VARSITY EDITORIAL PG 11
ONTARIO FUNDING FORMULA HURTS STUDENTS
VOL. CXXXIV, NO. 16
UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO’S STUDENT NEWSPAPER SINCE 1880
27 JANUARY, 2014
INSIDE NEWS
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S I PR RE T N O FU UD SID G G E E RA E N T E T M H E
Leadership shuffle Important changes have occurred among top leadership positions in Canada’s universities. Franco Vaccarino will become president of the University of Guelph; Stephen Toope will become director of U of T’s Munk School of Global Affairs, and David Cameron will become dean of Arts and Science at U of T.
PG 5 COMMENT
Addressing study drugs
The ability to pay: students question unpaid internships Overseas unpaid internships financial impossibility for some students Sarah Niedoba
ASSOCIATE NEWS EDITOR
“No other opportunity like it,” says U of T medical student Antonio Lee, describing his experience working with the World Health Organization (who) in Geneva this past summer. Lee worked as an intern developing target studies regarding hiv infection among sex workers and men who have sex with men. For a student interested in the public health industry, Lee said, the experience was unprecedented: “Living in Geneva, walking among diplomats everyday, I don’t know how you’d replicate something like that.” While in Geneva, Lee served on the who’s Intern Board, a group of students who met weekly to discuss concerns affecting the intern
community. One of the first problems Lee’s group landed upon was the glass ceiling created by the nature of the internship itself: students below a certain income simply could not afford it. The who’s interns received no stipends, and were required to finance their own airfare, accommodation, and living expenses. “Geneva is one of the most expensive cities in the world to live in,” explained Lee. He went on to describe how food was also expensive in the city: eating out meant 20–30 francs ($25–$37 cad) for a small dinner — cooking his own meals was a financial necessity. He also said that working part-time to subsidize living costs was impossible, due to the requirement for a work visa and the amount of hours he dedicated to working for the who. “We real-
ized pretty immediately that there was a problem,” said Lee. “It was on the back of everyone’s minds from the very beginning.” The who is not the only organization to run internships out of the city of Geneva. The city is often referred to as the humanitarian capital of the world: the United Nations, World Trade Organization, International Organization for Migration, and the World Federation of Public Health Associations are only a few of the institutions whose Geneva headquarters use unpaid intern labour. Toronto-based labour lawyer and anti-unpaid-internship activist Andew Langille says that one of the many problems raised by overseas internships is that, to a certain degree, their selection pro-
CONTINUED ON PG 6
The pressures of balancing academic success with a social life, combined with the possibility of a part-time or full-time job, have driven some U of T students to resort to the use of study drugs. While students may find the drugs helpful in the short-term, studying for an exam, or perhaps pulling an all-nighter to finish an assignment, their effects on work habits are decidedly negative.
PG 8 ARTS
The art of the handjob “Does everybody have a penis?” Ray, sec’s public relations representative, asks, surveying the crowd at the saw event to make sure all attendees are properly prepared with dildos or cucumbers. Equipped with faux phalluses supplied by Good for Her and generous dabs of lube, a large group of curious students like myself sat in the sec to learn the intricate art of the handjob.
PG 14 SPORTS
The issue of race in sport “Either you’re slingin’ crack rock or you’ve got a wicked jump shot,” said Greg Gary, the head coach of the Varsity Blues men’s football team, quoting The Notorious B.I.G. According to Gary, the lyrics — taken from the 1994 track“Things Done Changed” — are still an accurate reflection of the experiences of racialized youth in the inner city.
PG 21