CCSS election results in
The Camosun College Student Society (CCSS) have announced the results of their fall elections. Jordan Sandwith and Deanna Srdic are Interurban directors, Archie D’Souza and Peggy Liu are Lansdowne directors, and Bradley Clements is the Lansdowne executive. A referendum was passed to increase the CCSS levy by nine cents per month to pay the students with disabilites director.
UBC joins Africa Calling
The University of BC has joined the Camosun College-grown non-profit organization Africa Calling. UBC joined after Camosun invited other Canadian postsecondary to get involved in the cause. Africa Calling has now made its first shipment of cellular phones to Africa and given away phones that can’t be used in Africa to local Canadian charitable organizations (only phones with SIM cards can be sent to Africa and used). Check out the newly launched africacalling.ca for more information.
BC students to lobby Ottawa for increased federal transfers
Students from across Canada recently travelled to Ottawa to lobby members of parliament and senators for increased funding for postsecondary education. Zach Chrispin, chairperson of the Canadian Federation of Students-BC, said in a recent press release that the federal government spends half as much on postsecondary education as it did a generation ago.
An estimated 20 million tons of debris from the tsunami that occurred in Japan last March could be headed for the coasts of British Columbia, according to scientists at the University of Hawaii (UoH). The debris was initially spotted by a Russian training ship in the Pacific Ocean. Estimations about the size of the debris field suggest that it’s roughly 3,200 km long and 1,600 km wide, and could reach shores in Hawaii as early as 2013, and BC as soon as 2014.
Stepmother’s investigation led her to Pickton farm years before RCMP
A woman recently told the Missing Women Inquiry that a rumour led her to the farm of infamous killer Robert Pickton in the late 1990s—years before his arrest in 2002. Lynne Frey told the inquiry that she was looking for her stepdaughter, Marnie. A tip from Frey’s foster sister led her to Pickton’s farm, where she climbed the fence to investigate, but fled when dogs were set on her, she told the inquiry. Frey says she returned to the farm many times afterwards. Pickton was arrested in 2002 and is currently serving a life sentence for the murders of six women, including Marnie.