OPIRG MCMASTER
NOVEMBER-2015
PIRGSPECTIVES newsletter of OPIRG McMaster
Many ways to get involved! OPIRG McMaster has geared our volunteer program to suit busy schedules and student life. Volunteering and great grades are not mutually exclusive: you can contribute when you have time and still build your experience and sharpen skills without compromising your school work. Maybe you haven’t got time to volunteer at all, but just want to come and learn at a free event or workshop. We can help! Glenesha (pictured above) is interning with OPIRG this semester for credit in her Communications and Multimedia class. By helping OPIRG with our online publicity she is gaining valuable experience and making us stronger! Watch our Youtube channel for some new material! www.youtube.com/ user/OPIRGmcmaster. There are three main streams of VOLUNTEERING:
EVENTS & WORKSHOPS
check out OPIRG’s event calendar at www.opirg.ca/ calendar CUP OF CONNECTIONS
Weekly drop in for tea/coffee #fairtrade Thursdays 2:30-4pm MUSC 229 OPIRG.CA
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WORKING GROUPS
GENERAL VOLUNTEER
BOARD OF DIRECTOR
Each social justice or enviro themed group sets their own schedule and is free to join
Help with graphics, communications, resource centre, history archive & more
Serve as a volunteer member of our board all decisions made by consensus
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Get a free account and get weekly event listings, invitations, updates Follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Blogger
PIRGSPECTIVES
MORE ARTICLES AND IN DEPTH AT OPIRGMCMASTER.BLOGSPOT.CA I was told recently that I’d become very vocal in the past few months about various social issues, and I was thinking and trying to figure out why that had happened. When I was handing out rave cards at this event and reading the stories and trying not to let the dread take over me, that’s when I got my answer.
Political Gets Personal By Sadiyah Jamal McMaster Indigenous Student Community Alliance (MISCA) Working Group
I was volunteering at an event to raise awareness about Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women. A display was set up in the student centre atrium telling the stories of Indigenous women from all over Canada who had been stolen.
“when I got angry about the state of the world, that’s when I began thinking” When I opened myself up to learning and listening, when these tragedies became realities and when I got angry about the state of the world, that’s when I began thinking. When I realized that silence was no longer an option (and never had been) that’s when I began speaking up. When I realized that when so many people have the same “personal issues” it is no longer personal. That’s when the personal becomes political, and that’s when I began trying to take action.
I was handing out rave cards at the event, and when I wasn’t doing that I was reading the stories myself. The more I read the harder it became for me to keep talking to people about it, yet I could hear my voice became more and more genuine. One story that really struck me was of a woman who had been stolen on October 7, 1995. As I read the date that this woman had been stolen, fear wrapped itself around me. I was one month and one day old when this woman was stolen, and she had yet to be found. More than twenty years later, and she is still missing.
Find MISCA and other OPIRG Working Groups on our website at opirg.ca/groups
FROM THE ARCHIVES During our work digitizing paper files, we found a bookmark from 1995, just as the PIRG was starting at McMaster. How have we changed? The emphasis is on coordinating research, education and action by providing ‣ A staffed office/resource library ‣ A base for Working Groups ‣ Research Grants/internships Find more archives online at www.opirgmcmasterhistory.blogspot.ca
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