Well... Not so.
From the Canadian University Press wire:
Danielle Webb, The Xaverian Weekly:Imagine that type of vision and energy at the SFUO.
In a time when student apathy is soaring, students at Nova Scotia’s St. Francis Xavier University turned out in droves to vote in their annual students’ union election — breaking 50 per cent voter turnout. The massive turnout is unique in Canadian student politics.
“We advertised the living shit out of it,” said Michael MacIsaac, the union’s chief returning officer and chair of council.
Blogs designed to cover the candidates were introduced this year, the union’s website was updated regularly as the campaigns progressed, a second all-candidate’s debate was held, the campus was covered in advertisements, and the union even convinced the university to post a link to election information on the main university’s homepage.
But St. FX’s Stephen is not one to rest on his laurel’s after his elections promotions racked up an impressive 50 per cent voter turnout. He believes that there is still room for improvement, particularly with off-campus students.
14 comments:
An official campaign blog sanctioned by the student union and run by student media. What a concept.
I wonder if they were granted any resources to blog the St. F-X campaign?
I wonder if Sylvia will give this blog some resources. :)
I could use a camera-assistant.
You really need to hype up the elections. Make them an event worth following, make them relevent to students. People need to be engaged with the issues, but should also have something to look forward to. They need to be inspired to care, whether it be through a blog, a webcast, podcast, or whatever.
Sam says we should have an entorage that follows them. Jason...?
Amy,
Sure thing.
If you know a candidate is going to be somewhere or they are planning to do something, you should email Wassim and CC me at mrchiu@mac.com
jasonchiu
By inspiring people I mean it can't be made into a clique-type, only certain students allowed, sort of atmosphere. What blogs like this do is humanize candidates and make them more relatable and gives us more insights into who they are, besides what simply their opponents' rhetoric offers us. It also provides for a lot of more nuanced dialogue than simply what is in the platforms of the candidates. It becomes a more realistic election.
As for myself and my resignation. I did not resign because I didn't get what I want, as you say. I resigned because I knew I was not well-suited to work with Austin, and that there would be great difficulty for our executive to function well for students. We let others step in and start fresh. And in all likelihood their year has been more productive than our could have been after that GA. I still however stand by everything that was said at the GA. It's not politicizing, it's not dehumanizing. What is dumanizing to taking advantage of the students you represent, and that's what we were trying to stop.
What happened with PIDSSA this year, did motivate people to care. Look at the turnout at that GA. Look at the number of potential candidates in their upcoming election. When something this important happens students care. We just need to get the word out to all of them.
LOL
"and the same leftist/socialist/revolutionary wannabe candidates keep running."
I went through 3 years of neutral/liberal/conservative boringness until there was enough momentum from the activist community to change that. Granted, parts of the SFUO had started running campaigns that interested the activist community, but that was only in my 3rd year here.
And in those years before those leftist goons started running, voter turnout was still on the decline. So nice try at putting together some attack on your campus left, but against all the research and history of the fed, the leanings don't matter.
So way to dehumanize their issues and call them wannabes in a comment that was supposed to call out the dehumanization of the process.
When something this important happens? I can't even begin to understand what you are talking about... You sort of just talk, and I imagine that it all makes sense to you but at least some people read through it!
I was equally enraged as you were during 101 Week when YOU, Amy, approached me about PIDSSA President Austin Menyasz... And the rage subsided quite quickly after the GA, which I attended.
One of your opening comments was, if I remember correctly (and I certainly do) that he was phony for wearing ties. Okay, so maybe it wasn't a vendetta... But you were so ravenous and, to be frank, it was quite disgusting. If there had been no trial, I would have voted guilty in a second! You and those you associated with are the exact problem that rathgrith is talking about.
Its not so much about the left-movement... there is a lot of merit in what they do. Its about the hypocrisy of the people in specific that is bad for students.
And, Amy, even if motivated people to care, why do you keep pointing out flaws that are, for the most part not very serious, such as your most recent posts on the group talking about loss of interest through people leaving the group... Which one is it? Are they inspired by the process, or as you seem to always say, being alienated?
I hope that there are disagreements on the BOA, so you could choose to leave that as well... I would argue that politics is about differing views, but whatever!
This is an extremely personal discussion (or attack), that is entirely uncalled for on this blog.
However...
Pointing out flaws, and being critical of a group, or policy, or what have you, is a very intragal part of politics. Disagreement is too; the two are inherent in each other!! You and I seem to agree on a lot, perhaps except for the approach I've used. Fair enough.
My perspective on the situation: I think some people were alienated right off the bat, and those people will need to be actively engaged and sought out in order to return to the association. There are others though,who because of the more negative things that happened, were encouraged to follow through with the association to correct those errors. It's a very complex situation. Not hypocracy!Just a mess that needs be sorted through some critical analysis. (I suppose you think i'm just saying this to hear myself talk, but trust me when I say i'm being sincere).
I am looking forward to the BOA, and all the debates and discussion that will go on there, because it is a place where everyone's opinions matter, and everyone gets to make those opinions heard with one vote.
As an ex-member of the PIDSSA executive, I feel that many statements have been made, not only directed to Amy, but to those of us that resigned.
(See Jenn’s comment: “You and those you associated with are the exact problem that rathgrith is talking about.”)
I'd like to bring a little bit of perspective into this: To me, resigning from PIDSSA was like leaving an abusive husband; after being taken advantage of for long enough, it was time to get our lives back together and move on!
I find some of the comments here incredibly offensive. Amy suggests that we find ways to engage students; she gets attacked because she’s apparently unprofessional for resigning from PIDSSA.
As well, I’d like to respond to this comment from Jenn “I hope that there are disagreements on the BOA, so you could choose to leave that as well... I would argue that politics is about differing views, but whatever!”
Clearly you misunderstood all of our (numerous) reasons for resigning. Speaking for me, there was no “disagreements” on issues, differing views, but rather views that people should do their job, versus people thinking they didn’t have to do jack and could get away with it. These aren’t political disagreements; it’s almost more of an HR issue.
If PIDSSA were a political party, and the leader of my party was corrupt, I would certainly try to remove them as leader, and if that was not successful, why would I want to be linked to corruption? I would evidently resign, stating that I did not agree with what was being done, on a moral level.
You can’t expect people to stick around when they are mistreated and stepped all over.
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