Board causes outrage

14 students allegedly locked out of Board of Trustees

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ASUS representative to the AMS, Fraser MacPherson attended the Board of Trustees meeting to express his opinion on the proposed international tuition increase. He said even though the tuition has increased over the past four or five years, international students are not informed adequately about it.

“Many are struggling to deal with the jumps. In my mind [fee increases] are not a solution to the inaccessibility,” MacPherson said. “This is an issue that has been going on for a long time and has been under the radar. I hope that there’s a conversation in the future on the different types of support services for international students.”

Because he hadn’t emailed the Board 48 hours in advance, MacPherson said he knew he wouldn’t be able to speak at the meeting, but along with 13 other students against the proposed international tuition increases, he lined up to enter the meeting behind the Trustees and various student leaders.

“I wanted the Board of Trustees to see that there were students who didn’t support it and that we would not remain invisible,” MacPherson said. “We did nothing that was not peaceful.” Instead of entering the room like everyone else, MacPherson said he and the 13 other students he was with, were denied entry into the meeting on a basis of fire code violations.

“The Principal said the room was at fire capacity and that we could bring one representative in … eventually he said we could elect five people to go in, and eventually he said we could come in and stand and look through the doors,” MacPherson said. “Nick Day counted 17 empty chairs and asked if we could be allowed to come in and sit down, and finally the Principal consented.”

Undergraduate Student Trustee Morgan Campbell said that what happened at the meeting was simply a miscommunication.

“The coordinators of the board meeting usually have some support staff there and they didn’t want any huge disruptions so they said [the students outside the room] could let one person in because they thought they were all from the same group,” Campbell said.

After let in the room, MacPherson said that he and another student distributed letters to everyone in the room calling on them to reconsider voting for the tuition increases and then sat down on the sidelines. While happy that all student representatives voted against the increase, MacPherson said that his frustration lies with the lack of consideration the Board gave to student voices.

“It was a vote of three to 40,” he said. “What is the power of student voices in this form? A couple dozen students came out to show their opposition but what does this case show?”

Katherine Fernandez-Blance

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