Queens Park

I apologize for the blog hiatus but I assure you it has been for good reason.  Last week I had the opportunity to participate in a provincial lobby conference with the Ontario Undergraduate Student Alliance (OUSA).  

OUSA is a coalition of elected university student councils from across Ontario, 

Your new OUSA campus coordinator Laine McGarragle and I represented Windsor in several lobby meetings with members of provincial parliament and various post secondary education stakeholders (Council of Ontario Universities, Ontario Confederation of University Faculty Associations...).

We spoke about three main issues:  Student Financial Aid, Funding and Access to Education.  We spoke about the problems with OSAP that need to be addressed and the necessity for continued and greater investment in post secondary education from the provincial government.  We spoke of the need for government support of early outreach initiatives in their grassroots forms across Ontario.  

We shared the sentiment with OCUFA that "quality matters" and discussed ways in which we could work together on campaigns about quality education.

Perhaps the most interesting discussion that took place during the lobby conference was one with Steve Peters (the speaker of the house) about the necessity for there to be a united student movement.  Why is it that the Ontario Undergraduate Student Alliance and the Canadian Federation of Students can not work together?  It is the age old question, and Windsor just might be the only school with the ability to bridge that gap.  

I returned to Windsor that Thursday at 12pm only to discover that I was TRIPLE booked at 3pm for three very important meetings.  Since I am unable to clone myself it was a challenge addressing that issue.  

Lobbying at Queens Park was fun, but nothing beats a day on the job in Windsor.