Would you like fries with that diploma?

This is a comic I made for a zine, using my campus map and attempting to turn it into a factory pumping students through on a conveyor belt to McJobs or unemployement.

I have been reading and thinking a lot about privatization within universities lately. Maybe not universities so much as within the particular institution that I currently attend. In the almost 6 years I have been here, I have seen so many changes occur, and like many academics, I am getting increasingly concerned about the future of my program and university educations more generally.

I have done a few presentations lately on the cuts within the university, and the main point that I have been trying to get across is that this is an organized attack on the quality of education and the quality of jobs on campus in the name of profits.

My university, like many others, has been changing from a public institution of knowledge to a private service where students purchase a degree and investors purchase research. Within neoliberalism, an attack on the idea of public goods is rather typical -- whether it be education, health care or social services -- the idea of publicly funded anything is counter to neoliberal ideologies, and for the wealthy to become as rich as possible these ideals must permeate into other areas of our social worlds.

With regards to employment on campus, there have been many changes. The highest paid positions are increasingly becoming even more high paid (our president just recieved a $79,000 wage increase) and the lowest are becoming even lower paid (from full-time to part-time). The combined salaries of the 10 highest paid people in the university are higher than all 240 GTAs combined. This past summer, 25 unionized positions were cut, as they were deemed redundant, and yet they are being replaced by contract workers. There are rumors that there will be another 25 jobs cut this coming summer.

The cuts to services on campus have been terrible. We went from having 6 counsellors to 2, and there is currently a 4 week wait to talk to someone. Tutoring services used to be free for all students; now they only exist for those with special needs and the rest of the work falls to GTAs and professors. There used to be a shuttle to take students around campus, as the parking lot is quite far from some of the buildings and it is sometimes -40 degrees in January and February, but this shuttle was cancelled despite rising parking costs.

My undergraduate program was quite small. When I started, there were about 10 full-time faculty and several sessionals. Last year, there were 6 full-time faculty and many sessional professors. Next year, it looks like we may only have 2-3 full-time faculty as well as fewer sessionals than in previous years. We are also be one of the only sociology programs that I have heard of that does not have a (non-sessional) female professor!

If these were strictly cost-saving measures, as the university claims, cuts would be felt across the board. There would be no raises or bonuses for upper admin, and there certainly would not be more upper administrators right now than there was 3 years ago.

One of the reasons I think this is happening is because of the change from universities being run by academics to them being run by business people. The current president was just named one of Canada's top 40 people under 40, and has a background in business. He does not have a PhD, and has no experience teaching in universities. How can we expect that the needs of educators will be met when those making the big decisions are not educators, but business people trained to make a profit? Our university is not a corporation, and I resent it being run like one.

Another consequence of this is what happens to academics. Academic freedom is lost. Researchers only take up certain types of studies because searching for knowledge is no longer funded. Those that speak out against certain companies or corporatization more generally can be reprimanded as it can affect corporate donations. So, business friendly administrators receive profit and power while employees see eroding wages and working conditions and students see diminished quality and access.

The only way to fight back against an organized attack like this one is with a coordinated response. Students and workers will have to work together across campuses if we expect any kind of meaningful change.

Political polls at a virtual town hall meeting

I just got a phone call from the Minister of Finance Dwight Duncan and the local Member of Parliament, Rick Bartelucci, on a virtual town hall meeting. Unfortunately, I had to go put the kids to bed before I had a chance to ask my question, but I will write about it here instead.

They asked 2 polls, and, as a student in a program called "Applied Social Research" I have no choice but to comment on these questions. They were horrible.

What is your biggest concern about the economy?
1. Jobs
2. Taxes
3. Deficit
Press 4 if your situation is worse than it was a year ago

No "other" or "none of the above".

So, if your situation is worse than it was a year ago, you cannot choose a main concern? Or if you have a concern (from this list), then you can't say your condition is worse than a year ago?

Not exactly an exclusive or exhaustive list.

What about those of us who have concerns that are not on this list. A few things come to mind... $2-4 billion in corporate tax cuts, cuts to social programs, the wage freeze for non-unionized employees that attempted to undermine union rights to bargain for a collective agreement.

What about education? That was going to be my question. Do they have any plans to make education more accessible?

I was going to start by saying something along the lines of "As a social researcher, I think that it is important to have a more exclusive and exhaustive list. How do you expect to get accurate information about what we think when you are severely limiting our response options? Is this the type of information on which you base your political platforms?"

Then I wanted to answer their poll by telling them that what matters most to me is education- tuition is going up and course options are dropping... my program has NO electives because they do not have the money to pay for it. Student loans are at unprecedented levels... I will have to pay $600 per month for 10 years when i graduate. Will they freeze (and by freeze, I mean eliminate, but I'm being realistic here) tuition and/or come up with other ways to make education more accessible?

Unfortunately, I didn't get that opportunity. Not that I expected it to make a difference for his platform, but they reported an absurd amount of people on the call, and I wanted to get the message out. Maybe I'll turn this post into a letter to the editor so that it might be read by a few more people than my blog allows.

The second poll question was better written, but I think there was a reason for that.

What do you think was our [provincial Liberals] top accomplishment?
1. Strengthening education (did they do this? I missed that memo)
2. Improving health care by getting doctors for people (what about the tens of thousands in my hometown who don't have doctors?)
3. Getting people working (again, when did this happen)
4. Cutting tax for 90% of Ontario tax payers (at what cost?)
5. Building clean, reliable energy system (some progress here, but still not enough)

They did give us more options, but this question was not to ask our opinion, but to tell us what it is that they did. To make us think that they have really accomplished something over the past few years. To advertise their supposed accomplishments.

What a joke.

Another Montessouri ad

I just saw another bench today that compares to the one I previously posted advertising for Montessouri Schools. I am going to skip details about the school, but I do have a class analysis at the previous link, which was further discussed here.


Sorry about the image quality, but it was taken from a cell phone camera in a moving vehicle. The ad reads

1 to 8 VS. 1 to 30.
You do the Math. Our students can.

This refers to class size and student teacher ratios... Of course, it doesn't mention that they can afford to have extra teachers because parents are paying for their children to attend these schools, where as the government has been cutting funds to public schools.

This suggests that public school classes are too big and public school teachers are overworked, I agree so far. But rather than actually doing anything about it or trying to get additional funding to public schools, middle to upper class families should merely put their children in a private school and leave the large class sizes for the children whose families cannot afford this "better" education...

Who needs social mobility when the status quo is so much more advantageous to the elite who write our social policy and decide how much funding to put into our schools... all while sending their children to private institutions.

And, to add insult to injury, they need to include a comment implying that public school students cannot do simple math.

Queer Ontario's response to the new sex ed curriculum

A few weeks ago, I posted about Ontario's new sex education curriculum. I thought it was one of the best sex education programs that I have seen. However, conservative and religious groups did not, and the provincial government pulled the program, and plans to consult with these groups in developing a new curriculum plan.

Queer Ontario has just released a statement about the curriculum that I will quote at length

Queer Ontario feels the Elementary Health and Physical Education Curriculum proposed by the McGuinty government back in January of 2010 was a step in the right direction that would have provided Ontario children and youth with up-to-date scientific information on human development, physical health, sex, sexuality, sexual behaviour, and gender identity. So it came as a tremendous disappointment to hear that McGuinty succumbed to the pressures that were created by sex-negative religious fundamentalists, moral conservatives, and misinformed parents, ultimately rescinding the curriculum just 54 hours after he had come out in strong support of it.

Given that the first round of consultations had already taken into consideration the concerns of parent groups and religious organizations like the Institute for Catholic Education – alongside public health organizations, sex educators, school boards, academics, and LGBTQ groups including Queer Ontario’s predecessor, the Coalition for Lesbian and Gay Rights in Ontario (CLGRO), – the new curriculum was in no way under consulted and actually served to bring Ontario’s Health and Physical Education Curriculum in line with those of other, more progressive provinces like British Columbia. The new proposed curriculum is overdue and progressive respecting personal differences and individual uniqueness, much needed concepts that would have begun to be addressed in Ontario’s elementary school systems.

To this end Queer Ontario calls for:

The Province of Ontario to fully implement the proposed Health and Physical Education Curriculum and not to abandon important tenets regarding aspects of sex education dealing with sex, sexual orientation, sexual behaviour, gender and gender identity.

A balanced approach (as with the first rounds) should a second round of consultations be set up, albeit redundantly, by inviting all previously-consulted groups to the table to ensure – once again – that there is an inclusive, well-informed, and comprehensive review of the necessary changes.

The inclusion of Queer Ontario and other LGBT groups in the second round of consultations.

The Premier’s intention, be supported, to implement the new proposed curriculum across both the public and separate Catholic school systems throughout Ontario inclusive of the sex education components.

The media did not release information pertaining to how many groups were consulted in the development of the new curriculum; they made it seem as though the curriculum were developed privately by the liberal government and released, shocking groups and parents alike. The news stories that I read (and there were a lot of them) also failed to mention that a similar program exists in British Columbia; they made it seem as though this were first of it's kind and extremely radical. I guess we can see the mainstream media's stance on the curriculum in this omission.

If a new curriculum really is developed to replace both the existing and proposed curriculum, I really hope the government at very least includes Queer Ontario and other LGBT groups in Ontario in developing this curriculum. I think "protecting" children from information about same sex couples is a big part of what leads to systemic heterosexism.

Every child (with wealthy parents)

I have been passing this same bench every day for the past year or so, and it has been getting on my nerves every day since I first saw it.

It is somewhat blurry, but it says "Every child, every chance, every day" and is an ad for Montessori schools.

Now I love the premise of Montessori schools, I really like how kids can essentially teach themselves without all the same structures of a typical classroom setting. However, I don't like the $7000 per year tuition price tag, but apparently that is quite cheap. In Toronto, tuition ranges from $10,300 for kindergarten to $19,895 for grades 11 and 12. That is more expensive than my undergraduate university tuition in this province (Ontario), but it is for children in elementary school.

So, how can they claim this option is for every child? Maybe it should say "Every child whose parents can afford the tuition, every chance offered to children of the elite, every day in capitalist societies."

I don't know how they can even use the words "every child" in their ads when they do not allow just any child in their school. This is a blatant example of how privileged is reproduced.

New childcare subsidy regulations

Dear whichever neoliberal policy maker is currently in charge of childcare subsidy,

I know that your intent is to save "taxpayers" money by cutting "unnecessary" programs, and that is why you decided to change subsidy this year. You have succeeded. I might be forced to spend the summer (maybe longer) on welfare because of your cuts, but, hey, with our abysmal rates, that is actually cheaper for you than paying my childcare expenses while I get a minimum wage job.

Last April, when I finished my exams, you gave me 90 days to find a job before I lost my childcare funding. You understood that jobs do not appear out of thin air, they take work to aquire. This year, you decided that I am to lose my childcare space the day the exam period is over.

Now I ask you, Mr. Neo-liberal Policy Maker, how am I supposed to find a job without daycare? You say I can look for work while my children are in school. I accept that premise, but what you don't answer is what I am supposed to do when I find a job and have already lost my daycare spots? I will have to turn down the job because I won't be able to go to work without daycare- especially because my son is in kindergarten, and, as such, is not yet in school full-time. It took me 3 years to get through the waiting list at the daycare my children need to be in for me to attend grad school in September because it is the only childcare center in the city that is open later than 6:00 and my classes will run in the evening. That means that if I lose this daycare spot, I may not be able to go to grad school in September. But I'm glad you saved a few dollars.

I am not asking for you to pay for this "uneccesary" childcare indefinitely; just give me a month or two to find a job. I am currently finishing a placement, which also involves preparing a 30 minute presentation and 20 page paper, my fourth year honours essay is due by the end of the month, which also includes a 30 minute presentation, and I have an exam in fourth year statistics. As much as I would love to begin my job search right now, that is not feasible because I am a full-time student which is why you are providing me with daycare in the first place.

So, because you want to save a few dollars by not covering daycare any longer than necessary (necessary as defined by you, Mr. Neo-liberal Policy Maker), I may lose my daycare and not be able to attend graduate school. Thank you. I am glad that you are doing your job and saving a few dollars.

By the way, I'm sure Ontario businesses really appreciate the cut to their electrical costs in the recent budget. And I'm sure Canadian businesses appreciate having the lowest tax rates in the "developed" world. But 30 days to find a job is asking for too much I guess.

Sincerely,

former grad student candidate

Study about how men benefit from marriage misses the mark

A study conducted by the Pew Research Center was discussed on USA Today to show how men are beginning to benefit from marriage because women make more money than they used to. This article mentioned factors such as women's wages rising 44% over a time frame when men's rose only 6%, and women's higher rate of education as factors for why men benefit from marriage now (as though they didn't before). This research was cited on a local radio station today.

This article fails to mention that women still only make 71 cents on a man's dollar in Canada, much better than 50 years ago, but down from 72 cents in the mid-1990s.

Another slight oversight is the many ways in which men have benefited (currently and historically) from the unpaid work that women do in the home. According to many studies, women still do two thirds of the work in the home, even when both she and her husband work outside the home. Historically, men were only able to work because women took care of the children and the housework, thereby producing and reproducing workers.

The article's first line is "If you think women still reap more economic benefit than men do from marriage, you may be living in the past." This assumes that I think women benefit more from marriage than men, which I do not- and remarriage rates support this theory. It would be difficult to question women's dependence on men for economic survival, especially at times when women were not expected to work outside the home, but I think the amount that men have gained from having an unpaid worker in the house needs to be stated. This research also doesn't explain why single mothers and widowed women are by far the poorest groups in the country. If marriage were as important economically to men as it is to women, would they not have equal rates of poverty when not married?

The question shouldn't be "who has the most education" or "who makes the most money" or even "who spends the most" all of which are mentioned in the article. Here are some suggested questions that I believe could better be used to study equality within marriage:

Why is it that even with higher rates of post-secondary education, women make less money than men? And I don't mean falling back on human capital theory or biological determinist arguments.

How is it that we continue to allow unpaid childrearing and domestic labour to remain invisible? And what impact does this have on women's wages?

Are these figures specific to certain groups? For example, do these trends hold across various ethnic groups and social classes within the population? And how do non-heterosexual couples factor in to this type of study?

Are arguments such as these being used to tell women to sit down and shut up because we've never had it so good?

And why have I never heard it argued that historically (or in other countries) men have it much worse than men in contemporary western society, so they should be grateful for what they have?