Fee levies in Question

LettersAlex Matak — Published September 21, 2010

I was pleased to find an article on fee-levy groups in the issue because I think that these autonomous student initiatives are a big part of what makes Concordia such a special university where students are encouraged to be active in their community in a meaningful way. Not every university has an organic grocery store, a soup-kitchen, great educational film screenings, a co-op bookstore, two student-run newspapers, easy access to media equipment and so on.

I would like to correct some of the article’s information that I found misleading. For example, the image used for the 2110 centre for gender advocacy has a logo that says “femmes.” This is not the logo of the organization and may in reality contradict that its true spirit exists to promote gender equality and empowerment, but is not exclusively for “femmes.”

The article mentions the Sustainability Action Fund but not only fails to mention Sustainable Concordia—also involved in promoting ecologically sustainable initiatives, but inappropriately its logo was inappropriately used in place of that of the action fund. Two other important groups omitted from the article are The Co-op Bookstore and CUTV. [Editor’s note: a correction was previously issued for the use of the Sustainable Concordia logo and the omission of certain Fee Levy Groups.]
Furthermore, FEUQ is a completely separate entity from the fee-levy groups at Concordia.

Information on all of the groups can be easily found by students by taking a quick look at each group’s specific websites. Lumping this info together may detract from the reality that each of these groups is offering a very unique and specific service to the students; services that are very much worth taking the few minutes to become informed about.

As Concordia students we are lucky to have such a wide array of community services available for us to tap into at any time we may need them. However, it might also be important to remember that these are all not-for-profit groups that depend on fee-levies in order to run. Even if I may never use some of their services, I for one feel happy to know that my money is providing support to ALL of these groups, working to maintain an active and socially healthy student community.

—Alex Matak,
B.A. Geography & People’s Potato collective member

This article originally appeared in Volume 31, Issue 06, published September 21, 2010.