5 per cent lower than last year. If an FCI is over 10 per cent, then repairs are needed.

The FCI of the 10 buildings at UTSC is 11 per cent . The 14 buildings at UTM have a combined FCI of 6.7 per cent.

UTSG’s FCI currently stands at 14.7 per cent, down slightly from last year’s 15 per cent. Of the 101 academic and administrative buildings audited for the report, 71 were classified as being in poor condition.

The report also noted that the majority of UTSG buildings were built post-war and have lower construction quality than pre-war buildings and modern,

complex buildings on campus. These post-war buildings tend to require a “fundamental renewal of building systems.”

The report also pointed out that the combined internal and federal funding is “approaching” the roughly $28 million needed to reduce the FCI to 12 per cent within 10 years at UTSG. According to the report, the university “can maintain and even start to improve the condition of our academic and administrative buildings [at U of T]” with this funding.

The document also detailed changes to be made to how the deferred maintenance figures are assessed, including shortening the auditing frequency from every seven years to every five years, incorporating costs associated with professional services and consulting fees, and providing more accurate building information.

From left: Chestnut Residence, the Medical Sciences Building, Sidney Smith Hall, and the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education are the top four in deferred maintenance cost at UTSG. PHOTO COURTESY OF WIKIMEDIA; ALEXANDRA HU/THE VARSITY;NATHAN CHAN/THE VARSITY; NANCY ZHAO/THE VARSITY

JANUARY 29, 2018 • 5

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Starbucks at College and Beverley closes doors to make way for new condo Local residents concerned about pollution, noise, influx of students to area Nouran Sakr Varsity Staff

Starbucks has no plans to open a store in the new condo or in the general vicinity of College and Beverley.

SOFIA LUDWIG/THE VARSITY

The Starbucks on the southeast corner of College Street and Beverly Street has closed its doors permanently. In January 2020, a 29-storey condo tower will replace the five-storey, mixed-use building that housed the coffee shop.

The condo will consist of 26 floors sitting atop a three- to fivestorey space designated for retail and office. It will provide 309 residential units at the southern end of UTSG. The current proposal for the project was sent to the Ontario Municipal Board in March 2016, and the tower will be built by Page and Steele of IBI the Group. The developer is Parallax Investment Corporation. “[The District Manager] confirmed that everyone was offered a new position,” said Tim Gallant, Senior Manager of External Communications at Starbucks Canada. “So nobody was left unemployed as a result of this closure.”

Gallant added that Starbucks has no plans to open a store in the new tower or in the same vicinity as the old one. Students expressed their disappointment about the store’s closure.

“I’m going to miss it because it’s in a perfect location,” said third-year student Alex Pavel. “I didn’t know it was closing.”

Pavel was not the only person surprised; many students did not know about the closure, although some flyers were handed out by employees.

Thalia Charney, a neighbourhood resident who lives right across from the building, is mainly concerned about the noise

generated by the construction. “It could take a long time to build this, so it’ll make the street noisy,” she said. She also believes pollution may be a potential problem.

“It doesn’t fit the neighbourhood,” said Gale Fraser, another resident of the area. She could not see any benefits to the project and is concerned about noise and garbage disposal issues. She also fears that the tower would block sunlight from its surrounding buildings.

Fraser is worried about traffic as well. “There’s supposed to be limited vehicles,” she said. “But it’s never what they say it’s going to be.”

She added that the new building would increase the number of students in the neighbourhood.

“It’s a transient population,” said Fraser. “We want people who are going to stay and be a part of the community.” She believes that, because students live in the neighbourhood only during their time at U of T, there is no real investment in the community.

She raised concerns about vandalism as well, citing a park that was “destroyed a year and a half ago.”

According to the City of Toronto staff report, the project is proposing 58 underground parking spots located underground and an entrance via College. This would not be sufficient to meet the demand created by a project of this size.

The report also specified that no information had been provided regarding the additional loading space required for solid waste management vehicles.

British journalist subject to online threats following interview with Jordan Peterson Peterson says threats and criticism not the same, calls on Twitter followers to stop making threats Lidia Likhodi Varsity Contributor

U of T psychology professor Jordan Peterson has attracted controversy after appearing in an interview with Cathy Newman of UK news channel Channel 4 News, in which he debated gender equality, transgender rights, and free speech.

Since the interview was posted on January 16, Newman has been the subject of gender-based abuse and threats on social media, which has led Channel 4 to conduct a risk analysis by security experts.

When questioned about his refusal to use transgender pronouns, Peterson said, “I actually never got in trouble for not calling anyone anything,” and he added that he had instead refused to “follow the compelled speech dictates” of government.

The interview has received over 4 million online views since it aired, and it has garnered strong reactions against Newman on social media. A Channel 4 News spokesperson said that “immediate steps” have been taken to “ensure [Newman’s] safety and security.” The nature of the threats against her or specific measures taken, however, have not been specified.

Channel 4 editor Ben de Pear tweeted that he would “not hesitate to get the police involved if necessary.”

In an email to The Varsity, Peterson wrote that “Channel 4 should make the ‘threats’ public so that the public can judge their validity.”

“Criticism and threats are not the same thing, and as far as I know there has been no police involvement,” said Peterson.

On Twitter, Peterson has called on his followers to stop threatening Newman if they were doing so, saying, “Try to be civilized in your criticism. It was words. Words, people, words. Remember those?”

A Twitter search failed to unearth direct threats against Newman. Two Twitter comments reacting to the debate said “RIP Cathy Newman.” Around 10 tweets since January 16 have leveled slurs against the interviewer. One Twitter user

Jordan Peterson speaking at the Canadian Freedom Summit in July 2017. STEVEN LEE/THE VARSITY

collated comments on the YouTube video and found over 750 comments using misogynistic slurs.

During the interview, Newman also pressed Peterson on his views on the gender pay gap, noting that wage disparities made it seem to many women “that they’re still being dominated and excluded.”

“I didn’t deny [the gap] existed, I denied it existed because of gender,” said Peterson in his interview with Newman.

“There is prejudice... But it accounts for a much smaller proportion of the variance in the pay gap than the radical feminists claim.”

“Agreeable people get paid less,” said Peterson. “Women are more agreeable than men.”

“So why not get them to ask for a pay rise?” asked

Newman. Peterson replied that he had successfully provided assertiveness training to female professionals in his clinical practice “many, many times.”

When Newman asked why Peterson’s right to free speech trumped the rights of transgender people not to be offended, Peterson responded, “You’re certainly willing to risk offending me in the pursuit of truth. Why should you have the right to do that?”

He added that, as a journalist, she was “digging a bit... that’s what you should do.”

Peterson appeared in the interview as part of an international tour to promote his new self-help book, 12 Rules for Life.

6 • THE VARSITY • NEWS

news@thevarsity.ca

U of T forecasts $391 million in annual net income, according to new CFO report Debt expected to rise above $1 billion due to capital projects Aidan Currie Deputy News Editor

and $444 million in capital asset additions, or property.

U of T is expected to report a net income of $391 million for the fiscal year ending April 30, 2018. This income shows a decrease of $26 million from last year’s $417 million, according to a report from Chief Financial Officer Sheila Brown to the Governing Council’s Business Board. Net assets are projected to be approximately $5.8 billion, increasing by $313 million from 2017.

The report details revenue, expenses, net income, and net assets for the university. It was prepared using a combination of forecasting methods, including projection to April 30 using current year-to-date figures and estimation based on trend analysis of prior years.

Key assumptions made in projecting these numbers are a 5.4 per cent investment return, an $84 million endowment payout, $100 million in divisional savings,

Revenue and deficits Based on the report, U of T’s revenue should be $3.36 billion this year, principally generated through a projected $1.57 billion in student fees. Expenses are forecast to come in at $2.97 billion, meaning U of T is making and spending a little more than it did last year, based on totals of $3.22 billion in revenue and $2.8 billion in expenses from 2017.

A deficit of $95 million is projected for 2018. Last year’s report projected a deficit of $93.9 million, but the actual deficit came in at $59 million.

The deficit is comprised of a $43 million operating fund surplus, with $35 million more in tuition fee revenue earned than in budgeted due to international undergraduate enrolment, $5 million in utilities savings, $4 million in additional government grants, and $3 million in investment

returns.

An unrestricted deficit of $138 million in other funds is attributed to the internal debt component of the university’s debt program. These will be repaid over a longer period of time.

Debt projections U of T places its outstanding debt at $1 billion, whereas its debt policy limit, or the amount it can borrow, stands at $1.5 billion. The Business Board approved $1.26 billion in allocations, which includes borrowing and contingency for donations, targets, and pledges, leaving $241 million remaining for future allocation throughout the next four months.

The annual debt strategy review states that debt “primarily supports capital projects and pensions.” Over the next five years, the review estimates that approximately $560 million of additional debt will be needed for capital projects that have not yet been approved by the Business Board

but that are under consideration.

Some of these capital projects include a second instructional centre at UTSC, renovations to some Arts & Science buildings at UTSG, and the Landmark project to renovate front campus.

“In assessing the appropriateness of a debt strategy, we considered the need for debt together with the need to remain affordable, and for debt servicing to continue to be financially responsible,” reads the Debt Strategy Review.

By April 30, 2023, the debt policy limit is projected to increase to $1.85 billion to accommodate these new capital projects.

Moody’s Investors Service gave U of T an Aa2 credit rating, which is unchanged from recent years, meaning U of T fulfils its financial commitments and repays the money it borrows in an effective and timely manner.

David Frum talks Trump at U of T George W. Bush’s former speechwriter offers insight on political consequences of current White House

Frum (middle) was joined by Heather Reisman (left), CEO of Indigo Books & Music Inc., and Jeffrey Goldberg (right), the editor-inchief of The Atlantic magazine. SHANNA HUNTER/THE VARSITY

Jillian Schuler Associate News Editor

David Frum, author and former speechwriter for President George W. Bush, spoke at an event held by the Rotman School of Management on January 24.

The event served as a promotion of Frum’s new book, Trumpocracy: The Corruption of the American Republic, which provides an analysis of the effects the Trump administration has had on democratic institutions in the United States.

The event featured a discussion with Frum and Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic magazine, and it was moderated by Heather Reisman, CEO of Indigo Books & Music, Inc. Before getting into discussions based on the content of

the book, Reisman asked Frum about the investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 US federal election. Frum said that, with what we already know about the Russian investigation, this is “one of the biggest scandals in American history.”

He explained that while there still remains a lot of unanswered questions in the investigation, “to sit down” and to “take a meeting with a foreign intelligence agency” with the specific purpose of collaborating on defeating another political candidate is enough of a scandal, without even beginning to answer the questions currently being investigated: “to what degree did the Trump people coordinate [and] how much did they share back with the Russians?”

His book attempts to address the current Trump administration’s impact on the US political landscape. The two speakers offered their insights and perspectives on the cur-

rent status of democracy in the US the role of immigration in the country’s political polarization.

Frum argued that democracy is on the decline, citing a widespread survey from his book that posed the question, “Is it essential to you to live in a democracy?” Among Americans over the age of 70, over 80 per cent of the responses said yes, while with the people under the age of 30, only about 25 per cent said yes.

Frum said that this is due to the fact that, for younger generations, wars fought on the basis of democracy are too far in the past to have the same impact they had on older generations.

Goldberg added that, from World War II, the Nazis “were so heinously awful that one could make a shortcut mentally to say, ‘Well obviously [democracy] is enormously useful because look at what we defeated,’ but people don’t have these memories anymore.”

Frum argued that immigration will always be a “source of stress,” using the 2016 election in the US and the Brexit referendum in the United Kingdom as examples of the right-wing backlash to immigration.

Goldberg said he does not view the United States’ current political turmoil as a consequence of immigration but as a backlash to the US electing its first African American president.

Barack Obama was more than just a president, he said, but rather a “symbol that a country is changing, that the colour of a country is changing.”

Moving forward, both Frum and Goldberg said it is difficult to predict what kind of long-term impact this administration will have on the United States.

Goldberg said that he has two theories that he alternates between, depending on “the day of the week.” On the one hand, he said that America has resilience “built into the system,” and that one day Americans will “wake up” and “snap back to some behaviour” that he considers to be more reasonable. However, he also acknowledged the fact that “all empires decline.”

Frum said that the long-term implications of the Trump administration depend on how long Trump remains in office.

With the current economic growth and the “higher spending power” of after-tax income due to the Republican tax bill, he added that the odds could potentially be in the Republican party’s favour for the 2018 midterm elections.

JANUARY 29, 2018 • 7

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Chizoba Imoka discusses Black education at 2018 Hancock Lecture OISE student stresses importance of “pluriversal” world, recognizing diverse cultures

Chizoba Imoka (left) spoke about being “forced to take on a Eurocentric perspective” during her lecture. SHAHD FULATH KHAN/THE VARSITY

Silas Le Blanc Varsity Staff

The 17th annual Margaret Hancock Lecture, titled “Black & Educated? Unveiling the Contradictions & Redesigning the Future,” featured Hancock Lecturer Chizoba Imoka and moderator Dr. Kofi Hope. At Hart House on January 23, Imoka spoke about key issues facing today’s Black youth, primarily focusing on the effect of colonialism on the education system.

Imoka began by recognizing the history of Black people, who made it possible for her to gain a platform. “A little over 200 years ago, people like me were slaves,” she said. “How we evolved from there to here has really been because of the vision, the courage, and the persistence of many Black people who did not give up.”

She also stressed the importance of providing space and platforms, such as the Hancock lecture, to Black people.

Imoka’s father was an immigrant to Canada from Nigeria, which gave her first-hand experience of the issues that Black youth face in Canadian schooling.

“For me, what it has meant to be Black and educated has meant being uprooted from my cultural heritage and being forced to take on a Eurocentric perspective,” she said. “And that has prevented me from transforming the world, transforming my continent, transforming Canada at the time and the place that I thought was necessary.”

She recalled a specific instance when her advisor told her that she was not eligible for a particular scholarship because he assumed she did not go to school in Canada, “an assumption based on [her] skin colour.”

She elaborated on how the effects of colonialism are still present in Nigeria. In 1969, the country held its first conference regarding Indigenous education, in order to design an education system better suited for postcolonial Nigeria. “After the conference, what changed? Nothing.” “[The] language of instruction remained English, even though there are 250 ethnic groups in Nigeria, and 400-plus languages,” said Imoka.

She suggested a shift from a universal world with common understandings of religion, philosophy, and art to a world

with a melting pot of ideas and cultures.

“We need to move to a pluriversal world, where all the diverse cultures and epistemologies of the world that we shut out as a result of colonialism... We need to bring them in and create a world where all the multiple knowledge systems and all the philosophies start to form the world,” she said.

Hope delivered a short speech containing examples of his own personal experiences in education to end the talk, and he reiterated many of Imoka’s points.

“When you think about people of African descent, we know certainly that educational systems can perpetuate anti-Black racism, but they can also provide social mobility, and a platform for us to overturn oppression,” he said.

The Hancock Lecture was first launched in 2001, with the goal of igniting conversation and debate among the public about issues deemed important by youth. Originally named Hart House Lecture, the event was renamed in 2007 in honour of Margaret Hancock, the first female warden of Hart House.

The Breakdown: Governing Council The structure and role of Governing Council in the lives of students Aidan Currie Deputy News Editor

Governing Council elections will run from February 5–16, and campaigning is already underway. There are 47 student candidates running for eight seats. With the elections coming up, here is a breakdown of how Governing Council works and how it affects U of T students.

lap/Duplication, Deficiencies, Ambiguities – Board and Committee Mandates; Delegated Authority for Academic Divisions – Lack of Clarity, Inconsistency; Delegated Authority in the Tri-campus Context – Levels of Oversight and Accountability, Redundancy; Quality of Governors – Experience Mix and Representation; and Roles of and Appropriate Interfaces between Governors and the Administration.

Evolving history U of T was previously governed by a senate and a board of governors, but the University of Toronto Act of 1971 merged those two bodies into one: Governing Council.

The University of Toronto Act stipulates that members of Governing Council and its boards and committees must put the interests of the university first, regardless of the constituency they represent.

More recently, the Task Force on Governance, established in 2007 by former U of T President David Naylor, established six themes by which Governing Council would shape itself: Oversight and Accountability – Quality of the Governing Council’s Meeting Agendas; Over-

Structure Governing Council’s role is to oversee academic, business, and student affairs. Its composition is based on the five ‘estates’ of the university: government appointees, teaching staff, alumni, administration, and students.

The council is composed of 50 members — U of T Chancellor Michael Wilson and President Meric Gertler are members by virtue of their positions. Sixteen members are appointed by Lieutenant Governor-in-Council Shirley Hoy, and two are appointed by Gertler. Thirty members are elected: 12 teaching staff, eight alumni, two administrative staff, and eight students. Of the eight student members, four are full-time undergraduates, two are part-time undergrad-

uates, and two are graduates.

A series of boards and committees are part of Governing Council, though not all board and committee members are Governing Council members. The three main boards are the Academic Board, the Business Board, and the University Affairs Board. Students sit on all three boards, and the various committees are beneath them.

The Academic Board handles matters affecting the teaching, learning, and research functions of the university. It establishes priorities and objectives, plans initiatives, and determines how to effectively use resources in the interest of academic progress. There are 123 voting members of the Academic Board: 88 teaching staff; two elected librarians; four administrative staff; six “lay members,” who are alumni or government appointees to Governing Council; 16 students, four who are elected members of Governing Council and 12 who are appointed by the Academic Board’s striking committee; four voting assessors selected by Gertler; and the President, Chancellor, Chair, and Vice-Chair of Governing Council.

The Business Board is made up of 27 mem-

bers, including two students. It oversees policy regarding funding, student fees or ancillaries, and approves Hart House’s operating plan.

Governing Council’s website describes the Business Board’s responsibilities as “ensuring that resource allocations are responsible and cost-effective, and approving policy and major transactions in the business-management of the University.”

The University Affairs Board is also made up of 27 members, including nine students.

It is responsible for non-academic policy that concerns quality of student and campus life.

It appoints six members to the Discipline Appeals Board, while the other six members are appointed by the Academic Board. It handles policy involving campus security, childcare, cocurricular programs, and university-wide campus issues at UTSG. Ceremonials, equity issues, community relations, representative student groups, use of the University of Toronto’s name and incidental fees also fall under the purview of the University Affairs board.

Comment

January 29, 2018 var.st/comment comment@thevarsity.ca

Hell hath no fury like a campus scorned From resources to reputation, UTM and UTSC contributors stress the merits of diverting the spotlight away from UTSG Varsity Contributors

As an Indigenous student, UTSC can be an isolating space. It is UTSG that hosts the majority of Indigenous spaces at U of T, such as First Nations House and the Centre for Indigenous Studies. Over the past year, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission committee has been advocating for UTSC to invest in and create Indigenous spaces as well hire Indigenous faculty and staff. This has yet to happen.

For years, UTSC has not taken a role in engaging the local urban Indigenous community, often resulting in a huge lack of awareness and education around Indigeneity. UTSC does not offer courses in Indigenous studies, leaving many disciplines lacking foundational knowledge on the history of settlercolonialism in Canada and contemporary issues such as reconciliation. UTSC needs to do more work to meaningfully engage Indigenous peoples and perspectives in the university space.

Diane Hill is a fourth-year student at UTSC studying Health Studies and Anthropology.

When I first walked through the sad-looking doors of UTSC’s Instructional Centre, I remembered a tip that was given to me: to do well on exams, I must practice test questions using old exams. It made sense to me — practicing on previous exams would familiarize me with the exams’ format and questions. I could also practice writing the exam within the time limit, reducing stress and time pressure.

So, approaching midterms, I searched for my courses’ past exams in U of T’s Old Exams Repository — but my courses were not included in UTSC’s limited exams list. I realized that, unless restricted by faculty request, the repository provides UTSG students with all of their courses’ three most recent years of previous exams. UTSC instructors, however, submit previous exams on a voluntary and inconsistent basis. As a result, the repository hosts an overwhelming number of UTSG exams and only a meagre number of UTSC exams.

Given our school’s stressful environment, having the ability to access old exams would help improve students’ mental health by ensuring they are well prepared for finals. Yet it seems that in U of T’s eyes, UTSC is never a priority. It is difficult to grasp how a university prides itself on being ‘tri-campus’ without giving students at all three of its campuses the right to see all their courses’ past exams online.

Jayra Almanzor is a first-year student at UTSC studying Journalism.

‘Scarbage,’ the high school of U of T, and the place where academia goes to die — I’ve heard UTSC called all of these things by St. George students. Frankly, the name-calling is a bit childish at times, but during frosh, when every college is spitting out insults like sunflower seeds, it is considered acceptable and admittedly fun to watch. But these stereotypes are only vaguely true.

I’ve lived in Scarborough for nearly half my life and can personally understand the ‘Scarbage’ claims — referring mostly to the location of the university rather than the people. There’s no way a university located in Scarborough wouldn’t be made fun of for being in Scarborough, so I’ll give them that.

It’s also true that UTSC looks like a high school.

But being a smaller campus has its advantages, like smaller class sizes, shorter walking distance between buildings, and, of course, the sense of community.

The one stereotype that I strongly disagree with is the quality of academia. UTSC’s small environment comes with one important advantage, and that’s the fact that I can go to my prof’s office hours and have a three-hour conversation about democratic tyranny without being interrupted. The academic minds at U of T are world-class, and at UTSC they are easily accessible.

Tebat Kadhem is a third-year student at UTSC studying International Development, Public Policy, and Public Law.

Many believe that UTSC is like a high school, especially when compared to UTSG, which is both larger in size and more established. These two facts steal the attention away from UTSC and don’t allow it to come out of its older sibling’s shadow.

As a student who has taken classes at both campuses, I can say that UTSC is definitely the friendlier campus.

It is important to note that large campus size doesn’t always equate to a happier student population.

For many, the small size of UTSC allows for strong friendships to be made. This doesn’t hold true for the downtown campus, as arguably the only surefire ways to make long-lasting friendships is to either live on campus or to join school clubs.

UTSC may be smaller than UTSG, but it creates a warm and welcoming atmosphere for all students who attend it. The campus size provides students with ample opportunities to create strong bonds with people that they meet, which also includes staff and faculty at the school. UTSG may get the glory of being an older and larger campus, but UTSC’s friendliness makes up for it.

Tania Sleman is a third-year student at UTSC studying Human Biology and Psychology.

While students and tourists flock to appreciate the Gothic architecture at UTSG, I find more beauty when taking a rejuvenating stroll down the Valley at UTSC. The Valley, also known as the Ravine Zone or the Highland Creek Ravine, is a little gem of a place tucked away behind the lower campus. It is hugged by tall maple trees and unique native trees and overgrown bushes, parting a paved path in the middle that is perfect for strolls. The beautiful Valley acts as the meditation spot for many students, travelers, and trekkers who wish to escape from the stressful institutional spaces of university life and enjoy the wildlife or outdoor activities.

I have walked down the majestic steps of the Valley during the hard times in my life. Whether it was coping with exam stress or personal issues, the Valley has helped me escape reality and reboot myself — something that is much more difficult to do on the crowded downtown campus. The fact is that UTSG does not have secluded, natural spots that allow people to remove themselves and recover from the everyday stress of student life, and it is too bad that what UTSC has to offer in this regard often gets ignored.

Madiha Turshin is a fourth-year student at UTSC studying Media Studies and History.

JANUARY 29, 2018 • 9

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As an English and History student, I have sometimes browsed the UTSG course calendar and been shocked at the number of courses available in comparison to the ones at UTM. Don’t get me wrong, I love my campus and the feel of a close-knit community, but sometimes I wish that we had the same options as students at UTSG. This academic year, UTM is offering 54 English courses over the two terms, compared to the 62 available at UTSG. UTM is a great and resourceful campus, but we could use just a little bit more choice and variety to align us with the opportunities available at UTSG. When it comes to reputation and attention, UTSG is seen as the superior campus, and course options certainly play a role in establishing that status. It is important to recognize the importance and influence of the two other campuses as well. We are privileged to be students at the University of Toronto, and perhaps that privilege can be spread across the three campuses in a more satisfactory manner.

Aisha Malik is a fourth-year student at UTM studying English and History.

Four years ago, I was just your typical UTSG student.

I was attending a prestigious school and working toward a prestigious engineering degree, all with the prestigious backdrop of Toronto to keep me company. I had it all. When I switched into a writing program at UTM, I expected to feel isolated due to the commute and distance from friends, but I could not have foreseen the disappointment my decision would awaken in others.

Professors, peers, the parents of children I babysat — everyone seemed shocked and personally disgusted by my decision to go to a ‘lesser’ program, a ‘lesser’ school.

Even now, after the switch and with no reference to my past, my studies at UTM are met with polite nods and smiles. My GPA receives congratulations that sound inauthentic or patronizing, because everyone assumes it’s easier to achieve academic success at UTM. Everyone behaves as if my professors do not bear the same credentials as the professors at UTSG, and furthermore, as if every UTSG professor is outstanding, even though we all know that isn’t true.

It’s time to stop treating UTM like a second choice to UTSG — they are unequivocally both parts of the same institution.

Jenisse Minott is a third-year student at UTM studying Communications, Culture, Information & Technology and Professional Writing. She is an Associate Comment Editor for The Varsity.

Whenever I reveal the ‘secret’ that I’m a UTM student to the people I meet at UTSG, I’m constantly met with confusion, shock, and sometimes hostility. Statements like, ‘What do you mean?’ and, ‘Oh, you’re not supposed to share that’ are just some of the responses I’ve received, and I’ve never understood why.

A similar response was heard on a larger scale during The Varsity’s UTSU presidential debate on March 13, 2017. Micah Ryu, then-disqualified presidential candidate for the Reboot UofT slate, answered a question about how Reboot planned to reach out to students on the UTM campus with the response, “Frankly, UTM students should fuck off.”

Why are UTM students as a whole seen as otherworldly creatures that live on a satellite light years away from the metropolitan UTSG campus?

Many of the experiences UTSG students face are, in fact, not unique to them. Surprise! We all have the same Blackboard maintenance, ACORN lags, and waitlist troubles. UTM students are not less deserving of anything. I’m tired.

Elham Numan is a student at UTM studying Art & Art History and English. She is The Varsity’s Creative Director.

I’m a copy editor at UTM’s The Medium. Both The Medium and The Varsity get their funding from student levy fees. The stark difference between the two, however, is that The Varsity gets fees from both UTM and UTSG, whereas The Medium only gets funding from UTM. Funding determines not only where we can afford to publish our papers and magazines — without compromising professional quality, that is — but also how often we can publish. I find it unfair that The Medium does not also get funding from the UTSG campus, because many students who attend UTSG are also from the City of Mississauga. The Medium does not only publish Mississauga-focused content; it focuses on issues pertinent to students across all campuses. Likewise, The Varsity does not produce enough Mississauga-focused content, even though they receive levy fees from students in Mississauga.

Many students from both campuses take courses from the other. Let’s unite and not compete — we’re on the same team here.

Ayesha Tak is a fourth-year student at UTM studying Sociology.

I was accepted to both UTM and UTSG about four years ago, and I weighed the pros and cons of each campus before I made the decision to attend UTM. When I accepted my offer, I received looks, questions, and worrisome expressions of concern. That was the summer I began to realize that there were real differences between UTM and UTSG. However, I am ultimately glad that I chose the campus where I have spent some really good years.

The UTM campus is small, but feels like a community.

You will probably pass by the same people daily and know everyone in your program within the first year.

Although our campus doesn’t rival Hogwarts, the newer architecture is aesthetically pleasing. Plus, freaking out over where to find your classes in first year isn’t an option, given that everything is within a few minutes’ walking distance.

Choosing UTM is not a consolation prize after not getting into UTSG. It’s an experience that regenerates you without needing city lights or a vast campus space.

UTM has given me what I needed because it’s been like a friend — a place where I don’t get lost, literally and figuratively — and a place that is still U of T, but a warmer, more tightly knit version.

Keena Alwahaidi is a fourth-year student at UTM studying English.

There is something inherently powerful and enjoyable about memes. A single picture or phrase can be reworded and reshaped as needed by the user to express emotions that words alone can’t quite express.

As enjoyable as memes are, however, they can often become hurtful rather than humourous — ignorant, hurtful, and even banal at times. The memes about UTM are often all three. From mocking how frequently UTM students spot deer to confessions deeming UTM an inferior school, these memes reduce the secondlargest division of U of T, whose diversity and research know no bounds, to a barn overrun by deer. Joining the deer are undergraduate students whose grades and intellect, apparently not meeting the standards of UTSG's requirements, have damned them to a bland, personally unfulfilling, and academically undemanding life at UTM. It is time to move away from these stale and overtired memes and focus this meme-making energy to shed light on other sides of UTM, even if it is for mocking purposes. For starters, our athletic centre is called the RAWC, we have a cricket pitch on campus that nobody uses, and every ride on the UTM Shuttle is wild from start to finish — meme those things, if you will.

Zeahaa Rehman is a third-year student at UTM studying Linguistics and Professional Writing.

10 • THE VARSITY • COMMENT

comment@thevarsity.ca

The UTGSU has a role to play in sexual assault prevention The results of The Professor Is In’s survey reveals holes in U of T’s approach to addressing sexual assault of graduate students Angela Feng Campus Politics Columnist

The Professor Is In, a graduate student advice website, recently revealed 16 anonymous cases of sexual harassment at the University of Toronto, in which graduate students were targeted by their academic mentors. In the same survey, it was revealed that, allegedly, none of the perpetrators suffered any

STEVEN LEE/THE VARSITY

academic consequences, even in cases where the abuse had been reported.

In general, graduate students interact with professors and other students in positions of power more so than undergraduates.

Dependent on advisers to further their careers, students can be left powerless and unwilling to report abuse in fear of the repercussions to their academic reputations. While some of these relationships can develop into mentorships or friendships, the fact that one party is in a position of power is crucial to understanding why harassment occurs.

At the same time, the resources available for addressing sexual assault at the university are not sufficiently tailored to graduate students’ specific concerns. Some respondents to the survey reported being told that staying silent would be best for their careers in the longterm and that reporting a specific harasser might only work to tarnish their reputations rather than resulting in any reprimands for the abuser.

While the new TriCampus Sexual Violence Prevention and Support Centre offers some useful services, it also has limited operating hours that hinder its accessibility, especially for graduate students

who may have heavy workloads and whose hectic schedules may not allow them to access these services.

A better option for graduate students, in that sense, would be the University of Toronto Graduate Students’ Union (UTGSU), a body tasked specifically with representing graduate students’ interests. Specifically, the UTGSU can ensure that students do not face undue harm to their academic careers as a result of the actions of their harassers and can pursue provisions to prevent superiors from refusing or neglecting to support students who experience abuse.

According to The Professor Is In, one student reported increasingly violent verbal and written harassment from her supervisor after refusing his advances, to the point where she did not publish her thesis in order to avoid further contact. The student also did not receive a recommendation from her supervisor, and she cites what happened to her as one reason she was forced to prematurely end her academic career.

One way to meet graduate students’ needs might be to establish an internal body specifically tasked with providing support for graduate students in circumstances like these.

Using the university’s new Policy on Sexual Violence and Sexual Harassment for guidance may help the union establish a centre that makes up for a lack of specialized professional

and peer-to-peer services on campus.

Systematically establishing safe spaces for graduate students is a necessary step the UTGSU must take to support students who have faced sexual harassment. Graduate students need the support of the UTGSU to address violence that originates from within the U of T community.

Encouragingly, the UTGSU acknowledges this need. In a response to The Varsity’s request for comment, the UTGSU expressed its intention to continue working toward improving the accessibility of policies and resources to support all students.

Supporting the well-being of students over maintaining the reputations of staff, partnered with a concentrated effort to establish a safe and supportive space for students to report and address sexual harassment, will immensely benefit women working in academia. In the long run, these changes will go toward establishing academia as a safe and inclusive space, dispelling any environmental or community-based stigmas that might prevent female academics from furthering their careers.

Angela Feng is a second-year student at St. Michael’s College studying History and Cinema Studies. She is The Varsity’s Campus Politics Columnist.

What's in a meme?

U of T meme groups on Facebook offer an accessible vantage point into the student experience Adina Heisler Student Life Columnist

If you’re even slightly active on Facebook, chances are that you’re probably in a meme group of some kind. The most popular meme groups at the University of Toronto are ‘UofT Memes for Edgy Teens,’ which boasts over 13,500 members, and ‘UofT memes for true lue teens,’ which has over 3,000 members.

These groups have moderators, and although some content may not be approved or kept up for long, the groups are ultimately a free space wherein anyone can post whatever they want.

Merriam-Webster defines a meme as “an amusing or interesting item… spread widely online.” I like to think of memes as inside jokes for the internet, and often as inside jokes for a group of people with shared experiences. In the case of U of T meme groups, that experience is being a student at this university. Although some might question the wisdom of taking these memes too seriously, I think they express student concerns and anxieties better than any other medium.

This is not in spite of the informality of the medium — it’s because of it. As Marshall McLuhan would say, the medium is the message.

McLuhan was talking about how mediums like television, print, or radio would shape the way we think about the world and process information. Yet we can see his insights reflected in memes and internet culture as well.

The fact is that memes permit a type of selfexpression that is normally unavailable in other forms of discourse. Expressing qualms about the university through a meme is easier than filing a complaint through official channels, and it often garners attention nevertheless.

Compulsory respect for public figures when expressing oneself, conversely, is unnecessary, and few if any topics are wholly off limits. All that is required to create a good meme is a sense of humour and a knowledge that the meme will be understood by the community.

In Elizabeth Bruenig’s Washington Post article “Why is Millennial Humor So Weird?,” she discusses how the absurdism of life for millennials, from economic anxiety to uncertainty about the future, has given way to embracement of the bizarre and strange. You can find plenty of especially strange memes in both U of T meme groups. One meme, for instance, explains how to look like a Rotman Commerce student — wearing an expensive but unremarkable suit and tie and purchasing a potato chip to place on your shoulder. Another meme, in rebuttal to a Trinity College student’s denial that the college is “extra,” displays a photo from the college itself: a stained glass window depicting an angel holding a photo of the college in its hands.

To an outsider, these memes might seem nonsensical, yet they manage to convey the anxieties and oddities that are unique to U of T life — in this case, those anxieties and oddities that are unique to certain programs and colleges. Similarly, other memes in the groups focus on other commonplace concepts within the U of T community, such as the antics of Jordan Peterson or all of those posters around campus that call the university ‘boundless.’

The stresses of our lives, including extreme academic pressure, sky-high tuition fees, everincreasing job insecurity, and a crumbling mental health system, have inevitably given way to the “the surreal and bizarre,” as Bruenig puts it. But memes have distilled our anxieties into something else — something that is, dare

SCREENSHOT VIA UOFT TEENS FOR EDGY MEMES

I say, boundless. Memes help us communicate and share inside jokes and references about the student experience without having to rely on formal language, reinforcing our sense of community as students at this university.

In fact, it’s hard to imagine how the content these memes could be expressed in any other medium.

Our memes have tapped into something that few other student publications or organizations have been able to truly understand, and they have helped us raise common thoughts about the student experience that might have previously stayed private. Since so many people are in one meme group, sharing thoughts on any given topic only requires creating a post. The impact of that accessibility can be unexpectedly far-reaching, especially for this campus — consider that only 4,403 students

cast votes for UTSU President during the first round of last year’s UTSU elections, a figure lower than the amount of people who belong to ‘UofT Memes For Edgy Teens.’

In a way, memes are more representative of student beliefs than anything else, as they are so easily accessible and the groups are so democratized. If you really want to understand what’s going on in the student mind — what has resulted from our unique circumstances, and what issues actually draw people’s attention and concerns — look no further than our meme groups.

Adina Heisler is a third-year student at University College studying Women & Gender Studies and English. She is The Varsity’s Student Life Columnist.

Editorial

January 29, 2018 var.st/comment editorial@thevarsity.ca

UTSU resignations trigger questions of democracy Internal replacement procedures and mixed justifications for absences warrant keeping an eye on this issue going forward SEPTEMBER

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OCTOBER

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Vice-President University Affairs

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Stuart Norton

Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering Director

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Ammara Wasim

Aron Sankar/ Jeff Dryden

Danja Papajani

University College Director

Aidan Swirsky

Victoria College Director

Hamboluhle Moyo

Mathematics and Physical Sciences Director

Wilson Wu

Resignations of elected UTSU representatives, 2017–2018

If someone you voted for in the University of Toronto Students’ Union (UTSU) spring election was elected to the board, there’s an 18 per cent chance they have bid their position farewell.

Of the 39 elected members that initially occupied the board following the spring election, a total of seven, for a host of reasons, have now officially resigned from their posts. The union lost two executives and five elected directors: Vice-President University Affairs Carina Zhang, Vice-President Campus Life Stuart Norton, University College Director Aidan Swirsky, Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering Directors Danja Papajani and Andrew Sweeny, Victoria College Director Hamboluhle Moyo, and Mathematics and Physical Sciences Director Wilson Wu. Appointed General Equity Directors Ted Williamson and Gaby Garcia-Casanova have also resigned, bringing the number of UTSU resignations to a total of nine thus far in the academic year.

It should be noted that Faculty of Music Undergraduate Association (FMUA) President Rebekah Tam occupied the Faculty of Music Director position until the FMUA elected its Vice-President External, who, as per the organization’s bylaws, stepped in to fill the role. Tam’s resignation from her temporary post was not included in The Varsity’s calculations above.

The UTSU’s bylaws outline the appropriate procedures for replacing any vacancies on the board. As per By-Law X, s. 5, Division I or II Director vacancies occurring after the nomination period for the fall byelections, which take place at the beginning of October, are to be replaced through an interim election process, in which any candidate belonging to the constituency in question can run, but only board members are able to vote. Executive resignations that occur prior to August 1 must be replaced via byelection, while those occurring August 1 or later

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Aron Sankar/ Jeff Dryden

Andrew Sweeny

The Varsity Editorial Board

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Adrian Huntelar

Carina Zhang

Vice-President Campus Life

Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering Director

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are replaced through an internal hiring process wherein at least two candidates must be recommended to the board for a vote.

In summary, if resignations occur after the prescribed deadlines, the members who remain on the board are granted substantial control over whom their new co-workers will be. Four of the representatives outlined above have since been replaced in this manner, and it is unclear as of yet whether the seats formerly belonging to Swirsky, Moyo, or Wu will meet the same fate.

There is also reason to believe the UTSU is anticipating the possibility of future resignations. At the Board of Directors meeting on January 26, the UTSU appointed a Director Shortlisting Committee for the purpose of seeking members in the community who could apply to fill any future vacancies.

Given the UTSU’s mandate to advocate for and provide services to the constituents who put them in power, any substantial turnover in staff warrants further examination, particularly when elected representatives are replaced through internal mechanisms later in the year.

Many people might have reason to be concerned about the democratic legitimacy of the UTSU to begin with. Voter turnout has hovered from 9–13 per cent over the past few years, and as of December 2017, 29 per cent of this year’s board has been absent from enough meetings to technically warrant their removal altogether.

Unexpected facelifts to the Board of Directors’ roll call can hardly help matters in this regard.

The impacts of a resignation, in turn, can be significant. Directors and executives are generally elected on the basis of specific platforms and promises, and they work hard to represent their constituents during their time in office. Once those representatives are out of the picture, it is possible their projects may be left behind, the work they pursued through UTSU committees and commissions might be delayed, or the ideas they pitched to students

Representative resigned

throughout the course of their campaigns may not make it past the cutting room floor. If representatives quit too late in the year, replacing them may not be feasible at all.

Given the problems associated with resignations, it is in students’ best interest to understand why they happen in the first place.

Certain cases this year hint at serious concerns about the board’s operations. Sweeny resigned following a majority board vote to approve the Hudson lawsuit settlement, stating that it was “so disappointing” that the UTSU had lost his support. Meanwhile, Swirsky’s resignation letter to the board expressed he had experienced “a number of ongoing personal and professional disagreements with some colleagues” and that divergences in beliefs with the members he had run alongside during the election cycle had taken a substantial emotional toll.

Both these cases suggest that resignation can sometimes result from fundamental problems that representatives experience when trying to work together throughout the year.

Other times, frustratingly, we are given no insight into what happened at all. Little has been said about the departures of multiple representatives this year, including both executives, except that they resigned for “personal reasons.”

Though it is not our prerogative to disrespect the privacy of these individuals, it should be acknowledged that little information is ultimately made available to students on reasons why their formerly elected representatives are being replaced.

To its credit, the UTSU has released statements about the two executive resignations that took place this year. However, there is also no formal obligation to publicize such information. As confirmed by UTSU Vice-President External Anne Boucher in conversation with The Varsity, all that is required when a representative resigns is for email notice to be given to the meeting chair, though it should be noted that resignations are formally accepted at Board

Replacement enters office

of Director meetings and therefore eventually appear in agendas and minutes. The present circumstances might therefore amount to difficulties when trying to engage in meaningful conversations about the dynamics that lead to resignation — a situation not conducive to preventing them in the future.

In an email to The Varsity, UTSU President Mathias Memmel wrote, “The UTSU is a demanding organization, and we shouldn’t expect volunteer directors to make it the most important thing in their lives. If a director or even an executive is fundamentally unable to do their job, they shouldn’t be shamed for resigning. No one is served by elected representatives who aren’t in a position to represent anyone.”

Though we agree with these sentiments, a student union cannot claim to be fully democratic when it becomes commonplace for their elected members to be replaced by appointed ones. The members who currently sit on the board should see it as their responsibility to fulfil the democratic mandate granted to them by students and to remain on board for as long as possible.

In a similar vein, Boucher told The Varsity that she was disappointed with the number of resignations the board has received so far, and she expressed the need to rethink engagement with the board and the UTSU membership.

Meanwhile, our job as journalists is to make information about the UTSU as accessible as possible to the student body. This means we’ll be striving to better publicize any resignations that may happen the future. The UTSU team’s efforts to work together and our commitment to transparency hopefully mean we can ride out the rest of the year without having to wonder why another seat at the board table is empty.

The Varsity’s editorial board is elected by the masthead at the beginning of each semester.

For more information about the editorial policy, email editorial@thevarsity.ca.

“I was literally refreshing my page from 9:58 to 10:01,” wrote user AdmiralRR on the U of T subreddit. “Still didn’t get a spot.”

Dozens of similar complaints cascaded on Reddit after tickets to Bernie Sanders’ October 29, 2017 health care talk at Convocation Hall sold out within seconds.

AdmiralRR continued, pointing fingers as to why the tickets were gone so quickly: “Too many bots,” they wrote. “The eventbrite [sic] site has no anti-bot systems. For all we know, one guy could have gotten all of the tickets and might end up selling them.” Another user promptly debunked this notion: “They can’t resell them. They’re using the system to simply register names. If you don’t have ID that matches the name of the person who booked the tickets, you can’t get in.”

Whether or not ticket bots — software that can quickly acquire large amounts of tickets online, most of which are usually later resold at a price significantly above face value — had a role or not in the Bernie Sanders event, the topic itself has received much attention over the last few months. On December 13, 2017, the Ticket Sales Act was passed in Ontario. The act formally banned ticket bots and implemented secondary measures to reduce reselling incentives. Additionally, Ticketmaster has made significant upgrades to its technology to fend off the bots. Will these measures really be enough to win the arms race against ticket bots?

21st century scalping

Scalping has always existed in some shape or form since ticketing has existed. However, it has reached new dimensions with the shift

to selling tickets online. Experts estimate that the global scalping industry is currently worth $8 billion.

It’s hard to believe this revenue was generated by scalpers sitting by their computers buying their tickets one at a time.

Rather, bots are snapping up huge amounts of tickets online by filling in the seller’s dropdown prompts in mere milliseconds.

Many of these bots used a software called Optical Character Recognition — which is designed to recognize and input numbers and characters as a human does — to bypass CAPTCHA. CAPTCHA is the distorted text users must decode when purchasing tickets to verify that they are human.

However, a lot of ticket bots’ success comes from the grunt work that is completed before the software is written. Many scalpers study the underlying architecture and of the Ticketmaster website, research presale passwords, or enrolling in presale-specific credit cards.

This effort is rewarded by an ever-growing demand for tickets and resellers themselves.

According to a recent CBC article, StubHub, a ticket reselling website, offers attractive benefits to high-volume resellers, including “reducing its 10 per cent cut on each ticket sold” and providing “special software to upload and manage” large inventories of tickets.

Given the inherent unfair nature of ticket bots, what is being done to undermine these efforts?

Stop the resellers

bots,

stop

the

Legal officials in Ontario have taken steps they believe will curtail the use of ticket bots, the most significant of which has been the Ticket Sales Act. The legislation effectively bans the use or sale of ticket bots and caps resale prices at no more than 50 per cent above the original price. Essentially, the act seeks to not only outlaw ticket bots, but to remove the incentive to use them in the first place. It also forces sellers to disclose the maximum event capacity, the distribution method of the tickets, and surcharges up front. Violators of this law could face jail sentences of up to two years and fines as high as $250,000 for corporations or $50,000 for individuals, according to a spokesperson from the Ministry of the Attorney General.

The Ticket Sales Act was originally announced by Attorney General Yasir Naqvi in June 2017 in response to The Tragically Hip’s farewell hometown concert in Kingston selling out in minutes. Two-thirds of the fans turned to online scalpers to get tickets, with fans paying hundreds or even thousands of dollars for a ticket originally priced at $50.

It is estimated that resellers made between $25 million and $30 million in markups on the final tour of the iconic Canadian band.

The spokesperson from the Ministry of the Attorney General said that the proposed

change seeks to give fans a “fair shot” at getting their preferred tickets and that the resale cap of 50 per cent, although meant to disincentivize resellers, doesn’t seek to “eliminate the resale market altogether.”

On the other hand, criticism has not been sparse regarding the legislation. In a recent CBC article, Steve Tissenbaum, a mobile commerce professor at Ryerson University’s Ted Rogers School of Management, expressed concern regarding the legislation’s inability to address scalpers who may be operating outside of Ontario and hiding their identities using proxy IP addresses. Progressive Conservative MPP Jim McDonell, the critic of government and consumer services, called the act “a band-aid solution at best.”

Critics of the legislation also believe the cap on resale prices is problematic. “If you don’t provide a platform for people to sell for more, they’ll simply go t o underground sites, because there will still be a demand ... there’s never going to be enough tickets,” said Catherine Moore, an adjunct professor of Music Technology & Digital Media at U of T. StubHub echoed Moore’s sentiments; in a recent Global News article, Laura Dooley, the company’s Senior Manager of Government Affairs, stated that the cap would “expose fans to higher instances of fraud” as fans go

The real ticket masters Ticket bots are banned in Ontario and sellers have upgraded their technology to fend them off — but is this enough to win the arms race against this software?

Article by Alex Tough Illustrations by Julien Balbontin

underground, where there is “non-existent customer service.”

Broadly, Canadians are unsure if the government should control ticket bots. A recent poll published by the Angus Reid Institute illustrated that, although eight in 10 Canadians supported making ticket bots illegal, they were split down the middle on whether changing the ticket marketplace should be the responsibility of the government or the industry.

If half of Canadians feel that the ticket bots should be handled by the industry, what have they done so far to reduce ticket bot attacks?

It seems that there isn’t an industry standard: each seller has their own defense plan.

Eventbrite uses an “algorithmic approach,” which consists of weeding out scalpers in three stages: before the purchase is finalized, within a few minutes of completion of purchase before the tickets sell out, and after all tickets are sold, conducting a “paper scrape” in the days that follow.

Ticketmaster, in contrast, uses a wider range of techniques to stop ticket bots.

According to a spokesperson from the company, these techniques include IP blocking; behavioural identification, which is when nefarious users are blocked; paperless ticketing, which requires fans to present the credit card and photo ID to gain access

to the event; and “over the limit” sweeps, cancelling orders of persons “who exceed ticket limits imposed by a venue or artist/ event management.”

However, scalpers have easily circumvented the latter two methods. In an interview with Vice, legendary scalper Ken Lowson stated that with multiple credit cards and multiple addresses — thus appearing to be several different people — a careful scalper can easily beat the over the limit sweeps.

Paperless ticketing is also not an issue according to Lowson. Wiseguy, the scalping company run by Lowson before his arrest for wire fraud charges in 2010, would request its wholesalers to ask their clients for their credit card numbers, before entering the credit card numbers when paying, just like any other client.

But Ticketmaster is evolving. Most recently, the company launched the Verified Fan program, where ticket buyers are screened to confirm their authenticity as fans of the artist prior to getting first dibs on tickets.

In the case of ticket sales for Taylor Swift’s most recent tour, which used a version of the Verified Fan program, fans were measured as authentic by their participation in “boosting” activities such as buying her new album, watching videos, sharing links on social media. Nonetheless, given the sophistication of many scalpers, fans who spend a considerable amount of time boosting Swift may not even get tickets.

In addition, there is also “dynamic pricing,” where ticket prices are not set but fluctuate according to demand. This was the approach used in ticket sales for the hit Broadway musical Hamilton, which was successful in reducing the price of tickets on reselling sites.

However, doubt has been expressed as to whether this measure will translate into more tickets for the average fan. “[Ticketmaster] will simply BECOME the scalper, eliminating [the resellers] from the mix,” wrote Nine Inch Nails frontman Trent Reznor on the band’s messaging board.

Show me the tickets

If the most recent measures taken by the ticketing industry seem to favour sellers and artists, and in some cases makes it easy for resellers t o circumvent them, then is the industry really looking out for the fans? Dean Budnick, co-author of Ticket Masters: The Rise of the Concert Industry and How the Public Got Scalped, in an interview with Vice, may have given the answer: “Ticketmaster’s job is to

sell tickets,” said Budnick. “They want to sell as many tickets as they can, and if they want to sell to thousands of people who are going to resell them, they have a right to do that.

That’s what the laws are.”

Last year, the New York Attorney General’s office released a “comprehensive” report on the ticketing industry. They determined that “the majority of tickets for the most popular concerts are not reserved for the general public,” with an average of 46 per cent of tickets on sale for the public; the rest of the tickets are acquired in presales, put on hold for promoters, or “sold directly to scalpers by the venues themselves.”

In between bots, legislation, and a reduced number of tickets available to the public, typical concert-goers like students looking to decompress after midterms or fulfill their long awaited wishes to see their dream band in the flesh will have to shell out more money than ever to do that. This makes listening to your favorite music live a luxury.

Arts&Culture

January 29, 2018 var.st/arts arts@thevarsity.ca

Infinite adoration for Kusama’s Infinity Mirrors The Japanese artist’s retrospective comes to the AGO in March Edgar Vargas Varsity Columnist

If you’ve been commuting in Toronto lately, you’ve likely seen minimalist advertisements around the city featuring mostly blank canvases covered with red polka dots. These vibrant designs, which also cover streetcars and construction sites, advertise the Yayoi Kusama: Infinity Mirrors art exhibition, which comes to the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO) this spring from March 3 to May 7. It is the exhibit’s only Canadian stop on a twoyear North American tour.

Infinity Mirrors is a retrospective on acclaimed Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama, and it features six of her immersive and participatory art pieces. The pieces on display were all created between 1965 and 2016, and they exist in confined rooms meant to accommodate only two to three people at a time, in order to ensure a more private experience of the work for the individual.

At 88 years old, Kusama is experiencing newfound popularity. Her work is now reaching peak levels of adoration and respect, as her retrospectives have sold out around the world. Though she has been creating art since the late 1950s and has worked in similar circles as other avant-garde artists like Andy Warhol and Allan Kaprow, she has never been as much of a household name as she has been in the 21st century.

The works comprising the exhibit are pieces from the 1960s, 1990s, and 2000s that feel timeless and are meant to evoke feelings of being lost in infinity, making them perfectly suited to a retrospective. The pieces invite you to experience a deeply personal exploration of yourself as your eyes wander through rooms filled with countless images of Kusama’s patterned sculptures or seas of LED lights aglow in the mirrored walls. The

rooms’ evocative titles, like “Aftermath of Obliteration and Eternity” and “The Souls of Millions of Light Years Away,” pair well with their visual accompaniments.

Since 1975, Kusama has spent the majority of her life in a Japanese mental hospital that she voluntarily checked herself into on the advice of her psychiatrist, and she has created her art in a studio near the hospital. Her work creates visual representations of the audio-visual hallucinations she suffers from.

“My artwork is an expression of my life, particularly of my mental disease,” said Kusama in an 1999 interview with BOMB magazine. “I translate the hallucinations and obsessional images that plague me into sculptures and paintings. All my works in pastels are the products of obsessional neurosis and are therefore inextricably connected to my disease.”

Kusama’s growth in popularity since the exhibit started touring in 2017 is likely due in part to the heavy advertisement of her work that social media permits. An experience like Infinity Mirrors, one that is both deeply personal but also highly exclusive due to its limited availability, is the kind of event that takes over social media feeds worldwide.

Her mirrored rooms benefit greatly from daily documentation — and the selfie specifically — as sharing their images allows audiences around the globe a glimpse into Kusama’s world. The AGO has even encouraged sharing selfies taken in the mirrored rooms with #InfiniteKusama.

While Kusama has been creating these experimental and deeply participatory works for decades, her art’s themes of infinity, contemplation of the self, and the mystery of the afterlife ring strong and true now more than ever. Her art represents both a complement to our involved digital age and a moment in time that can exist completely apart.

Artist Yayoi Kusama sits submerged in her thought-provoking exhibitionist artwork. PHOTO COURTESY OF YAYOI KUSAMA

Whether one chooses to document their short time spent in the Infinity Mirrors exhibit or not, the effect these six rooms will have on their audience will be sure to bring us all closer to Kusama’s mind and vision, as well our own individual perceptions of self.

Obtaining tickets for the exhibits has already become notoriously difficult, with tens of thousands of tickets selling out each time that the AGO releases more. Understanding the demand, the AGO website has an 11-part FAQ on how to better your chances of get-

ting tickets to the exhibit, as well as separate sections explaining the importance of arriving on time and how long a guest will have in each Infinity Room.

The long queues and exhaustive planning necessary may not seem enticing, but the gallery has never before had such a popular exhibit, where demand greatly exceeds the number of tickets and available time slots.

The next batch of tickets for Infinity Mirrors goes on sale on March 6 at 10:00 am.

Kusama aims for her bright patterns to inspire unconventional thinking.

PHOTO BY TOMOAKI MAKINO, COURTESY OF YAYOI KUSAMA

JANUARY 29, 2018 • 15

var.st/arts

I’m not ashamed to love The Room The Disaster Artist’s source material has its own merits Katie Macintosh

Varsity Columnist

“Imagine a movie so incomprehensible that you find yourself compelled to watch it over and over again.”

So writes Greg Sestero in the author’s note of The Disaster Artist: My Life Inside The Room, The Greatest Bad Movie Ever Made, co-written with Tom Bissell. Published in 2013, the book details the production of what is widely reputed to be the worst movie ever made — and now, it’s been adapted into a feature film by none other than James Franco.

I am not ashamed to admit that I love The Room. I have seen it more times than I can count, and I have strong-armed all of my

friends into watching it. And I would happily spend my hard-earned dollars to attend one of its legendary midnight screenings, where audience members engage in the ritualistic practice of collectively yelling phrases at the screen during certain scenes.

Obviously, I am not alone in my fanaticism. In the 14 years since its original release, The Room has achieved near-mythical status in the canon of the so-called ‘trash film,’ a genre defined by low budgets and amateurish production. So great is the fervour of The Room’s fan base that it has been the subject of actual empirical research.

Given the film’s notoriety, I was not altogether surprised when I first heard that The Disaster Artist — which, yes, I have read through multiple times — was on its way to the big screen. I was torn:

MIA CARNEVALE/THE VARSITY

excited on the one hand, nervous on the other.

I was excited because I will gleefully consume any Room-related media without hesitation — did you know that some wonderful soul made an entire tribute game on Newgrounds? Because I sure did! — and I was nervous because the very concept of a Disaster Artist movie seemed too contradictory a project to be successful.

A study published in the journal Poetics, which examined audiences’ consumption of trash films, found that people who watch movies like The Room do so largely because they appreciate their marked deviance from the norms of mainstream cinema. The appeal of these films lies in their transgressive nature. This is as true for The Room as for any other ‘trash’ movie — films such as The Black Gestapo (1975), Roadhouse (1989), or Ben & Arthur (2003). To quote Disaster Artist co-author Bissell, “[The Room] is like a movie made by an alien who has never seen a movie, but has had movies thoroughly explained to him.”

The Room is fun to watch because, despite the veneer of legitimacy afforded it by a $6 million budget, it is conspicuously missing every single element that makes for a ‘good’ movie. It is full of plot holes and abandoned subplots; its characters’ motivations are inscrutable, illogical, or both; its writing is nonsensical at best, syntactically splintered at worst.

In sharp contrast to The Room, The Disaster Artist is beautifully shot, wonderfully acted, and it possesses a coherent narrative structure. It bears all the markers of your typical mainstream movie.

And yet The Disaster Artist does not feel typical. This is especially thanks to Franco’s masterful portrayal of Tommy Wiseau, the maverick who wrote, directed, produced, and starred in The Room. Franco’s Wiseau is so uncannily familiar it verges on the surreal, down to his singularly ambiguous accent, described by Sestero and Bissell as “an Eastern European accent that had been hit by a Parisian bus.”

At the same time, The Disaster Artist’s treatment of Wiseau is never cruel, though it easily could have been. It does an exceedingly good job of humanizing a figure that has captivated the public through his eccentricity. The Disaster Artist embraces the niche-ness of its source material, but it does so in a way that makes it compatible with a big-budget, big-name production.

Yes, there are pitfalls to wrestling a movie like The Room into the framework of a Hollywood feature. To a great extent, enjoyment of The Disaster Artist requires familiarity with The Room — I suspect that, for the uninitiated, the film may be more confusing than hilarious.

That said, when you look past its esoteric exterior, the core themes of The Disaster Artist, I think, hold a broader appeal. At the end of the day, the movie is asking its viewers an important question: what is art, and what makes it ‘good?’

“The Room, to me, shatters the distinction between good and bad,” Bissell told Vox in an interview earlier this year. “Do I think it’s a good movie? No. Do I think it’s a strong movie that moves me on the level that art usually moves me? Absolutely not. But I can’t say it’s bad because … it’s brought me so much joy.”

Overlooked: Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, Jane the Virgin Alongside its staple of superhero shows, The CW network’s stronger series have gone under the radar Reut Cohen Arts and Culture Editor

The merged successor to The WB and UPN, The CW is a joint venture between CBS and Warner Bros. Since its debut in 2006, the network has had its growing pains, but it was still at the forefront of the teen melodrama with shows such as Gossip Girl, 90210, and The Vampire Diaries.

In recent years, though, the network might as well have been known as the superhero show channel, home to DC comic adaptations including Arrow, Supergirl, and The Flash. Yet aside from these anchors, in addition to the blockbuster Supernatural, the network’s lineup also currently includes a number of compelling series that are not getting the attention they deserve.

Every so often, there is a piece of pop culture that makes you feel truly seen. For me, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is one such show.

Its depiction of Jewish female anxiety is part of my favourite growing niche in media, alongside the hysterical Broad City, Amazon’s recent The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, as well as elements of other shows like Transparent and unREAL. Co-creator Rachel Bloom, previously best-known for the viral YouTube parody song “Fuck Me, Ray Bradbury,” is wonderful as Rebecca Bunch, a New York corporate lawyer who moves to West Covina, California in pursuit of a former

summer camp fling. Rebecca’s delusional pursuit of happiness, in the form of Josh Chan, is initially both cringe-worthy and riveting, but the viewer soon begins to feel real empathy for the show’s clearly damaged protagonist.

Despite being a critical darling, CXG is one of the lowest-rated shows on television, having taken the bottom spot in fall rankings for each of the three years it’s been on the air. The show is simply not reaching enough people — a true shame, since it includes a brilliant ensemble cast, clever musical numbers, and one of the best portrayals of mental illness on television.

CXG effortlessly moves between genres to pursue its ultimate goal: a deconstruction of the societal norms of romance. I could write essays on its use of musical parodies, but instead I will direct you to a couple of my recent favorites: “Let’s Have Intercourse,” a pitch-perfect Ed Sheeran mockery, and "The End of the Movie,” which warns against treating your life as a straightforward narrative — with the use of a killer cameo. To say nothing of classics like “Friendtopia,” “Fit Hot Guys Have Problems Too,” and “Let’s Generalize About Men.” Not far ahead of CXG in the ratings is Jane the Virgin, my go-to recommendation anytime someone asks me what they should watch next.

Jane the Virgin begins with a ridiculous

premise — literally ‘straight out of a telenovela’ — as Jane, who planned on waiting until marriage to have sex, is accidentally artificially inseminated.

Despite this absurd starting point, I haven’t seen anything else on TV that can compare in terms of heart. The show’s quirks, such as its omniscient narrator known as the Latin Lover and its tendency to indulge in plot twists like evil twins and child kidnappings, belie its core: a smart and often touching portrayal of love, life, and family.

I haven’t even mentioned the postapocalyptic drama The 100, or Riverdale, the show we are all growing to love to hate.

Suffice it to say that treating The CW as solely the domain of Greg Berlanti is both an incorrect assumption and one that’s a shame. Behind the archery, capes, and lightning bolts are a handful of series that are well worth the watch.

Overlooked is a recurring feature in the Arts & Culture section where writers make the case for pieces of culture that don’t get the attention they deserve. To contribute, email arts@thevarsity.ca.

IRIS DENG/THE VARSITY

16 • THE VARSITY • ARTS & CULTURE

arts@thevarsity.ca

Theatre review: Hart House’s The Crucible The show examines the cyclical nature of scapegoating for political means Leah Kuperman Varsity Theatre Critic

Last Friday, Hart House Theatre opened its run of Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, the theatre’s third production of the 2017–2018 season.

First performed in 1953, the play is a partially fictionalized story of the events of the Salem witch trials. Beneath the surface, the play is an allegory for the mania and finger-pointing of McCarthyism, as well as the Cold War era during Miller’s time, of which he himself was a victim. The Crucible is a highly political piece that questions religion, human nature, gossip, and mob mentality.

The show takes place after a young girl falls ill, leading the town to believe the illness was caused by witchcraft. The remainder of the show is, for lack of a better word, a witch hunt; a witch hunt to determine who has turned away from Christ and toward the Devil. The people of Salem begin to accuse

their neighbours of witchcraft based on personal vendettas, affairs gone awry, and business arrangements.

Hart House’s rendition presented a new dimension to the character of Abigail Williams, the play’s central antagonist.

Played by Courtney Lamanna, she allows the audience to see that Abigail may not simply be a conniving villain, but rather a girl who fell in love based on a false promise. Lamanna makes the character relatable, emphasizing the universal emotions of Abigail’s story.

Thomas Gough also gives an excellent performance in the role of Giles Corey, providing some much-needed comic relief in this otherwise dreary tale. Magda UculmanaFalcon is highly compelling in her heartwrenching, emotional performance as Tituba.

When I spoke with director Michael Rubinstein before the show, he told me that his goal was to make the story “as accessible as possible” by breaking down any barriers that might separate the audience from

Behold: McCarthyism. PHOTO BY SCOTT GORMAN, COURTESY OF HART HOUSE THEATRE

The actress playing Abigail Williams lies and waits for evil spirits to be lifted from her.

PHOTO BY SCOTT GORMAN, COURTESY OF HART HOUSE THEATRE

connecting with the story.

The costumes and set design accomplish this well, with actors clad in simple, mostly black and brown attire that would not be out of place today. The set is simplistic and bare, allowing the story to feel as though it could be set anywhere. Simple beams, withered trees, and wooden furniture further contribute to the puritanical yet eerie feel of the show.

The second act represents a downward descent into chaos. While The Crucible’s first act is full of excitement, its second act leaves something to be desired. Though staying true to Miller’s work should be and is a priority to this production, the repetitive dialogue

regarding seeing the Devil and being a bad Christian might have been reinvigorated to greater effect.

Overall, the show did its job. I left questioning how much of this story can be left in the past and how much of it applies to the events of the world today. The Crucible shows us that many of the trends of today’s politics have been repeated over the course of history. It’s a raw look at the use of scapegoating for political purposes.

The Crucible runs at Hart House Theatre until February 3.

Theatre review: VCDS’ lady in the red dress The show explores discrimination against Chinese-Canadians, both past and present Khyrsten Mieras Varsity Theatre Critic

The Victoria College Drama Society (VCDS) began 2018 with its production of lady in the red dress on Thursday, January 25 at The Cat’s Eye Student Pub & Lounge. The show examines the anti-Asian racism surrounding the Chinese head tax imposed by the Canadian government, as well as issues of sexism, violence, and death.

The play takes place in Toronto and loosely follows the timeline of the Chinese head tax, alternating between present day and the early 1900s.

A talented young cast was on hand for this adaptation of David Yee’s play, portraying their characters in dramatic yet realistic and comical ways. Max (James Hyett), a lawyer negotiating the head tax redress, encounters Sylvia (Kenzie Tsang), an enigmatic woman in a red dress looking for vengeance.

Sylvia drags him into the history of the Chinese-Canadian struggle, and her search for the elusive Tommy Jade (Nam Nguyen).

Along the way, Max is shot, stabbed, suffers a

heart attack, and discovers that his son Danny (Cy Macikunas) has been taken hostage. As the show progresses, Max experiences the discrimination against Chinese-Canadians and the effects of the head tax firsthand.

While Max is at first insensitive to these disparities, he comes to the realization that everyone has a collective responsibility to do the right thing and draw attention to the harsh history endured by past generations.

Gianni Sallese gives brilliant performances in the roles of Hatch and Coogan, and Alice Guo and Victoria Ngai’s non-speaking roles in the chorus also added to the dramatics.

Overall, lady in the red dress is an extraordinary play that portrays the diversity of a predominantly Chinese-Canadian story well with Chinese and mixed actors. It reverberates the significance of Canada’s diversity today, especially in Toronto, and helps us to shift our perspectives on critical issues of injustice. lady in the red dress ran at The Cat’s Eye from January 25–27.

From left to right, Alice Guo, Kenzie Tsang, James Hyett, and Victoria Ngai performed at The Cat's Eye last week.

PHOTO BY LUCY FANG, COURTESY OF THE VCDS

Science

January 29, 2018 var.st/science science@thevarsity.ca

BIO120 instructors to retire after more than 25 years on the job A reflection on Spencer Barrett’s and James Thomson’s impact on students

Dr. Spencer Barrett lectures in Convocation Hall. PHOTO COURTESY OF PROFESSOR MARC JOHNSON

Anastasia Pitcher Varsity Contributor

On a cold day last December, Professors Spencer Barrett and James Thomson gave their last BIO120 lecture. Both will retire later this year. The ultimate tag team, these two have been a cornerstone of U of T’s Life Science program. Barrett has been teaching ecology and evolution to nearly every Life Science undergraduate who has passed through Convocation Hall’s doors since 1990, with Thomson joining him in 2007.

Thomson is a captivating lecturer who often opts for showing rather than telling.

Nothing woke students up faster over the years than his annual demonstrations, which included dangling a rat over a blender to show the difference between studying whole organisms compared to studying blended cells and heating up a pinecone with a hair dryer to demonstrate how pinecones release seeds after a forest fire.

Barrett is memorable for weaving tales of Darwin’s adventures with stories from his own decades of experience. Showing past photos of himself waist-deep in water hyacinths and scenic panoramas, Barrett’s lectures kept eyes open even at the earliest hours.

Barrett’s impact is exemplified well in his successor for BIO120, Stephen Wright.

Wright, now an associate professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, was taught BIO120, then known as BIO150, by Barrett.

Wright gained some of his first research experience in the Barrett lab. Driven by enthusiasm, excitement, and a stomach full of butterflies, Wright contacted Barrett when he was in the second year of his undergraduate degree to ask about a lab position. “I can remember my hand shaking as I picked up the phone, at the prospect of speaking directly to this ‘rock star’ Prof [who] had given [these] awe-inspiring lectures to us in first year,” wrote Wright.

Barrett helped him become an effective member of the lab, igniting his passion for evolutionary biology. “I got to attend lab

meetings, measure plants, do fieldwork, chase bees with flowers tied to sticks, and conduct my own research project on Trillium [flowers],” recalled Wright.

Students have sometimes shaped Barrett’s research as well. During a BIO120 tutorial a few years ago, between questions about polymorphisms and Darwin, Barrett fielded a question about genetic drift that he did not how to answer. Having to ponder this question led to innovative work in his laboratory.

“Thinking about the problem [led me] to think more deeply about the system I study,” said Barrett, adding that it led to one of his laboratory’s most important discoveries.

“That is often the way science works. Students asking good questions!”

Thomson is quite the act to follow as well, with his infectious humour and habit of putting on blues classics from his youth in Convocation Hall before class. He was awarded the President’s Teaching Award in 2016 and was also named a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. Recognized both as an educator and a scholar, this is an extraordinary combination of highly prestigious awards.

“I now have a small but choice collection of handdrawn pika pictures. You probably can’t imagine how affecting these are,” said Thomson.

“My role models excelled in both teaching and research, and this pair of awards makes me feel that I have been able to live up to their example,” explained Thomson.

Thomson’s successor, Megan Frederickson, recognizes the gravity of assuming this new teaching assignment. Having taught EEB440 with Thomson for many years, she hopes to keep his teaching style of both showing and telling.

“He’d always bring the students to his lab to see the (live) bumblebees he was studying in flight cages—a great example of synergism between teaching and research,” wrote Fred-

erickson.

Thomson and Barrett are both proud of the doctoral students they have supervised. Of Thomson’s 23 students, he said, “The credit for their success belongs to them, but a little bit of glory gets reflected back to me.”

Barrett also spoke fondly of the PhD students he supervised. “Seeing them achieve their goal is one of the best things about being an academic.”

Regarding their retirement, both professors feel a sense of sadness but also excitement for the future of BIO120. Thomson will miss everything about lecturing except writing exams and assigning grades. Barrett felt the weight of his last BIO120 lecture, realizing that it was the end of a 40-year teaching era. “I was very aware that this was finally the end and that had a certain sadness attached to it... I have always considered teaching the course an unusual privilege that I never took for granted, so giving that all up was bittersweet.”

Despite this, he has faith in the course’s new instructors and looks forward to seeing BIO120 evolve with new instructors who will bring their own passion and ideas to the course.

Thomson’s iconic model organism, the pika, will not be forgotten any time soon either. Despite never personally researching the animal, Thomson, who conducts most of his summer fieldwork in the alpine habitats of Colorado, enjoys going out of his way to the talus slopes to seek out the rabbitlike creatures. “I intend to keep those projects going as long as I stay healthy enough to handle the altitude. So, yes, pikas are in my future. Things are looking good,” explained Thomson.

He has been collecting thank you notes over the years, mementos of the many students whom he has inspired. “I now have a small but choice collection of hand-drawn pika pictures. You probably can’t imagine how affecting these are,” said Thomson.

As this chapter closes, Barrett’s advice to students is, “Believe in yourselves and be prepared for long hours of hard work and deciding on what excites you most.”

BIO120 professors Dr. Spencer Barrett and Dr. James Thomson will retire this year.

PHOTO COURTESY OF ANA TYSZKO

He also urges us to not take the opportunities we have for granted. “In Canada we are exceptionally fortunate to have great universities... [and] opportunities that students in less developed countries can only dream of.”

Thomson found his path toward an academic career in the charisma and inspiration of his own professors. His advice to students is to get involved with those whose work you find inspiring and impactful. “U of T has many profs... who can transmit their love for what they do. Find out who they are,” he urged.

New BIO120 students filing into Convocation Hall next September will not be instructed by Thomson or Barrett, but they have left their marks. And maybe, just maybe, a pika or water hyacinth will find its way onto a set of lecture slides.

18 • THE VARSITY • SCIENCE

science@thevarsity.ca

Tip of the tongue First language attrition in bilinguals is more common than you think Hai Lin Wang Varsity Contributor

It was lunchtime and my co-worker asked me to make a note of what I wanted for takeout. Working as a summer-term English teacher in Tianjin, China at the time, I was eager to try boxed lunches that were popular among the students. I remember struggling and erasing my draft several times before I could admit that I forgot how to write the Chinese character for ‘box.’

This scenario was just one of many since my family’s migration from China to Canada. As a nine-year-old child, I practiced calligraphy, recited poetry, and loved Chinese literature class. If I were to meet my former self, I may

not be able to out-compete her in Chinese language skills.

This experience resonates with many bilingual speakers who can comprehend text and speech in their first language but have trouble speaking and writing in it.

Researchers at the University of Essex believe attrition in a healthy bilingual adult ultimately arises from competition between the two languages in the brain.

Although both languages are active, one will eventually dominate. In addition, continuous inhibition of the native language can make recalling vocabulary and syntax difficult, since the brain substitutes these with those of the second language.

Age is one of the biggest factors that lead to a decline in native language proficiency.

STEVEN LEE/THE VARSITY

Children who immigrate before reaching puberty — which is often considered the critical period for cementing language skills — are the most prone to first language attrition because their mother tongue has not been fully acquired yet.

Due to the plasticity in developing brains, linguistic concepts children learn from their first language are not stored permanently. Along with prolonged inhibition by a newly acquired second language, this causes a gradual loss of

the language.

On the other hand, adolescents past the critical period are less prone to first language attrition, but the access pathway for the retrieval of the language can be influenced by the second language. For example, vocabulary and grammar substitutions can occur, but the underlying principles remain intact.

Contrary to popular belief, prolonged contact with the native culture’s migrant group cannot prevent attrition. In fact, this can make the speaker more susceptible to interference.

A French study comparing isolated contact and continuous contact with immigrant communities found that frequently switching between two languages and activating the languages together eventually leads to native language attrition.

The brain cannot completely inhibit the second language when activating the first language, resulting in the interference of concepts from both. This gradual loss is characterized by restructured sentences and grammar.

It can be difficult to accept that you are no longer proficient in your native language.

Like many other immigrants, I experienced culture shock upon my arrival to Canada. I longed to speak English as fluently as my peers. The desire to assimilate to a new culture can overpower the desire to maintain a native one. As a result, some children may even feel ashamed of their native language due to feelings of social rejection.

Eventually, these thoughts morph into an innate desire to forget the native language, which can have devastating effects on its maintenance.

A study on German fluency in Jewish Germans who immigrated to America just before or after the onset of World War II showed that there were drastic reductions in syntax and vocabulary compared to the successful

maintenance of German in immigrants who were not affected by World War II. Typical linguistic factors, such as age and language exposure, had little influence on attrition. Instead, the traumatic prosecution endured by Jewish Germans and their wish for acceptance from American society caused them to distance themselves from German culture, and in turn, the German language.

These factors pose a big problem for immigrants, especially of our generation, because language is so intertwined with culture and identity.

So how do we recover what has been lost?

There needs to be just enough exposure to the language — but not too much — to prevent interference. Short periods of intense cultural exposure are the most ideal, especially if that exposure takes place in a person’s native country.

A case study shows that perhaps even a 10-day visit is sufficient and can provide more opportunities for first language activation and language production than typical weekend language schools.

Bilingualism is not a black-and-white concept — it exists as a spectrum ranging from dominance of one language to a balanced state where the two languages are equally active. Languages are fluid and constantly changing along with our environment.

On my flight back to Toronto Pearson International Airport from Tianjin, the man sitting beside me asked if I could help translate his declaration card from English to Chinese because it was his first time flying to a foreign country. He then asked about the cultural differences that he would encounter in Canada. I realized that, despite my brief language attrition, perhaps that is the greatest benefit of bilingualism — the ability to bridge two cultures.

A catalyst for sustainable production U of T research group develops catalyst that turns carbon dioxide into plastic

Phil De Luna holds up the catalyst that allows for artificial photosynthesis.

PHOTO COURTESY OF PHIL DE LUNA

Vibhor Rohatgi Varsity Contributor

Mitigating anthropogenic climate change is a significant issue we face in the 21st century. Today, through research and innovation, we are inching closer to a solution.

Recently, a group led by Dr. Ted Sargent, a U of T professor in Electrical & Computer Engineering and the Canada Research Chair

in Nanotechnology, published a solution to this persistent problem in Nature Catalysis.

The researchers used an electroreduction reaction that converts carbon dioxide (CO₂), the principal greenhouse gas responsible for driving changes in Earth’s climate, into various hydrocarbon products, including ethylene, which is a precursor to most of the plastics omnipresent in our societies today.

The team developed a copper catalyst,

which was studied at the Canadian Light Source facility in Saskatchewan.

“Where plants can take carbon dioxide, water, sunlight and make sugars - we take carbon dioxide, water, and renewable energy and make fuels and feedstocks. In this specific project, we found a catalyst that can make ethylene very selectively,” wrote Phil De Luna, U of T PhD student and lead author of the study, in an email to The Varsity.

In this sense, the researchers have developed a method for artificial photosynthesis.

“We were able to track how the material changes during [the] reaction, something that had never been done before with CO2 reduction,” he wrote.

The team’s study is the culmination of a year-long effort to progress research in sustainable materials and long-term energy storage technology and to scale the project from a laboratory setting to a pilot stage.

In fact, the group’s insights and persistence have seen them crowned as one of 23 semi-finalists for the Carbon XPrize — a global competition that rewards $20 million to the team that can best capture and convert CO₂ into a useful product.

There can be potentially huge implications in chemical and manufacturing industries with the adoption of this technology,

given that the global demand for polyethylene resins is expected to rise to 99.6 million metric tons in 2018.

According to De Luna, this technology could be used at a commercial scale and aid in sustainable plastic production. Non-biodegradable plastics, like water bottles and packaging, are difficult to recycle, and the only current solution is to burn them, which releases CO₂ into the atmosphere.

“However, [if] we can take waste plastic, burn it, capture the CO2, and then recycle it back into plastics, we can completely close that loop,” wrote De Luna.

Apart from sustainable ethylene production with relatively little waste output, similar technologies can be used to convert CO₂ into a myriad of products based on reaction conditions and the type of catalyst used.

Some of these products include syngas, a precursor to synthetic fuel and biofuels, natural gas, and formic acid that is commonly used in textile manufacturing.

“This is a very active field of research right now,” said De Luna. “Scientists all over the world are trying to find ways to make specific products efficiently, selectively, and cheaply.

It’s an incredibly exciting time for this technology.”

JANUARY 29, 2018 • 19

var.st/science

Not-so-ninja Turtles Selective pressures led to loss of weaponized tails in turtles Anya Rakhecha Varsity Contributor

Dinosaurs have been extinct for millions of years, yet we continue to be enamoured of them.

The legacy of dinosaurs isn’t just found at the movies, however, as there are several descendant species that currently inhabit the earth. Present-day lizards and birds inherited scaly skin and modified beaks from dinosaurs.

However, missing among these remnants of dinosaur ancestry are their magnificent weaponized tails. This caught the attention of Dr. Victoria Arbour, a postdoctoral fellow at U of T and the Royal Ontario Museum, and Dr. Lindsay Zanno, an Assistant Research Professor at North Carolina State University.

The pair recently published a study that investigated why certain amniotes — tetrapod vertebrates like reptiles and birds — no longer have bony spikes, focusing on turtles in particular.

Although turtles are one of the closest relatives to dinosaurs, they lack the rear defences that their ancestors once had. According to the study, this is partly because of various morphological and ecological constraints that might limit the bony tail weaponry from being passed down in amniote evolution.

The researchers found that this loss was a result of sexual and natural selection, specifically pertaining to locomotive, feeding, or defensive traits.

Bone formations of tail weaponry involve modifications to the stiffness of the tail toward the end of its attachment, its width to-

ward the centre, and the presence or absence of spikes at the end of it.

Arbour and Zanno classified tail weaponry into two categories: tail clubs and tail flails.

Instead of these structures, turtles hide their tail ends in dermal armour.

Amniote species like lizards and pangolins are known to use tails as an antipredator defence. For most of these amniotes, the use of tails as weapons is a last resort and usually used for vigilance or escape. The Agama lizard species are the only living creatures that use the tail for male-to-male combat.

Due to the high cost and risk of direct combat, the selective pressures favouring this behaviour were found to be weaker than other antipredator strategies. In addition, tail lashing as a defensive strategy requires such traits as having a large body size and thoracic stiffness, which are largely absent in present-day amniotes.

Arbour and Zanno made use of several museum collections to gather data needed for the study and stressed the importance of using fossils in this type of research. Of the species they analyzed, 164 of 286 were extinct species known only from fossil records.

“Including fossils into big picture studies of evolutionary patterns is important because there are many cases where animals known only from fossils have anatomical features

that aren’t present in modern day animals,” said Arbour in reference to the weaponized tails.

The pair hopes to continue to use fossils to study the descendants of dinosaurs. One avenue for further research, for example, is to study the evolutionary connection between glyptodonts, an extinct family of armadillos, and ankylosaurs, a heavily armoured dinosaur.

“Some of the next steps that Lindsay Zanno… and I are taking are to look at how similar glyptodonts and ankylosaurs really are - trying to measure the strength of convergent evolution in these two groups, and see if glyptodonts evolved tail clubs in the same stepwise pattern that ankylosaurs did,” wrote Arbour.

FIONA TUNG/THE VARSITY

Toronto is less effective at responding to air pollution than places like Santiago

To mitigate health effects that arise from air pollution, many major cities have employed air quality alert programs that enable users to receive updates on air quality conditions.

If air quality is poor, alerts will advise individuals to avoid outdoor activity.

However, the programs’ effectiveness is not regularly assessed due to a lack of research.

A recent study led by Dr. Hong Chen, U of T assistant professor at the Dalla Lana School of Public Health, found that air quality alert programs had few benefits to daily health outcomes of residents.

Using data from 2003–2012, the team

FIONA TUNG/THE VARSITY

identified seven health outcomes that are typically affected by an increase in shortterm air pollution that are related to cardiovascular or respiratory health.

According to the study, the only significant benefit to the programs was a reduction in asthma-related emergency visits by 25 per cent on days when air quality alerts were sent. Effects of the alerts on other related health outcomes were not significant.

Long-term air pollution also contributes to serious health problems like cancer and cardiovascular or respiratory diseases. Chen and his team hope that their findings will help improve future air quality policies.

“Prevention of air pollution burden depends on strong policy makers and sciencebased air quality standards, as well as on rigorous implementation of air management plans,” said Chen.

Chen and his team compared the effectiveness of the program used in Toronto to the one in Santiago, Chile. Santiago experiences a higher amount of daily air pollution than Toronto, and yet a 2015 study found the Chilean program to be more effective.

The alerts used in Santiago were responsible for preventing an estimated 20 air pollution-related deaths per one million people, and this is likely owed to the city’s more rigorous response to air pollution.

Toronto and other large North American cities respond to air quality alerts by admin-

Charmaine Nyakonda Varsity Staff

Postcards from the ‘real’ world of drinking water — case studies, unexpected events, and solutions Water treatment involves the application of science fields ranging from microbiology to engineering.

This presentation will delve into the challenges facing water treatment and practical solutions for providing a steady and safe supply of drinking water.

Date: Thursday, February 1 Time: 5:00–6:00 pm Location: Galbraith Building, 35 St. George Street, Room 217 Admission: Free with registration

Air quality alerts aren’t enough to protect public health Daniel Li Varsity Contributor

Science Around Town

istering information campaigns — typically through online and media advertisements.

These campaigns merely offer suggestions, such as avoiding outdoor physical activity and not participating in emissions-producing activities such as driving, but they do not force the public or industries to adhere to air quality programs.

In Santiago, however, government enforcement ensures that biomass combustion and operation of high-emissions factories are shut down on air quality alert days.

According to Chen, air quality alert programs can be improved through addressing urban and transportation planning and improving fuel standards and emission control — especially those used in industries.

“Air pollution problems may be best addressed through collective and enforceable actions... focusing only on days with the highest levels of pollution are unlikely to help address the most harmful effects of air pollution,” said Chen.

Research is still lacking, however, and Chen encourages students to contribute to the growing research field.

“We will still need powerful arguments and more evidence to support clean air agenda and to fend off potential assault against the science of air pollution,” said Chen. “This is an area with substantial public health significance. We would like to encourage more students to engage in this area of research.”

AstroTours - Magnetars: Nature at its extremes This talk will explore the incredible behaviour of magnetars — objects with the strongest magnetic fields in the universe. After the talk, you can enjoy an evening exploring the night sky through a telescope.

Date: Thursday, February 1 Time: 8:00 pm Location: McLennan Physical Laboratories, 60 St. George Street, Room 203 Admission: Free Into the Unknown: The future of space exploration The Astronomy & Space Exploration Society is hosting a symposium on the challenges of human technology and abilities in space. The event will feature guest speaker Dr. John Charles, chief of the International Science Office of NASA’s Human Research Program, and Professor Soon-Jo Chung, Associate Professor of Aerospace at the California Institute of Technology.

Date: Friday, February 2 Time: 6:00–9:00 pm Location: Earth Sciences Centre, 33 Wilcocks Street, Room 1050 Admission: Free with valid student ID, $10.00 for the general public Mental Health Symposium: Resilience - Your Blu Matters Three weeks into the new semester, deadlines, midterms, and papers are piling up. At this symposium, U of T students can meet and interact with researchers and professionals who are currently making strides in the field of mental health and wellness.

Date: Friday, February 2 Time: 6:00–9:00 pm Location: Sidney Smith Hall, 100 St. George Street, Room 2127 Admission: Free with registration

Sports

January 29, 2018 var.st/sports sports@thevarsity.ca

KPE Task Force looks to increase Indigenous involvement in Varsity Blues athletics Griffin Assance-Goulais discusses his journey to Varsity athletics Jackie Emick Associate Sports Editor

Lack of athletic opportunities, distance, and discrimination — these are all barriers that Indigenous Varsity Blues student athletes face on their university-level athletic journeys.

Article No. 90 of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada: Calls to Action states a clause to further ensure the equal participation of members of the Indigenous community within sports. This mandates development programs, awareness campaigns, and funding to bring Indigenous inclusivity to the University of Toronto athletic programs. Every postsecondary institution across Canada is mandated to follow and abide by this clause.

As recent conversations regarding inclusivity have been stirring around campus, The Varsity took a look at the University of Toronto’s athletic program’s official policies with regard to Indigenous student athletes by analyzing inclusivity initiatives, recruitment, the requirements under the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, and commentary from Indigenous student athletes.

How is the University of Toronto holding up?

Executive Director of the Faculty of Kinesiology and Physical Education’s (KPE) Co-Curricular Athletics and Physical Activity Programs Beth Ali provided The Varsity with a list of past and current initiatives that U of T has implemented to facilitate the inclusion of marginalized communities, particularly Indigenous athletes, in its sporting programs.

In the past, U of T has adopted initiatives to further its promise of achieving equity. These include the 1994 Gender Equity Task Force, the 2001 Report on Inclusive Practices for Ethnocultural, Racial and Religious groups, the Varsity Blues Athlete Ally program, the Change Room Project, and Hurdle to Success.

Created in 2016, the KPE Task Force on Race and Indigeneity encourages the KPE community to “continue to reflect, examine, critique and take action on race and Indigeneity as we work to realize our vision and values.”

Article No. 90 of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada “We call upon the federal government to ensure that national sports policies, programs, and initiatives are inclusive of Aboriginal peoples, including, but not limited to, establishing: i. In collaboration with provincial and territorial governments, stable funding for, and access to, community sports programs that reflect the diverse cultures and traditional sporting activities of Aboriginal peoples. ii. An elite athlete development program for Aboriginal athletes. iii. Programs for coaches, trainers, and sports officials that are culturally relevant for Aboriginal peoples. iv. Anti-racism awareness and training programs.

“This Task Force was created out of a symposium we held two years ago [in 2015] on accelerating action on race and indigeneity and that brought together a bunch of academic and non-academic people, as well as people from the indigenous community to talk about the truth and reconciliation report,” wrote Ali. The task force is in charge of presenting a report that examines the KPE. The interim report was originally scheduled to be published in December 2017 but has been pushed back to August 2018, and it is currently unknown when the concluding report will be published. This report is supposed to analyze and critique “anti-racism and Indigenous inclusion practices” and provide “substantive recommendations” and “an implementation framework involving measurable outcomes and timelines for implementation.”

“It will be interesting to see through the Task Force if there are better pathways to make that recruitment more meaningful from both sides,” wrote Ali. “[And] is there a way of enhancing our connections with the aboriginal community in order to assist us in recruiting more indigenous athletes and is there a way

to make ourselves more accessible?”

For most athletes, the journey to university-level athletics is not one that is easy or perfect. In an effort to further examine the journey of Indigenous athletes at U of T, Varsity Blues fullback Griffin Assance-Goulais, an Anishinaabe of Beausoleil First Nation and Nipissing First Nation, discussed his life and upbringing as an Indigenous athlete.

For Assance-Goulais, living up on Christian Island created a barrier when it came to access to sports. But once he moved off reserve to Sturgeon Falls, he had more exposure to athletic opportunities.

“That was one of the benefits I got when I moved up north in 2007, there was so much more opportunity school-wise and athletically,” said Assance-Goulais. “I actually had little to no exposure to sports before I moved, and even then it took a few years to fully get into sport, but I never would’ve been given that opportunity had my family stayed onreserve.”

In the spirit of facilitating inclusive recruitment, U of T runs the SOAR Indigenous Youth Gathering, an annual KPE program that invites 20 Indigenous youth ages 14–17 to “ex-

perience university life at U of T, visit Toronto landmarks, and participate in a series of recreational and Indigenous focused events and activities.”

The University of Western Ontario’s Mini University Program, which is similar to the U of T SOAR program, provides Indigenous youth with a one-week on-campus experiential learning program that involves activities in art research laboratories and the Athletic Centre.

The lack of high performance athletic opportunities in more remote regions of Ontario can also prove to be a hurdle when it comes to succeeding in sport.

“Coming from Sturgeon Falls, the football up north did not prepare me for the level of play at University, so I took any opportunity to play summer football and go to camps to play against better competition,” said Assance-Goulais.

His journey personifies the importance of programs like SOAR and Mini University Program. Without these experiences, athletes like Assance-Goulais wouldn’t have an introduction to high performance varsity athletics. Prospective student athletes who live in more remote regions and on reserves are often deprived of the same scouting and training opportunities that other athletes are given.

Despite this, Ali insists that the Varsity Blues athletic program still has the ability to find talented athletes in northern Indigenous communities.

“Our varsity coaches recruit anywhere where they feel there is an athlete that can make a difference to our program, said Ali. “Our coaches recruit everywhere.”

Still, in the future, U of T needs to do more to mandate and enforce the inclusion of Indigenous student athletes. This is not a policy that they should place on the back burner. Accommodations must continue to be made in order to ensure equal treatment and equal opportunities for all aspiring Indigenous student athletes.

“I definitely am working to better myself each and every day so that I can be a role model for youth in my community to look at and realize that it is not unthinkable to come to university, play sports and get a top notch education,” said Assance-Goulais.

MIA CARNEVALE/THE VARSITY

JANUARY 29, 2018 • 21

var.st/sports

Executive Director of Athletics and Physical Activity sets the record straight “Programs, facilities and services are for the entire student body”

The Faculty of Kinesiology and Exercise Science building is located at 713 Spadina Avenue. SHANNA HUNTER/THE VARSITY

Tamim Mansour Back End Web Developer

Confusion about sports facilities and services on campus is nothing new. For a long time, students have been puzzled over whether they can go skating in the Varsity Arena, how much Varsity Blues game tickets cost, what swimming lessons are available and — wait — are non-Kinesiology students allowed to use the pool at the Athletic Centre, or can we only use the one at Hart House?

The Faculty of Kinesiology and Physical Education (KPE) is mindful of these sorts of questions. Based on feedback from surveys and focus groups, Beth Ali, Executive Director of Athletics and Physical Activity, said that “first-year students… wouldn’t go in the buildings because they thought that the swim lessons, the open rec basketball, varsity programs or intramural programs were only for KPE students.”

To counter this confusion, the faculty has adopted the moniker of “U of T Sport and Rec” as a way to differentiate the division of the faculty that runs co-curricular activities from its academic division.

The name was first used last year as part of the faculty’s Come See What You Can Do campaign to “engage all U of T students in sport and physical activity and raise awareness [of] the facilities, programs and services offered.”

“What we were introducing was the concept, that we live in KPE, we work with KPE, but U of T Sport and Rec is for the entire university student body and all of our programs, facilities and services are for the entire student body,” wrote Ali. KPE is unique among other faculties in that it has an additional mandate to provide resources for sports and physical activity on all three campuses. This mandate is a result of a merger between the Department of Athletics and Recreation, the Graduate Program of Exercise Science, and the thennamed School of Physical and Health Education in 1998.

But with such a broad mandate, it can be unclear what exactly falls under it given the breadth of programs and services related to sports and physical activity on the three campuses.

The most important point to note is that every student pays an ancillary fee to KPE and that the revenue collected is part of a co-curricular budget run by U of T Sport and Rec. This fee accounts for about 70 per cent of U of T Sport and Rec’s operating revenue, and it is kept separate from the budget run by the academic side of the faculty.

This means that the facilities, programs, and services operated by U of T Sport and Rec are open to all students. These facilities include the Athletic Centre, the Varsity Stadium and Arena, the Back Campus Fields, and even the intimidatingly named Goldring Centre for High Performance Sport.

A portion of the ancillary fee is remitted to UTM and UTSC to run programming for their own campuses. The operation of their facilities, which include UTM’s Recreation, Athletic and Wellness Centre and UTSC’s Toronto Pan Am Sports Centre, is funded by a separate fee from UTM and UTSC students.

U of T Sport and Rec also runs tricampus programs like intramurals and Varsity Blues. The Tri-Campus Development League is a particular program where two teams from UTSG and one team from UTM and UTSC each compete in a semester-long tournament with weekly practices.

U of T Sport and Rec is the largest employer of students on campus with over $5 million of operating expenses paid to 1,114 student employees. Ali believes that as a university employer, KPE is more mindful of the challenges student employees face in balancing work and studies.

“There’s an understanding that, yes you’re an employee, but you’re also a student and because you’re a student, you being successful as a student is our first priority. You working for us is the second priority,” said Ali.

22 • THE VARSITY • SPORTS

sports@thevarsity.ca

Commuting across campuses as a Varsity Blues athlete U of T athletics can be difficult for students situated outside UTSG — one UTM athlete details her experiences

MIA CARNEVALE/THE VARSITY

Julia Costanzo Varsity Contributor

As a third-year student athlete, I compete for the Varsity Blues field hockey team while studying Communication, Culture, Information & Technology and Professional Writing and Communication — majors only offered at UTM. When people ask me what being a Varsity Blues athlete at UTM is like, my answer is simple: I love it. Every now and then I might envy the simplicity of school and field hockey being in the same place, but overall, I view my unique situation as an opportunity to experience the best of what both UTSG and UTM have to offer my athletic and academic careers.

There is no such thing as a ‘typi-

cal day’ for me, as my daily routine changes based on my class schedule, commute times, and training requirements. As a student living in downtown Toronto, I catch the UTM shuttle bus in front of Hart House to get to classes, then I take the return shuttle downtown to lift weights, go to practice, study, and sleep.

Sometimes, especially during our off-season, I spend more hours per week on the bus than I do at practice.

Depending on the day, I make use of my time on the bus differently. I might do readings, work on assignments for class, catch up on sleep, or rest before practice. I try to make my commute either productive or enjoyable so that I’m less likely to dread it.

Organization is key. I fill the pages of my planner and constantly receive

updates from my Google Calendar. In order to perform my best on the field and in the classroom, I focus all of my energy on the task at hand. At training, I think about field hockey; in class, I think about my coursework. These responsibilities — along with my job at the Munk School of Global Affairs, writing for The Varsity, and working with the UTM Innovation Association — are ordered so that I can complete everything I need to. This way I never get too overwhelmed.

My team has always been supportive and accommodating of me.

If I’m late to practice or if I have to skip a lift, everyone understands. Our schedule can be flexible, so I miss as little as possible.

But given the difference in UTM and UTSG’s academic calendars, I

commonly face logistical challenges.

For example, this year I started classes earlier than my teammates, and I had a different fall reading week and a slightly different exam period.

I always look forward to spending time with my teammates on and off the field. In my first year, as I navigated two unfamiliar campuses, my teammates immediately made me feel at home downtown. We like to eat meals, work at the library, and watch other Blues games together.

Sometimes I find myself envying the way they help each other study, compare notes, and share textbooks, but I never feel excluded.

Though I don’t have classes in common with my teammates, my small classes and the opportunity to work closely with students and professors

are my favourite aspects of UTM. I’ve collaborated on writing pieces, design projects, and assignments with bright and talented individuals who have become my close friends. This year, some of those friends and I founded the UTM Innovation Association to provide students with access to local startups.

Overall, my student athlete experience combines the best of both campuses. I train and compete downtown in a big city, but I attend class surrounded by forest and the occasional deer roaming around campus.

I belong to a massive Varsity athlete community, but I study in a tight-knit program. I’m surrounded by traditional brick buildings downtown, but I see my reflection in the brand new glass buildings in Mississauga.

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JANUARY 29, 2018 • 23

var.st/sports

Is there hope for the Blue Jays in 2018?

Jays revamp outfield with Granderson and Grichuk

WEEKLY BOX SCORES BASKETBALL MEN’S January 26 Varsity Blues

January 27 Varsity Blues

53–97

Carleton Ravens

75–84 Ottawa Gee-Gees

WOMEN’S January 26 Varsity Blues

January 27 Varsity Blues

54–72

62–53

Carleton Ravens

Ottawa Gee-Gees

HOCKEY MEN’S January 26 Varsity Blues

January 27 Varsity Blues

4–5

Guelph Gryphons

4–3

Ryerson Rams

WOMEN’S Outfielder Curtis Granderson during his time with the New York Mets. CURTIS GRANDERSON/CC WIKIMEDIA

Michelle Krasovitski Varsity Staff

The 2018 Major League Baseball (MLB) season is going to be tough for the Toronto Blue Jays. The Boston Red Sox have maintained their pitching and hitting power, and the New York Yankees have acquired powerhouse Giancarlo Stanton — who hit 59 home runs last season — in a trade that didn’t see them lose many significant players. That’s right, the Yankees now have 2017’s National League MVP and American League (AL) Rookie of the Year in their lineup, and the Jays are going to have to compete with that for years to come.

In terms of significant transactions, barring the Stanton trade, this year’s offseason has been rather cold, seeing minor trades here and there and no spectacular free-agent signings — José Bautista is still in limbo, belonging to no team quite yet.

Attempting to fortify a team not ready for the strong competition brewing in the AL East, the Jays signed free agent and former Met and Yankee player Curtis Granderson, dishing out $5 million USD for one year. Granderson, who is going to be 37 years old come Opening Day, will most likely split time in left field as part of a platoon. Granderson is a lefthanded hitter — a type of player

the Jays desperately need. Hitting 26 home runs last year for the Los Angeles Dodgers and New York Mets, Granderson’s signing is encouraging but not an addition that can single-handedly lead the Jays to the playoffs.

What is exciting, however, is the trade that brought 26-yearold outfielder Randal Grichuk to Toronto from St. Louis, with pitchers Dominic Leone and Conner Greene going the other way. Not only is Grichuk a reliable defenseman more than qualified to fill Bautista’s spot in right field, but with enough plate discipline, he can shine with a bat as well. Offering a measly .238 batting average for 2017, Grichuk, who batted .276 in 103 games in 2015, is far too young to be written off as mediocre and will hopefully thrive in a hitterfriendly ballpark like Rogers Centre. Words of encouragement: he hit over 20 home runs in each of the past two seasons. Here’s hoping that number only rises.

But, in the interest of being realistic and objective, Grichuk would have to go through a JustinSmoak-like transformation to be a power-hitter that is feared in the AL East – something that is very unlikely to happen.

In additional trades, the Jays picked up infielders Aledmys Diaz and Yangervis Solarte from St. Louis and San Diego respectively to play the middle of Josh Donaldson

and Justin Smoak’s corners of the infield. Along with Troy Tulowitzki — who can hopefully rise up from his steady decline — and Devon Travis — who can hopefully stay healthy for a season straight — the infield is the team’s most stable and secure area. The outfield is fine too: the cast of six outfielders are an upgrade from last year, but it is nowhere near rivalling the outfield of the Yankees.

Pitching is something that has also been heavily neglected by the Blue Jays’ front office this offseason. It would be best for the team and the fans if the rumours of regular reliever Joe Biagini being promoted to a number-five starter remain just that — rumours. The Jays need to pay a starter and pay him well. Aaron Sanchez and Marcus Stroman can’t carry this team on their two backs, and the Jays’ underwhelming goings-on in the bullpen only cast a shadow over the overall pitching situation.

Call me misguided, but I believe with enough pitching fortification, the Jays can confidently secure a Wild Card spot in the 2018 MLB season.

Not all is lost, but at this point, unless the front office can stir up a trade that gets Toronto a reliable starter and reliever — or two — the only hope for the team to make the playoffs is if they move to a different division altogether.

January 26 Varsity Blues

January 28 Varsity Blues

3–2

4–1

Brock Badgers

Waterloo Warriors

VOLLEYBALL MEN’S January 27

1–3

Varsity Blues

(22-25, 25-20, 2523, 19-25)

Varsity Blues

(27-25, 27-25, 25-18)

Varsity Blues

(17-25, 25-15, 1625, 19-25)

January 28

3–0

Queen’s Gaels

RMC Paladins

WOMEN’S January 27

January 28 Varsity Blues

1–3

3–0

(25-16, 25-11, 25-9)

Queen’s Gaels

RMC Paladins

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JANUARY 29, 2018 • 24

TH E VARS ITY

Design Workshop Series

T h e Varsity w i l l b e h o s t i n g a s e ri e s of d e si gn wo rksho p s fo r stu dents who a r e i nter ested in d esign but have little to no pr i o r exper i ence. T he i n trod uctory workshop will pr ovi de a n over vi ew of the bas i c e le m e n t s a n d co r e pr i nci ples of desi gn a lo ng wi t h p r a c t i c a l t r a i n i n g o n h ow to a pply tho se sk i lls. T he su bs equent three workshop s wi ll be i ntr o du cto r y tu to r i a ls o n In De s i g n , P h o to s h o p, a nd I llu str a to r.

I N TRODUCTORY WOR KS HOP FE B 2, 2018 5PM – 7PM

I N DESI G N WOR KS HOP S u i te 3 0 2 2 1 Su s s ex Ave To r o n to, O N M5 S 1 J6 th ev a r s i ty. c a d e s i g n e r @ t h ev a r s i ty.ca

FE B 6, 2018 5PM – 6PM

PHOTOSHOP WOR KS HOP FE B 13, 2 0 1 8 5PM – 6P M

RE G I ST E R @ va r. st/ desi gnwo r ks h o p

IL L UST RATOR WORKSHOP F EB 2 7, 2 0 1 8 5PM – 6PM