Tuesday, March 11, 2014

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W W W .W E STERNGAZETTE.C A • @UW OGAZETTE

Can you really keep it casual? Casual sex could lead to problems >> pg. 4

thegazette Icing our ankles since 1906

TUESDAY, MARCH 11, 2014

TODAY high 4 low -9

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CANADA’S ONLY DAILY STUDENT NEWSPAPER • FOUNDED 1906

VOLUME 107, ISSUE 81

Western’s birthday celebration crashed Police

Profs air grievances over pay via Twitter on Founder’s Day prepare for

St. Paddy’s

Dorothy Kessler GAZETTE STAFF

Megan Devlin NEWS EDITOR

While Western alumni were tweeting their Western memories on Founder’s Day last Friday, some used the opportunity to protest the allegedly insufficient wages of some Western professors. Using the official Founder’s Day hashtag, #since1878, faculty and students in the Faculty of Information and Media Studies posted tweets condemning the university. Eric Lohman, a professor of media studies, sent tweets at Western exposing the low wages of staff and increasing tuition fees for international students. “I sent the tweets I did because as an adjunct professor and TA at Western, it is incredibly frustrating to see the administrators celebrating the school’s founding when the people who make this university function — adjuncts and TAs — are being forced to live below the poverty line,” Lohman said in an >> see WAGES pg.3

Twitter

SHOTS FIRED. Western encountered a bit of a PR problem on Friday when its Twitter hashtag, #since1878, was used by professors to air their grievances.

Western TV coming to campus this fall Amy O’Kruk CONTRIBUTOR Western TV — unambiguous, clean and clearly associated with Western, it’s a perfect new name for Big Purple Couch. BPC is Western’s resident online TV show, often referred to as the official talk show of the University Students’ Council. While plans for BPC’s rebranding have been in the works for a while, it was announced at a USC meeting last Wednesday that its re-launch as Western TV will take place before the end of the school year. Jas Irwin, vice-president communications for the USC, said the purpose of BPC’s name change is to better expose the show to Western’s student population. “Big Purple Couch is iconic and has been around for a long time but it’s often very exhausting to say and gets shortened into the acronym BPC,” said Irwin. “For students who aren’t naturally connected with the media landscape on campus, ‘BPC’ doesn’t have any significance to them or doesn’t immediately connotate what it is — which is a campus television program.”

While a promotional campaign was originally scheduled for January to advertise the change from BPC to “Purple TV,” Taylor Simmons, a BPC coordinator, said that they pushed the launch back to get it right. “TV Western was the name a while back when [BPC] had different responsibilities, so it was kind of an issue that we wanted to return to that name,” Simmons said. “We just think it’s the best one and really wanted it so we were pushing for [Western TV]; it took a while to get that straightened out.” The launch of Western TV will also better reflect the nature of what BPC has become. Irwin explained that BPC is much more than just a talk show and now includes news segments, sketches and coverage of on-campus events. This past year BPC actively contributed content covering USC elections, providing students with another resource for informed voting. Simmons said that BPC is working on finalizing the promotional material needed for the name change and plans to launch Western TV in a way that garners as much publicity as possible. “We just thought the best idea

Haida Lu GAZETTE

BIG PURPLE RE-BRAND. Big Purple Couch will be re-launching itself as Western TV, after canceling a re-brand as Purple TV. The re-brand is an effort to show Western’s student population that BPC is more than just a talk show.

is to launch it right before school ends so everyone gets an idea of what it is,” Simmons said. “When the students are back it will be fully re-branded and ready to go.” Irwin said that she hopes the rebrand will expose students to BPC and wants to highlight that BPC offers a learning experience. She says that students shouldn’t feel pressured to show up polished and accomplished.

“I think people feel like in order to volunteer for any of the media on campus, but especially BPC, they need to have a base level of technical skill or be really outgoing and feel comfortable in front of camera,” Irwin said. “My experience working with BPC this year has been that it is really meant to be an opportunity to learn, to try something new and dip your toe in the water.”

Western students on St. Patrick’s Day tend to look a lot like the Lucky Charms leprechaun — except instead of kids stealing his cereal, police are confiscating the leprechaun’s alcohol. London Police Service and Western’s Campus Community Police Service will be ramping up patrols in preparation for St. Patrick’s Day next Monday — but not significantly more than last year. LPS will have increased patrols in student neighbourhoods and campus police are bringing in an extra officer for the day for extra coverage and visibility on campus. “What we’re asking is that everybody be responsible and respectful,” constable Ken Steeves, media relations officer with LPS, said. However, he said he wasn’t anticipating anything close to the St. Patrick’s Day riot on Fleming Drive two years ago. “That was an isolated incident. It occurred two years ago, it wasn’t a planned event and we certainly don’t expect that to happen again within our city,” Steeves said. “We’ve sent a clear message that such actions are not acceptable and will not be tolerated.” He also cited the weather as a contributing factor — festivities will likely be dulled with a forecast high of -6 Celsius (feeling like -11). The most common offences during the Irish-themed celebration are liquor-related — public urination and open liquor in public are two that students can take care to avoid. However, theft is often an overlooked crime that can spike during highly intoxicated pseudo-holidays like St. Patrick’s Day. Staff sergeant R.C. Aubin with the campus police warned residence students to lock the doors to their dorms while out enjoying the day. As for off-campus festivities, the LPS told students not to be too conspicuous when partying. “Don’t invite us to the party,” Steeves said. The LPS has released a YouTube video warning students to be cautious on St. Patrick’s Day featuring >> see POLICE pg.3


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