ANAL RETENTIVE SINCE 1918
UBC’S OFFICIAL STUDENT NEWSPAPER | OCTOBER 22, 2012 | VOLUME XCIV| ISSUE XV
BUDDIES BEAT ’BIRDS (BUT WHO’S COUNTING?)
Men’s hockey team stands up to NHLlevel competition, helps raise over $200,000 in charity hockey game P5
U
THE UBYSSEY
T E G E W AROUND
STRIKE
ENDS
After a successful weekend at the table, CUPE 116 will ask its members to ratify an agreement with UBC P3
CHANGE ROOM
VOYEUR
RCMP arrest man for allegedly recording videos in Osborne Centre women’s change room P3
’ve gotta get here Whether by bus, car or bike, we ation shapes ort somehow. A look at how transp Page 6 UBC — and your daily life — on
PHYLO UNDER FUN
David Ng unveils his Pokémon-esque plan to teach kids taxonomy P8
MONDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2012 |
YOUR GUIDE TO UBC EVENTS + PEOPLE
What’s on Tue 1222
OUR CAMPUS
THIS WEEK, MAY WE SUGGEST...
LAUGHS >>
2
ONE ON ONE WITH THE PEOPLE WHO MAKE UBC
MONDAY
Comedy Night: 8 p.m. @ the Gallery Lounge
Ever wish that the Comedy Mix was a little bit closer to campus? Well, you’re in luck this week! Kyle Bottom and four other Vancouver comics will be coming to your local watering hole to add a little pep to your upcoming week. Tickets are $3 at the door. Tue 1223
Tue 1224
TRAVEL >>
TUESDAY
FILMS >>
WEDNESDAY
Go Global 101: 1-2 p.m. @ West Mall Swing 122 Doesn’t studying in Europe just sound more fun for next year? If you have any interest in studying abroad in the coming year, make sure to go to this informational workshop to learn the important details before you pack your bags. Tue 1225
DAVID MARINO PHOTO/THE UBYSSEY
Barnabas Caro has gone from event organizer to rez advisor to student senator at UBC.
Caro on caring about UBC
SPEAKER >>
THURSDAY
Pumpkin Massacre & Movie Marathon: 10 p.m. @ Abdul Ladha Didn’t think you were going to carve a pumpkin in rez this year? Think again! The SUS is having an all-night movie marathon at Ladha with prizes and events that are sure to improve your hump day. Tickets $2 at the door.
Vulnerability and the Human Condition: 4-5:30 p.m. @ Green College Renowned legal scholar and UBC prof Martha Fineman will deliver this year’s annual Richard V. Ericson lecture to discuss different ways to view equality in society. Tue 1226
PARTY >>
FRIDAY
EUS/AUS Halloween Bash: 9 p.m. @ MASS (in Buch. D) Ladies and gentleman, get your costumes ready! Start your Halloween weekend right with this party, conveniently located on campus. Cheap beer, fresh baets, costume contest — what more could you ask for? Tickets $5 at the door or from the AUS & EUS.
Got an event you’d like to see on this page? Send your event and your best pitch to printeditor@ubyssey.ca.
This Week at The Norm Wednesday 24–Sunday 28 The Dark Night: 6 p.m. The Dark Night Rises: 9 p.m.
Tickets are $5 for students, $2.50 for FilmSoc members. Learn more at UBCfilmsociety.com!
U THE UBYSSEY
EDITORIAL
Senior Lifestyle Writer STAFF Zafira Rajan Bryce Warnes, Josh Curran, zrajan@ubyssey.ca
Coordinating Editor Jonny Wakefield coordinating@ubyssey.ca Features Editor Natalya Kautz features@ubyssey.ca Managing Editor, Print Jeff Aschkinasi Video Editor printeditor@ubyssey.ca David Marino video@ubyssey.ca Managing Editor, Web Andrew Bates Copy Editor webeditor@ubyssey.ca Karina Palmitesta News Editors Will McDonald + Laura Rodgers news@ubyssey.ca
copy@ubyssey.ca
Senior News Writer Ming Wong mwong@ubyssey.ca
Graphics Assistant Indiana Joel ijoel@ubyssey.ca
Culture Editor Anna Zoria culture@ubyssey.ca
Layout Artist Collyn Chan cchan@ubyssey.ca
Senior Culture Writer Rhys Edwards redwards@ubyssey.ca
Videographer Soo Min Park spark@ubyssey.ca
Sports + Rec Editor CJ Pentland sports@ubyssey.ca
Webmaster Riley Tomasek webmaster@ubyssey.ca
Art Director Kai Jacobson art@ubyssey.ca
Peter Wojnar, Anthony Poon, Veronika Bondarenko, Yara De Jong, Lu Zhang, Ginny Monaco, Arno Rosenfeld, Matt Meuse, Hogan Wong, Rory Gattens, Brandon Chow, Joseph Ssettuba
Sarah Bigam Contributor
Barnabas Caro wants to eventually work as a humanitarian in Africa, but for now he’s focused on improving things for students here at UBC. An international student from Tanzania, Caro has been volunteering and pitching in wherever he could since he started at UBC. “I jumped right into it and haven’t regretted a bit of it so far,” said Caro. In his first year, he organized events with the Arts Undergraduate Society. That summer, he went home to Tanzania and set up a program that provided food and school supplies to orphans. Since then he’s focused on improving things locally for UBC students, though he plans to return home and work in aid some day. In second year, Caro worked as a residence advisor in Place Vanier. “You’ve got to have a really, really close connection with a lot of people who are going through an experience that you want to share,” said Caro of his time there. While working at Vanier, he noticed a gap in communication and services from the AMS student society to people living
in residence. “I felt like I was only affecting a few students in the grand scheme of things,” Caro said. “I wanted to go into student government so I could really try and get to a lot of people.” The next year, Caro won a student seat on the UBC Senate, the university’s highest academic body. While campaigning for Senate, he thought about how he could work to create more programs at UBC to support people with learning disabilities. Dyslexic himself, Caro said that such programs have been extremely helpful to him over the years. Now a fourth-year Arts student with a major in political science and a minor in English, Caro said he wouldn’t have succeeded academically without the help he received through some UBC programs for people with learning disabilities. “It’s incredible, the things you can do here to help people learn,” he said. Once Caro was elected to Senate, he found there were already many senators working on projects to help people with learning disabilities, so he decided to join the academic building needs committee instead. He made it his new goal
to create more student-focused spaces at UBC. “What I really try to do in student government is get areas of the university devoted to student life so that they can use them to form community on campus,” Caro said. “It’s hard to maintain good grades and a social life and I think that comes about from the fact that we don’t let them mix together, but if your close friends are people you share academic [interests] with, then you’re set.” He also works on the Arts Undergraduate Society committee that’s trying to build a new student space. He hopes this will also become a place where students can build connections between academics and their social lives. Although his ultimate goal is to continue doing aid work in Tanzania, Caro says he wants to first take up journalism for a while so he can better learn to help people and communities. “I’d like to go into journalism first, so I’ll have time to explore the whole world of aid in a journalistic capacity, to figure out what type of aid work is best,” he said. “When I figure out how best I can [help], I’ll do that.” U
OCTOBER 22, 2012 | VOLUME XCIV| ISSUE XV BUSINESS
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A PSA from your student paper: As of Oct. 22, there are only 63 days until Christmas, so start stockpiling those copies of The Ubyssey to save money on wrapping paper.
MONDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2012 |
EDITORS WILL MCDONALD + LAURA RODGERS
CRIME >>
3
LABOUR >>
CUPE 116 union reaches tentative deal with UBC after 34 hours of mediation Will McDonald News Editor
KAI JACOBSON PHOTO/THE UBYSSEY
Campus RCMP arrested a man accused of secretly filming a student in the Osborne Centre change rooms, and they’re trying to find links to similar reports at UBC and BCIT.
RCMP investigate reports of change room voyeurism Man charged with recording nudity on campus to appear in court Andrew Bates Managing Editor, Web
RCMP officers are working to determine if there is a link between a man charged with secretly recording nudity in a UBC change room and other complaints received on campus and at another institution. Jay Forster, a 42-year-old Vancouver man, has been charged with two counts of secretly observing or recording nudity in a private place. Police are comparing allegations that Forster secretly recorded a woman in the Osborne Centre gym to complaints of similar incidents on UBC campus and another incident at the British Columbia Institute of Technology (BCIT). “We’ve had other complaints,” said Staff Sgt. Kevin Jones of the UBC RCMP detachment. “So we’re trying to see if we can tie in any other complaints to this individual, both on campus and at BCIT.” According to an application for a search warrant obtained by The Ubyssey , a woman was changing in the Osborne Centre change room on Sept. 28 when she noticed “a <em>
</em>
NEWS BRIEF UBC clerical staff union ratifies collective agreement CUPE 2950, the union local representing library, clerical and Chan Centre staff at UBC, has voted to accept a four-year collective agreement with the university. The agreement, signed Thursday, covers wages from April 2010 through March 2014. It includes two years of zero per cent wage increases, and two subsequent years each with a two per cent wage increase. The 2012 wage increase will be backdated to April 2012. Workers at the Chan Centre will receive a 2.25 per cent increase in 2013, to put their wages more in line with industry standards. According to union vice-president Edita Michalek, over 700 of the union’s 1,700 members attended a vote today to ratify the agreement. She says that 90 per cent of members voted in favour. “What I heard from people — just very few comments — was that they were quite pleased that we got some money,” Michalek said. “Some people were hoping for more; we wanted to get [a] cost-of-living increase, also, but didn’t.” The agreement still needs to be ratified on the UBC side by the Board of Governors, and according to a university bulletin, they are hoping to do this by next week. U
movement out of the corner of her eye ... and saw a male staring at her at the east end of the locker bank.” The document says that the man then fled the scene. On Oct. 2, the same student asked a friend to accompany her into the Osborne change room because she was uncomfortable. The two began checking the showers, where they allegedly found the suspect. “When they opened one of them, they saw him inside, not quite huddled, but crouching,” read the application. “They began to scream and he came out of the shower.” According to the document, the alleged suspect fled and a witness called the RCMP, who pursued him over a fence and into the trails to the south of Thunderbird Stadium. “As I ran down the eastbound trail, I located the same male matching the description provided to me over the radio heading towards a fence,” read the account of the arresting officer. “I yelled, ‘Hey, hey, police, stop’ and at this point observed the male
already on the fence and attempting to get over.... I approached the fence, jumped over it [and] told the male he was under arrest.” According to the application, another arresting RCMP officer identified the suspect as Forster and seized his phone. The phone allegedly contained five videos of bathroom stalls with legs underneath and one “with a female who had her pants around her ankles and the video was close enough that [the officer] could see her genitals,” according to the officer’s account. Forster was taken into custody by the RCMP and referred to court, where he was charged and released on the condition that he could not possess cellphones or recording devices. According to Staff Sgt. Jones, the court did not grant a request to bar him from the University Endowment Lands and UBC. Forster is due to appear in Richmond Provincial Court on Nov. 1. According to Jones, University RCMP are working with the Burnaby detachment to confirm if the case is related to a similar incident
that took place four days earlier at BCIT, where a man was reportedly taking pictures in a woman’s bathroom. Similar complaints on the UBC campus, one taking place December 2011 in the Osborne Centre, are also under investigation to see if they can be linked. Paul Wong, director of UBC Campus Security, said it is important to report incidents and suspicious activity to security and the RCMP. “It’s disturbing when it happens, but when it does, we encourage people to report it right away,” he said. “Even if they just felt they suspected that something was happening,... it’s always better to report it, and based on that type of information we can do extra patrols in areas.” Wong praised the actions of the students. “It sounds like that [student] did a lot of the right things, obviously,” he said. “They had a level of discomfort, they went with a friend, they looked around, and obviously when they spotted somebody they suspected, they alerted others.” U
READINGS >>
B.C. government to commission free online textbooks
Veronika Bondarenko Staff Writer
The B.C. government wants to offer online textbooks for free to university students, but there’s still a fair bit of homework to do before the project becomes a reality. The B.C. Ministry of Advanced Education plans to commission textbook authors or developers to put together online textbooks for popular undergraduate courses. As a condition of funding, they’ll be available through a Creative Commons licence that makes them free for anyone to use, reuse and revise. A nonprofit called BCcampus, acting as an agent of the government, will store the textbooks online. The ministry has promised to offer free online textbooks for 40 of the most popular post-secondary courses in the province, but it’s up to professors to decide what textbooks are assigned within specific courses. If all goes according to plan, some of the books will be available by September 2013. After looking at data from B.C. schools and similar projects in Washington and California, the ministry will decide which courses will get free books. They expect to commission books for first-year courses like English, psychology and calculus. The BCcampus organization, a
STEPHANIE XU PHOTO / THE UBYSSEY
The B.C. government hopes to have free online textbooks ready by 2013.
10-year-old publicly funded group, creates online shared services and resources for universities and colleges in B.C. The CUPE 116 support and service staff union at UBC, which only just reached a tentative agreemen with UBC, has railed against any “shared services” plans promoted by the province, arguing that they may result in lost jobs. The government argues that the free textbooks will save over 200,000 students hundreds of dollars per year, but Debbie Harvie, managing director of the UBC Bookstore, said she’ll wait and see whether this plan will cut into sales. “We don’t yet know the effect of this announcement, except to say that there are not a lot of ‘free’ materials available at this point,” said Harvie. “I am waiting to hear more specifics so that I can understand how this could affect the Bookstore. In the meantime, we are, of course, selling e-textbooks when we can get them, as well as new [and] used
[textbooks], custom course packs and renting books too.” Kiran Mahal, AMS vice-president academic and university affairs, agreed that free access to online textbooks would help make post-secondary education cheaper. “Different institutions, and even different professors within the same institution, use different textbooks for courses that cover the same broad subject matter,” said Mahal. “The exact textbook choice is up to the professors.... This is why collaboration and coordination with post-secondary institutions is essential to the success of this system.” Mahal also stressed that the quest to make higher education more affordable should not end at textbooks. “More needs to be done around funding of higher education in a more consistent and holistic way, from student loan reform to increasing the block grant provided to public institutions like UBC,” Mahal said. U
CUPE 116 and UBC have reached a tentative agreement after three days of mediation. All CUPE 116 workers, including garbage collectors, campus mail workers and custodial staff, will return to work on Oct. 22. The parties were in scheduled mediation on Friday and Saturday, and then continued the talks into Sunday. UBC and CUPE 116 reached a tentative agreement late Sunday night. The agreement still needs to be ratified in a vote by union members. CUPE 116 President Colleen Garbe said the union would likely vote on the agreement on Wednesday or Thursday of this week. The details of the deal haven’t been disclosed, but Garbe said she thinks the union should take the deal. “We never get what we’re hoping for, but we have a very good settlement that’s going to be improvement for all of our members, really broad-based,” said Garbe. The bargaining sessions, mediated by Vince Ready, lasted 34 hours. “There was goodwill on both sides and a lot of hard work went into this to hammer out an agreement. So we’re thrilled, of course, we’re waiting, we’re hoping for ratification by the membership,” said director of UBC Public Affairs Lucie McNeill. In Friday’s bargaining session, CUPE 116 raised concerns that the Faculty of Forestry had illegally hired students to fill in for striking custodial workers. McNeill said that two faculties, which she declined to name, posted notices trying to hire students to do temporary custodial work. According to McNeill, no students were actually hired. “It’s people not being clear on what’s allowed under the labour relations code and thinking of doing the right thing: providing students a way to earn some money … and not having to do it themselves, probably,” said McNeill. While custodial workers were off the job during last week and the week before, managers were required to clean and empty garbage in all UBC buildings. McNeill said the university responded quickly and prevented students from being illegally hired to replace the CUPE 116 custodial workers. “It got resolved. As soon as it was brought up, the university took action. Whatever effort had been underway got nipped in the bud,” said McNeill. Garbe said that despite setbacks in negotiations, she is satisfied with the outcome. “It’s been nutty, but I think we’re happy,” said Garbe. McNeill said that UBC will no longer be affected by CUPE 116’s job action. “Things go back to normal on campus. Picket lines are down immediately. Anybody who was on strike is basically going back to work, and the overtime ban is lifted.… So that’s good news for the students, faculty and staff of the university.” U <em>
—With files from Laura Rodgers
</em>
MONDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2012 |
EDITOR C.J. PENTLAND
SOCCER >>
FOOTBALL >>
The No. 2 team in the nation beats Victoria, Fraser Valley
C.J. Pentland Sports + Rec Editor
Men’s soccer continues to dominate C.J. Pentland Sports + Rec Writer
The University of Victoria Vikes played tough on Friday night, but the UBC men’s soccer team prevailed in a closely contested battle, winning 2-1 at Thunderbird Stadium. The CIS No. 2 ranked T-Birds (11-0-1) used timely scoring and sound defence to withstand some strong pressure from UVic (5-5-2), and remained undefeated on the year with just two games left in the regular season. Gagandeep Dosanjh continued his torrid pace and opened the scoring just 11 minutes in, converting a pass from Reynold Stewart and taking advantage of a miscue by the Vike keeper to give UBC an early 1-0 lead. “I thought we were quite good overall in the first 15-20 minutes,” said UBC head coach Mike Mosher. “We generated a lot of chances.” Dosanjh, who leads the Canada West conference in scoring with 12 goals and eight assists, was all over the place in the opening 45 minutes, creating several scoring opportunities with his blazing speed and barely missing another goal when he nailed one off the crossbar from outside the 18-yard box. UBC controlled the play for the majority of the first half, but Victoria was able to counterattack. The Vikes used a quick passing play inside the box to tie the game at 1-1 in the 23rd minute, as Craig Gorman put one past a helpless Luke O’Shea. The keeper was otherwise strong in net for the ’Birds, making two saves, one of which was a diving effort that stopped a sure goal. The second half saw both teams struggle for good scoring opportunities. The Vikings missed a gorgeous chance early on when they
KAI JACOBSON PHOTO/THE UBYSSEY
UBC fought off Victoria on Friday night, winning 2-1 and remaining undefeated on the year.
were staring at a wide-open net, but the ball rung off the crossbar and the score remained tied. The T-Birds finally got their chance in the 71st minute and capitalized. Third-year Paul Clerc got his head on a Marco Visintin chip into the box and it fooled the UVic keeper, breaking the deadlock and putting UBC up 2-1. It was a lead the T-Birds wouldn’t relinquish, as they held off a late Victoria push with a solid shut-down effort on defence. “The second goal was a good goal,” said Mosher. “It was a good service in from Marco.… It was a nice, quick in-swinging serve, and Paul just got a little touch, and that was the difference.” UBC will face the CIS No. 8 ranked Trinity Western Spartans next weekend in a home-andhome series. It will be a good test for the ’Birds as they head into the postseason right after facing
playoff-calibre teams like Victoria and the Spartans. “Get used to those one-goal nail-biters where you’re hanging on at the end,” said Mosher. “That’s what you’re going to see down the line in the playoffs. It’s good to get those games to prepare us.” The T-Birds took care of the University of the Fraser Valley Cascades on Saturday night, winning 3-0. Milad Mehrabi tallied twice, Brandon Ho scored the third goal and Richard Meister recorded the shutout for UBC. UBC and TWU have sewed up their Canada West Pacific division playoff spots, while Victoria has a four-point lead on UFV with three games remaining. The ’Birds will travel to Langley to play the Spartans on Friday night and come home to finish off the regular season Saturday. Kickoff for both games is at 7 p.m. U
SOCCER STATS
BY THE
NUMBERS
20 points this year (12
goals and eight assists) for Gagandeep Dosanjh — eight more than the next highest total in the Canada West
43 goals scored by UBC
this year — 12 more than the next highest total in the Canada West
7 goals allowed by UBC
in 12 games this year — the fewest in the Canada West
7 shutouts this year by the T-Birds
HOCKEY >>
Men’s hockey rolls to a sweep
Rory Gattens Staff Writer
The UBC men’s hockey team finished off an important weekend sweep of the Lethbridge Pronghorns on Saturday night with a 3-2 win at the Doug Mitchell Thunderbird Sports Centre. After a convincing 5-1 win by the T-Birds (4-1-1) on Friday night, the Pronghorns (0-5-1) made life more difficult for UBC on Saturday. A goaltender change and a tighter defensive core made it tough for the Thunderbirds to penetrate the offensive zone, but UBC responded by getting pucks deep into the attacking zone and relying on their forecheck to pressure the Pronghorns. “That’s our identity. We are a forechecking cycling team and everyone knows that,” said UBC head coach Milan Dragcevic. “Today we could’ve buried them early, but [Lethbridge goalie] Damien Ketlo played outstanding for them and really kept them in the game.” Immediately after serving a two-minute minor penalty, UBC first-year forward Dillon Wagner opened the scoring after he jumped out of the box to start a 3-on-2, which concluded with Wagner tipping a Justin McCrae shot to give the Thunderbirds an early advantage. A little over a minute later, two-way forward Wyatt Hamilton
showed patience and perseverance by knocking home his own rebound to give UBC a 2-0 lead. UBC goaltender Jordan White looked poised in net during the first, confidently dealing with the limited Pronghorn attacks. But a shot from the point by Hayden Rintoul managed to find its way past him with six minutes to go in the first, as the puck bounced off a UBC defenceman and into the net. After the intermission, McCrae scored his third goal of the weekend to increase the Thunderbird lead to 3-1. The goal was a huge relief for the team captain. “The first couple of weekends it kind of felt like I was slumping and the pucks weren’t bouncing my way, but with this weekend I got a couple of lucky bounces and capitalized,” said McCrae. “We kept things simple: not getting too fancy with the puck, limiting our turnovers. With our guys, we really just need to keep pucks going forward and try to play in their end as much as we can.” In the middle of the third period, after a Thunderbird power play, Lethbridge forward Tyler Hlookoff flew out of the penalty box to latch onto a brilliant forward pass by defenceman Chase Schaber. Hlookoff calmly slotted home the breakaway to cut the lead to 3-2. Dragicevic was not pleased
HOGAN WONG PHOTO/THE UBYSSEY
UBC men’s hockey outscored Lethbridge 8-3 on the weekend en route to a sweep.
with the Thunderbirds’ brief lapse in concentration, but was happy overall with his team’s effort to conserve the lead. “Mistakes like that cannot happen. Everyone has to be aware when that guy is coming back onto the ice and just be smarter,” he said. “[But] I liked the way we responded to the goal by blocking key shots in the last minute and a half. We’ll take the win and are happy
with the four points [over the weekend].” White had to deal with a late push by the Pronghorn offence, but dealt with each effort with confidence. He made some sensational late saves to preserve the UBC lead and hold on for the win. Next weekend UBC plays host to the Saskatchewan Huskies. Games will be on Friday, Oct. 26 and Saturday, Oct. 27 at Father David Bauer Arena. U
4
UBC football comes up short Just like their effort to squeeze into the final Canada West playoff spot, the UBC football team’s effort to stage a comeback on Saturday afternoon against the University of Manitoba Bisons just wasn’t enough. A 37-31 defeat at the hands of the Bisons dropped the Thunderbirds to 2-5 on the season, eliminating them from playoff contention. The game had all the makings of a comeback for the ages. UBC trailed 30-4 at the half and looked as if they would be rolled over by Manitoba’s high-powered running game. But 27 unanswered points later, the T-Birds had taken the lead, leading the Bisons 31-30 in the fourth quarter. Billy Greene was at the centre of the charge, displaying the strong throwing arm that hasn’t been seen much this year. A 98-yard touchdown throw to Jordan Grieve kickstarted the turnaround in the third quarter, and an 18-yard touchdown toss to Andrew Darcovich at the start of the fourth cut the lead to 13. After an onside kick that the T-Birds were able to recover, Greene quickly went back to work, hooking up with Patrick Bull in the endzone on third down and 13 yards to go. A stop on defence got UBC the ball back right away, and the reigning CIS player of the year took them all the way back when he found Darcovich for his fourth touchdown pass of the day to put the ’Birds up by one. Yet the defence, which had been so instrumental in getting UBC that lead, couldn’t make one more stop. Bison running back Anthony Coombs caught a pass from quarterback Cam Clark and took it to the endzone, giving Manitoba the lead with just under six minutes left. Greene was then picked off on UBC’s next possession, but the T-Bird special teams came up big to limit the damage when Chris Adams blocked the Bison field goal attempt. This gave the T-Birds one last shot at keeping their playoff hopes alive. They marched down into Manitoba territory, converting on a couple of third downs. But Greene was shaken up by a few hits and had to be replaced by Dominik Bundschuh, who couldn’t complete a pass to Grieve to keep the drive alive, ending the T-Birds’ hopes of a dramatic comeback. It was a game reflective of how the season has played out: a poor start, a period where things refused to turn around, a glimmer of hope followed by a slow rise of progress that stirred some optimism. But for both the season and the game, it proved to be all for naught. The T-Birds simply couldn’t do enough to carry that momentum and finish it all off, and in the end they came up short. It was an unfortunate and untimely end for a season and game that started out with so much promise. Getting over such a tough loss is one thing; when that loss puts the team out of playoff contention, it’ll take a bit longer to deal with. The truth is that after a breakthrough 2011 campaign that saw them make the Canada West final, the UBC Thunderbirds won’t be making the playoffs in 2012. U
MONDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2012
| sports + rec | 5
HOCKEY >>
Bieksa creates night to remember Sold-out hockey game raises over $200,000 for three charities C.J. Pentland Sports + Rec Editor
In the most hyped hockey game of the past few months, the UBC men’s hockey team and Bieksa’s Buddies didn’t disappoint. Stellar goals, crafty stickwork and generous donations to charity highlighted Wednesday’s exhibition at the Doug Mitchell Thunderbird Sports Centre. A total of 15 goals were scored and $200,000 was donated to three Canuck charities in Bieksa’s Buddies’ come-from-behind 8-7 win over the Thunderbirds. The event was overall a big success; the sold-out crowd was thrilled at the chance to see their favourite Canucks take the ice and watch some of the best players in B.C. put on a show. “When you throw an event like this, there are so many things that can go wrong.… I thought for the most part it went pretty smooth,” said Vancouver Canucks defenceman Kevin Bieksa, who organized the event. “We accomplished everything we needed to. I think the fans had a great time and they were very receptive to everything.… For us as players, we had a great time playing a meaningful game, and it was a success.” The pregame event was perhaps the most impressive and important moment of the night. A cheque for $100,000 was presented to three Canuck charities, and it was then announced that famed singer Michael Bublé, who was a coach for Bieksa’s squad, would match that total and donate an additional $100,000. “I’m really lucky to be in the position to be able to do something like that,” said Bublé, who was originally going to play but pulled out in favour of coaching. “When I spoke to Kevin, I was just thrilled that he would even think to involve me in all of this. And when it came down to it, I asked him how much he hoped to raise and he told me 100 grand, and I told him, ‘Let’s make it two.’” Once the action on the ice started, there was no shortage of goals and excitement. UBC opened the scoring 5:23 in on a nifty backhand by Ben Schmidt that beat Canucks goalie Cory Schneider. After Canuck Aaron Volpatti tied it up at 1-1 a few minutes later, the teams traded goals for the remainder of the period and the score stood at 3-3 after 20 minutes. Joe Antilla and Nate Fleming tallied for UBC, while Daniel Sedin and Volpatti
SCORES
THUNDERBIRD WEEKEND RESULTS Friday, Oct. 19 Men’s hockey Lethbridge 1 UBC 5 Women’s hockey UBC 1 Lethbridge 0 Women’s soccer UBC 1 Victoria 2 Women’s basketball UBC 69 Brock 59 Women’s rugby (Canada West semifinal) UBC 12 Alberta 62 Saturday, Oct. 20 Women’s hockey UBC 1 Lethbridge 4 Men’s soccer UBC 3 Fraser Valley 0
Chris Borchert PHOTO/THE UBYSSEY
There was no lack of hockey action on Wednesday night at UBC, as Bieksa’s Buddies and UBC combined for 15 goals.
added the others for Bieksa’s Buddies. T-Bird Jordan White made 13 saves on 16 shots in the opening frame, while Schneider stopped six of nine, despite letting in the first two shots he faced. However, with Canucks goalie Roberto Luongo nowhere to be seen, Schneider remained in the game. The second period was all UBC. A couple of nice passing plays led to four unanswered goals for the T-Birds, as Schmidt, Fleming, Jessi Hilton and Cole Pruden all scored for UBC to make it 7-3 after 40 minutes. Kraymer Barnstable came in and stopped all seven shots he faced in the period. However, Bieksa’s Buddies seemed to flip a switch in the final frame, controlling the play for the remainder of the game. T-Bird goalie Steven Stanford was left out to dry on numerous occasions, as the intricate puck work of the Buddies — most notably by the magical Sedins — led to four easy goals that gave them the lead. Bieksa’s brother Marty, Chris Higgins, Anaheim Duck Rod Pelley, Manny Malhotra and Daniel Sedin all found the back of the net, and Schneider finally found his form
to stop all the shots he faced to give Bieksa’s Buddies the comefrom-behind victory. The game didn’t end in traditional fashion, however. After the T-Birds pulled their goalie for the extra attacker, the Buddies proceeded to pull Schneider, meaning there were no goalies on the ice for the remaining 22 seconds of the game. But UBC couldn’t capitalize, and the contest ended 8-7. Following regulation time, both teams partook in a shootout, with each squad selecting 10 players to shoot. Neil Manning and Scott Wasden both scored for UBC, while Dan Hamhuis and Max Lapierre scored for the Buddies to even it at two. On the final shot, the ’Birds put all three goalies in net to face Volpatti, and stopped him to ensure that the shootout ended in a draw. Despite falling short in the game, the ’Birds had nothing but positive thoughts about the game. “All the guys were really excited; it’s not every day you get to play against pros and some of your idols growing up,” said firstyear Scott MacDonald. “It was definitely a fun opportunity.” “The biggest thing we wanted to see was 5,000-plus people
walking away that had fun,” said head coach Milan Dragicevic. “[We wanted] to really showcase how good our hockey is and how good our players are,… that it’s entertaining and it’s a lot of fun, and I thought we did that. I thought our guys put on a good show.” The Canucks all relished the opportunity to get out and play an actual game. “It was a lot of fun. It was certainly the most fun I’ve ever had giving up seven goals,” said Schneider after the game. “Hopefully it doesn’t happen too much more.” “It was a fun game just to start zipping the puck around a little bit again and [get a] kind of game sense,” said Canucks forward Manny Malhotra. “Playing in front of fans again was a fun feeling, but it was nice to get a win.” It was a night with few flaws. Bieksa’s goals for the game were to raise money for charity and entertain the fans, and both were definitely accomplished. The lockout has been unfortunate for many people — players, fans, charities funded by the Canucks — but for one night, all of that was forgotten, thanks to the work of Kevin Bieksa. U
Women’s soccer UBC 5 Fraser Valley 2 Women’s field hockey UBC 3 Victoria 1 Women’s basketball UBC 72 Western 62 Women’s volleyball Thompson Rivers 0 UBC 3 Men’s volleyball (Thunderball Final) Thompson Rivers 3 UBC 2 Sunday, Oct. 21 Women’s rugby UBC 7 Lethbridge 60 Women’s volleyball (West Coast Classic) Trinity Western 3 UBC 1 Women’s basketball UBC 75 Alberta 72 Women’s field hockey UBC 6 Victoria 0
6 | feature |
MONDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2012
PARKING It’s no secret that finding free parking on UBC campus is close to impossible. Since the late ’90s, the university has been trying to reduce parking on campus. Three thousand parking spots on campus have been eliminated since 1997 — a reduction of about 25 per cent. The price of daily parking in surface lots has also tripled since then, from $2 per day in 1997 to $6 per day in 2011. Today, there are only 8,510 parking spaces on campus. “The [number of] lots will continue to shrink as we go through in time,” said Debbie Harvie, managing director of University Community Services. According to Harvie, parking lots are being removed to make room for the creation of new academic buildings on campus. Guiding the trend is the university’s Sustainability Plan, which aims to reduce emissions on campus; limited parking means fewer people driving to UBC. “I think people have become more conscious of social sustainability and not needing your car … when they can have transit options,” said Harvie. Many people bike or bus to campus, but Harvie said she feels spots should still be available for people who choose to drive. “Our parkades are not full,” Harvie added. “On any given day, the only one that does get a little bit full is Health
Few students, if any, talk about the bus loop as a focal point at UBC. To most, the wet, pitted concrete is just another part of their grinding commute. But with the construction set to transform campus, some see potential for the bus loop to become the heart of campus. In September, UBC announced its plans for an underground bus parking depot to be constructed by 2016. Despite these new plans, the location of the campus bus loop has been a contentious issue between students, TransLink and UBC for some time. Proposals between TransLink and UBC that date back to the late 1990s showed that both parties were interested in building an underground bus loop. The current aboveground bus loop, built in 2004, was intended to be temporary. “If TransLink’s funding doesn’t come through, they have no other source of funding and they will have to cancel the underground bus loop,” said former AMS President Blake Frederick in a 2009 press release put out by the AMS. Unfortunately, this was exactly the case. In October 2009, TransLink announced it would not be committing funds to the construction of an underground bus loop due to regional funding shortfalls — mak-
Sciences.” As such, UBC has no plans to build another parkade. The price of parking is scheduled to remain fixed as well, including the available parking passes. The state of parking policy on UBC campus has been heatedly debated in the past, and last fall, new regulations for parking were instituted accordingly. The update followed a 2006 class action lawsuit filed against UBC by Daniel Barbour, alleging that the university did not have the legal authority to issue parking tickets on campus. In early 2010, the B.C. Court of Appeal ruled that it is legal for UBC to issue parking tickets. Consequently, parking regulations were updated and passed by the UBC Board of Governors in September 2011. “If people don’t pay, they will get tickets and ultimately will get towed, and that can be very expensive,” said Harvie. New parking regulations were also introduced in the residential neighbourhoods on campus last winter. Distinct from the rules on the rest of campus, these were put into place to prevent drivers from parking in front of residents’ houses. The regulations now require some visitors to show a sticker or permit, and violators of any of these regulations can now be towed immediately.
“There has been clear relief in people now being able to park their vehicles where they should have been able to park them: in front of their residences,” said Erica Frank, a director of the University Neighbourhoods Association, the organization responsible for representing residents of market housing on campus. Frank did express some issues with the signage enforcing these new regulations. “I think the signs are clear, but I’ve had friends towed and they’re … smart people, but they missed it, and that’s no fun.” As parking has decreased, car-sharing programs like Car2Go, Zipcar and Modo have appeared on campus as alternatives to driving. Car2Go, introduced on campus last February, currently has 28 designated parking spaces on campus. Zipcar has six vehicles currently on campus and Modo has nine, according to their websites. Despite UBC’s interest in reducing driving to and around campus, Harvie said these car-sharing programs allow the university to meet people halfway. “If people need a car from time to time, we’re trying to make that available to them,” she said. —Sarah Bigam
ing UBC short $10 million of the $50 million project. Without TransLink’s support, C+CP was unsure about how it would move forward. “One of the problems with the transit terminal is there are a number of other initiatives at play right now, including the Student Union Building and the Alumni Centre, and we have to bear in mind that what we see on the ground is going to change,” said Joe Stott, director of C+CP, in 2010. After discussing several options, C+CP and campus infrastructure planners have since agreed to keep the bus loop at surface level but move it next to War Memorial Gym and closer to the new SUB, which is set to open in 2014. The AMS in particular supported this approach, hoping the new SUB would be the point of arrival for students on busses. For now, most busses remain isolated on the edge of MacInnes Field. However, Stott said in 2010 that UBC aims to incorporate transportation as a main feature of campus. “We need to make sure, when we provide better facilities for the transit riders to and from UBC, that it’s integrated into a whole, rather than sort of a disjointed approach,” he said. —Alvin Yu
BUS LOOP
TRANSPORTATION
From bike racks to bus loops, UBC campus is shaped by the many transportation services it hosts. Whether they
bus, bike or drive, nearly 50,000 students rely on this infrastructure to get them through their days. Throughout the past dec-
MONDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2012
For many UBC students, the U-Pass is a vital part of their everyday routine. Though it is one of the AMS’s most successful programs, the U-Pass has faced many referenda, redesigns and problems in the decade since its inception. “UBC identified a need for a student transit program to address single occupancy vehicles in the late ’90s. We introduced the U-Pass program, U-Pass UBC, in 2003,” explained Margaret Eckenfelder, acting director of UBC’s Transportation Planning office. Introduced at a fee of $20 per month, the U-Pass program was a significant success. According to a 2011 TransLink update, ridership has nearly quadrupled from 19,000 trips per weekday in 1997 to over 75,000 in 2011. TransLink cites the U-Pass program as a financial hit, saving students an average of $400 per term. “In 2003, 2005, 2008 and 2011, there were AMS referendums to confirm support for the program, and each time those referendums were run, it was confirmed [by] above 90 per cent of the voting students,” recounted Eckenfelder. The most recent referendum in March 2011 saw 95 per cent of voters in support of renewing the program. Despite its high approval rate, the U-Pass is not without its share of problems. Access to transit is a common concern among students, caused in part
| feature | 7
by overcrowding. Since 1997, transit to UBC has seen a 208 per cent increase in overall ridership. Students have also complained about their inability to opt out of the U-Pass program. A 2010 transit review of students by UBC’s Trek Transportation Planning found that 10 per cent of students had no intention of using their U-Pass. In fall 2011, the program switched to a monthly pass in an effort to combat fraud. Replacement policies were tightened for lost or stolen U-Passes, limiting students to one replacement per term. “We’ve never proven fraud,… but we were getting excessive numbers of people requesting replacement passes,” said Eckenfelder. In the next phase of its life, the U-Pass will go electronic. In continuing efforts to combat fraud, the new format, called the Compass, will be scanned on a sensor to permit boarding. Though Eckenfelder explained that discussions with the provincial government are still ongoing, she said she hoped the U-Pass program continues to be supported by UBC in some form. “[It’s] always a work in progress,” she said. —Jillian James
U-PASS CYCLING On a campus the size of UBC’s, traveling on foot is not always the most feasible option. Though biking has become a popular form of transportation for many students, it is not without its challenges. ”We have had 25 or 30 bike sales in September and we’ve had more than 500 requests for bikes,” said Lucas Gallagher, the current manager of the UBC Bike Kitchen, who has been working at the shop for five years. Run through the UBC Bike Co-op, the Bike Kitchen offers full service repairs, from fixing broken bikes to refurbishing and selling used bikes. Founded in 1998 with the support of the AMS and UBC’s Transportation Planning office, the Bike Co-op has a strong history of supporting bikers on campus. It’s well-known for offering a fleet of used bikes for campus commuting, all painted purple and yellow. “They don’t belong to an individual; they belong to the collective,” said Gallagher. “They do get damaged, they do break down. It’s just a natural part of life for purple and yellow.” But once your bike is fixed, where to put it? The structural facilities available for storing and securing bikes on campus have evolved over the years. “We have bike lockers or bike cages in most of the parking
ade, these services have been in flux. Systems like the U-Pass have shaped the way students travel to campus. Parking your car has become a thorny issue, while amen-
ities for cyclists have become expected. The planning of such essential services is complicated — and not without its share of debate. This supplement exam-
facilities … and we’ve added some lockers for people to put their wet clothing in the bike cages,” said Margaret Eckenfelder, director of Transportation Planning. Last April, 54 bike lockers were added to various locations around campus. The 97 per cent occupation rate indicates a heavy demand for secure bike parking spaces at UBC. “You walk around campus, you will see the bike racks are pretty full,” said Eckenfelder. Despite the efforts of Transportation Planning, Gallagher said UBC campus isn’t always kind to bikers. “Bike theft is pretty bad on campus,” he said. “That’s probably the biggest thing keeping people from cycling onto campus.” Gallagher also said he feels campus is not specifically designed for cycling. “Cycling wasn’t the first motion they thought of when laying out the campus. It’s kind of a free-for-all. Once you get inside, where there’s no driving on roads,… service vehicles, bikes [and] walking people are kind of all mixed together,” he said. “Increasingly as they build new buildings, there’s more facilities being created, there’s more thoughts given [to] bikes, so I think it’s on the rise,” said Gallagher. “[But] there’s always room for improvements.” U —Erin May
ines both the deliberate and unintended results as transportation infrastructure evolves on campus. Though the systems may change, their importance does not: just
ask any UBC student, whether they’re 15 minutes from class by bike or 50 minutes by bus. Natalya Kautz Features Editor
MONDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2012 |
EDITOR ANNA ZORIA
8
Kai Jacobson PHOTO/THE UBYSSEY
David Ng proudly displays the climate change card, designed by Lindsay Chetek.
EDUCATION >>
Gotta learn ’em all
New card game developed by UBC prof teaches kids biodiversity through play Zafira Rajan
Senior Lifestyle Writer
The popular phenomenon of Pokémon lives on today, but with an unexpected twist: a card game about biodiversity. David Ng, a UBC faculty member and supervisor of the Advanced Molecular Biology Laboratory at Michael Smith Laboratories, has taken the online community by storm with his crowd-sourcing creation, phylo. “The inspiration to do this came from data showing that kids out there are really good at knowing stuff and categorizing information,” Ng said. “The model we’re using is based on the data on how well kids know about Pokémon culture. They know all these statistics to dizzying degrees, and if you compare that to what they know about the animals
and plants in their backyard, it’s a huge difference.” Phylo has been in the works since January 2010. Ng brought together scientists and artists to design decks of printable cards that can be easily accessed through the website, phylogame.org. “Seeing all these expertise pools come together was really neat,” he said. “Over the past couple of years, what is available now is pretty amazing because it literally came from nothing; it’s just hundreds of people doing a little bit, and then it becomes this grand project.” Ng said he is particularly grateful towards phylo’s artists, the majority of which are locally based. “We want to figure out a way where we can compensate artists down the road,” Ng said. “So the community
has talked about getting museums or nonprofits to host decks and work out a way where high-quality cards are produced and artists are paid. “If so, the host has the ability to sell the cards to recoup the investment, and thus everyone is happy. [Artists are] getting paid, the museum or NGO is getting their deck and any revenue that comes in, [and] the artist can stipulate that it goes towards good things, like field trips or research.” Phylo’s artwork varies from illustrations to paintings to photographs, so different decks can appeal to various age groups. “We had 100 elementary students come for a workshop, where we showed them a bunch of different cards and asked them which
ones they liked best,” Ng explained. “We found that the kids liked them all, but the prevailing factor was that they were simply very good at knowing when the art was good and that there was talent behind it. Whether the images are scientific or not, it works to our advantage because people can choose what they like.” Ng and his team have been experimenting further with the use of the decks in classrooms. “We’re trying to set up a situation where classrooms can make their own decks.… A whole class could potentially produce their own deck. We have piloted this in a number of schools, and found that kids love it.” Ng’s next Phylo project is a deck in collaboration with the Beaty Biodiversity Museum.
“We collaborated with Beaty, and it was a good way to start off with a pilot project,” he said. “They came up with a species list with local emphasis, as well as elements relating [to] their exhibits. Before next summer, the cards should be released and they’ll sell [the deck], with the card’s revenue going towards their outreach programs.” Ng said he is excited about how the game will evolve. “Imagine, if you will, every natural history museum in the world saying that they want to host a deck. You’re beginning to create this card culture of all these different types of cards.… In theory, all of these cards can be played with each other because they are all part of the same game.… We could end up with a huge card base.” U
THEATRE >>
Sorrows adds modern edge to 100-year-old Goethe novel
Jeremy Avery Contributor
The second show of the Theatre at UBC season only had a brief run, but Fannina Waubert de Puiseau’s adaptation of Goethe’s The Sorrows of Young Werther certainly made its mark. This staging of the infamous German novel tells the story of a young man, Werther, who has fallen in love with a married woman. Unable to deal with the pain of unrequited love, the hero takes his own life, but not before sharing his innermost torments with the audience. With judicious use of video projections and modern pop songs, de Puiseau’s approach to the material had moments of wonderful liveliness that fired up the imagination. Needless to say, Ryan Beil’s performance as Werther only added fuel to that fire. He set the tone with a dramatic and unexpected start, entering through the same doorway that the audience had used mere moments before and ambling down the stairway towards the stage. The relaxed, familiar entrance had some audience members tittering at first, but as the dialogue unfolded, it proved an effective way to quickly connect audience to character. Though he was dressed in a plaid <em>
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shirt, jeans and Converse hightops, Werther’s verbose reflections on life and love harkened back to an older style of storytelling. But one well-placed “Fuck!” as he rummaged through his belongings loosened up the crowd and indicated that the production was willing to challenge expectations. With the house lights on, the first quarter-hour relied heavily on Beil’s ability to take command over the space and earn the attention of the audience. He succeeded: alternately grandiose and coarse, his Werther seemed at least casually aware of his own contradictions, which removed the danger of caricature and introduced the amusing facets of this young man’s personality. As Werther gradually became undone, Beil’s performance only got stronger and more involved. What could have been a two-dimensional performance became a complete and convincing commitment to the character. The relationship that Werther had with his motel room was also mesmerizing; the violence enacted upon it was truly frightening. On the production front, the work of projection and lighting designer Matthew Norman was one of the strongest points of the show. It was subtle at first, with a simple projection of the date on the back
Tim Matheson PHOTO/UBC THEATRE
Ryan Beil stars in this contemporary stage adaptation of Goethe’s novel The Sorrows of Young Werther.
wall. But as the story unraveled, the audience was presented with the purples of infatuation, the stark and sickly white-greens of jealousy, and the hot, consuming reds of consumptive passion. Part of Werther’s world was washed in the night rain, another was afloat in a lonely lagoon, and still another was lit by cathedral windows. The lighting was brilliant and unforgettable; it was crucial in add-
ing substance to the one-man show. It was so effective in the second half of the performance that, in retrospect, it seemed curiously underutilized in the first half. The only criticism that can be leveled at de Puisseau is that she may not be aware of just how talented she is with her risk-taking. The production’s flaws seemed mostly related to any conservative choices that were made, the vestiges of old
work that would have been best left in the past. The antique style of dialogue became tiresome, even in the talented hands of Beil. Any attempt at modernization and adaptation is bound to be a roll of the dice, as it runs the risk of alienating purists in the audience. But this work was undoubtedly at its best moments when it left convention behind and plunged boldly ahead. U
MONDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2012
| culture | 9
Dropping the bass
DUBSTEP >>
On Oct. 27, Bassnectar, Santa Cruz’s dubstep demon, will arrive in the quiet neighbourhood of Point Grey. In a phone interview with The Ubyssey, the DJ mused on death metal, touring and mixing tracks. Quinn Aebi Contributor
Ubyssey: It must be tough being on the road for long periods of time. How do you keep yourself sane? <strong>
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a new tweak out. So I’m always coming back and remixing my old music and making new versions. <strong>
U: Tell me about your live set-up. Do you actually fade from song to song? <strong>
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B: You know, I’m pretty used to it. It’s all very natural at this point. I remember doing, like, 14 nights in a row in 2001, and people would go, “How are you doing that?” And I’d be like, well, I’ve been doing it for a long time, ’cause I’ve been doing it since ’96. So at this point it’s like riding a bike. U: No doubt. It seems like you’re on the road all year. <strong>
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B: Yeah, well, it’s comfortable. I’ve got a great crew and actually make and listen to all of my music in my headphones.… I’m always working on new tracks and just zipping around doing the tours. It’s lots of fun. U: Are the artists that go on tour with you friends of yours?
B: I took a lot from Z-Trip. I had a lot of influence from him in terms of how scratch DJs perform using routines. I’ve worked out several hundred, maybe even a thousand little routines that last from one minute to five minutes. Within these routines, it’s like a choose-your-adventure book; I can go a million different directions. I’ve got all these different cue-points and clips for each song and instrumentals and a capellas and all this different stuff ... and then the songs kind of gel together improvisationally. And then I skip between routines. It’s an adventure for me, so I can only imagine that it’s an adventure for other people.
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B: One way or another, they’re friends of mine — whether before or after. But I do like to be buddies with folks on the road. I like to plan out each show as if it’s a special event. I want to have a journey of music begin kind of slowly and build up throughout the night, with each person hopefully contributing something that’s creative and unique. So I’m not looking for, like, some bloodbath of 50 dubstep DJs. [I want] an eclectic event.
U: I know that you have some metal roots. Would you say you still have some metal influences? <strong>
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B: I’m constantly acquiring new ideas from other people and just being influenced by other things, but I’m still influenced by all the death metal and punk rock from my childhood. U: Last question. On tour, besides working with your music, what are your hobbies and interests? <strong>
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U: I know you said that freestyling played a big part in the making of the new EP. How does that work in creating an album? <strong>
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B: Actually, I don’t really write albums.... I work on multiple songs at once, year-round, 24/7. And when I end up with a certain amount, I put them onto an album or an EP and release them. The songs are created for a live experience, so each song that I’ve written is developed to be a unique kind of section of the journey for each night. There’s a lot of demand for new stuff. I’ve got people traveling from show to show and paying attention and kind of always wanting
I would say I’m about 50 per cent into music and 50 per cent into community and culture. And I love planning out the events and the tours just as much as I do the music. So it’s pretty much like two full-time jobs and then mixed in with that are a bunch of side projects that I do with other friends.… And if I have any free time, which I don’t, I dunno.... I like writing, I like reading, I like hiking.… All the basic shit, but I don’t get too much time for that stuff. U <em>
—With files from Anna Zoria
</em>
NUMBERS
BASSNECTAR BY THE
PHOTO COURTESY OF BASSNECTAR
MONDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2012 |
STUDENT VOICE. COMMUNITY REACH.
LAST WORDS
10
Job action offers campus left a chance to rally
Michael Thibault FILE PHOTO/THE UBYSSEY
In 2009, former AMS President Blake Frederick made a formal human rights complaint to the United Nations over high tuition. Many students saw it as a ridiculous stunt, and since then we’ve see little of the “campus left.”
KATICHISMS
by Gordon Katic ILLUSTRATION RICHARD KIM/THE UBYSSEY
THIS UNIVERSITY NEEDS 1,000 MORE DAVID NGS <STRONG>
UBC cross-disciplinary superstar David Ng’s latest project, Phylogame.org, is brilliant. Inspired by the success of Pokémon, Phylo takes a few tips from Magic: The Gathering and other card games to teach kids about taxonomy in a fun and interactive way. Many of the cards and their artwork come from user submissions, all freely available for download on the game’s website. This is the kind of research we’d like to see more of from UBC — research that provides tangible benefits to the general public. It has both academic and popular aspects. Sure, getting cited is what ultimately earns you points within the academy, but we think that it’s oftentimes out of step with what society wants from universities. But can academics be blamed for the pursuit of the almighty citation if that’s what their institutions are pushing? Universities can talk all they want about what they provide to communities, but if citations are still the main goal, researchers will continue to produce work that is only really of value to other researchers. Crowdsourcing, gamification, edutainment — Phylo brings more buzzwords than you can shake a cliché at. But until universities can escape the doldrums of academic publishing, projects like Phylo will continue to be the exception, not the rule.
A PLAN(?) FOR “FREE” TEXTBOOKS FROM A MINISTRY THAT’S OUT OF IDEAS <STRONG>
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Hey! Free textbooks! That sounds kind of cool, I guess! I just spent $300 at the UBC Bookstore last month! If the government wants to give me free textbooks, that sounds awesome! Well, that’s the reaction the provincial government hoped they’d get from your regular UBC student when they announced a half-baked plan for free online textbooks last week. It’s a shiny, uncontroversial, feel-good public relations move:
a tiny band-aid over a post-secondary sector that’s otherwise been cut severely and left to fester. Do they know what texts will be available under the new program? No! Do they know who will make the textbooks? No! Do they have any idea how much it’ll cost to make them? Nope! How will they get profs and classes to actually use the new texts? Who cares, that’s someone else’s problem! There are already some e-textbooks out there that cost a hell of a lot less than print ones, so why isn’t anyone using them already? That doesn’t matter! Why are they creating an in-house online “repository” when there are so many cheaper, better, more reliable ways to do that elsewhere? We really have no idea! And the group that’s being contracted to get all of this done, BCcampus, has a few projects in the works that are a little less benign than helping you pay less for your Sociology 101 course materials. Their plans mention trying to save money by moving more of B.C.’s higher education system online, i.e. away from the classroom. They also talk about creating “shared services” across different schools to replace things like enrolment systems, something vehemently opposed by the CUPE 116 union at UBC, which reached a tentative agreement with UBC yesterday after weeks of strikes and tension. So, really, the Ministry of Advanced Education doesn’t have a plan about how they want to get this done, other than their hope that it’ll make you temporarily forget how bad they are at their jobs. Don’t get your hopes up about how much money it’ll save you; for all we know, everyone will forget about this project until May, when the current government will, in all likelihood, be voted out.
SYSTEMIC CHANGES NEEDED AT OSBORNE CENTRE <STRONG>
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What (allegedly) happened at the Osborne Centre earlier this
month is horrifying. And for the most part, things worked how they ought to: the authorities were notified and the reported voyeur will soon appear before a judge. But based on the information that’s out there, this wasn’t the first time such an incident has occurred at Osborne. We have to wonder if something should have been done at the facility level after the first time a suspicious person was reported lurking around the change rooms. The Osborne Centre isn’t a great building. The hallways are narrow and poorly lit, and there’s no central entrance monitored by a front desk. It’s kind of a creepy building to begin with — the kind designed to withstand an atomic bomb rather than provide visibility and security for the people who work and study there. We think there are a few simple tweaks that could make the Osborne Centre safer. At the Aquatic Centre, for example, people entering the change rooms have to register at the front desk, either with a student card or membership. Access is controlled by turnstile, and no one gets in who isn’t supposed to be there. Of course, the two buildings don’t serve the exact same purpose: one is a public swimming facility, the other is a space with classrooms, a gym and labs. But the metered access model would be inexpensive to implement, and hopefully not overly intrusive, as the centre is used primarily by kinesiology students. Upping security would probably be an expensive and not terribly effective stop-gap measure. And the message we’re getting from campus security and the RCMP isn’t that reassuring. In a nutshell, they’re advising people to look after themselves and their friends, and to report any suspicious activity. People should absolutely be doing this, but it’s disturbing that more systemic changes didn’t take place as soon as it was clear people didn’t feel safe in the building. U
Since former AMS President Blake Frederick lodged a formal complaint to the United Nations around rising tuition (otherwise known as “UN-gate”), we haven’t seen much of the campus left. However, the service worker strike at UBC presents an opportunity to reignite this long-dormant movement for decreased tuition. A confluence of three key factors makes for a rather combustible situation. First, the interests of both parties — employers and employees — align against one common target: the provincial government. When you speak to the striking workers, you would expect to hear resentful screeds about dictatorial bosses. But in this case, “the university’s hands are tied” is a common worker refrain. The government has bound the hands of the university through provincial mandates and budget cuts that forbid or restrict wage increases. At the same time, universities are increasingly frustrated with the provincial government’s cuts to post-secondary funding. In March, presidents of 25 B.C. colleges and universities signed a letter which said they were “very concerned” over the 2012 budget. The second factor is the stagnating economy and the increased media attention in Canada and the United States on the rising financial pressures facing recent graduates. The Quebec strikes and the Occupy movement can be thanked for forcing this issue into the public consciousness, particularly with respect to student debt. Students are starting to realize that tuition levels are rising because university budgets have been squeezed by government cuts to post-secondary education. As I noted in my column last week, the percentage of university operating revenues from government sources was 90 per cent during the 1970s, but now approaches just 50 per cent. That budget shortfall has made the academy increasingly dependent on tuition and private donations, fundamentally transforming the university experience. The third factor is the resurgence of organized labour. Public workers, particularly in the United States, have fought enormous cutbacks and efforts to curtail their collective bargaining rights. We have had similar high-profile conflicts in Canada, where the federal government threatened back-to-work legislation against Air Canada employees. From teachers to nurses, CUPE 116
and even Walmart employees, organized labour has revived itself in response to this latest round of austerity measures. In an effort to elicit broader support, this new rise has featured a greater emphasis on labour’s common interest with other segments of society. Many were saying labour’s conspicuous absence from the Occupy movement signaled its irrelevance, but it has instead been energized by the allegiances it has made with this large network of activists. In the debate around public sector unions, we can see a reiteration of the claim that strong public sector unions lift wages in the private sector — an effort to demonstrate that the interests of organized labour are the interests of all labour. In this particular strike, there is a sensitivity to the interests of students. Not only does CUPE 116 have many students in their ranks, but they have distributed literature that expresses the common interests between students and employees, and have been careful not to picket classrooms. When I spoke with Colleen Garbe of CUPE 116, she affirmed that their ultimate target is the provincial government, not students, who themselves are struggling from the same post-secondary budget cuts that are responsible both for lower wages and increased tuition. All three groups — students, universities and employees — should recognize their common interest in pressuring the provincial government for reinvestment in post-secondary education. Campus leftists should use this unique confluence of historical factors to reassert their alternative vision for a university with the provincial funding necessary to lower tuition, raise service worker wages and stimulate the broader economy. Going forward, the campus left needs to make political allegiances with these two groups. It cannot take merely an academic interest in organized labour; it must take an earnest look at the issues facing UBC’s workers, the same people who cook, clean and care for students so that they may read abstract theories of worker exploitation. The campus left must also abandon the notion of the university administrator boogeyman. At least in the short term, it should make alliances with the university, recognizing that they are as squeezed by cuts to post-secondary education as students are by rising tuition. U
MONDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2012 |
PICTURES + WORDS ON YOUR UNIVERSITY EXPERIENCE
HACKÉDEX
ADVICE >>
Classroom crushes and going commando WHAT YOU SHOULD DO by Dr. Bryce Warnes
<em>
Dr. Warnes,
I am in a pretty small faculty and I see the same girl in all my classes. I think she’s pretty but I don’t really wanna talk to her, she seems like a bitch. Is it creepy to just enjoy the view from afar? Seenster </em>
Dear Seenster, What makes this person seem like a bitch? Is she outspoken? Does she fail to smile at you or behave in a pliable, flirtatious manner? Or does she seem like a bitch because you don’t think you stand a chance with her? Consider these questions before you completely write off her personality. That being said, as long as you’re not overtly ogling the female in question in a way that makes her (or others) uncomfortable, I don’t see a problem. One of the caveats of participating in public life is
Quote of the Week
that people who find you attractive can look at you. Gazing upon an individual’s physical beauty without ever getting to know them isn’t especially creepy — just kind of sad. ••• <em>
Dr. Warnes,
I am currently a third-year Arts student at UBC. My degree has been seeming less and less relevant and enjoyable for me. I am considering dropping out of school and joining the Canadian Forces. I have looked into it, and the Army seems like a perfect fit for me. What should I do? Name Rank and Number </em>
Dear NRaN, Go for it. Serving in the armed forces will provide you with a steady income as well as experiences that few other Canadians will ever have. You’ll get the opportunity to travel, and possibly subsidize your university schooling in case you decide to finish your degree.
At the same time, you will be protecting our country’s economic interests abroad, allowing our civilian population to continue living and dying and shopping in relative peace. You say you’ve “looked into it,” so I’ll assume you’ve done your homework and know the personal risks involved. But before you apply, make sure you’re totally okay with killing people. You don’t want to have issues further down the line when you realize that you’ve violently ended the lives of not just Bad Guys, but fathers and sons, and maybe mothers and their children (accidents happen). Also, try to become comfortable with the fact that you may see close friends suddenly killed in the line of duty. Your training will prepare you for these eventualities to a degree. But be aware that therapy and medication may become an important part of your life in the future. Stay safe. U
YOUR UBC WORD OF THE WEEK
UBCPT
UBCPT, better known as the UBC Properties Trust, is a wholly owned company that manages the real estate assets of the university. As such, they’re responsible for all the new buildings on campus (and at UBC Okanagan), as well as selling all the prime market housing on our lovely Point Grey campus. Since they’re a private-ish company, they aren’t subject to the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act. So basically we have no idea how they make decisions about development. Democracy!
What It Smells Like Now Skipping showers since 1918
GREASY HAIR
Because you haven’t taken a shower in three weeks. #hatemidterms
GARBAGE
Because no one has emptied that garbage can in the corner of IKB. #strikes
Do you have a question for Dr. Bryce? Ask anonymously online at ubyssey.ca/advice.
WET DOG
Because TransLink needs to stop blasting the heat every two minutes when it’s a torrential downpour outside. #haterain
I think the signs are clear, but I’ve had friends towed and they’re smart people. They missed [the signs] and that’s no fun.... The tow trucks are out here a lot, it seems to me.
GANGNAM STYLE
Erica Frank Director of the University Neighbourhoods Association (on getting your car towed on campus)
Seriously? #wehateGS DAVID MARINO GRAPHIC/THE UBYSSEY
UBYSSEY •UBYSSEY FEATURES• HUMBLE SQUIRES IN SERVICE OF TRUTH
ASSEMBLE WEEKLY, MONDAYS AT TWO P.M. FEATURES AT UBYSSEY DOT CA
ExPlOrE yOur CArEEr OPtiONS Get your questions answered by faculty and staff, and discover a wide variety of full-time and part-time programs. Wednesday, October 24, 5–8 pm Burnaby Campus 3700 Willingdon Avenue To register and get a preview of BIG Info, visit
bcit.ca/biginfo 1 Ad Name: Big Info Fall 2012 2 Media: UBC Ubyssey
11
It’s your career. Get it right.
12 | Games |
MONDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2012
56- Eye layer 57- Numbered rds. 58- Raccoon relative 60- Crux 61- Words of understanding 62- Sic on 63- Sneaky guy? 64- Maize 65- Utopias
50- The devil 51- Gives off 53- Wishing won’t make ___ 54- Change direction 59- Brit. lexicon
DOWN
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ACROSS 1- Door handles 6- Skater Lipinski 10- Heating fuel 14- Artist’s support 15- Bakery fixture 16- River in central Switzerland 17- Lost 18- ___ kleine Nachtmusik 19- Bailiwick 20- Skater Babilonia 21- Authority source 24- Thin 26- Extremely 27- ___ Lingus
28- Greek marketplace 30- Astrologer Sydney 33- Bert’s buddy 34- Wrap up 37- Be dependent 38- Early computer 39- ___ Little Tenderness 40- Diner order 41- Young eel 42- Additional pay 43- Follows orders 44- Life story 45- Aztec god of rain 48- Person who lives in seclusion 52- Power to retain 55- Male sheep who may play football for St Louis!
1- “Endymion” poet 2- Pertaining to birth 3- Actor Davis 4- Yellow and black insect 5- Defame 6- It’s human 7- Tel ___ 8- Actress Russo 9- Echo-free 10- Monetary unit of Tonga 11- You are here 12- Staggering 13- Weeping 22- Alway 23- Cork’s place 25- ___ a soul 28- Sign of spring 29- Growl 30- Eyeball 31- ___ Brooks, filmmaker responsible for “Blazing Saddles” 32- High-pitched 33- Begrudge 34- East ender? 35- Big Apple sch. 36- ___ Kapital 38- Charged 39- Implement 41- Black 42- Two wheel vehicle 43- Soap ingredient 44- Wager 45- Outdo 46- Embankment 47- Bothered 48- Ascended 49- Liquid waste component
ANSWERS FROM OCTOBER 18 ISSUE
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