At the Jan. 23 McGill Senate meeting, Principal Heather Munroe-Blum spoke on the government-imposed university budget cuts that the Parti Québécois (PQ) announced in December. Vice-President (Finance and Administration) Michael Di Grappa also updated Senate on the progress of the Statement of Values and Principles concerning freedom of expression and freedom of peaceful assembly.

Munroe-Blum told senators that she has received “signals” from Minister of Higher Education Pierre Duchesne that more budget cuts will affect the budget for the 2014 fiscal year.

“While we are committed to accountability and working productively with the government in every way we can, we also must take the course of not taking these retroactive cuts in this academic year,” she told Senate. “It would be irresponsible.”

According to Munroe-Blum, the university would be in a better position to accept budget cuts this year if the government promised to reinvest back into the university system in the years to come. However, she said Quebec Premier Pauline Marois “refuses to commit” to reinvestment, or indicate when such an action may come.

Munroe-Blum also noted that she has been participating in pre-Education Summit meetings in Quebec City on behalf of the Conférence des recteurs et des principaux des universities du Québec (CREPUQ) and McGill. University leaders from Montreal intend to hold their own summit on Feb. 4.

“The goal of the summit is to set an agenda, and create Montreal as a centre of education … before the government summit begins,” Munroe-Blum said.
The principal also asked Di Grappa to provide an update on the statement of values and principles, which will be released this week. He announced that the statement will be accompanied by a separate document, detailing permanent “operational procedures.” These will serve as guidelines that campus security and disciplinary officers will follow when dealing with protests on campus.

Di Grappa confirmed that, while the statement of values and principles will be voted on by both Senate and the Board of Governors (BoG), the operational procedures will be implemented with no vote in either body.

“The operational procedures are an administrative document, not a matter of academic or fiscal policy. We have all kinds of operational procedures at McGill, in various units and departments,” Di Grappa said following Senate. “They are not approved by Senate or Board.”

Although they will be separate documents, the statement and operational procedures will face consultation together.

Consultation fairs over the statement of values and principles, as well as the operational procedures will occur at both campuses, and an open website is expected to launch this week, according to Di Grappa.

Arts Senator James Gutman expressed concern at Senate about how the last consultation period was handled, pointing to the fact that the administration only received 25 responses.

“One thing that upset me when you sent out the consultation email is that you sent it out during exams, and then had it end when students were coming back to McGill on Jan. 7,” he said. “I think that was really bad. … There is a reason only 25 people responded.”

Senate also discussed the possibility of expanding the McGill campus into the Royal Victoria Hospital area, as well as introducing the topic of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs).

Following updates from top administrators, Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) Vice-President University Affairs Haley Dinel asked Di Grappa if there were any plans to use Royal Victoria Hospital for university-related purposes like classes or research.

Di Grappa pointed out that the university does not own the hospital, but that before the PQ government was elected in September, there had been talks with the Charest government over the potential transfer of the property to McGill. The hospital will soon move to another site. According to Di Grappa, the government will have to decide what it does with the property once this move takes place.

“It is now unclear how Marois would deal with this,” he said. “McGill needs to expand its space. The hospital represents an important amount of space, in which the school could gradually expand over time.”

“The new government is undertaking a ‘reflection’ on what to do with this property, as well as Hotel Dieu,” he said following Senate. “We have met with representatives of the new government to make the case that McGill should acquire the site.”

Di Grappa also said it might not be the best time for the university to pursue plans to expand.

“It would appear that renovation costs would probably be too high,” he said. “We are examining this more to see if it is feasible. The university is also dealing with budget cuts … and a campus that has buildings that [already] need reparations.”

The majority of Wednesday’s Senate meeting was spent discussing MOOCs—online courses that universities like Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Harvard University have begun to offer. The discussion outlined how various members of Senate feel about eventually implementing large online lectures into academic programs at McGill. Opinions on this topic varied widely.

Arts Senator Max Zidel said he supports the idea, but would like to see these programs as one option out of many that students could use when completing their programs.

“I would like to think of them as different [than] conferences and lectures,” he said.

Zidel suggested that high school students could be allowed to take MOOCs before coming to McGill to get certain prerequisite classes and program requirements out of the way.

Other senators showed concern about the idea of online courses.

“My gut feeling is that, at its root, this is ultimately a revenue generation exercise,” said Medicine Senator Daniel Bernard. “I know there might be a feeling that if we don’t get on this train, we might miss it, but I think we should consider that the train may be going nowhere or, worse, over a cliff.”

Dinel expressed hope that the courses would be open to a wider demographic, which could involve people in other countries.

“It could provide a great societal development,” she said. “It would provide access [to education] to students and people who can’t come [to McGill]. … It’s a great way to share our knowledge with everyone else.”