VICTORIA—The Camosun College Student Society (CCSS) will be hosting a free soup kitchen for students tomorrow as part of a day of campus events throughout Vancouver Island for the Education Shouldn't be a Debt Sentence campaign. Students at UVic, Camosun College, Vancouver Island University, and North Island College will be gathering signatures on the provincial petition to reduce student debt at the events.

The events come on the heels of last week's government report on the public consultations held for the 2010 BC budget. The report recommended that the government address BC's high student loan interest rates and inadequate funding for universities and colleges.

"Camosun Students are calling on the government to take concrete action in the 2010 BC Budget  to reduce student debt and make education affordable", said CCSS External Executive Matteus Clement, "The government needs to realise that students are really suffering and help now."

WHAT: Soup Kitchen for Student Debt

WHEN: 11am - 12pm, Wednesday November 18, 2009

WHERE: Outside the Fisher Building, Lansdowne Campus

WHO: CCSS & Canadian Federation of Students representatives  

The Camosun College Student Society represents 9,000 students at the Lansdowne and Interurban Campuses of Camosun College.

In conjunction with the election of directors to the Student Society board, students will be asked 2 referendum questions.

• An increase of $2 per month in the general operating levy.
• A $0.25 or $0.50 fee targetted specifically to special events. Students can vote yes or no, and vote on the size of the increase if passed.

This is all of the information at press time. Official wording and background documentation to follow. There are traditionally materials and resources (and rules) for the "yes" and "no" side of the Referendum.

Camosun College was invaided by a horde of zombies on March 30, staggering and moaning through campus and along Richmond and Foul Bay Road.

Their Purpose was to protest the high cost of education, causing more and more students to build up large, insurmountable debt loads.

These zombies were actually Camosun student activists who took time off from their classes to paint their faces white, wear tattered ruins of Sid Vicious' wardrobe, and affect their best Thriller-style shuffle. So why the zombie attire?
"Student debt is turning us into the living dead," explains CCSS External Executive Christopher Gillespie. CCSS Student Service Coorindator Michael Glover, who rallied students to the cause with the cry "You're evil, you're undead. Zombify!" added that student debts affects us all.

"Education is like infrastructure for our province, Without that, we'll be in much worse shape than we are today. We need [education] like we need roads and waterways." Glover hopes the zombies will also be a reminder for students of the importance of voting in the upcoming provincial election.

"Students need to be aware this coming election, says Glover. "Spend some time, think education. "Vote with education in mind and you could strike a blow against the living dead!"

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Did you know how much the balance of public funding has changed? In 2011 tuition fees will be more revenue for the government than corporate income tax. Tuition fees will also outpace fuel taxes.

Students at Camosun kicked off participation in a national campaign marking student debt levels reaching the $13 billion mark on January 21st. This is defined as loans disbursed by the CSL Program, less those that have been repaid, and it is increasing by $1.2 million dollars a day, or more than $430 million per year. $13 billion is more than the debt of some provinces and approximately the cost of the Afghanistan mission to date. This figure does not include the approx $5-8 billion in provincial student debt. This is largely the result of cuts to funding that have caused the share of PSE operating budgets funded by tuition fees to more than double between 1985 and 2005, rising from 14% to 30%

Gordon Campbell is playing politics with young people’s futures.

One year ago, the BC government received the Campus 2020 Report on BC’s post-secondary education system, recommending major investment in research, and equalization of participation in post-secondary education from Aboriginal students and those from low-income backgrounds. Yet, the government has put it off for a year, and will continue to dawdle until the late fall. Then, just a month before the beginning of the fiscal year, while budgets were being finalized, colleges and universities got a nasty shock with a 2.6% cut to the funding they had been promised a month before in the provincial budget on top of cutbacks to funding new student seats. With economic forecasts worsening, and an election in May 2009, it seems the Liberals needed a fall reserve for their pre-election funding announcements.

As a result, many students will be writing their final exams this week not knowing whether the classes they need next year will continue to be offered, or if that great instructor will still have a job.

Here are just a few examples of the damage so far:

• Vancouver Community College has cut an entire English as a Second Language program, cut back at least 11 other program offerings, and issued 16 layoff notices thus far. Another 40 staff and faculty positions are being cut through early retirement and unfilled vacancies.
• SFU has a chronic shortage of teaching support staff and tutorials.
• The College of New Caledonia has eliminated its forestry program, made cuts to job training and business programs and its program for students with disabilities, and is issuing at least 20 layoff notices.
• UBC-Okanagan’s planned expansion to meet the Okanagan’s needs in sciences and engineering has been severely reduced as the cut amounts to a $4.5 million deficit, while faculty and staff hiring is being cut by about 60%. And the list goes on and on.

At the time of the BC Budget announcement, UBC already faced a $24 million structural deficit that it planned to deal with through recurring cuts. The surprise budget cut from the government amounts to an additional $11.3 million. Like its Okanagan campus, UBC Vancouver is already experiencing staff cuts, scaling back faculty hiring, and considering cuts to certain programs.

To attempt to justify the cut, the Liberal government has pointed to enrolment targets not being met by many colleges and universities. We must point out that the government caused BC’s enrolment woes by doubling tuition fees, cutting BC’s grants program, and allowing student debt to rise to highest in Canada outside the Maritimes, at an average of $27,000 upon graduation. With tuition fees increasing again this year to a collective $989 million, all this most recent cut achieves is forcing students to pay more for less in September, while thousands of others continue to be forced into dead-end jobs because they cannot afford an education.

British Columbians have seen this kind of pre-election ploy before. The government first starves colleges and universities of the funding that is needed to provide high-quality accessible post-secondary education. We can now expect that over the coming months, there will be numerous photo ops and press releases at universities and colleges throughout the province, as the government targets funding to achieve its political goals.

Students and British Columbians cannot accept the government playing political games with our futures. This government needs to set politics aside, and actually address the problems in BC’s post-secondary education system. The Campbell government must invest in grants and reducing tuition fees in order to spur enrolment. And this government must properly fund universities and colleges as a way to build the backbone of strong communities and a strong economy.

Until enrolment declines are no longer an issue, until faculty and staff layoffs are reversed, until programs are restored, and until low- and middle-income students no longer face massive student debt, students are not going to allow this government to build a re-election platform on its education record.

As a part of the Canadian Federation of Students WE RIDE campaign, the University of Victoria Students� Society and Camosun College Students� Society, in partnership with other local organizations, are campaigning for fast, accessible, and affordable public transit to and from UVic and Camosun and in the Greater Victoria area as a whole.