, ’

Huntioml Festival life Ad em:

.The Cadre, Mar. 18, 1975, page i

I cannot help but to urge all people who consid- er theirstay in the-Univer— sity Worthwhile and mean- Y ingful, to equate education with a "Festival of Life and Learning." Thursday of last week was a very mean— ingful day for me because " for the first time in my brief encounter here at U.

P.E.I., a number of students

have concerned themselves with asking basic fundamen- tal questions as to why we are here in the university, what role is the university playing and finally ; is the university benefiting and facilitating students real needs in terms of the decisions-that are made by the administration who hap- pen to be a very small min- ority when comparing them to the entire student body. The.reason why Thursdays' halfwday teach-in was focf used around the theme "Fes-, tival of Life and Learning" is because it was felt by

concerned people in academ-~

ia that a real universityv education should be a com- bination of our individual lives and the interests we hold most important plus the academics which are- necessary in order that we may become "complete" in— dividuals. To remain untrUe to the fact that education should be synonomous'with real dynamic, stimulating g learning is to suggest that ignorance ,a sense of false

consciousness and a distor— y

ted myth as to what educa—, tion should be, tragically is governing the mind of a now conditioned academic, who can no longer think, speak, listen,.act and res act for himself. ‘

A lot of people who attended the Teach-in, how- ever, are wondering what' the Teach-in will lead to; what will it mean in the future and is it just some— thing to have for one day and then forget about it. The propoSal of aims and‘ _ objectives as submitted by the senate committee on . . aims and objectives and the student council, indicate firstly that there is a tre—

mendous necessity to redefine

the role of the university in our rapidly changing world to help make it more relevent and condusive to- wards developing the"whole" individual and henceforth understand the community so

that we can help the commun-

ity. However, it is not solelythe responsibility of these people to impler ment their proposals so that change can be brought

about. There must be support

and acceptance given by more than thirty-or fourty people. We must be 1400 strong in supporting aims and objectives that can only better and improve

the university. The primary purpose of the Teach-in then, was to raise an aware— ness amongst students part-

' icularily, that we do need

changes in the university and that the only way that change can come about is if there is a majority who

,support and adhere to rele-

vent aims and objectives and hence actively eXercise the power we as students have and thus see that the proposals are implemented

so that what is determined wathe Students can benifit students who are the univer- sity. '

What will come of all this? Unless the student takes seriously who he is as an individual, what he wants out of the university and why he wants it,as well as inquiringas to whether

=or not his present needs

and desires are being met; change.can never come because there will never

be an awareness as to what the.student needs and must desperately have and hence there will never be the initiative or motivation

to desire the need for change. I believe that the. Teach-in can be the catalyst needed towards raising this

Necessary level of conscious-

ness as to what those cone

lcerned need and long for,

Student Report On.

We feel that one of the prime concerns of the Un— iversity should be the appointment of an Ombuds— man, a direct liason from students and faculty to the governing bodies of this university; i.e. and the President. The Ombudsman would also serve_as an arbitrator in problems arising with- in departments. The ‘Ombudsman should be on an equal power basis with ,the Senate and Board of Governors. He could also serve as a direct link -to government with com— .plaints which students .felt the Administration had unjustifiably cast aside.

Also, in this area, the students felt that a

should be extablished to work hand in hand with the Ombudsman. make—up of this Council was established and it is subject to change on the

Board of Governors, Senate

Council on University Life'

A tentative

Si:

2%.”

HofHum, Hype,_and Ernest

in terms of constructive change that will more ad—' equately satisfy those needs.

The Teach-in has precip? itated some fundamental

questions that are vital in terms of making us aware of

what we have to be aware

about in order to enact change. Some of these ques— tions are: Why are we here in the university? Why

do we need a university? What is the connection be- tween university and commun—V

ity? How much power do stu— dents have to change things? How much power does adminis- tration have towards dictat— ing student policy? How im— portant is the Senate as a decision making body? What is tenure—~should we have

'it? Why are university

departments drifting furth— er away into Separate fac- tions? Why aren't student resources being tapped in terms of helping to solve community problems? Why don't students eat with

Objectives At The

advice of faculty and students. This Council could consist of the President of the Student (Union, the President of the Alumni Association, five elected Student Union members, 3 day students and 2 resident students, the Director of Athletics, the Director of Student Services and a staff

,member of Student

Services, the three Academic deans and a Chairman. The 15th member would be-the Ombudsman. It was 'strongly.felt that the Ombudsman should be chosen from the general community, be hired by the University, and be completly free from all restraints\in his efforts to work for the betterment of our

_University.

In theearea of tenure, students felt the pres— ent systan of tenure was

, inadequate. _However, since

in 2 Frver ll

.photo by G. Coffin faculty and visa—versa?

All of what has been said in this article will be meaningless and all of the aims and objective. meetingsthat have been held will have been all for nought if students don't actively participate and be responsible for determin— ing what the role of the university should be. We have a lot of theories on aims and objectives as to changing the univer— sity. We must go one step farther and implement these proposals. Change takes de- termination, persistence and time and unless we are willing to pay this small toll; small when looking\ at what we can gain from change, we will be untrue .to the fact that education is a festival of life and learning and that we are essentially slaves to ignorance, illusions and false ideals.

Art Laffin

University Of NJ.

the system cannot be immediately changed with— out some study, we felt that an immediate change must take place in the :Tenure Committee. A suit- able make—up of such a committee would be:

3 Academic Deans

2 Faculty members from _faculty of person being interviewed.

2 Students from faculty of person being inter- viewed.

2 Students to be elected (appointed) from the student body.

In the area of long—term planning with regards to tenure, we feel that a contract system would be far more effective 'than tenure. A number ‘of the professors would *be evaluated yearly;

the minimum number to be evaluated yearly would be 20% of the entire staff.

Con't. pg.19......