We Teach Carleton

The decision to rip up the garden without notice and the arrest of peaceful protestors raises serious questions about senior management's approach to the student experience and respect for the Carleton community,” said Justine De Jaegher, Vice-President Finance. "When students heard this was happening, they came to the garden in droves and managed to stop it. We still can't believe senior management had the audacity to try this." The garden is to be replaced by a private, for-profit residence. The Board of Governors, the highest decision-making body of the university, has yet to approve the construction of the proposed for-profit residence.

What makes the new parking garage even more insidious is that the vice president finance said that we can easily afford the cost over-runs for this structure. At the 8 October 2013 board meeting, this was a $25M garage. But 50 days later, at the 28 November 2013 board meeting, this was a $34M garage. This late in construction, how do you not know about such a huge (36%) cost over-run? I believe the original amount that the board approved for this garage (before my time on the board) was $21M, so this is not the first cost over-run here. I can think of far better ways to spend between $9M and $13M (the cost of the over-run) or $34M (the cost of the garage), especially in this era of special pension payments and perennial budget cuts of approximately 5% per academic unit per year.

I really like being a contract instructor: it gives me the opportunity to stay abreast of my field, it informs me how the next generation is thinking, and it gives me hope about the future when I see the number of bright kids moving up in the world. The pay isn't great, but somehow that is not important to me as I thought it would be, I get pleasure from the course I teach, and from the students.

We, the contract instructors, do not have permanent employment or guaranteed contracts: Every semester we must re-apply for our jobs, even if we’ve been teaching the same course for a decade or more. Very few institutional resources are extended to us: Many of us do not have offices, access to computers or phones on campus, and, thus, cannot easily meet or co-ordinate with our students. Our working conditions are our students’ learning conditions and, to be frank, our working conditions are horrible.