The 2015 semester was part of another great year for the Victoria University Students’ Administrative Council. Beginning in the summer of 2015, VUSAC began brainstorming initiatives for the 2015-2016 school year. “We came into the semester with very ambitious goals,” says Ben Atkins, one of the two VUSAC co-presidents. Priority was placed on making VUSAC an accessible resource for students at Victoria College.
Early in the first semester, VUSAC worked with the University of Toronto Students’ Union to preserve Victoria College’s student body representation in the board of directors. VUSAC reportedly received some of the highest number of votes they have ever seen. This positive outcome is due to VUSAC taking the opportunity to promote students’ voting rights.
VUSAC has continued to receive attention and participation from the student body, specifically first-year students. Large numbers of first-year students attended Frosh Week activities and showed their interest in student government by running for councillor and other positions within VUSAC. “The first years are definitely extremely involved, which is great to see,” says Atkins.
The equity commission within VUSAC also saw great involvement from the student body. Their event, “Art Battle,” raised approximately $400 for homeless LGBTQ youth in the GTA.
The key initiatives for VUSAC in 2015 were the mental health and sexual violence focus groups. These focus groups completed reports that influenced the Dean’s office to create the support program, “Ask, Listen, and Talk.” This campaign provides students with a safe outlet to voice their problems surrounding the issues of mental health and sexual violence.
For 2016, VUSAC hopes to create more positive change within the student body, specifically by making Victoria College a more safe and secure place. Surprisingly, there is currently no sexual assault policy at Victoria College. During the VUSAC election period last school year, Dean of Students Kelley Castle and former president Paul W. Gooch claimed that there was a protocol that was not easily accessible to the public. This protocol worked in a tier system, where incidents would be filtered through many different levels, which does not work effectively in situations of sensitive and private nature. VUSAC addressed this issue by creating small focus groups over the summer where different policies from different universities were discussed. The intent of these small groups was to build a policy that was personal and effective within Victoria University. “There needs to be something concrete in place for students,” says VUSAC Equity Commissioner Claire Wilkins. “It’s not one of those things that’s just going to go away, so we need to make sure we are making a committed effort with the amount of initiatives from the past semester that have been neglected, to be fair, and this semester we can take recommendations from over the summer”.
In 2015, VUSAC focused their efforts on making the council externally visible and involved in student life. In 2016, the student government will be more focused internally, but will still be making efforts to be involved in Victoria College student life. Atkins explained that something the council wanted to accomplish was making communication between members more consistent, as well as reforming the VUSAC constitution to ensure its prosperity for future years to come. While making efforts to maintain a relationship with the student body, VUSAC’s Equity Commission is also planning events for Black History Month and investigating ways the college can support Syrian refugees. The council want to make themselves more accessible to students, so VUSAC members are implementing an initiative known as “out of office-office hours.” This is an effort to refocus internally as a council while still being involved with the Vic community.
A new, exciting opportunity, run by Claire Wilkins and VUSAC co-president Gabriel Zoltan-Johan, supplies women on the go with pads and tampons in hopes of relieving unnecessary stress in young women’s lives. The idea was submitted to Student Projects and received funding. The project should be accessible to students no later than the beginning of February.
VUSAC’s efforts to insert themselves into Vic life have resulted in a visibly increased presence in the current student body’s lives. VUSAC continues towards their goal to build Victoria College up as a welcoming, friendly place to study and live.
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