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the
gazette
www.westerngazette.ca
WESTERN’S DAILY STUDENT NEWSPAPER•EST.1906
• VOLUME 103, ISSUE 30
T
UESDAY
, O
CTOBER
27, 2009
... better than the rest since 1906
SPORTS
GOLF 
Women’s streak over … p.7
A&E
METRIC
Indie rockers delight crowd … p.5
WESTERNGAZETTE.CA
FASHION BLOG
Rainy day fashions
GLOBE AND MAIL UNIVERSITY RANKINGS
 Western tops Globe survey 
 Annual poll places Western ahead of U of T, UBC andMcGill in student satisfaction and teaching quality 
By Cheryl Stone
Gazette Staff 
The
Globe and Mail 
has releasedtheir annual university report, giv-ing Western another A grade in stu-dent satisfaction.The report rankings were deter-mined by surveys filled out by cur-rent undergraduate students. Theiranswers were then turned intoaverage scores and given a lettergrade.Other top grades for Westernincluded an A for quality of educa-tion and academic reputation, andan A+ for campus atmosphere.Lower rankings included a B- forenvironmental commitment and aB for career preparation.“It is gratifying to see that [West-ern’s] commitment to student expe-rience is recognized in this way,”John Doerksen, vice-provost acade-mic programs and students at Western, said.“In surveys such as this, we wantto pay attention to areas needing improvement,” Doerksen added.Carolyn Hawthorn, communi-cations officer for the University Students’ Council confirmed thissentiment.“We are very pleased with theranking but don’t feel as though it isa reason for us to get complacent,”Hawthorn said. “There is alwaysroom for improvement and we atthe USC are always looking for waysto better our campus and the stu-dent experience here at Western.”Both Doerksen and Hawthornacknowledged appreciation for Western’s high ranking, but main-tained a humble attitude.“External accolades such as the
Globe and Mail 
rankings are nice,but the real reason we all get out of bed in the morning is to enhancestudent experience,” Hawthornadded.“The rankings are but one of themany factors [Western] takes intoaccount in setting priorities,”Doerksenadded.Ultimately, the rankings may noteven be an influential factor forsome students.“I basically neglected rankings[when I applied],” Kaiyman Para, afirst-year social science student,said. He admitted program quality  was a larger concern.“I’m not really sure what stan-dards it’s based on so I don’t trustit,” Para said.Hawthorn as well as Doerksensaid Western’s high rankings wererelated to the opportunities to learnoutside of the classroom.“At Western, we have an excel-lent learning environment thatcombines work in the academicprograms with opportunitiesbeyond the classroom,” Doerksennoted.“The USC provides opportuni-ties for out of classroom learning,”Hawthorn echoed. She cited clubsand services as examples.Lori Bunt, assistant director of communication and public affairsat the University of Guelph notedthe importance of taking studentopinion into account in regards tothe surveys.“Asking [students] what do youthink, what do you want to see […], we take those comments very seri-ously,” Bunt said. Areas where Western scoredpoorly in were class-size and stu-dent-faculty interaction. Westernreceived a B and a B+ respectively,in comparison to smaller schoolssuch as Nipissing University, which received an A+ in class-sizeand an A in student faculty inter-action.“The survey indicates thatsmaller institutions do score higherin areas such as student-faculty interaction and class size, and at Western we will want to explore ways of making our courses moreeffective, whatever the class size,”Doerksen said.Doerksen also mentioned this isthe eighth year in a row Western hashad the highest ranking in its cate-gory.
By Allie Fonarev 
Gazette Staff 
 Western students were among thecrowds who filled ParliamentHill last Saturday to rally the government on cli-mate change.Between 2,000 and3,000 people attended theevent, which hosted speakers, per-formances and information onenvironmental issues pertaining toCanada.“It was to rally support againstCanada’s inaction on the worldstage,” said Andrew Healey, orga-nizer of the London Fill the Hillconstituency. “Our specific goals were for Canada to clean up its act,”he added.The event was affiliated with theInternational Day of Climate Action, which held rallies across the worldto bring attention to the upcoming United Nations Climate ChangeConference in Copenhagen. TheConference will highlight climateissues and strive towards forming an international agreement on car-bon emission reduction. According to Healey, who is afourth-year Western student inmedia, information and technocul-ture, the purpose of the rally was torebuke the government for not rat-ifying Kyoto, for continuing to sup-port the tar sands in Alberta and forgeneral Canadian inaction.However, Ed Holder, Member of Parliament for London West, warnsthe blame does not lie solely withthe government.“Whenever there’s a governmentin power […] they’re the target […] What tends to happen is people
“Fill the Hill” points to bigger issue
Climate change rally meant to draw attention to Canada’s failed promises
Corey Stanford/Gazette
AND FOR MY NEXT TRICK, MY GUITARIST WILL JUMP THROUGH THISHOOP.
Emily Haines, lead singer of Metric, does duble duty belting outvocals and banging away at a tambourine during Friday night’s perfor-mance. Full review on page 5.
METRIC AT CENTENNIAL HALL
PLEASE SEE STUDENT P3
Courtesy of Andrew Weir
 
Tues, Oct. 27
•
Midnight Massacre
When: Today – Friday, 5:30 p.m.to 11:00 p.m.Where: UCC GymWhat: A haunted house orga-nized by the University Students’Council.•
University Students’ CouncilMeeting 
When: 7:00 p.m.Where: USC Council Chambers,UCC Rm. 340What: Representatives meet todiscuss and debate current stu-dent-related politics.
Wed, Oct. 28
•
La Tertulia
When: 3:30 p.m.Where: University College, Rm.117What: A Spanish ConversationGroup presented by the depart-ment of modern languages andliteratures for anyone wishing tospeak Spanish and meet peoplefrom different Spanish-speakingcountries.•
Philosophy – Library LectureSeries
When: 7:00 p.m. to 8:30 p.m.Where: Central London PublicLibrary, 251 Dundas St.What: Henrik Lagerlund will bepresenting his paper on “FromEros to Agape: Love in Ancientand Medieval Times.”
Thurs, Oct. 29
•
Graduate and ProfessionalSchool Fair 
When: 11:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.Where: Western Student Recre-ation CentreWhat: An event organized by TheCareer Centre @ Western, pro-moting educational programsoffered by universities and col-leges from around the world.•
“Song Show” An Exhibition of Media Art Based on Popular Song 
When: Opening today at 1 p.m.,running until Nov. 20Where: John Labatt Visual ArtCentreWhat: The free exhibitionexplores how artists have madeuse of the popular song toreflect on its format, contents,mythologies and emotions itengages.
Fri, Oct. 30
•
USS & The Scenario BenefitConcert
When: 9:30 p.m.Where: London Music HallWhat: A fundraising concert forWellspring Cancer Support Cen-tre. Visitwww.londonmusichall.com formore details.
If you have an event you wouldlike to share please send your information toevents.gazette@gmail.com
P2
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theGazette
•T
UESDAY
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CTOBER
27, 2009
NEWS
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The Cryptoquip is a substitution cipher in which one letter stands for another. If you think that Xequals O, it will equal O throughout the puzzle. Single letters, short words and words using an apos-trophe give you clues to locating vowels. Solution is by trial and error.© 2002 by Kings Features Syndicate, Inc.
Charity campaignsexceed goal
The numbers are in for funds raisedat this year’s Shinerama and Terry Fox orientation campaigns. Both were a big success according to theUniversity Students’ Council.“From what we saw, there wasan overwhelming response,” Justin Arcaro, USC vice-president campusevents, said. While Arcaro said itseemed students were out for ashorter period of time than in pre-vious years, he believed there weremore of them.“We had to call buses back because we had an overload of stu-dents,” Arcaro said.Shinerama took place on Satur-day, Sept. 12 in various locationsacross London. Western students washed cars and windshields toraise money for the Canadian Cys-tic Fibrosis Foundation.The next day, the Terry Fox Runbegan on Concrete Beach. Run-ners and walkers followed a five-kilometre course around campus.Money raised will be given to theTerry Fox Research Institute tohelp fight cancer.Last year, post-secondary schoolsacross Canada raised $940,000 dur-ing Shinerama, with Western stu-dents raising $102,000 of the total. Western’s Terry Fox Run last yearraised $80,225 and was one of thelargest post-secondary runs accord-ing to the Orientation Week website.This year, the profits of bothcampaigns were combined, bring-ing a total of $195,303.67 to date,exceeding their goal of $191,360.
—Steve Howard
Rats, foiled again
London is dealing with an infesta-tion, and this time they are notreferring to students.Health inspectors and bylaw officers became aware of the prob-lem in the Fanshawe College areaabout a week and a half ago, inresponse to tenants calling the City and complaining about the preva-lence of rats in their backyard.Orest Katolyk, manager of bylaw enforcement, noted the primary concern of the City right now iscontainment.“Our first plan of action was [to]notify all tenants, in working withthe Middlesex Health Unit on thehabits of rats and mice,” Katolyk said. “The focus will be on contain-ment of garbage.”Katolyk was quick to point outthe area by Fanshawe College isheavily populated by students, often with multiple students living in eachhouse. Garbage management is,therefore, a significant concern.“It’s necessary that property owners visit these properties […] toensure vermin haven’t gotten intothe house,” Katolyk noted.“Ultimately, the biggest empha-sis is on prevention. And preven-tion is solved by good practices of garbage containment.”
—Meagan Kashty 
EVENTS CALENDAR
 
By Meagan Kashty 
Gazette Staff 
The University of British Colum-bia’s Alma Mater Society has decid-ed to leave the Canadian Alliance of Student Associations. After having first declared anintent to immediately withdraw from the association, AMS — thelargest student union in Canada — was forced to change their separa-tion date to April 1, 2010, in accor-dance with CASA’s policy.CASA, an alliance of studentassociations and student unions,represents the interests of post-sec-ondary students to federal andinter-provincial levels of govern-ment and has 24 participating orga-nizations, with UBC being one of the founding members.Blake Frederick, AMS president,noted a number of reasonsprompting the departure fromCASA. He expressed concerns AMSdid not have the influence withinCASA it once had.“Primarily, our council cited that we don’t have much say over theorganization now,” Frederick said.He added because AMS is one of the largest student organizations inCanada, they have a lot of resourcesin house, thus making theresources provided by CASA to itsmembers unnecessary.Finally, Frederick felt AMS andCASA no longer had the same pri-orities, and wanted the opportuni-ty for UBC to pursue their ownefforts.“The AMS would like to focusmore heavily on provincial lobby-ing,” Frederick said. “We intend tocontinue our independent federallobbying efforts, but going forward, we intend to focus more on provin-cial efforts.” Arati Sharma, national directorof CASA, understood the direction AMS wants to pursue, but main-tained provincial lobbying was nota concern for them.“We’re mandated to work onfederal lobbying issues,” Sharmasaid. “If [AMS] wants to create aprovincial lobby group, we supportthat, but currently there’s noprovincial lobbying within CASA.”Frederick was optimistic aboutthe future efforts of UBC and AMS,independent from CASA.“The students at UBC will beseeing a greater amount of resources put into the AMS’s lobby-ing efforts because we will nolonger have to pay membershipdues to CASA,” Frederick said.“Those funds will be freed up forthe AMS to structure their own lob-bying efforts.”The University Students’ Coun-cil at Western has been a part of CASA for a number of years.Carolyn Hawthorn, communi-cations officer for the USC, empha-sized the importance of going topoliticians with a collective voice,rather than an individual approach.“Along with our partners acrossCanada, we take the concerns of the students to politicians,”Hawthorn said.Sharma confirmed this senti-ment, and noted an alliance withCASA means an alliance with 23other schools.“CASA is member-driven,” Shar-ma said. “All [lobbying efforts] aredecided through policy-strategy conferences in the summer.” While Western has shown sup-port of CASA in the past, Hawthornmentioned the USC plans to under-take a review of the association.“The external representationpolicy mandates us to review every two years,” Hawthorn said. “Thisprovides Western the opportunity to offer constructive feedback toCASA in the spirit of strengthening the organization.”Despite AMS’s departure fromCASA, Sharma was optimisticabout the association’s future.“We’re at an interesting time. We’re growing our members andour influence in Ottawa is increas-ing,” she said. “We’re looking for- ward to another year of lobbying and policy agreements.”
—With files from Evan Lewis
point more to where your deficien-cies are as opposed to where yourpositives are,” Holder said.He also emphasized the amountof garbage left on the Hill after theprotest.“I wonder where the personalresponsibility is,” Holder quipped.He acknowledged there areissues to address in regards to cli-mate change, but maintained thefederal government has to deter-mine practical solutions to balancethe economy as well as addressenvironmental issues.“I think this current governmentis doing some very significant thingsto accomplish this,” Holder argued.However, Glen Pearson, MP forLondon North Centre, said the gov-ernment will not achieve the targetsother nations are hoping to meet inCopenhagen. He suggested a moreco-operative and non-partisanmechanism to meet emissions tar-gets, since allowing businesses tovoluntarily reduce their own emis-sions will not work.“My hope is that [the rally] willsponsor more events and the over-all amalgamation of these events will change the Harper govern-ment,” Healey said. According to David Blair, associ-ate professor of political science at Western, this type of activism may not instill the exact change the pro-testers seek. However, he explainedadvocacy is still significant inincreasing the potential for change.“People are not going to beimmediately directly involved inthis problem in the world, but areshowing concern for a problem thatis going to affect lots of other peo-ple in the world, and that’s signifi-cant,” Blair said.Gordon McBean, professor of geography at Western and memberof the Intergovernmental Panel onClimate Change, also noted theimportance of students to keep theissue fresh.“If they’re not out there shouting and screaming then the industriallobby voices will be the only onesheard,” he said.Healey noted while he believedthe government may not listen, theprotest will act as a catalyst andinspire more events to happen.“While [environmentalism] has adeep respect for nature, at this pointit is about looking out for future gen-erations of Canadians,” he added.
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•T
UESDAY
, O
CTOBER
27, 2009
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UBC to CASA: See ya later
Lack of input, differing priorities and suitablein-house resources cited as reasons for leaving 
STUDENT POLITICS
“Primarily, our councilcited that we don’thave much say overthe organization now.”
— Blake Frederick,
UBC Alma Mater Society president
Student action crucialfor change, McBean
Brett Higgs/Gazette
CRISIS IN THE CONGO.
Avril Benoît, director of communications forMédecins Sans Frontières / Doctors Without Borders and a formerCBC journalist spoke in UCC council chambers yesterday about theongoing humanitarian crisis in Haut-Uélé, Congo involving the Lord’sResistance Army.
DOCTORS WITHOUT BORDERS
CONTINUED FROM P1
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