October 9, 2012 by The Ubyssey

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UBC’S OFFICIAL STUDENT NEWSPAPER | OCTOBER 9, 2012 | VOLUME XCIV| ISSUE XI

OCCUPY VANCOUVER Two young filmmakers premiere a documentary on Vancouver’s experience of the historic movement P9

STRIKE

Hundreds of UBC staff picket and rally on Oct. 4 — and it won’t be the last job action you see P4

THE UBYSSEY

BIEKSA ’BIRDS VS.

UBC Thunderbirds to face off with Canucks players in charity game P5

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 9, 2012 |

YOUR GUIDE TO UBC EVENTS + PEOPLE

What’s on Tue 129

OUR CAMPUS

THIS WEEK, MAY WE SUGGEST...

FOOD >>

ONE ON ONE WITH THE PEOPLE WHO MAKE UBC

TUESDAY

Feast Day: 5–7 p.m. @ St. Mark’s College Got a sweet tooth? The UBC Catholic Students’ Association is putting on a dessert dinner in celebration of their patron’s feast day. Drop by for a round of their famous Vatican board game! Tue 1210

Tue 1211

HISTORY >>

WEDNESDAY

WORDS >>

THURSDAY

War of 1812 readings: 7:30 p.m. @ the Chan Centre To commemorate the 200th anniversary of the War of 1812, UBC Theatre has launched a series of rehearsed readings of Canadian plays on the topic. This evening’s reading is followed by a talk by history prof Michel Ducharme.

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Tue

KAI JACOBSON/THE UBYSSEY

Community Eats director Emily Lomax greets customers outside the Sprouts café in the SUB basement.

Tending to a growing Sprouts Ginny Monaco Staff Writer

PARTY >>

FRIDAY

UBC Poetry Slam: 8 p.m. @ Simply French Café Interested in battling with words? UBC Poetry Slam is hosting a coffeehouse event in which UBC’s sharpest wordsmiths go head-to-head with only metaphors and similes for weapons. $2 cover, free with membership.

Snow Pants or No Pants If you haven’t heard about the awesomeness of the UBC Ski & Board Club and their parties, this bzzr garden will be sure to remedy the situation. Have fun, get freaky and potentially lose your pants. Tue 1213

FOOD >>

SATURDAY

Apple Festival: 11 a.m.–4 p.m. @ UBC Farm The annual apple festival features educational activities for children and over 60 different varieties of apples to sample.

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 10–Sunday 14 Turn Me On, Dammit!: 7 p.m. Magic Mike: 9 p.m.

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, Print Andrew Bates Copy Editor webeditor@ubyssey.ca Karina Palmitesta News Editors Will McDonald + Laura Rodgers news@ubyssey.ca

Tickets are $5 for students, $2.50 for FilmSoc members. Learn more at UBCfilmsociety.com!

Peter Wojnar, Anthony Poon, Veronika Bondarenko, Yara De Jong, Lu Zhang, Ginny Monaco, Arno Rosenfeld, Matt Meuse, Hogan Wong, Rory Gattens, Brandon Chow

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

CONTACT

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Editorial Office: SUB 24 604.822.2301

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Web Ad Sales Ben Chen bchen@ubyssey.ca

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OCTOBER 9, 2012 | VOLUME XCIV| ISSUE XI BUSINESS

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On any given Friday afternoon, Emily Lomax can be found in the SUB basement counting pennies. Lomax, a fifth-year plant biology major, is the Sprouts Community Eats director, responsible for the organization’s popular weekly cheap lunch. With an eager team of volunteers, Lomax cooks up a vegan by-donation meal every Thursday night. “We have so many volunteers,” Lomax said. “Every Thursday we have almost 20 people in the kitchen. It’s a big party.” Sprouts began when a small group of students were looking to eat more sustainably. “We started as a bulk buying club, where everyone was looking to make food less expensive and have it be good, healthy food,” Lomax said. Now the popular co-op runs a bulk grocery store and a bike-delivered produce program, and sells coffee, soup and treats out of its storefront in the SUB. But the Community Eats lunch every Friday may still be its most popular program. All of the produce and bread used to create Community Eats

Write. Shoot. Edit. Code. Drink.

meals is donated to Sprouts. The money they collect is used to purchase staples, “like spices and beans and rice and stuff that doesn’t get donated,” Lomax said. “Usually we get 50 cents a person, when we figure out how many people we’ve served.” A regular Community Eats meal will include a soup or stew, rice, salad, fruit, bread and spreads. The food is almost completely vegan. “It’s more sustainable,” said Lomax. “It’s inclusive. Then everyone can share it.” When she found Sprouts in her first year at UBC, Lomax immediately felt like she belonged. “I walked in and thought, ‘This is the most amazing place I’ve ever seen.’ I didn’t have any friends, it’s a big university. It felt like coming home and it still does. I’m here all the time.” Lomax became a vegetarian while in high school. While she said her mother is “really environmentally active,” Lomax grew up in a “meat-and-potatoes” kind of family and it was her cousin who inspired her to make the switch. “[She] was doing it and I thought it was cool. I really admired my cousin.

When I stopped eating meat, I realized I didn’t miss it anymore and then it became more ethical and environmental. “I’m not against eating animals at all if it’s done ethically and [it’s] environmentally sustainable. If someone’s catching [animals] themselves, it’s completely different.” Community Eats has grown in recent years, and this presents a new set of challenges for Sprouts. “Right now we’re limited by our physical capacity to feed people. We have so many volunteers. Food is limited. We only have a certain amount of food donated every week. Something we need to do is get other places on board to potentially donate food. Even today, we’re giving out smaller portions and turning people away by the end of the day. It would be nice to be able to feed everybody,” she said. “I think Community Eats is everything good. We’re not producing any kind of waste, everything is donation, it’s all volunteer-run, all non-profit. What is good in the world is happening with Community Eats. I love it.” U

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 9, 2012 |

EDITORS WILL MCDONALD + LAURA RODGERS

LABOUR >>

B.C. plan stymies striking CUPE unions

kai jacobson PHOTO/THE UBYSSEY

Staff unions at UBC and other universities are worried that their jobs may be privatized by the B.C. government.

Andrew Bates Managing Editor, Web

A provincial plan to combine administrative services at B.C. universities has cast a shadow over labour negotiations at UBC. The government hopes to save money by consolidating services at universities and colleges across B.C. But service and support staff unions currently striking at various B.C. universities say that this amounts to privatization and worry that some of their members may lose their jobs. A $20 million cut is planned for the B.C.’s government’s entire post-secondary budget next year, and this plan is one of many ways for them to save some cash. The province is calling the plan the “Post-Secondary Sector Administrative Service Delivery Transformation Project.” They’ve brought in consulting firm Deloitte to look at universities’ non-academic operations and deduce where things can be run more cheaply. The firm is considering whether everything from libraries to IT support

NEWS BRIEFS Crown seeks more jail time for UBC student in Stanley Cup Riot The Crown is seeking a harsher sentence for UBC student Alexander Peepre, who helped flip a truck and assaulted a photographer in the 2011 Stanley Cup riot. The Crown filed notice with the B.C. Court of Appeals asking for an increased jail sentence, but does not specifically ask for Peepre to be in jail during the week as well as on weekends. Peepre, a 21-year-old political science student, was sentenced on Sept. 13 to 60 days of jail time to be served on weekends. He was also sentenced to 18 months of probation and 125 hours of community service. Peepre is also required to pay $2,000 in restitution to the owner of the truck that he helped flip. UBC to hold consultation on tuition for new economics degree The Economics Student Association is holding a tuition consultation for the proposed new bachelor of international economics degree. The proposed tuition fees for the new program are $10,000 per year for domestic students and $29,000 for international students. The new degree has had its academic requirements approved by the UBC Senate, but its tuition hasn’t yet been approved by UBC or the province. A consultation session about the new program, and the Vancouver School of Economics, a new UBC entity that is set to offer it, will take place at 12:30 p.m. in Buchanan B215 on Tuesday, Oct. 9. U

could be run centrally for all B.C. universities. The union representing service and support workers on UBC campus, CUPE 116, is worried about what could happen if the project goes through. CUPE 116 President Colleen Garbe said that it will result in private companies taking over jobs from the union’s public-sector workers, whose job descriptions range from IT support, to janitorial work, to Campus Security. “We’re not signing a collective agreement with that threat overhead,” said Garbe on Thursday. “They have to take that away, just like [the B.C. government] took ... the threat of privatization of the liquor distribution branch away,” she said, referencing how the provincial government recently went back on its plans to privatize liquor distributions when labour negotiations with another public-sector union went sour. “That has to go.” “[UBC] doesn’t agree with it, but at the end of the day, the university told us they have no control, ultimately, if the government decides to contract services at UBC,” Garbe

said Thursday. But UBC plans to keep their bargaining with CUPE 116 limited to issues like wages and pensions, and doesn’t want to discuss this project at the bargaining table. “Our bargaining proposals and the mandate we got from the government were completely independent of this particular review,” said UBC Director of Public Affairs Lucie McNeill. UBC is participating in discussions about the project, and McNeill says that so far, she isn’t convinced that it will end with UBC staff jobs being outsourced. “We have not had indication that this project would entail any kind of privatization,” McNeill said. CUPE B.C., the group overseeing collective bargaining for the many CUPE unions across the province, argues that centralized university services will wind up being less efficient. “If you’re registering for a course, as a student, and you have to phone ... or email somewhere that’s not your university and the person who’s actually dealing with your registration doesn’t work there, that

would end up being a problem in the end,” said Jordana Feist, staff advisor for CUPE B.C. A provincial steering committee working on the project will release a report about how to go forward by mid-October. Any decisions they make will be binding. Minister for Advanced Education John Yap said the public may not see the report “before the committee completes its work.” Critics of the project are concerned that university staff and faculty will not get to have any input before any changes take place. In September, the Federation of Post-Secondary Educators sent a letter co-signed by the faculty associations of 19 B.C. universities asking the government to hold a summit to discuss the issue. The group is worried that the plan will lead to layoffs. “We want to talk to them about it, because we don’t really know much in the way of details,” said George Davison, secretary-treasurer of the Federation of Post-Secondary Educators. “We’re concerned about what may happen to students and support staff.” Davison continued, “If serious decisions are going to be made … we’d hope that stakeholders would be involved, including ... support staff unions, faculty ... and students.” B.C.’s official opposition party also has a dim view of the project. “They’re looking at [this] not from the perspective of how can we better serve students, but how can we save money,” said Michelle Mungall, the NDP critic for advanced education. Still, Yap contends that B.C. universities should be able to cut $20 million — which accounts for one per cent of the total budget for the sector — without hurting services to students. “What we’re talking about, is a one per cent opportunity for finding ways to work more efficiently,” said Yap. U

MONEY >>

Major Entrance Scholarship now open to all UBC applicants

Ming Wong Senior News Writer

Prospective UBC students no longer have to fill out a separate application for a Major Entrance Scholarship. Under the broad-based admissions model implemented last year, incoming undergraduates applying for 2013-2014 admission by the early deadline on December 10 will automatically be considered for the Major Entrance Scholarship based on their broad-based admissions profile. “Seeing that the [broad-based admissions] focused on exactly the same criteria we were looking at for Major Entrance Scholarship, it was a natural blend,” said Barbara Crocker, lead director of the Student Financial Support Project, which deals with student awards. Previously, high school counsellors nominated the top two per cent of students for the scholarship and students had to fill out an application package that included reference letters and a 500-word essay demonstrating “character and ability as an outstanding leader.” With the new system, students respond to short essay questions in the personal profile component of their online admission application. As a result, counsellors are taken out of the equation, students submit

Hogan Wong PHOTO/THE UBYSSEY

All students are now automatically considered for UBC’s big-ticket scholarship.

only one application, UBC can look at all the information at once and the pool of applicants will increase. To ensure students do not pad their profile with false information, students are required to put down references; UBC then contacts the references of shortlisted candidates. “Before, the references were all on paper.... I don’t remember ever going back and actually talking to a counsellor,” said Crocker. AMS VP Academic and University Affairs Kiran Mahal said UBC hasn’t made any fundamental changes to the Major Entrance Scholarship, which awards students who show outstanding leadership achievement and promise. “They’re not changing the criteria for it either; they’re just changing the way they administer applications,” said Mahal. Over the last seven years, UBC has averaged 1,000 Major Entrance Scholarship applications per year. Crocker predicts that over 3,500 students will be considered under the new system. The adjudication

process will require groups of readers to rank the applicants before coming up with a shortlist. Lisa Collins, associate registrar of UBC, said that process changes are not related to the cancellation of the President’s Entrance Scholarship, which used to automatically offer scholarships based on students’ admission averages. Crocker said UBC found that a well-written personal profile gave the same information as the old scholarship application package. The amount of scholarship money is still the same, ranging from onetime awards of $5,000 to renewable multi-year awards of $40,000. Annually UBC awards $400,000 of Major Entrance Scholarships, including 25 renewable winners and 15 to 20 one-time winners. The key to successfully securing a Major Entrance Scholarship? “The usual winners are people who really can show on paper or in the personal profile their passion and it really does jump off the page,” said Collins. U

CLASS >>

New animal bio program focuses on research

INDIANA JOEL ILLUSTRATION/THE UBYSSEY

Arno Rosenfeld Staff Writer

UBC’s applied biology program has created a new, research-intensive honours track in animal biology to manage the crush of students who have joined the program since its inception three years ago. From 39 students in its first year, the applied biology program now has grown to over 300. The program, which is within the Faculty of Land and Food Systems, originally covered working with both animals and plants and kept its focus on agricultural applications. But students who wanted to study animals in a more research-intensive way, like those who plan to apply to veterinary school, wanted a more focused curriculum. “I transferred out of the agroecology program,” fourth-year applied biology student Emma Strazhnik wrote in an email. “Having an animal-based program really opened up the scope of classes I could take and allowed me to find a community of animal lovers like myself, which were hard to come by in agroecology.” Strazhnik plans to attend veterinary school after her undergrad. Professor Daniel Weary, associate dean in the Faculty of Land and and Food Systems, said the creation of the honours track would allow students interested in animals to work closely with professors. The program plans to accommodate about 20 students. According to Weary, the growth of the animal stream in the applied biology program was surprisingly quick. A little over a decade ago, UBC’s former Faculty of Agricultural Sciences became the Faculty of Land and Food Systems. Students in the rejigged faculty were split into two programs: food, nutrition and health, and agroecology. Then, three years ago, the applied biology program was created; students could either focus mostly on animals or plant and soil biology. But some students felt that the program still focused too heavily on sustainable agriculture. According to Weary, students who were more interested in working with animals became frustrated. Weary said the department prides itself on making graduate-level research accessible to undergraduate students. As the stream grew, there were not enough faculty members to give all the students individual assistance with research. “Research seems like such a big, scary world from the outside,” said Strazhnik. “But having the professors and the TA advise us based on our individual experiences ... was an amazing head start.” Weary hopes the students who are interested in research will self-select and put themselves in the honours track so that research-focused undergrads can continue to have experiences like Strazhnik’s. U

4 | news |

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 9, 2012

LABOUR >>

Campus unions march, picket SUB and hold rally “This is the first day of our escalating job action”: CUPE 116 Laura Rodgers News Editor

Many support and service workers of CUPE (Canadian Union of Public Employees) Local 116 picketed and rallied as part of a day of job action at UBC. Over 500 CUPE workers from UBC, as well as supporters from other union locals, formed a march that snaked its way around campus at noon on Oct. 4, ending in a rally in the SUB north plaza. A picket line was also set up in front of various SUB entrances. The workers are planning more job action in the coming weeks. “This is the first day of our escalating job action. We need to wake up, first of all, we need to make some noise, because I don’t think they can hear us over in Victoria,” said CUPE 116 President Colleen Garbe to a crowd of union workers outside the SUB. Since any offers from UBC are bound by mandates set by the provincial government, various CUPE unions at universities across the province are planning concerted job action to put pressure on the province. “Yes, we’re UBC employees and UBC is our employer, but the the government has been hamstringing them and tying their hands,” said Garbe. CUPE 116 represents Campus Security, food services, tradespeople, custodians and other support and service staff throughout UBC. Garbe said that today would be a one-day strike including

CUPE 116 members marched around campus wearing signs and carrying flags.

many of their employees and they will be back at work by tomorrow, but she added that job action will continue to escalate as long as CUPE and UBC have not reached a collective agreement. “At 11:34 we shut down the food services in the SUB so our members could come out,” said Garbe, describing the job action in a later interview. “We went over to Plant Operations and we took out all the trades, the clerical, the utilities, the mail room. We also took down our Campus Security to the essential service levels.” Other CUPE unions representing staff at the University of Victoria, Simon Fraser University, Thompson Rivers University and

the University of Northern British Columbia have also given notice of their plans to begin job action as of today. Representatives from other CUPE locals participated in the march, and Barry O’Neill, president of all CUPE unions in B.C., also spoke at the rally. “What the locals are asking for is a cost of living allowance which doesn’t seem very outrageous to me,” said O’Neill. The union has no future bargaining dates set up with UBC. CUPE 116 workers are asking for increased job security, cost-of-living allowances and pensions for all of their members. COPE 378, the union repre-

KAI JACOBSON PHOTO/THE UBYSSEY

senting AMS Security staff, also put up a one-day picket line outside the SUB in support of CUPE. AMS security workers have been negotiating a collective agreement with the AMS since September 2011. COPE representatives said that bargaining with the AMS is winding down, and the two parties’ offers are now within a dollar of each other. Their main reason for picketing was to support CUPE 116. The provincial government has recently considered privatizing service jobs across B.C. public universities, according to Garbe. She said that the CUPE unions across B.C. will not cease their job action until the province promises that

no privatization will happen. So far, the job action hasn’t had a huge effect on UBC’s day-today operations, according to UBC Director of Public Affairs Lucie McNeill. “We have to say that service disruptions have been kept to a minimum and we’re grateful for that,” said McNeill. “Our students and our faculty and staff who are not involved in this particular dispute appreciate the fact that they can go about their business.” If picket lines are set up around classes in the future, students will need to notify UBC if they choose not to cross them as a matter of personal conscience. So far the university sent out a single broadcast email today about the job action on campus, but many students still aren’t fully aware of the situation. Sauder student Krystal Ramirez said she wasn’t aware any job action was going on until she saw the picket lines outside the SUB. “I haven’t checked my email, so probably it’s there, but I don’t know,” she said. When a CUPE picket captain informed her of the job action underway, she opted to turn back and not cross the picket line. But she said she may not make the same choice in the future. “I would definitely go into my classroom. I won’t miss a class just because of this, you know? Education is important. This is important for some people, but for me, education is more important.” U

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 9, 2012 |

EDITOR C.J. PENTLAND

HOCKEY >>

Bieksa and co. chip in for charity Locked-out Canucks will take on UBC men’s hockey

Kai Jacobson PHOTO/THE UBYSSEY

Fret not, NHL fans: you can still watch some of your favourite hockey players take to the ice this month. Vancouver Canucks defenceman Kevin Bieksa has assembled a group of teammates and other “celebrities” to take on the UBC Thunderbirds men’s hockey team on Oct. 17 at Thunderbird Arena. In addition to giving hockey fans their fix of high quality hockey during the lockout, the event is being used to raise money for charity. “It was something I thought about in the summer if the lockout did go through,” said Bieksa after a midday skate at Thunderbird Arena. “And if we were locked out for an extended period of time, I knew we’d have some time on our hands, and raising money for charity for me was a primary objective of this time off. “With the help of some good people and some good friends, so far we’ve put together most of the details, and I’m looking forward to Saturday for ticket sales.”

Along with Bieksa, a good number of top Canucks players will be attendance. As of now, there are nine confirmed attendees, including Daniel and Henrik Sedin, Chris Higgins, Dan Hamhuis, Manny Malhotra, Max Lapierre and Cory Schneider. “When I brought this up to them,… I just threw this out there to see if they were interested in it, and there wasn’t one ounce of resistance; everybody was on board 100 per cent,” said Bieksa. “They said they’d do whatever I asked of them and that they’d be there for sure. If anything, I have too many guys right now that want to play.” The team is also leaving a few spots open for a few other guys who are waiting to be confirmed. However, the spots won’t necessarily be filled by Canucks or even NHL players. “There’s been some interest from other guys from around the league that have contacted me,” said the defenceman. “It’s not just the Canucks; it’s guys that are skating out here [during practice],… guys that are good friends of mine that are going to play, but there’s also guys from

other teams, some siblings, some brother-in-laws; it’s not just going to be NHL-calibre players.” A few of the guest stars will include Bieksa’s brother, and his father Al will be reffing the contest. Despite the disparity in talent level, Bieksa’s Buddies, as the team is called, won’t be taking their T-Bird opponents lightly. “These guys can’t be underestimated,” said Bieksa. “We’ve practiced with them, we’ve been training in the gym with them for the last couple weeks, so we know what they’re all about. We know they work hard and have played junior hockey for the most part, so they’re good players. We’re going to try and not get embarrassed out there and we’re going to play hard.” As expected, the Thunderbirds are also pumped up to play in this game. “The boys are all excited,” said third-year T-Bird defenceman Mike McGurk. “We heard about it a couple of weeks ago … so it’s been on the boys’ mind since, and now that it’s official, everyone is ready to play.” Despite the amount of top-

notch talent on the ice and the fact that the NHL players will be itching to play an actual game, Bieksa wants to make sure that the game is ultimately about the fans. “We’re hoping to bring the intensity down a little bit and make it a little bit more fun and entertaining,” he said. He also has faith that this game will fill up Thunderbird Arena. “I think we can [sell it out]. That’s the goal,” Bieksa said. “Obviously the primary objective is to raise money for three charities that are important to me, but it’s also to give the fans a little bit of entertainment, something they’re missing right now. And it’s at a good price.” Tickets go on sale on Saturday, Oct. 6 at 10 a.m. through Ticketmaster. All tickets cost $20, and the proceeds from the game will be donated to the Canuck Place Children’s Hospice, Canucks Autism Network and Canucks Family Education Centre. Doors open for the game at 6 p.m. on Oct. 17 at the Doug Mitchell Thunderbird Sports Centre; the puck drops at 7 p.m. U

Men’s basketball comes back to beat Bishop’s Joseph Ssettuba Contributor

KAI JACOBSON PHOTO/THE UBYSSEY

The UBC men’s basketball team overcame a rough first half to beat the Bishop’s University Gaiters 87-75 during exhibition play at War Memorial Gym on Friday night. Doug Plumb and O’Brien Wallace led the way, finishing with a combined 43 points in the victory. Plumb, a fifth-year guard, scored 12 of his 21 points in the first half and kept the Thunderbirds in the game while the rest of the team struggled. Wallace finished things off with 20 points in the second half; at one point, he scored four straight three-point shots. Things weren’t all rosy for the home side, though, as they committed 17 turnovers and generally looked out of sorts on offence. In a team with only four returning players, they often struggled to find a sense of continuity. The lack of cohesion certainly showed on the court, as several possessions turned into missed opportunities and a

halftime deficit of 40-36 for the Thunderbirds. “We did an awful job of offensive rebounding,” said UBC head coach Kevin Hanson, in reference to his team’s troubled efforts in the first half. “At halftime they had 13 offensive boards and we had 17 turnovers, so that’s what we talked about at halftime.” The ’Birds never quit, and their relentless play started to pay off in the third quarter. As the crowd came alive, the Thunderbirds began to rally, and with 5:47 left in the third, they finally tied the score. A 12-0 run, some heroics from Wallace and forced turnovers which led to fast breaks keyed the Thunderbirds’ run and their first lead since opening the game 2-0. “It’s almost like the higher the difficulty the shot is, the higher percentage it has of going in,” coach Hanson said of his leading scorer, Wallace. “You’re going, ‘No, no, no … yes!’ on a lot of his shots, but he’s capable of getting those runs going and obviously that was big for us

HOCKEY >>

Women’s hockey dominates Regina in season opener Donald Wang Contributor

Manny Malhotra and Cory Schneider are two of the players that will be taking the ice alongside Kevin Bieksa to take on the UBC men’s hockey team on October 17.

C.J. Pentland Sports + Rec Editor

when he hit those threes.” With the crowd rallying around their team, the Thunderbirds took a 63-57 lead into the fourth quarter. The Gaiters did not go down easy, though, as Jeremy Leonard-Smith finished with 20 points and 11 rebounds, keeping his team hanging around until the end. However, when he fouled out in the waning minutes of the game, victory was all but assured for the Thunderbirds. Freshman Isaiah Solomon led the attack from the point guards, helping to overcome the early spotty play and close out the Gaiters. He finished with a team high six steals to go along with countless deflections, which led to a series of fast breaks and easy points, especially for the racehorse Plumb. Next up for the Thunderbirds is the Wilfred Laurier Tournament in Ontario next weekend. After its conclusion, the team has two more weeks of exhibition games before the commencement of the regular season on Nov. 2. U

A dominant performance by the UBC women’s hockey team against the Regina Cougars led to a 4-0 victory on Friday evening at the Doug Mitchell Thunderbird Sports Centre in their season opener. The win was a refreshing change and hopefully a sign of things to come for a team that is looking to build off a sub-par 2011-2012 campaign. The first period was a shaky start for the T-Birds; they got outshot 8-3 by Regina, who attacked with quick puck movement and kept the play mostly in the UBC zone. Passing errors, offsides and icing calls kept the T-Birds from making plays in the attacking zone, but Regina failed to convert in the first period despite being the more dominant team. UBC came out strong in the second, and Nicole Saxvik opened the scoring by getting one past Regina goalie Jennifer Schmidt. The Thunderbirds continued to attack aggressively and actively kept the puck in the Regina zone. This also led to UBC being awarded a penalty shot late in the second, but Rebecca Unrau failed to score. Shots were 13-4 in the second period. In the third period, the Thunderbirds took advantage of a boarding penalty by Paige Wheeler when Rebecca Unrau knocked one home on a rebound, assisted by Cailey Hay and Emily Grainger. Tatiana Rafter scored late in the third period to boost the lead to 3-0, and after a late timeout by Regina and a decision to pull the goalie, Unrau scored her second goal of the game into an empty net. Penalties were a major problem for the T-Birds, but the team managed to kill off all Regina powerplays, including a minute-long five-on-three in the third period. Goalie Danielle Dube made several impressive saves and was a major factor in keeping the Cougars off the board during their entire game. In total she made 30 saves for the shutout. Coach Graham Thomas, a former assistant coach at Syracuse, made his Thunderbird debut on Friday night and was impressed with how his team performed. “The biggest challenge for this team is the mental block, … and [to] get in the habit of attention to detail and what it takes to win, and what it takes to play successful....We need the confidence and we need to believe in ourselves and in each other. It is a process and it’s starting to happen.” Dube, a former member for Team Canada, was perfect throughout the game and helped backstop the team to the victory. Thomas described Dube as a “calming presence” that brings experience, leadership and character to the team. “This team came from where they came from last season; they have so much potential. I don’t think they know it yet,” said Thomas. Dube echoed the same thoughts. “[The team] has [the potential], and they just need to get it in their heads that they have it.” Things are definitely looking up for women’s hockey at UBC, and based on their performance on Friday night, there is potential for a much more successful season in 2012-2013. U

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 9, 2012 |

EDITOR ANNA ZORIA

GREEN >>

Pedal-pushers unite

FILM >>

Doc premieres on Occupy anniversary

Bike art exhibit at Liu Institute champions sustainability

PHOTO COURTESY OF THE OCCUPATION

Journalism students Rafferty Baker and Matthew J. Van Deventer are the creators behind the Occupy Vancouver documentary.

Joan Tan Contributor

HOGAN WONG PHOTO/THE UBYSSEY

Small bike, big power. gLiving exhibit shows alternate ways to generate energy.

Rebekah Ho Contributor

UBC’s Liu Institute for Global Issues has debuted a new art exhibit that is equal parts environmental and interactive. The exhibit, titled gLiving , opened on Oct. 3 and features human-powered bike generators created by gBikes, a team of UBC alumni and students. Their goal? To challenge the conventional method of generating energy. “Here’s a bunch of guys … who spend a lot of their free time building artwork that combines physical activity of pedaling and biking with the production of electricity,” said Solen Roth, one of two coordinators for the exhibit. “They’re bringing attention to the idea of how much physical energy from humans it takes to create the kinds of electricity in our lives without thinking about it.” Six co-creators make up the gBikes team: Curtis Perrin, Bryant DeRoy, Spencer Treffry, Grant Harris, Michael Sitwell and Sam Carter. gBikes is part of a large educational charity organization called Energy Awareness Through Art, or EatArt. “EatArt does an annual fundraiser every year … [powering] a Vancouver art gallery.… They have these generator bikes, and teams of riders collect pledges to generate power for about an hour at a time,” co-creator Perrin explained. “They did that for a couple of years … and wanted to get a group to take ownership of that.” The gLiving exhibit consists of a recliner chair with pedals that powers a television with over 100 LED lights. It fits in perfectly at the Liu Institute, whose three themes, according to Roth, are “sustainability, security and social justice.” “It’s an interactive piece that demonstrates the potential energy you have within your own body. You can see it tangibly produced with what we have inside the TV, in terms of physical effort,” said gBikes team member

DeRoy. “It puts everything into perspective and, hopefully, that can make a positive impact on people in realizing energy is not really free, even though it’s easy to come by.” “If you want this form of entertainment to work, you have to pedal,… so it’s kind of superposing this sedentary space to this physical activity,” added Roth. The gBikes team agreed that the skills they learned at UBC set the stage for this project. “Four of six of us are from UBC,” said Perrin. “I went to school for engineering here, so it taught me a lot of the things that would help in making stuff like this.” “I started off in UBC in fine arts, and I transferred to natural resource conservation,” said DeRoy. “[I have] interest in both arts and science and energy awareness.… This is a good way to get that all out in one place.” One of the bigger projects the team is developing is a four-person, four-wheeled “BikeCar” named the Black Ghost, which they brought to the opening night of the exhibit. “Originally we had our four generator bikes, but we always had to throw them in a vehicle to take them places, which sort of breaks our mandate,” said Treffry. “The idea is to create a little trailer to tow behind the BikeCar, so everything is clean and we can take it all around the city on our own energy.” For DeRoy, the BikeCar represents something much bigger than just a project in sustainability. “I had all these ideas about art and energy since I started working, and the BikeCar was the first time that I saw an idea or something we had thought of as friends come to life. Something that I thought was intangible was possible and doable.” The gLiving exhibition is open from Oct. 3 to Nov. 5 at the Lobby Gallery in the Liu Institute for Global Justice. U

Oct. 15 marks the one-year anniversary of Occupy Vancouver, the movement that gathered approximately 6,000 activists in front of the Vancouver Art Gallery to protest issues of social, political and economic imbalance. Among the diverse group of activists and protesters were two BCIT journalism students, Rafferty Baker and Matthew J. Van Deventer, who set out to document the movement through film. The result of their hard labour? The Occupation, a documentary that showcases the entire 39-day event, from the first rally to the pitching of tents. Baker and Van Deventer offer a candid look at what it was like to be part of this historic social movement. According to Baker, who graduated from UBC in 2006 with a history and philosophy degree, the film sprang from his keen interest in history and documentation as a whole. “As a history major,...

I believe in the importance of documenting momentous events,” he said. The two young filmmakers were most interested in how activists held the physical space, and the resulting impact on the public sphere. “The physical encampment, logistics and reality of sustaining a tent city in the core of Vancouver,… that provided a remarkable story of Occupy Vancouver,” said Baker. Baker and Van Deventer were both present for all 39 days of Occupy, although they did not camp alongside protesters and activists. “This was part of the idea of not getting too involved in activity.… We wanted to remain as passive observers and draw the line somewhere,” said Baker. “Activism and politics should and can happen on the streets.… In my opinion, street politics are as important as parliament and electoral politics, it’s just a different format, but it means that anyone can get involved and engaged.”

But Marina Classen, a secondyear Arts student at UBC who was present at some of the Occupy protests, said that there’s not enough awareness of the movement among students. “Awareness on the issue is largely disconnected from the youth body,” said Classen. “... The movement relates to and affects all of us,… and the issues are highly applicable to us now.” Even a year after the fact, the Occupy Vancouver movement is still fresh in the mind of the public. “These issues are still important, and they don’t just disappear.… These issues have not yet been resolved,” said Baker. Baker and Van Deventer hope that The Occupation will help to preserve the Occupy movement in history and continue to inform the public about the ongoing debate. The Occupation premieres on Oct. 15 at the Rio Theatre. For tickets and further information about the documentary, visit www. theoccupationdocumentary.com. U

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 9, 2012 |

STUDENT VOICE. COMMUNITY REACH.

LAST WORDS

Federal funding for research is intact LETTER

Re: “Federal funding cuts hurting UBC research programs” (Sept. 24, 2012) The Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) strives to ensure that Canada’s best researchers and top students have the resources to succeed and contribute to positioning Canada as a strong research and innovation player at the global level. While investments overall in science and technology funding have never been greater, we have had to reassign resources in some programs. In 2012-13, the overall budget for the Major Resource Support (MRS) program is $31 million. The breakdown of this budget is as follows:

kai jacobson PHOTO/THE UBYSSEY

What the service workers strike means for UBC

e’re going to assume that the picket line around the SUB last Thursday took the vast majority of UBC students by complete surprise. Further, we think it’s a safe bet that you’re probably trying to figure out what you think about the idea — and the reality — of a strike on campus. While most of campus responded somewhat apathetically, it seems likely this job action will escalate to the point where people will have to care. But to make up your mind, you’ll need to know the full story. We’re going to start from the beginning here, with the events that led to a considerable chunk of UBC’s service staff walking off the job. ••• Let’s start with the union. The Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Local 116 represents, among others, UBC Food Services, campus security, parking, plumbers and IT employees. They have been without a collective agreement (the document that outlines wages, salaries and benefits) since 2010. CUPE 116 says their demands are fairly modest. They want a cost-of-living increase to make sure their wages keep up with rising prices. They want to make sure all of their members receive some kind of pension. And they want job security in the face of a government plan to privatize and centralize certain university activities like human resources, procurement and libraries. UBC is required to manage its own finances. When it comes to collective bargaining, they receive instructions from the province about what they can and cannot offer. This is called a bargaining mandate. Since the start of this round of bargaining, UBC has been operating under “net zero.” In the net zero system, any wage increase in new contracts has to be accompanied

by an equivalent reduction in benefits. As you can imagine, public-sector workers hated net zero. So in response, B.C. brought in a new mandate: “cooperative gains.” Under this system, any increase to benefits or salaries have to be accompanied by cuts to another part of the institution — or, in admin speak, through “finding administrative efficiencies.” Everyone following this so far? Basically, UBC has been forced to operate under two systems that were bound to piss off unionized workers. They’re not getting any more money from the government. The unions and UBC agree that this is something that needs to change. Despite surrounding Brock Hall all day and blasting ’80s hair metal, most picketers understand that their main quarrel isn’t with UBC. At the rally, most of the speakers’ anger was directed at Victoria. They understand that UBC’s hands are tied. Universities in B.C. will receive a funding reduction of one per cent for 2013-2014, and a 1.5 per cent cut is planned for 2014-2015. Factor in inflation, and that ends up being a fairly sizeable squeeze. So both sides want more money from the government. Every university in B.C. has said as much. This is, without a doubt, a looming election issue. But where do things go from here? Well, CUPE has promised that this will be an escalating strike: the longer they go without a collective agreement that they find suitable, the more severe the disruption to services. We can only speculate on what UBC’s offer is at this point, and there’s a lot we don’t know. But there are a couple of ways this could pan out. The university and CUPE 116 could reach an agreement under cooperative gains. The two sides would meet in the middle, UBC would submit a savings plan

to the government and things would return to normal. But something would have to give, since both sides seem quite far apart in their offers. There’s no set date for the two sides to restart mediation. Or the government could legislate the union back to work, though this is extremely unlikely. The Labour Relations Board has set levels of essential services at UBC to ensure that the university is able to function. Such a move would be incredibly divisive. If this goes on long enough, expect the NDP to promise to increase funding to post-secondary education. The issue of privatization is the biggest concern. We know very little about what exactly the government is proposing here (and, quite frankly, neither does the minister in charge). But if there are plans to centralize essential university services, that changes the game entirely. And it’s something over which UBC has almost no control. But maybe it’s worth looking at the last major strike on campus. In 2003, the teaching assistants’ union, CUPE Local 2278, held a strike that brought the university to its knees. People were concerned about the entire academic year being lost. UBC President Martha Piper intervened, and sent a letter to the Ministry of Advanced Education. The TAs were eventually legislated back to work. ••• So though the pickets last Thursday were a surprise to many in the UBC community, this isn’t spontaneous job action. It’s been in the making for years, has involved hundreds of hours of meetings and has no clear resolution. It will soon affect every person on this campus. In short, UBC’s labour strife isn’t something you’re going to be able to ignore for much longer. U

• $14 million from Industry Canada and the National Research Council for the Canadian Light Source (CLS) • $5.3 million from NSERC for Thematic Institutes, such as the Pacific Institute for Mathematical Sciences and Banff International Research Station, that in the future will be funded through disciplinary envelopes • $6 million from NSERC for ongoing support to CLS and TRIUMF’s Centre for Molecular and Materials Sciences •$3.7 million reduction to the program This leaves an envelope of just over $1.8 million for experimental facilities, an insufficient amount to run a national competition. NSERC understands the importance of maintaining access to research facilities and will be consulting with stakeholders, such as the Canada Foundation for Innovation, to identify ways to address the funding of facilities in the future. As we envisioned possible budget reductions over the last year, we were mindful of the view expressed by the research community that preserving foundational support for the Discovery Grants Program and for scholarships and fellowships programs should be our highest priority. With a budget of $350 million, the Discovery Grants Program accounts for over one third of NSERC’s overall budget of just over $1 billion. In fact, the budget for this program has increased steadily over the years, with researchers funded

through the program representing a broad base of research capability. More than half of NSERC’s overall budget is used to support students and fellows, directly or indirectly. In fact, in 2011-12 NSERC supported almost 30,000 trainees through its scholarship and fellowship programs. NSERC’s support for students and post-doctoral fellows through its suite of programs supporting training in research has been maintained. The balance between individual awards and the Collaborative Research and Training Experience (CREATE) program is evolving as the CREATE program ramps up. This program and other NSERC grants programs have been instrumental in funding postdoctoral fellows at a significant rate. In addition to providing support to scholars at the postdoctoral level, CREATE provides an enhanced training environment through the encouragement of interdisciplinary collaboration as well as opportunities for fellows to develop their professional skills. Both of these elements have been highlighted by stakeholders as essential abilities required of successful researchers in the scientific community, within or outside academia. Finally, CREATE offers unique opportunities for students to work with colleagues at an international level. For example, in collaboration with Germany, NSERC established a unique lab-to-lab program that promotes exchanges between the countries to provide trainees with experience collaborating on research on an international stage. In 2009, NSERC formally launched the CREATE program within NSERC’s overall budget for students and fellows. A minimum of 80 per cent of each CREATE grant held by a research team must support students and fellows. The University of British Columbia has demonstrated the success of this program by holding 10 of these grants. We encourage the research community to contact us at connect@ nserc-crsng.gc.ca to share feedback on important programs and initiatives. I also invite anyone from the community to contact me and my colleagues directly at 613-995-5833 for further information. Isabelle Blain Vice-President, Research Grants and Scholarships NSERC

Why I’m refusing to cross picket lines LETTER Please find below a copy of the letter I sent to Anna-Marie Fenger, the assistant dean of Arts. I would like to extend its address to members of the administration who are actually responsible for the university’s strike response policies, as an open letter. I am writing to declare that I will not be crossing any picket lines during the CUPE 116 strike. I appreciate the university acknowledging that students have a right to exercise their consciences, but the caveat that we are expected to seek out “alternative entrances” to picketed buildings strikes me as undermining the rights of the workers on strike in a

particularly snaky way. I find the suggestion that I should prioritize sneaking past a picket line over my stated solidarity with CUPE 116 quite odious. Picket lines are meaningful not just as physical boundaries, but as symbolic spaces that delineate conflicting ideologies. The absence of a picket line in front of Buchanan does not indicate that that space is no longer a politically charged site. The university performs a gross injustice in reducing matters of principle and justice to the superficial mechanics of access and entry. Sincerely, Maddie Gorman Arts 4