Concordia Briefs

NewsJayde Norström — Published February 25, 2014 | Updated February 25, 2014 at 8:44am

TRAC Creates Strike Committee

The Teaching and Research Assistants at Concordia have formed a strike committee following Concordia’s denial of the pay and benefit requests at a bargaining session held on Feb. 11.

The requests stemmed from the large workloads and low pay of teaching assistants, but were denied due to a clause from a previous agreement that all union group wages must be raised by the same amount if one receives a raise of over two per cent. In an interview with The Link, university spokesperson Chris Mota said the school is “working diligently to reach an agreement” with TRAC.

Concordia Launches Sexuality Major

In a Senate meeting on Feb. 14, a motion was passed for the creation of a new 42-credit BA Major in Interdisciplinary Studies in Sexuality to begin in the 2015-2016 academic term.

The program is a collaboration between the Simone de Beauvoir Institute and the Faculty of Fine Arts that aims “to foster students’ understanding of the role of human sexuality in society and behaviour [and to] encourage a recognition of sexual culture, social organization, and identity in all aspects of our world, as well as providing a strong preparation for various careers and academic programs,” according to the program’s proposal. Seven new courses will be created along with the program.

Centre for Gender Advocacy and CUTV to Be Featured on CSU Ballot

The Centre for Gender Advocacy and Community University Television will both present ballot questions in the upcoming CSU elections.

The Centre is looking for an increase in their fee levy—from $0.29 per credit to $0.37 per credit—to cover the cost of the services they provide, including
confidential peer support and work on sexual assault prevention.

CUTV is seeking to have control of their $0.34 per credit fee levy officially transferred from the Concordia Student Broadcasting Corporation back to the station. The transfer aims to clarify the relationship between the two groups, as CUTV already has de-facto control of the funds and the amount of the levy would not change. The date of the elections has not been announced, although they take place at the end of March.

—with files from Noelle Didierjean