University of Prince Edward Island

Moosehead Cuts Scholarship

By CINDY VENEMA

Moosehead Breweries has discontinuesd its donation to UPEI’s scholarship fund. Since 1971, they have been contributing 10 entrance schol- arships to top students. How- ever, aS .Of- next year Moosehead will not be con- tributing to the UPEI scholar- ship fund.

Moosehead has said that their reason for not continuing this financial contribution has been due to financial con- straints. They deny that their reasoning may be based on other factors. WaPo. t Varsity Athletics are spon- sored by Labatts, Moosehead’s major competi- tor. As well, the Panther Lounge only serves Labatt products on tap. Draft beer is popular with university. stu- dents, and therefore is a major product at the Student Union Pub.

When asked if Moosehead pulled its scholar-

ship because of poor repre- sentation on campus, Moosehead’s Director of Pub- lic Relations, Deanna Gallo- way, denied this suggestion, explaining, “Our corporate donations budget has been re- duced for the Atlantic region,” they are therefore “Reevaluating this donation, taking a break, and donating in other areas”.

The total of Moosehead’s contributions has been in excess of $330,000. According to Sonya Banks, Director of Public Relations, a significant portion of the dona- tion has been in the support of scholarships, but they have also helped in Capital cam- paigns, such as the renovation of Main.

Moosehead already de- cided to reduce its funding at the beginning of this academic year, when they cut their fund- ing from $14,000 to $7,000. Next year, however, they are completely cutting their schol- arship donation.

Banks was unsure as to Moosehead’s reasoning for discontinuing their funding, stat- ing that the way Moosehead explained the situation to her, “was that they were review- ing their donations policy and they were interested in redi- recting their donations to ar- eas that would bring them greater profile amongst their customers’’.

Moosehead is looking at giving the money to other or- ganizations on PEI, such as the Confederation Centre. They feel that the $330,000 UPEI has received is a huge amount of money and there- fore other organizations should be given the opportunity to benefit from their donations.

UPEI’s public relations has not given up hope, how- ever. They are hoping, ac- cording to Banks, “that Moosehead will be giving this money to other areas on cam- pus”, such as other Capital Campaigns. But that does not change the fact that 10 stu-

Panther Print

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February 11, 1997

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dents or even 5 students will not be receiving scholarships

for their academic carreers at UPEI.

Hey brother,Can you spare 1.8 million?

By KENT DRISCOLL

In a presentation to the UPEI Student Union Council, UPEI’s Vice President Fi- nance, Neil Henry, discussed the effect that a projected cut in provincial revenues will have on the university budget. For students, this means tuition will go up. When asked about the nature of these cuts, Henry said, “Bottom line, if there are going to be cuts it will have to come out of salaries and tui- tion”’.

Henry believes that

funding for UPEI will decrease anywhere between 8% and 10 %, and Henry added, “‘it will probably be 10%”. If tuition rates remain the same, that would leave a budget deficit of $1,487,185 inan 8% scenario, or a massive $1,800,357 in the 10% projection. With only lim- ited steps available to cut staff- ing and salaries, due to union contracts, the bulk of this defi- cit is certain to land in the laps of students.

If tuition was to be the sole factor in dealing with this shortfall, the result would be

devastating for UPEI students. Using Henry’s own worst case scenario figures, if the 1.8 mil- lion dollar deficit was to be solely shouldered by students, that would be $720 dollars per student, or a tuition hike of 20%.

Henry believes that many of these costs can be dealt with by not raising tui- tion. In his words, “There is nothing that is not being looked at”. A few areas that were discussed by the Student Councilors in attendance were the athletic department and the

health centre, and while Henry said that cutting these programs was not the goal of the Budget Committee, “everything is be- ing looked at”.

Henry cited many ex- amples of where these budget cuts could come from. Due to the early retirement policy, a number of higher paid tenured professors are being replaced by lower paid new faculty.

As well, money has been made available to the univer- sity due to extra money in the

university pension plan. Be-

cause of the upswing in recent

years of the stock market, the pension plan has grown larger then federal laws will allow, and some of that money is now revenue for the university. However, this one time only windfall will simply offset the cost of recruiting new faculty.

One area that the Budget Committee has not included in their estimates is professorial salaries. The Faculty Asso- ciation is currently in binding arbitration with the university, and if the professors win their

(continued p. 5, see "Tuition")