The Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) announced on Oct. 29 that it had formally signed a petition calling on the Quebec government to amend Bill 64, an Act to modernize legislative provisions as regards the protection of personal information. According to the petition, which was launched in early October[Read More…]
Editorial
SSMU representatives deserve compensation
Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) Vice-President University Affairs Brooklyn Frizzle recently submitted a motion that would have placed a proposed non–opt-outable SSMU Representatives fee to pay SSMU representatives on the Fall 2020 Referendum ballot. SSMU tabled the motion until Winter 2021, and some elements of the fee are still[Read More…]
McGill must address a growing mental health crisis
Since the pandemic struck Montreal seven months ago, McGill students’ lives have changed drastically. Classes are now online, many students are studying from home, and those residing in Montreal are once again subject to strict restrictions on social gatherings to curb the second wave of COVID-19. 2020 has been a[Read More…]
Graduate student workers must not be taken for granted
The COVID-19 pandemic has toppled the higher-education house of cards, scattering vulnerable academic support staff into uncertain workplace predicaments. McGill forced these employees into dire straits well before the pandemic: Overburdened by faculties and underappreciated by students, the university treats teaching assistants (TAs) and other academic support staff like raw[Read More…]
Quebec’s racist health care system needs reform
On Sept. 28, Joyce Echaquan, an Atikamekw woman and mother of seven, livestreamed the moments before her death at Joliette Hospital. The widely-shared video shows hospital staff making racist comments towards Echaquan, and sparked outrage across the country. The horrific situation highlights the deep flaws inherent in the Canadian health[Read More…]
The Royal Victoria Hospital must remain in public hands
On Sept. 4, students joined forces with Milton-Parc residents to protest the privatization of the old Royal Victoria Hospital. The building’s fate has remained unclear since it was decommissioned in 2015. In July, it was converted into a shelter for the unhoused during the COVID-19 pandemic. Although the City of[Read More…]
PEQ reforms highlight the CAQ’s xenophobia
On Sept. 12, activist group Le Quebec c’est nous aussi held a protest against proposed reforms to the Programme experience Quebecoise (PEQ), a fast-track immigration program for international students who wish to permanently reside in Quebec after graduation. While similar reforms proposed (and later suspended) last November sought to impose[Read More…]
Zoom University threatens to leave students behind
During the last two weeks, students were welcomed back to a McGill that no one had ever seen before. Across time zones throughout Canada and around the world, frantic searching for class locations was replaced with anxious scrambling for Zoom links as students and academic staff struggled to adapt to[Read More…]
Reconciliation must go beyond a toppled statue
The police murder of George Floyd on May 25, 2020 sparked global protests against police brutality and anti-Black racism, giving renewed momentum to the Black Lives Matter movement. In light of these events, McGill, an institution whose history is rooted in violence and enslavement, expressed its intention to put forward[Read More…]
McGill must move carefully into the digital world
McGill students’ lives are shifting entirely online. April 3 marks the end of the first week of classes since the university made course instruction remote. McGill administrators are attempting to provide uniformity to students in all faculties, but even so, professors have been left largely to their own devices in[Read More…]