January 16, 2017

JANUARY 17, 2017 | VOLUME XCVIII | ISSUE XVII WHY IS MY FACE THE EMOJI SINCE 1918

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NEWS

CULTURE

OPINION

SCIENCE

SPORTS

Birth control most prescribed drugs for students

Out of fast-fashion, into sustainable buying

Mixed feelings concerning John Furlong

How to ace this term, according to science

Men’s hockey takes third annual Winter Classic

THE UBYSSEY

LOVE & INFORMATION

BEHIND THE SCENES

T HE UBYSSEY GOES BACKSTAGE AT THE FR EDER IC WOOD THE ATR E TO SEE W H AT GOES INTO M A K IN G A PL AY.

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JANUARY 17, 2017 TUESDAY

YOUR GUIDE TO UBC EVENTS & PEOPLE

EVENTS

2

OUR CAMPUS

Bea Subion has an EyeOut for you JANUARY 21–22 THE HARRY POTTERTHON 1 P.M. @ RIO THEATRE Muggles of all ages are welcomed! Get ready for a weekend of trivia, costumes and magic.

DAY PASS $35 / WEEKEND PASS $60 / INDIVIDUAL $12

THURSDAY JANUARY 26 LAUGH MORE 7 P.M. @ THEA KOERNER HOUSE Come by for cheap drinks and comedians from all across Vancouver.

EARLY BIRD $5 / $7 REGULAR

JACK HAUEN

The project began as a way for students to connect with classmates, check past grades for courses and get into preferred sections.

Leo Soh Our Campus Coordinator

FRIDAY JANUARY 27 NARWUAR VIDEO VAULT 12 P.M. @ CITR RADIO Join CiTR’s DJ Nardwuar the Human Serviette live as he talks and plays clips from his audio and video vault of interviews!

FREE

ON THE COVER PHOTO BY Joshua Medicoff

Want to see your events listed here?

Email your event listings to printeditor@ubyssey.ca

U THE UBYSSEY

EDITORIAL

Photo Editor Josh Medicoff photos@ubyssey.ca

Coordinating Editor Jack Hauen coordinating@ubyssey.ca Our Campus Coordinator Design Editor Leo Soh Aiken Lao ourcampus@ubyssey.ca printeditor@ubyssey.ca News Editors Sruthi Tadepalli & Samantha McCabe news@ubyssey.ca Culture Editor Samuel Du Bois culture@ubyssey.ca Sports + Rec Editor Olamide Olaniyan sports@ubyssey.ca Video Producer Kate Colenbrander video@ubyssey.ca Opinions + Blog Editor Bailey Ramsay opinions@ubyssey.ca Science Editor Koby Michaels science@ubyssey.ca

JANUARY 17, 2017 | VOLUME XCVIII| ISSUE XVII

BUSINESS Business Manager Ron Gorodetsky business@ubyssey.ca

President Sebastian Miskovic president@ubyssey.ca

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The Ubyssey is the official student newspaper of the University of British Columbia. It is published every Tuesday by The Ubyssey Publications Society. We are an autonomous, democratically run student organization and all students are encouraged to participate.

Editorials are chosen and written by the Ubyssey staff. They are the expressed opinion of the staff, and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Ubyssey Publications Society or the University of British Columbia. All editorial content appearing in The Ubyssey is the property of The Ubyssey Publications Society. Stories, opinions, photographs and artwork contained herein cannot be reproduced without the expressed, written permission of The Ubyssey Publications Society.

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If you’ve ever used EyeOut to check seat availability in preferred sections, or the Grade Analyzer to scope out courses, you are among the many internet customers of UBC Slacknotes. The website, founded by Chris Zhu and now managed by Bea Subion, is rapidly growing, with over 100,000 site visits and 6,000 users signing up for the EyeOut service in December and January alone.

The project began as a way for computer science majors Subion and Zhu to fill what they thought was an unmet need for students — a tool to connect with classmates, check past grades for courses and get into preferred sections.

Originally, Slacknotes was to be a network of chatrooms for every course at UBC. But Zhu and Subion soon found that the site’s most popular element was the Grades Analyzer, where students can look at grade averages in any class between 2009 to 2015.

“The other incredibly popular [service] is EyeOut. Basically, if a course is full, you can leave your phone number or your email, and we send you a notification when a seat opens up,” said Subion.

Zhu, who now works at AirBnB, graduated in May 2016 and Subion is now the sole director of the entire project.

While the website has garnered much interest — and more importantly, page visits — Subion and Zhu have yet to monetize it. In fact, Slacknotes has been costing them a substantial amount of money, so much so that they even considered shutting the website down altogether.

“EyeOut has been free for a really long time, but it’s actually negative profit. [Zhu and I] have spent quite a bit of money to keep maintaining it. Every single text message costs money and when you send like 70,000 text messages, that really adds up,” said Subion.

To offset the costs of running the website, Subion has started a new premium EyeOut service, which offers superior notification times and one-click registration at the cost of $4.99. Since launching in late December, 65 people have signed up for the premium service.

“When you have 16,000 people [simultaneously] signing up for the free service, it can take between 0 and 30 minutes to actually send out a notification from when that course opens up. EyeOut Premium will take 0 to 30 seconds instead. You’re also helping to keep Slacknotes alive,” she said.

Subion clarified that making money or even professional development were never her primary goals. Instead, she claims the project is run purely in the interest of students at UBC. In line with her vision for Slacknotes, Subion promised that as long as she is the woman in charge, the basic EyeOut service will remain free to use.

“I really want to keep the service free — that’s important to me. You’re a UBC student, you want to graduate, our waitlists are kind of insane and I want to help. I want to help you get into that course. Given that I’m the only one working on it right now, I still see Slacknotes as a project and an awesome tool for students, not as a company,” she said.

Subion did not rule out running ads on the website as an alternative stream of revenue, and may hold an initial public offering (IPO) if her

rent gets more expensive.

With two more years of university left, Subion is looking forward to building a successful software engineering career.

Slacknotes has already helped her land an internship at Twilio, the San Francisco-based company that handles EyeOut’s automatic texting. Once she graduates, Subion hopes to line up a suitable candidate to step into her shoes and continue to maintain and further grow Slacknotes.

As VP Volunteering at the Computer Science Students Society, Subion hears and shares many of the concerns that currently plague computer science students at UBC. Recently, students have been unable to get into required courses, even with the assistance of EyeOut, and CPSC 213 underwent a final exam fiasco.

“The thing [is that] for computer science, it’s very difficult to get professors. And how much could you pay those professors when they’re being poached by companies that can pay much more than the university? People with a PhD in computer science can get paid a lot more [elswhere] than working at UBC, so I do understand that aspect of it, but I feel like the transition could have been a lot smoother. It was too many people being let in versus how much faculty they could hire, so if they foresaw that sooner, it could have been a lot better,” she said.

Subion believes that to deal with the current state of the computer science job market, the department could develop more massive open online courses, offer more distance education courses and raise the pay of TAs to expedite the marking process. U

NEWS

JANUARY 17, 2017 TUESDAY

EDITORS SRUTHI TADEPALLI + SAMANTHA MCCABE

3

UBC BUSINESSES //

AMS HEALTH PLAN //

Why the Bookstore ran out of your textbook

Birth control tops list of most-prescribed drugs to students

Sruthi Tadepalli News Editor

There are few things worse than going to the UBC Bookstore in hopes of buying a $200 book, but one of them has to be making the trek only to find out it isn’t there.

While textbooks are more commonly undersold at the Bookstore — with the university having to return in excess of $1.5 million of unsold books per year — an unlucky few will show up at the store a couple days late and be unable to find their required textbook.

There is no one reason why the Bookstore might be out of stock.

Reasons are as numerous as the number of variables its employees consider when determining how many to buy.

“It’s not an exact formula — ‘100 students, 100 books’ — because that would bankrupt us,” said Debbie Harvie, the Bookstore’s managing director. “We don’t sell that many.”

When stocking textbooks, the store considers the number of students, how the book is used in class, how many used books are available, how many will probably come in through their buyback program and how many textbooks have been sold in the past.

WHEN THE FORMULA GOES WRONG Past sales might not provide an

MAIA BOAKYE

The bookstore will airfrieght books in at their cost if they’re short.

accurate representation of how many books will sell if the professor for a certain course changes. If the syllabus requires students to read more of the book, more students are likely to buy it, leaving the Bookstore short.

“This is more complicated today than ever before. In the old days, there were new books and there were used books — that was it. Today we have new books, used books, rent books, online books [and] books from many, many sources outside of the bookstore,” said Harvie. “It’s actually very difficult today for course book buyers to figure out the quantity than

it ever has been.”

THE RETURN POLICY The UBC Bookstore allows students who buy a book for the term to return them until the add/drop date.

“If you buy a book, for example, in December, you can bring it back until the end of the add/drop period,” said Harvie.

So as long as students are adding and dropping classes, books are coming in and out. That means textbooks might not be available until the date passes, as students who have dropped classes return their books for others to buy.

FILE JOSHUA MEDICOFF

PROF PROBLEMS Some professors submit their orders late, or are assigned their courses late, delaying the process.

“We’ll take the orders whenever they come in and we’ll do our very best to have books available for the first day of classes. If not, we’ll try to keep in touch with the instructor and let them know when the books are coming in,” said Harvie.

SO WHAT HAPPENS WHEN THINGS GO WRONG? “If we are short, we do airfreight books into the Bookstore at our cost,” said Harvie. U

CRIME //

The UBC pride flag burning: A timeline March” they had planned as a part of OUTweek. “[Although] many folks outside of the collective would like to be in solidarity with us, we need our communities to listen to us and our needs at this time, rather than try to criticize and shame our decision to cancel the march,” said a statement they released at the time.

The burning of the flag was originally thought to be a hate crime.

Sruthi Tadepalli and Samantha McCabe News Editors

FEBRUARY 10, 2016 “It’s been a rough day,” said Rachel Garrett, one of the coordinators of the Pride Collective. “[There’s been] a lot of stress. I don’t think any of us feel safe right now and that’s a really hard feeling to be going through.”

A rainbow flag had just been raised on the pole outside the Old SUB for UBC’s OUTweek.

Pride Collective members noticed that the flag was missing on the morning of February 10 and contacted the UBC Equity and Inclusion Office to ask if they knew anything about the disappearance.

Officers then found remnants of the scorched flag still attached to the pole.

After the fact, the AMS and Equity and Inclusion both released

FILE JOSH CURRAN

statements condemning the burning of the flag.

“UBC condemns this incident as an act of hate and in contravention of the values of equity, inclusion and respect deeply held by the university community,” read a statement signed by Interim VP Academic and Provost Anji Redish, VP Human Resources Lisa Castle, VP Students Louise Cowin and Associate VP Equity and Inclusion Sara-Jane Finlay on behalf of the university.

The wider Vancouver community also reacted to the incident. The City of Vancouver showed solidarity by flying a rainbow flag outside City Hall, also making the lights rainbowcoloured instead of their usual white. The Vancouver School Board also flew a rainbow flag.

Meanwhile, the Pride Collective received criticism for their decision to cancel the “Fuck the Cis-tem

FEBRUARY 11, 2016 After receiving witness reports, the university announced that the person responsible for burning the flag had been identified.

“We believe this was an isolated incident. The university will continue to cooperate with the RCMP regarding their investigation,” said the statement released by Finlay.

Police were not investigating the incident as a hate crime. “We have nothing to say that it is a hate crime right yet. There’s no motivating factor yet to determine if it’d be a hate crime,” said UBC RCMP spokesman Sgt. Drew Grainger. “It’s not a hate crime as far as we’re concerned at this point.”

APRIL 22, 2016 In late April, 31-year-old UBC student Brooklyn Fink was charged by the Richmond Crown Counsel for burning down the flag, for mischief causing damage of property with a value of under $5,000.

After initially denying that she was the individual responsible for burning down the flag, Fink revealed some of her motivations to multiple news outlets. As a

transsexual person, Fink called the flag a non-inclusive symbol and described the LGBT label as imposing sexual politics onto transgender individuals.

The community was upset over the news, mostly viewing it not as a move of activism but one of “entitlement” and hate.

MAY 18, 2016 At her first appearance in court, Fink pled not guilty to the mischief charge “in the interest of public health and safety.” She was representing herself at the time, but was urged to get legal representation from council and the judge presiding over her case.

The matter was to go to trial for three days in March 2017. At that time, Fink was also reportedly suspended from UBC. DECEMBER 6, 2016 Crown prosecutors dropped the mischief charge against Brooklyn Fink in advance of her next planned appearance in court on December 6.

“The charges were stayed, as the Crown concluded that there was no longer a substantial likelihood of a conviction,” said Daniel McLaughlin, communications counsel for BC’s Criminal Justice Branch, in an emailed statement to The Ubyssey.

For a few months before the charge was dropped, Crown Counsel looked for an individual or organization willing to step forward and claim ownership of the damaged property. However, both the Pride Collective and UBC’s Equity and Inclusion office declined. U

Jack Hauen Coordinating Editor

The AMS Health and Dental plan covers 39,345 students, which means a lot of claims for prescription medication go through UBC’s student society. We dug through the 2015/16 annual report put together by Student Care, the plan’s administrator, to see which drugs are most often prescribed to students at UBC through the AMS plan.

There were 67,484 claims made over the last academic year. Birth control accounted for 59% of all prescribed drugs — not counting Influvac.

Here are the top 15 prescribed drugs: 1. Influvac Flu vaccine — 5,160 claims 2. Alysena 28 Birth control — 1,723 claims 3. Alesse 28 Birth control — 1,600 claims 4. Alesse 21 Birth control — 1,089 claims 5. Macrobid Urinary tract infection medication — 1,009 claims 6. Alysena 21 Birth control — 1,008 claims 7. Ran-Escitalopram Depression/anxiety medication — 935 claims 8. Nuvaring Birth control — 738 claims 9. Amoxicillin Antibiotic (fights tonsillitis, bronchitis, gonorrhea, etc.) — 690 claims 10. Dexedrine spansule src 10mg ADHD medication — 669 claims 11. Ratio-lenoltec No. 3 Pain relief medication — 602 claims 12. Pen-VK Penicillin (antibacterial medication) — 597 claims 13. Plan B Emergency contraceptive (the “morning after pill”) — 574 claims 14. Mirena Intrauterine device (birth control) — 550 claims 15. Mirvala 28 Birth control — 541 claims U

4 | news | TUESDAY JANUARY 17, 2017 FINANCE //

CONTROVERSY //

Sole Indigenous prof on UBC sexual BoG increases spending of endowment fund, more assault committee resigns due to Furlong money to go to financial aid

FILE NADYA RAHMAN

The professor is the chair of UBC’s First Nations studies program.

Sruthi Tadepalli News Editor

The decision was made at the December Board meeting.

Sophie Sutcliffe Senior Staff Writer

At their December meeting, the Board of Governors (BoG) approved an increase in the spending rate of UBC endowments from 3.5 per cent to 4 per cent. This change, which will affect all of the university’s endowments — a fund of approximately $1.8 billion — will be implemented on April 1.

Overall, the change means that the university will be able to spend more of its asset money each year at a slightly increased financial risk.

According to the report submitted to the Board on the spending rate review, the endowment spending rate is reviewed every three years in accordance with Endowment Management Policy 113.

“There are endowments across the university and each one’s spending rate will go from 3.5 to 4 per cent,” said Peter Smailes, UBC’s treasurer. “Many endowments have specific deeds ... and so the money will be spent in accordance with those deeds precisely on what the gift the original donation intended it to be.”

The endowment’s spending rate is the total percentage of it that is spent every year. Among other things, Smailes noted that student financial aid will benefit greatly from the newest change, letting the university spend about $1.4 million more each year.

The endowment spending rate review submitted to the Board also noted that in the case of a severe market crisis such as the 2008 financial crash, the asset mix of what the endowment is invested in is estimated to lose about $25

FILE JOSHUA MEDICOFF

million more than it otherwise would have.

“We’re speculating here, [but] if we had a market crash and you took the spend rate back from 4 per cent down to 3.5 because the Board felt that that was the prudent thing to do, we would be spending just under $1.4 million less a year on student aid,” said Smailes. “Even if the spend rate was not changed, what really happens is that the market value of the endowments goes down, and so it’s four per cent of a lower number.”

Smailes said that after the 2008 crash, the Board reduced the spend rate and that “virtually all” of the endowments were at their pre-crash value by 2015.

There are several changes that will be made to the asset mix, which the report to the BoG on the endowment spending rate review says will allow them to increase that rate, giving more funds to the university to use while not significantly changing the amount of risk.

For example, five per cent of the current investment in Canadian equities will instead be invested in global small cap equities, and 7 per cent of the current 13 per cent investment in bonds will be specifically put towards “UBC debenture,” which is the investment from the endowment that was made in Orchard Commons. “[The endowment] invested $100 million in Orchard Commons and that pays a return to the endowment,” said Smailes.

“We would not have been able to build Orchard Commons at the time without that UBC debenture financing because we’re prohibited from borrowing by the province.” U

The chair of UBC’s First Nations studies program has resigned from the sexual assault policy committee after John Furlong was reinstated as keynote speaker at the 18th annual ZLC Millennium Scholarship breakfast.

“I am sad to say that I cannot continue to serve with integrity on the UBC Sexual Assault Policy Committee,” reads Daniel Heath Justice’s letter of resignation, which he also posted publicly. “The Committee’s good work has been so deliberately and significantly survivor-centred; this reversal undermines the credibility of that process and further alienates a broader community that is already deeply concerned with the university’s handling of these matters.”

Furlong was removed as the ZLC Millennium Scholarship breakfast’s keynote speaker on December

23, after a letter of protest was submitted to the university which detailed allegations of abuse leveled against him in 2012. He was then reinstated on January 9 and UBC President Santa Ono released a statement apologizing for the “wellintentioned but incorrect decision to cancel John’s speaking engagement in the first place.”

Daniel Heath Justice was the only Indigenous member of the sexual assault policy committee before his resignation.

“There were many responsible and compassionate ways this matter might have been handled that would not have once again silenced or erased the abuse allegations of dozens of people from the Lake Babine First Nation,” said Justice’s letter.

In his letter of resignation, he alluded to the attempts of members of the Lake Babine First Nation to contact UBC, with no response.

“The president’s office is responding to all correspondence,

emails and phone calls. We received a great deal from community members with a diverse range of views,” said Susan Danard, managing director of UBC’s public affairs team.

“We respect Dr. Justice’s decision to resign from the committee and we thank him for his hard work on the committee.”

No one else will be appointed to Justice’s position following his resignation.

“At this point, I think we would want to move ahead with the people who have been working on it as hard as they have been,” said Sara-Jane Finlay, one of the co-chairs of the sexual assault policy committee.

Justice’s resignation letter encourages people to give the remaining Committee members support as they work to release a new draft of the sexual assault policy at February’s Board of Governors meeting.

“It will take a great deal of effort to undo the damage of this decision,” said Justice’s letter. U

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CULTURE

JANUARY 17, 2017 TUESDAY

EDITOR SAMUEL DU BOIS

5

FEAR AND CLOTHING ON THE 14 //

Former Castlegar resident rides the bus for 4.5 hours Tristan Wheeler Staff Writer

her cohort. Dominic nods and expresses concern.

Let me start off by saying something — I grew up in smalltown BC, about eight hours from the expanse of the Lower Mainland. Even though I was far away, the infamy of the Downtown Eastside reached my ears at a young age. Growing up, my family would always speak ill of it, saying that it is where you go if you don’t get good grades, graduate and go to college. They warned me of drug addicts, thieves and ruffians who would kill you at the first chance they got.

Obviously, the truth of East Hastings is much more complicated and I wanted to discover that for myself. When my editor offered me this pitch, I was initially concerned. Could I write something that wasn’t simply poverty tourism? I reassured myself that I was a key player in this story as well, as I was undoubtedly going to be the butt of this intimidating joke.

Either way, I couldn’t turn down a chance to see for myself what my parents’ pearl-clutching was about. A naive, wide-eyed kid from Castlegar should do great there, right?

7:43 p.m. The 14 begins to go back towards UBC, so I get off and wait for the 20 at Pender and Hastings.

I stand in the cold looking down the street. An ambulance whizzes past me going into the depths of the Downtown Eastside. Right before the bus arrives, an old man walks down the street, swinging an aluminum crutch.

“Christmas tree, Christmas tree ho! Christmas tree, Christmas tree hey!” he sings as we both get onto the 20.

I’m not in Castlegar anymore.

6:36 p.m. I get on the 14 bus departing from UBC. While I sit and wait for us to start moving, I am reminded that a woman almost gave birth on a Hastings bus this very morning. I panic. What if it was this bus? What if it was this seat?

7:28 p.m. We reach W Pender and Hastings in a bus that has been mostly vacated. When I take off my headphones, I overhear a conversation in progress.“Dominic! You know that ghost I was telling you about?

It followed me into my new frickin’ house!” says a woman to

8:09 p.m. Around me is a wide variety of people. Nothing too unusual until I see a man hork up a loogie and spit it into his jacket.

At about Main and Hastings, a couple wobbles onto the bus.

Firmly planted in the woman’s cheek is a toothbrush. She isn’t brushing, just holding it there. Its green handle is clearly visible.

The person sitting across from me is staring at me as if I don’t belong.

8:51 p.m. I am now in the back seat of a 16, going West. I have a good vantage point of the entire bus. There are a few forlorn looking people staring into their laps. Not a lot of movement.

8:58 p.m. A sign-spinner (he is holding a sign, so that’s what I assume he is) runs onto the bus and rockets right into the seat right next to me. He is holding a still-lit cigarette which fills the bus with the smell of tobacco.

After two stops, the sign-spinner leaves as quickly as he appeared.

In his place, he leaves the remainder of his cigarette.

9:05 p.m. A couple takes the place of the sign-spinner. They are having an argument about

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ROCIO HOLLMAN

Years of exaggeration and misinformation were subverted by an interesting but entirely safe voyage through East Hastings.

something. The man speaks loudly, eating out of a box of pastries between tirades. I quickly get off the bus and jump onto the next 16 heading east.

9:12 p.m. There is a woman who is transporting a particle board desk. It’s about three feet wide and looks like it is missing pieces.

The woman waddles off the bus with the desk soon after I get on.

9:15 p.m. Things start to heat up.

An angry man gets on the bus and says to the driver that all of his money has been stolen and that he is “fucking pissed.” He sits directly behind me. After a stop or two, another guy walks on the bus and tries to sit next to the angry man. But in his attempt to shuffle past into his seat, he trips onto the angry man’s lap. This starts a loud argument.

“Are you trying to sit on my fucking lap dude?” says the angry man.

“Hey, I’m sorry — I tripped.

Calm down,” says the other guy.

The entire bus looks on as this loud altercation unfolds.

“I don’t need you on my lap dude, that’s fucking gross,” says the angry man.

“Fuck off,” says the other guy and then, oddly enough, “Calm down.” After a few more expletives, the angry guy gets up and sits in the back. Crisis is averted, but my heart rate has accelerated dramatically. I refrain from taking notes so as not to draw attention to myself.

9:28 p.m. The rest of the ride is calm. I get off at Nanaimo Street, and wait for the next 16 in the bitter cold.

9:41 p.m. The bus arrives. A man who looks like Travis Bickle gets on and speaks to a woman. I observe him and take notes. He notices and begins to stare me down. He takes out the contents of a plastic bag to show them to me. I manage to look away before I am completely paralyzed by

09/11/2016 20:20

fear, acting like I wasn’t trying to eavesdrop. I think it was an electric shaving razor.

9:48 p.m. A man holding a bottle of lotion, a can of beans and a pair of woman’s mukluks gets on and catches Bickle’s attention. He is a calming presence.

9:53 p.m. Cruising through Main and Hastings, I see a man being arrested by the VPD. A fellow bus patron watches intently.

“Aw, fuck,” he says. The bus driver asks him a question.

“Probably for selling cigarettes or something,” he replies.

10:08 p.m. I am at the bus stop, waiting for the 16 to go back out again. At a nearby pot dispensary, I hear an altercation. Someone apparently threatened a man with a baseball bat. I listen to the 9-1-1 call that the guy is making. The bus arrives and I get on before hearing the end of the dispensary conflict.

10:22 p.m. This trip is uneventful.

It seems to be full of commuters. I get off again at Nanaimo Street.

10:41 p.m. My final journey through Hastings begins. I sit in the very back next to a completely hairless man. He gets my attention, asking if I want to see something. He and I end up having a very lengthy conversation. His name is Daniel and he is from Montreal. What he wanted to show me is his collection of newly acquired clothes that he got from a donation bin. Laid out on the seat in front of him are some pretty impressive finds: a Columbia jacket, an American Eagle sweatshirt and — the thing he was most of all excited about — a licensed Barbie toque. He talks about how he used to be a roofer and gave it all up to move to Vancouver. I don’t ask why. I change the subject back to the clothes he got.

“Those are some great finds,” I say.

“Yeah man! I’m guessing retail for these is about $700,” says Daniel. I don’t think that this is accurate at all, but who am I to say?

“Look at this jacket! You see that? Gore-tex, man!” He explodes with joy, hugging the jacket and wiggling in his seat. “I wanna keep this for my own!”

When Daniel’s stop comes, I am sure to ask his name and shake his hand. The skin is hard, calloused and scabbed — beyond leathery.

He thinks my name is Justin, but I correct him.

“I once knew a man named Tristan when I was a roofer. Except it was Montreal, so it was more like Tristán,” he says and gets off the bus.

10:56 p.m. As Daniel leaves, three guys sit in the seats facing each other at the back, right near me. One of them has a teardrop tattoo on his cheek and is eating a giant muffin.

They seem intoxicated.

“You having a good — what day is it?” one says to me.

“Monday,” I reply.

“You having a good Monday night?” I say yes and ask him in return. He says that it could be worse.

11:03 p.m. I get off the bus and head home. I’m done with my night’s journey and wisened for it. The Downtown Eastside hadn’t met my parents’ exaggerated imagery of druglords shooting heroin into unlucky passersby, but I was still vaguely uneasy the whole time.

Why was that? The simplest and best answer I’ve been able to come up with is that my preconceived notions were completely unfounded. The “infamous” East Hastings stretch is not what it is painted as. It is not a place to be terrified of or a place you go when you fail your math course. It is a community of people who are just as much a part of Vancouver as we are.

In the end, the Downtown Eastside is an important place that helped me to understand what it is actually like to live in Vancouver, while not being able to afford it. U

6 | culture | TUESDAY JANUARY 17, 2017 HEMP ISN’T THE ONLY ANSWER //

COMING TO CULTURE //

Sustainability in fashion: What’s going on and what you can do

It’s the new year, so you know what that means — deals, deals, deals. Now I can’t resist a good deal as much as the next person, but I’m finding the affordable accessibility of clothing to be a year-round thing. In fact, according to Greenpeace, today we buy 60 per cent more clothing than we did 15 years ago.

The average US consumer, according to The Atlantic, buys around 64 items of clothes per year, proving that the fast-fashion industry is alive and well. What is fast-fashion you may ask? It is an industry where companies continuously churn out on-trend styles at cheap prices. In the beginning, it seemed like a pretty good idea. Companies produce clothes at low-cost and consumers get the hottest designer styles as fast as they want. Everybody wins right? Unfortunately, not the environment.

The fast-fashion industry is incredibly taxing on our environment due to the amount of pollution it creates. In fact, the fashion industry was deemed the second largest cause of waste in the world, next to oil and gas.

It all seems pretty bad right now, but luckily the trend of sustainable and ethical fashion is on the rise. Now more than ever, large fashion brands that you and I shop at are joining the fight to make our world more sustainable.

H&M, for example, launched its Conscious Collection that exclusively uses recycled materials in order to produce their garments. They also launched their Garment Collection program in 2013, which aims to close the waste loop in fashion and recycle unwanted clothing.

Last year, H&M even came to UBC’s Vancouver campus so that students could easily drop-off their clothing.

Birkenstock — who make those hippie sandals that we all wear — has now developed an alternative called Birko-Flor, which is made of acrylic and polyamide feltfibres that are totally vegan.

Even startups are doing their part. Rothy’s is a San Franciscobased company that creates comfortable and stylish womens’ shoes out of recycled water bottles. So I would definitely be recycling my plastic bottles if

I were you. They could end up being worn on your feet.

I know its hard to directly shop for ethical clothing with a tight budget, so it’s good to know that the stores people often shop at are doing their part.

BUT WHAT ABOUT LOCALLY? With Vancouver’s great sustainability culture, a few ethical clothing brands were bound to pop up. If you’re ever in the Gastown area, I’d recommend taking a walk into retailers such as Neighbour, who sells a number of ethically sourced brands, and One of a Few, selling handmade accessories and vintage leather bags.

More notable brands include John Fleuvog. A majority of their soles are made with 100 per cent biodegradable hevea tree latex and cemented using water-based glue.

There is also our beloved Mountain Equipment Coop (MEC)! This brand is known for consistently recycling fabric, and limiting the waste from packaging and shopping bags.

They use lower impact options like organically-grown cotton and recycled nylon. A fun-fact is that twice a year, teams at MEC stores don coveralls and jump in their dumpsters to do a waste audit and find ways to improve. They go hard.

Eco Fashion Week, a not-forprofit organization, also aims to present the solutions and innovations that work to develop a more sustainable and responsible fashion industry. Just having its 11th season last November, it has expanded internationally to hosting a show in Seattle and grow the sustainability community.

WHAT CAN YOU DO? So there are a lot of cool innovations going on around the world, as well as in Vancouver, but all these things mean going out and buying more. Weren’t we supposed to be reducing the fashion waste? That is definitely doable and here are a few tips.

• Only buy what you love.

If you can’t see yourself wearing it 30 times, rethink the purchase.

• Buy quality over quantity.

If you can hold onto your clothing article for a month longer and not buy anything else, you will

Samuel Du Bois Culture Editor

Hello, lone engineer that stopped to read the culture section. Don’t worry, this isn’t the wrong newspaper. The science section is a few pages on from here. Don’t be scared! This article has things that you might find interesting, mainly E-Week — the unplugged drain that all engineering culture is sucked towards, twice a year.

FILE REHYANA HEATHERINGTON

Many popular brands are making surprising moves towards sustainability.

Laura Palombi Staff Writer

E-Week will make your liver fall out

•

actually be reducing your carbon footprint by 5–10 per cent.

Finally, if you really want to know if there are some purely sustainable brands out there, check out the B Corp website. As the website states, B Corps are for-profit companies, certified to meet the rigorous standards of social and environmental performance.

As author Anna Lappé stated, “Every time we buy something, we vote for what kind of world we want to live in.” Our purchasing power as consumers makes us in control of how sustainable the fashion industry and our environment can be. So let’s get on with it and — as cheesy as it sounds — make a difference in whatever way we can, big or small. U

TUESDAY, JAN 17 Start your morning off with a chariot race, taking place by the Cairn between 11 a.m. and noon. From 3 to 6 p.m., you can attend the engineers Speech and Debate. Always wanted to see two people argue about whether or not the substratum horizon is cooler that the subsoil horizon? This is your chance! Then, round off the night with the Pit Purge, where you get to drink on the EUS’s dime!

WEDNESDAY, JAN 18 Oh look, another event that involves alcohol. Who would have seen that coming? Show up to the Engineering Student Centre at 8 a.m. and kill that hangover with the PP Pancake Breakfast. What the “PP” stands for is something of a mystery but rest assured, there will be beer and 4-Legged Races.

At 1 p.m., through a drunken haze, participate in the True Engineer competition to determine “which department is the engineeriest.”

Following this is Cooking with Beer, which is exactly what it sounds like. It’s at 4 p.m., and will provide you with some good, solid food to help absorb the alcoholic content of your stomach.

After that, stumble over to the 4-Legged Race at 7 p.m. There will be trivia and, of course, drinks.

THURSDAY, JAN 19 This day begins a packed schedule with WiE (Women in Engineering) Trivia at 10 a.m. Then the morning continues with an hour and a half of intense dodgeball from 12:30 to 2 p.m. in Osbourne Gym. At 3:30 p.m., there are some logistical things to attend to at the Annual General Meeting. Gasp!

Organization! Then at 6 p.m., there is Old Red New Red, where some of the star alumni from the department show up to network with fresh-faced undergrads.

FRIDAY, JAN 20 The morning begins at 8 a.m. with the Gears and Queers Breakfast, and then is followed by three hours of E-Ball Soccer in the EOSC Field.

At 3 p.m., go to the Performance Theatre in the Nest for Film fEUSt, which promises to be a screening of some pretty fantastic home-movies.

Red Night kicks off at 8 p.m. and serves $0.25 beer for an awesome party in the Engineering Student Centre. Doors are open to the nonengineering rabble, but no cheap beer for you. Odds are that if you wear red, no one will know.

SATURDAY, JAN 21 Finally, the thing that every engineer has anxiously been waiting for. Taking place in the Diamond Ballroom, this night sports a formal dinner, dance and presumably some goddamned classy alcohol.

Sure, I may talk shit about you engineers, but I cannot deny that you guys know how to celebrate your promising futures and wellfunded events. Arts Week, please take note. This is how you bring a community together. U

U

THE UBYSSEY

JOIN US.

Whether you want to write one article a semester or an article a day, there’s a place for you at The Ubyssey — this paper has survived and thrived since 1918 because it has truly been a student paper, open to any student who wants to take part.

Visit ubyssey.ca/volunteer for more information.

FEATURES

8

LOVE & INFORMATION WORDS SAMUEL DU BOIS / PHOTOS JOSHUA MEDICOFF

JANUARY 17, 2017 TUESDAY | features | 9

A

t the beginning of November, Lauren Taylor and a team of students including Alaia Hamer, Edward Dawson, Stefan Zubovic and Sophie Tang began work on what would be for many of them their largest and most ambitious production to date. Comprising of 18 actors playing a total of 120 characters over the course of 59 scenes, it employed 185 lighting cues, 150 sound cues, 40 pieces of set furniture, 320 props and 526 costume pieces — the sum of which would be Caryl Churchill’s play, Love and Information.

Taylor, an MFA directing student, meets us in the basement of the Frederic Wood Theatre on Saturday, January 7. It is 12 days till opening night and on the stage above us, electricians are installing the lights and projection systems. By this point, the set is almost done. Backstage, several tables are lined up side-to-side and heaped with all of the props that will be used throughout the roughly 90-minute runtime of the show.

Despite how close we are to opening night and how much there still is to do, Taylor appears to be remarkably calm and collected.

We are meeting on her lunch break, during a tight window of time before she has to rush upstairs for rehearsals.

As we set up for the interview, she shows me the massive, three-ringed binder that she carries with her, which contains her copy of the script for Love and Information. Every scene has been cut and pasted onto large sheets of graph paper. Around every line, there are neatly written notes outlining every detail of how the text will transfer to the stage.

Love and Information is of a modern and somewhat abstract school of theatre. It is built in seven parts, each consisting of a handful of scenes which are self-contained and can range from 30 seconds to 10 minutes in length. At the end of the play there is a collection of 20 to 30 extra scenes, most of which can be included or excluded at the director’s discretion. The only exceptions are a collection of scenes entitled “Depression” which Churchill insisted are essential to the production.

This makes the play like a giant box of Lego bricks which the director is at liberty to assemble in almost any way they choose.

There are no stage directions, notes on lighting, sound, sets, costumes, characters or any other aspects of the play — only basic guidelines on the ordering of scenes. Churchill is basically throwing up her hands and saying, “I wrote it. You do the rest.”

This makes Love and Information either a director’s dream project or the bane of their existence. Churchill provides the opportunity to present an artistic vision that is almost entirely the director’s, with no real preconceptions to adhere to or subvert. The downside is that everything must be considered and decided upon during production — sets, costumes, props; all of it must be designed from scratch.

“I think I really liked the fact that the playwright gives you so much room, as a director, for interpretation,” says Taylor. “But it is daunting because it means that … the onus is on you to make some really smart decisions … so that you can create meaning for people who are watching these little snippets of scenes.”

From the beginning of production, Taylor closely worked with her design team to build a foundation of understanding about what the play was about and how it was going to be presented.

“Basically me and Lauren … had long meetings, starting in September, that would go on for about 8 to 12 hours each day,” says Stefan Zubovic, the lighting and projection designer. “And we would just bounce back ideas about the play, where is it taking place, what does it mean and big conceptual ideas from there.”

Finding unifying ideas in Love and Information can be an intimidating task. Scenes vary widely in subject matter, from fading stars and old flames, to putting radioactive implants in the brains of chickens.

“I think my biggest fear was that … there was no longer narrative arc — that it was all these tiny, self-contained little stories,” says Taylor.

“I was thinking, ‘Oh my gosh, is the audience going to leave us because there’s no kind of beginning, middle, end story?’ But I also love that about the play too.”

The task of sustaining the audience’s attention then falls squarely on how these scenes are presented. The design team has to construct an atmosphere for the actors to perform in which uses visual and audio techniques to ensure that the momentum of the play is maintained.

“I didn’t want to have too much of a sense of audience fatigue,”

Finding unifying ideas in Love and Information can be an intimidating task. Scenes vary widely in subject matter, from fading stars and old flames, to putting radioactive implants in the brains of chickens. says Taylor. “We’ve been using sound and some visuals as a … part of the experience that the audience will have when they see the play.”

We spot the sound designer, Edward Dawson, in the back of the theatre, surrounded by wires and gear. Before heading up to speak with him, we wander around the stage where one of the props people is working. There is a massive wall at upstage-left on which hundreds of theatre alumni have signed their names. I recognize a few. The sound of a distant train passing by echoes through the theatre, and I pause for moment and think, “Wait, there are no trains around here.”

This sound was Dawson at work preparing one of the 150 sound cues that he is in charge of arranging. Of that total, around 20 were composed or recorded by him, while the rest were acquired through other means. By his guess, the whole process will have taken him 200 to 300 hours to complete.

When we speak to Dawson, he is at a point in production called “levels,” where he programs all of the audio for the show. Later that night, he and Taylor will run through everything to figure out what works and what needs to be changed. At this point in the production, sound, lighting and projection have not been entirely implemented, meaning that in roughly a week, the 335 cues associated with these departments will have to be finalized.

“I really like the projections,” said Zubovic. “I think those have worked out the best, and I think those are going to have the biggest ‘wow’ moment … [and] as you go through the middle and towards the end of the show, it really ramps up and creates some really beautiful and impactful moments.”

This collaboration between departments is an integral part of the production. Especially when it comes to the projections, Zubovic’s work is built upon the careful planning laid out by himself, Taylor and Sophie Tang, who is the set designer.

Tang’s final design is literally the frame that holds the production together, while also being the canvas on which lighting operates. Its layered, black-painted walls dictate not only lighting, but also the movements of actors and how transitions are performed.

“We started with the idea of human study,” said Tang. “We started with a box and then it evolved into separate frames, just to open up the space, and at that point it looked like a rib cage. It feels like it’s protecting what’s inside, which is the human. Then we changed the proportion of things a little bit, so at the end it looks like the inside of an old camera. It has this zoom-in feeling. It’s almost like a snapshot of humanity and also … the set is very cubic, so it emphasizes the human organic form inside.”

From the start, Tang estimates that developing the set took about a month, with construction taking an additional two to three months.

DIRECTOR LAUREN TAYLOR

10 | features | TUESDAY JANUARY 17, 2017

In addition to the set itself, Tang is also in charge of the 40 pieces of set furniture that are used throughout the show. Most of these pieces are taken from daily life, but several, which are used in the last scene, have been custom-made.

This last scene is something of a mystery which we could not get any significant details on from the people we spoke with.

The most that we are able to find are some of the clothes that will be worn while it is performed.

We find these down in the costume department, which is a large, surprisingly sunny room tucked away in a corner of the basement. The door to this room stays closed at all times to prevent Fiona from escaping. Fiona is the dog who prowls behind us as the costume designer, Alaia Hamer, gives us a tour.

This room, like most of the others, seems to function as both a workshop and archive for the last 100 years of UBC theatre. Along most of the walls are shelves and cupboards chock-full of shoes, strange wigs and endless racks of costumes which include those from the mysterious final scene of the play. There is even room for a Kurt Vonnegut quote.

While we film and take pictures, Fiona glares at us from a nearby chair.

The props room is quite similar, with shelves of strange items which have been donated, dug up at thrift shops or custom-made. Jessica Warren, a student working in the props department, is painting a fake pumpkin when we arrive. She shows us around the two rooms that make up her workshop. They aren’t small, but they are so densely packed that it’s difficult to distinguish props from normal furniture.

Warren’s favourite prop is a crossbow that she eyes affectionately as she shows it to us. It comprises of entirely repurposed components and took her roughly a semester to make.

SOUND EDWARD DAWSON

Through all of these different departments — lighting, sound, set, costume and props — there is a powerful sense of unity under the artistic vision of director Lauren Taylor. That at this point, with only a small amount of time remaining before opening night, everyone appearing calm, confident and ready for the tasks required of them speaks volumes about their own professionalism as well as Taylor’s adept hand at managing such an immense project. There are none of ACTOR SARAH the Birdman-esque nervous breakdowns or frantic, last-minute decisions that you might expect, but rather an impressive level of preparedness.

There is no star actor in this show. The 120 characters are relatively evenly dispersed amongst the 18 performers, each of whom will have around six costume changes throughout the show. Much like the design team, the actors faced a very similar challenge in how to effectively build their characters from what, in some cases, was only a line or two of dialogue.

Between trying on wigs and running up to a rehearsal with the rest of the cast, Sarah Jane stops by to talk about her performance.

“We did a lot of discussion around the table about what this play means and the way we play the characters … So the play, Love and Information, we’ve decided is about human essence and how human essence is both love and information because humans are just made up of genetic code. But the thing that sets

JANE

JANUARY 17, 2017 TUESDAY | features | 11

us apart from a machine or a computer is love. Basically each of the characters are meant to be as human as possible, bringing little idiosyncrasies in and different physicalities, and then really just drawing from the text to inform how you make those decisions.”

When we later sit in on the warm up before rehearsal, we get to see some of this process in action. Taylor observes from her place in the centre of the audience as the cast moves about the whole theatre — some listening to music, some shouting wordless sounds, others engaged in emotional conversations with either fellow actors or the empty space in front of them.

There is a kind of insane hilarity to watching this unfold.

It’s even unpleasant at times when the sound gets particularly deafening. But right before the rehearsal begins, the actors line up — nine of them facing the other nine — and in perfect silence, they walk towards and then through each other. Once they reach the other side, they turn and repeat the movement, ending up right where they started. They are now ready to begin performing.

The stage clears, a table and some chairs are brought out, and two actors begin running through their lines. They aren’t quite perfect yet and Taylor interjects once or twice to get them to project their voices and turn their bodies to be more visible.

They improve quickly and are not stopped again.

There is no doubt that what we will see on the opening night of February 19 is as close to Taylor’s artistic vision as can be realized, but there is also no pretense about how much of a group effort this was to achieve. Just as the play Love and Information is the sum of 59 isolated, yet connected scenes, so too is the production itself the sum of many talented people’s great individual efforts, all dedicated towards the same ambitious end. U

PROPS JESSICA WARREN

“Basically each of the characters are meant to be as human as possible, bringing little idiosyncrasies in and different physicalities” - Sarah Jane, Actor

OPINIONS

JANUARY 17, 2017 TUESDAY

EDITOR BAILEY RAMSAY

FURLONG //

Letter: We should support Ono’s bravery reinviting Furlong to campus

FILE JACK HAUEN

Michael Stone Third-year Intergrated Science Student

This letter is a response to the previously published letter, “Ono’s cowardice on Furlong should end his honeymoon on campus,” which was published January 12, 2017.

Ono’s cowardice? More like Ono’s bravery. For the first time in my three years as a student at UBC, I’ve witnessed the administration stand up to the unbridled advance of social justice warrior values on campus.

Let’s start with the facts. The letter to which I’m responding left out several important details about Furlong’s allegations. Yes, John Furlong was accused in The Georgia Straight of abuse during his time working at a residential school. However, these claims were investigated by the RCMP and rejected by the courts. Following the article, Furlong and the writer of The Georgia Straight article became entangled in a libel lawsuit which Furlong won. Furthermore, one of the people who laid claims against Furlong was found not to have attended the school that he worked at during the alleged abuse.

It would seem that Arno Rosenfeld, writer of the letter, has forgotten something called “innocent

before proven guilty” — a.k.a. Article 11 of The Universal Declaration of Human Rights. When someone is accused of something, it is most certainly not license to assume they are guilty simply because you feel strongly about the matter.

UBC’s administration is generally as spineless as a cephalopod and we all know it. Much like a scared cuttlefish, the first sign of controversy sends them hiding under a rock. President Ono’s decision to stand up for Furlong’s reputation should be regarded as a step in the right direction towards evidencebased policies and decision-making.

Choosing to limit the free speech of others on a basis of conflicting opinion limits one’s ability to learn. The initial decision to cancel Furlong’s speech is reminiscent of another upsetting event on campus.

During the pro-life demonstrations last November, UBC Lifeline members were obstructed by counter-protesters with cardboard blockers and megaphones. This discouraged meaningful discussion about abortion laws in Canada (this coming from someone who respects women’s right to choose). The same mentality was responsible for UBC’s initial decision to cancel Furlong’s speech.

These days, the slightest hint that someone might get offended or upset appears to be cause to throw common sense out the window.

Let’s all think twice before calling a man who organized one of the most successful Olympic Games in recent memory a “racist child abuser.” U

SANTA ONO //

John Furlong’s invitation to UBC is highly controversial.

R. JULLIART/FLICKR

Letter: Ono’s cowardice on Furlong should end his honeymoon campus Arno Rosenfeld UBC alumnus and former Ubyssey editor

UBC’s new president has finally made a controversial decision, and revealed that behind his cute music videos and bow ties is utter contempt for people working against racism and child abuse in Canada.

Santa Ono’s unilateral decision to reinstate John Furlong as keynote speaker at a UBC fundraising event is all the worse for how unnecessary it was. It would have been one thing if Ono was under pressure to cancel Furlong’s speech.

Apparently nobody realized at first how controversial inviting

UBC GAMEPLAN Workshop: January 31 To provide high quality recreation and sport experiences for students, faculty, staff and residents, UBC is developing a long-range recreation and athletics facilities strategy.

Following public consultation last fall, UBC is seeking further input from the campus community on a shortlist of options for Thunderbird Stadium and War Memorial Gym.

12

This workshop will share how options have evolved since October and will include facilitated small group discussions to hear what the campus community thinks the opportunities and challenges are for each of the remaining options.

Join Us at the Workshop WHEN? Tuesday, January 31, 3 – 7pm · Please note this is a drop-in event

A workshop tailored to neighbourhood residents is taking place on January 21 from 1pm – 4pm at the Wesbrook Community Centre, 3335 Webber Lane.

WHERE? Hillel House, 6145 Student Union Boulevard

Online comments can be submitted from January 21 – February 5 at planning.ubc.ca/ubcgameplan

Questions? Please contact Gabrielle Armstrong, Senior Manager, Public Engagement, at gabrielle.armstrong@ubc.ca or 604-822-9984.

planning.ubc.ca/ubcgameplan This notice contains important information which may affect you. Please ask someone to translate it for you.

Furlong to campus would be. Once they realized that, the organizers cancelled his appearance last month. People make mistakes, they fix their mistakes, we move on.

Ono went out of his way to apologize to Furlong for the cancellation — but otherwise didn’t need to involve himself at all.

Let’s take a moment to clarify what Ono was involving himself in by laying out just what Furlong is accused of.

In 2012, eight First Nations students signed affidavits for a Georgia Straight reporter outlining physical and mental abuse by Furlong during his time as a physical education teacher at a residential school — the very kind of school UBC wants to be a leader in recognizing the awful legacy of.

One student said, “I was hit on the head all the time. I was hit with a ruler: a metre stick in the legs. I remember one day talking to another Native person in my language. I said, ‘What are you learning in school?’ John Furlong hit me for that. Those days, there was not too much learning. I remember John Furlong chased me home one day.”

Furlong denies all the allegations presented in the article.

The Georgia Straight article also said that Furlong, who organized the 2010 Vancouver Olympics, left out his time as a residential school teacher in all of his official biographies and in his autobiography.

Hm. Okay, now that we’re caught up to speed on why some people didn’t want Furlong speaking at UBC, let us return to our adorable new president’s involvement in this sordid affair.

Following the athletic department’s cancellation of Furlong’s speech, everything was fine. Furlong accepted the cancellation. Ono had nothing to do with any of this, and was in the clear.

But instead of letting well enough be, Ono decided to reinvite Furlong after two weeks — again, a man accused by eight

people of being horribly racist and beating them as children — after the athletics department cancelled his talk.

Why would he do that?

As a recent alumnus of UBC, that’s what I want an answer to.

Surely if Ono believed the eight First Nations students who had spoken to The Georgia Straight, he wouldn’t have re-invited Furlong.

After all, no president of a university aspiring to be one of the best in the world would want a racist child abuser raising funds for its sports teams.

So then, Ono must believe that the eight students who spoke to The Georgia Straight in 2012 are liars. In failing to believe them, Ono is making the same mistake that people in positions of authority across Canada made throughout the history of the residential school program where, for decades, Indigenous children were forcibly removed from their families and abused in boarding schools meant to take away any shred of their cultural identity.

There is a small chance that Ono believes that Furlong abused those children but thinks his work supporting sports in Canada in the decades since absolves him of guilt.

Or perhaps Ono simply believes that slighting a major figure in Canadian sports would hurt the university’s status in the eyes of certain donors.

Whatever the case, Ono’s aggressive cowardice in re-inviting Furlong to speak should end whatever honeymoon he received as a president who engaged nicely, if superficially, with students on social media and around campus (what a low bar we have for our leaders).

It is time for us to hold Ono accountable not only on his action in the case of Furlong, but on all the serious issues on campus: affordability, mental health, the quality of teaching and the priorities of the administration.

If Ono is willing to ignore the concerns of human rights advocates concerned about Furlong speaking on campus, it suggests the policy he sets as president may not be as in line with what students believe as his slick, self-created brand make it seem. U

SCIENCE

JANUARY 17, 2017 TUESDAY

EDITOR KOBY MICHAELS

13

ON THE ORIGIN OF SCIENTISTS //

Sara Harris teaches climate change differently Nivretta Thatra Senior Staff Writer

“I would love it if everyone out there who is voting had some background in evaluating evidence,” said Dr. Sara Harris, professor of teaching at UBC, paleo-oceanographer and coauthor of Understanding Climate Change: Science, Policy, and Practice.

“I would like to provide people — who are coming from all different backgrounds and going to all kinds of places — with an experience where they have some practice working with basic data about climate science and climate change,” she said.

Harris has a vision for her work — she wants to participate in the world in a way that is sustainable and humane. In her day-to-day work, she proves that she is rigorously committed to this goal. Rather than simply teaching climate science as she sees fit, Harris studies how people learn about climate science, and then implements these techniques in her classroom.

Researching how people learn is how Harris came to be such a strong proponent of teaching how to evaluate evidence rather than teaching the evidence itself.

“It turns out that showing people data in that kind of setting, just telling people that they’re wrong, is not helpful.”

Instead, people should be taught how to let evidence influence the decisions they make. “We’re all humans — it’s not always that evidence trumps other reasons to make a decision. But it is possible to use evidence to inform decisions,” said Harris.

To ensure that her teaching is not isolated to those of us privileged to be at this university, Harris organizes teams of UBC environmental science students to join with community partners through the Centre for Community

Engaged Learning. Since 2013, she has also taught a free, open online course on edX (and previously on Coursera), the first open-access climate change course of its kind.

Harris’ commitment to education and community engagement was a path she chose over that of basic research after her doctoral degree. After finishing her PhD at Oregon State, she had the choice of going to France to study marine sediments. She decided instead to teach with the Sea Education Association in Woods Hole, Massachusetts.

There, as chief scientist, she took students out to sea for six weeks at a time, teaching sailing, navigation and methodologies for collecting oceanographic data.

After seven years of teaching and sailing — which took her from Woods Hole to the Caribbean, Costa Rica, Tahiti and Hawaii — Harris felt ready to move on. Her interest in education was solidified at Woods Hole, so she was excited to join an education-focused tenure-track job at UBC. In 2005, during Harris’ very first term teaching at UBC, she was in the audience as Nobel Laureate Carl Wieman spoke on his initiative to study how students learn science.

Wieman’s talk set the tone for Harris’ work in the years to follow.

Young scientists, take heart.

Retrospectively, it can seem that Harris deliberately planned to end up doing the work she is doing, but she sees it differently.

“I started as a Russian major in college. And then on a fluke, I took a structural geology class which I was very unqualified to take, and crammed a geology major into my last year,” said Harris. “It’s very hard to look ahead at your own career. There’s no way that I could have foreseen being here, doing what I’m doing.”

Thankfully, there is no need for a grand plan in order to have a career as successful, interesting and community-oriented as Harris’. U

Sarah Harris’ teaching has taken her all over the world, which has helped shape her unique approach to educating.

AIKEN LAO

HEALTH //

If you want better grades, start exercising more often

Taking breaks on Facebook won’t cut it anymore.

Saurav Acharya and Igor Mihajlovic Contributors

Not happy with your grades from last term? Science has a solution for you — exercise.

Physical activity increases circulation, oxygen intake and endorphin release which all positively impact our brain’s efficiency. Dr. Peter Graf, a psychology professor at UBC

PETER WOJNAR

who studies memory, helped explain how students can use the relationship between exercise and their brain to improve their grades.

According to Graf, there are two main ways in which physical activity improves our ability to take in new information — it helps us conserve our attentional resources and takes advantage of the powerful effects of contextual learning.

Attentional resources are similar to a cognitive currency that the brain has to spend to do various mental tasks. These resources are limited, which means you can only do a few things at once. Learning and retaining information are expensive tasks and require a lot of attentional resources, but so does stress, anxiety and worrying. These negative emotions and thinking patterns drain your resource bank, and impede your ability to concentrate. Physical exercise can plug that drain.

“If you go and weightlift, or you go running, you actually disengage from [anxiety]. If you’re there and you’re pushing weight to the max, you’re no longer thinking, ‘I need to study for the exam, I need to do this, I need to do that,’” said Graf. “You actually approach it again with a new mindset when you get back to the task.”

Physical exercise can stop you from wasting unnecessary brain power by disengaging your mind from stress and worry. But can you get the same effect by simply distracting yourself with funny

YouTube videos? Possibly, but there is another critical way in which physical activity boosts your ability to learn — that of contextual effect.

“Everything we learn is connected in our mind to the context in which we learned it,” said Graf.

Whenever you take in a new piece of information, your mind automatically connects it with your current context and mental state, your environment, and the way in which you took in the information.

So if you decide to cram an exam’s worth of material in one night, chances are that it won’t work because all of the information is being stored in the same context. As a result, your brain will have trouble recalling and differentiating the information.

“In order for us to be good at remembering, we need a variety of different contexts,” said Graf.

He illustrated the importance of context with an analogy. “Context is like what happens if you have a hook for hanging clothes. You can put one jacket on there, [and then] a second jacket no problem. But

by the time you have 20 on there, obviously they don’t stay on and maybe even the hook falls out. In the same way, if we put too much onto the same context that we have for remembering, we lose it. The context is no longer useful [and] it is no longer distinctive.”

Physical activity creates a new context, creating a new hook to hang information on — just scrolling through Facebook won’t make that happen.

According to Graf, even simple things like walking outside, breathing in fresh air or seeing some friends can produce context variety and improve your learning.

You really don’t need a gym or a pool to be physically active — you might just need to be a bit creative.

“I live on the 25th floor of a high rise building. If it’s a really rainy or winter day, I go run up and down the stairs in the stairway [since] there’s nobody there. I could be naked if I wanted to. If I go up and down four times, I’ve done half the Grouse Grind. It’s a solid, solid workout.” U

14 | SPORTS+REC | TUESDAY JANUARY 17, 2017 HOCKEY //

BASKETBALL //

Third time’s the charm: ’Birds take Winter Classic

Bear-ly beaten: Women lose one, win one

Matt Langmuir Senior Staff Writer

After losing the previous two Winter Classics, the UBC men’s hockey team was finally able to please their home audience with a victory this year.

A UBC hockey record of 5,039 — a sell-out crowd — were in attendance to see UBC’s third annual Winter Classic event. Fans were sure in for a treat as their team came from behind to take down the University of Manitoba Bisons 4-3.

The game was physical and fastpaced from the get-go. Both teams were fighting for the sixth and final playoff spot in the Canada West, and the physicality on the ice highlighted just how crucial the game was.

Manitoba controlled the play in the first period and ultimately found themselves on the board first. Nick Zajac’s snipe from the slot gave the Bisons the icebreaker and silenced the sellout crowd. The visitors would double their lead early in the second with a power play goal from Jordan DePape.

But four minutes after the DePape goal, Thunderbirds forward Chase Clayton was able to pounce on a lose puck in the crease to cut the deficit in half and shift the momentum in UBC’s favour.

It was all Thunderbirds after that.

Defenceman Jerret Smith capitalized on a 5-on-3 to tie the game at 8:58 in the second period.

Less than three minutes later,

Manraj Hayer scored another power play goal to give the ’Birds their first lead of the night. ’Birds veteran Joe Antilla made it 4-2 six minutes later with yet another goal with the man advantage.

“The second period was incredible,” said UBC head coach Sven Butenschon. “We somehow went from playing nervous, tight hockey [in the first period] to ‘take a deep breath and play like we can.’

We were able to defend, we got our forecheck going … and our power play finally chipped in for us.”

UBC overwhelmed Manitoba with their power play, going three for seven. A big part of the ’Birds’ power play success was Joe Antilla, who assisted on Clayton and Hayer’s goals before potting the gamewinner himself.

“I’m happy obviously to get the game winning goal,” said Antilla. “But any guy on this team can score a game winning goal.

Collectively, it’s been awesome, so I’m happy we got the win tonight.”

Coach Butenschon spoke highly of his fifth-year veteran, commending his work ethic both on and off the ice during his university career. “[Joe] has been a leader for our group,” said Butenschon. “It’s just awesome to see him come through again.”

The ’Birds are currently in seventh place with 17 points.

Manitoba is one point ahead of

Salomon Micko Benrimoh Senior Staff Writer

JEREMY JOHNSON-SILVERS

Men’s hockey came back from a two-goal deficit to defeat the University of Manitoba Bisons.

them, which means a regulation win would see UBC take over the

sixth and final playoff spot from the Bisons. U

The UBC women’s basketball team won one game and lost another against the University of Alberta Golden Pandas this past weekend.

The T-Birds still hold a 13-8 overall record and a 9-3 Canada West record, but they’re still trying to bounce back into the form they were in when they won eight games in a row at the beginning of the season.

Friday’s game was good for the ’Birds. But the T-Birds took off in the fourth, scoring 26 points and keeping the Golden Pandas to only 19. The T-Birds eventually won the game by a final score of 71-64.

Saturday’s game was more closely fought. Spectators were on hand to witness the T-Birds and the Golden Pandas go back and forth in scoring for the majority of the game. The T-Birds did pull ahead in the third quarter, scoring a total of 18 points and keeping the Golden Pandas down to just 10 points. But the Golden Pandas responded in the next quarter, scoring a total 22 points to UBC’s 15.

The game itself was only determined in the dying moments of the fourth quarter, where the Golden Pandas were able to take a three-point lead thanks to a successful free throw attempt. They eventually held on to take the game 60-57, much to the dismay of the T-Birds. U

UNDER THEIR FEATHERS //

UBC football’s Blake Nill is synonymous with success

In his first year as UBC head coach, Nill led the ’Birds to a Vanier Cup win.

Bill Situ Senior Staff Writer

Coaching football wasn’t always a career that Blake Nill intended to pursue. Today, he is the current head coach of the Thunderbirds football team and his name has become almost synonymous with U Sport football success.

A native of Hanna, Alberta, Nill always saw himself as having the build to be a football player. For him — a man standing at 6’6’’ and weighing in at 275 pounds — getting into the sport was not a coincidence.

“The reason I got into [football] is genetics,” said Nill. “When you’re my size, you [have] got to play football when you’re a kid.”

Nill began his collegiate career at the University of Calgary, where he played as a defensive lineman

from 1980 to 1982. He then received a draft into the CFL in 1983, landing with the Montreal Concordes as the 19th overall pick. He went on to spend a total of five years in the CFL, playing for Montreal, Hamilton and Winnipeg.

Yet his career in football did not end there.

After earning his bachelor of arts and bachelor of science degrees from Concordia and St. Francis Xavier University respectively, Nill set his sights on earning a master’s in education, hoping to become a teacher. It was here that he discovered what was to become a long-term career as a football coach.

“As a coach, it was accidental. I just wanted to get into education. I applied to the school and they told me they would accept if I coached their football team, and that’s how I

JACK HAUEN

got into it,” said Nill.

Nill began coaching in 1992, starting as the defensive coordinator for the St. Francis Xavier X-Men. It didn’t take long before he struck gold. In 1996, the X-Men entered the Vanier Cup to face the Saskatchewan Huskies.

Although the game ended in a loss, it was a season to remember for Nill.

“To get St. FX to the Vanier Cup was very special and we played well. We almost won [the championship],” said Nill.

After six years as defensive coordinator, Nill moved on to become the head coach for the St. Mary Huskies. By now, Nill was committed to a career in coaching football.

“It kept me from going back to Alberta and being a teacher, but

what happened was that when I got the St. Mary’s job, it was a big deal for me because I wanted to remain in football,” said Nill. Again, success came early for Nill as he made four trips to the Vanier Cup in 1999, 2001, 2002 and 2003. Two of those years — 2001 and 2002 — ended in championship titles. Nill saw his time at St. Mary’s as a continuation of a legacy that former coach Larry Uteck — who the Uteck Bowl was named after — had established.

After these accomplishments at St. Mary’s, Nill transferred to the alma mater of his college football days — the University of Calgary — in 2006. Unlike St. Mary’s, which had been a powerhouse team at the time of Nill’s entry, Calgary was a team that hadn’t won a playoff game in 10 years.

“I felt that at that point, I was ready for a change. I had accomplished everything I could at St. Mary’s and Calgary needed a turnaround,” said Nill.

As it turned out, Nill was able to turn the team’s luck around.

Although the Dinos were second to last in Canada West during the 2005 and 2006 seasons, the team moved up to the second place spot by 2008 and to the top spot in 2009.

If that wasn’t impressive enough, every season from 2008 to 2013 ended in a Hardy Cup Championship. Three of those seasons — 2009, 2010 and 2013 — ended in Vanier Cup appearances.

Having successfully transformed the Dinos from a lacklustre team to a powerhouse in Canada West, Nill was determined to do the same when he came to UBC in

2015. At the time, the T-Birds had, coincidentally, a similar situation to the Dinos in 2005 — having made the playoffs only twice in eight seasons.

“I just believe that as a coach in a competitive situation … you’ve got to make a change every now and then to keep the fire going,” said Nill.

At UBC, the turnaround came even faster for Nill. In his first year as head coach, the ’Birds successfully ended their 18-year cup drought after several disappointing seasons.

Nill believes that there are three key reasons to his coaching success.

“I surround myself with very good people, and I’m a good evaluator of talent and I outwork,” he said.

His ability to evaluate talent showed during the 2015 season when UBC placed first in CIS for recruiting.

Despite his many successes, the most recent season — which ended in a 3-5 record and an exit from the playoffs at the Hardy Cup finals — was a disappointment for Nill. Still, he sees potential in the ’Birds.

“We’re competitive, but we just did not have enough plays to get the job done,” said Nill.

Nill’s philosophy for building football programs has also remained largely unchanged. For him, the goal for the next season — as it has been with his previous teams — is to continue instilling a culture and spirit of winning at UBC. “It is a consistency issue, but that only improves if you become a more veteran team and you learn the culture of winning,” said Nill. U

JANUARY 17, 2017 TUESDAY | sports+rec | 15 MEET //

DOMINATION //

Men’s basketball blows past Golden Bears

PATRICK GILLIN

The event took place in the basement of the Nest, with a total of 51 competitors.

Powerlifting club holds 2017 New Year’s Championships Bill Situ Senior Staff Writer

On Saturday, the UBC Weightlifting and Powerlifting Club held its first British Columbia Powerlifting Association (BCPA) sanctioned competitive event of the year.

The event took place in the basement of the Nest, with a total of 51 competitors from UBC and abroad of various weight and age classes — all of whom are members of the BCPA. Like most other powerlifting competitions, participants each had three attempts with three different lifts — the deadlift, bench press and squat.

According to Elizabeth Hu, the treasurer for the club and meet director for the competition, enthusiasm for the event was high from the beginning. Registration was full only 30 minutes after it became open to the public.

The meet was a fun experience for many, including those outside the university.

“I like the venue. It’s a little different from previous meets that I’ve been through,” said Eddie Lovsin, a competitor for the junior male 120 kilograms class from Maple Ridge. “The seating is a lot better. It gives you a good area to see the lifters.”

Cameron St. Amond — a student at the Justice Institute of BC who competed for the junior male 105 kilograms class — was most impressed by the overall efficiency of the event.

“For a local meet, it’s really well set up. They’re flying through the attempts, which is always good. You don’t want to be in the back area and waiting around too long in between attempts,” said St. Amond.

For Kevin Yoon, a fourth-year kinesiology student at UBC, the event was his first time coaching an athlete for competition. He was the coach for Carly Klohs of the female junior 72 kilograms class.

“It was pretty interesting. I was always in the athlete’s shoes, so I’ve never really experienced the coaching part of the sport,” said Yoon.

With Klohs being a first-time competitor, Yoon also saw the event as a chance to create a memorable experience for her.

For Hu, the event was her chance to see her efforts in a long planning process finally become a reality.

“It’s pretty amazing to see [the event] come together after six months of hard work. It was pretty stressful up until this point, but now everything’s moving along smoothly.”

- ELIZABETH HU, TREASURER AND MEET DIRECTOR

“It’s pretty amazing to see [the event] come together after six months of hard work. It was pretty stressful up until this point, but now everything’s moving along smoothly,” said Hu. Gabe Festing — president of the BCPA — was also thoroughly impressed with the way the competition turned out. With 11 other BCPA meets scheduled to take place this year, he sees the event as another effort to accommodate for a sport with growing popularity.

“Powerlifting has exploded over the last few years. It’s something that I never imagined ... [The UBC Powerlifting Club] has done an amazing job and I’m quite proud to have them on our BCPA team,” said Festing. U

The men’s basketball team are now 11-1 in Canada West play.

Salomon Micko Benrimoh Senior Staff Writer

The UBC men’s basketball team swept their weekend series with the University of Alberta Golden Bears through two commanding wins. The team now has a three-game winning streak heading into next week’s double header against the Mount Royal University Cougars.

On Friday night, the T-Birds stormed out in the first quarter scoring 21 points to Alberta’s 17.

Their momentum slowed a bit in the second and third quarters, and Alberta took advantage. The two teams entered the last quarter with Alberta ahead by a basket.

The ’Birds saved the best for last, scoring 27 in the fourth quarter and keeping the Golden Bears to only 15 points. The final result for the first game was 7868 in favour of the T-Birds.

The second game is where UBC really shined. A reasonable crowd of about 800 people was present for the team’s 102-76 rout of the Golden Bears. The T-Birds even put on a show during warmup, with many of the players displaying some pretty intense three-point shooting and dunking skills.

Once the actual game started, it stayed in favour of the Thunderbirds. A.J. Holloway

CHOLADHORN SINRACHTANANT

was electric in the first half, even stuffing seven-foot-one centre Brett Roughead from getting a basket in the first quarter, much to the delight of the crowd. The ’Birds combined for a whopping 57 points in the first half and they would continue outscoring the Golden Bears for the rest of the game.

The T-Birds are now 11-1 in Canada West play and 18-2 overall. U The ’Birds will look to continue their winning streak next week when they hit the road to face the Mount Royal University Cougars in Calgary, Alberta.

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16 | GAMES+COMICS | TUESDAY JANUARY 17, 2017

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