Campus improvement fund proposals approved

By Rhiannon Kirkland

It is easy for students to wish that their club spaces, labs and classrooms were newer and nicer but it can be hard to find ways to get those upgrades done. The Campus Improvement Fund is one way to make improvements and projects happen.

The Campus Improvement Fund is a Quality Money project run by the Students’ Academic Assembly. Faculty representatives are responsible for proposing projects that will benefit members of their faculty, said Students’ Union vice-president academic Meg Martin.

The first of this year’s proposals to get underway is a suicide prevention course proposed jointly by the faculties of nursing and social work.

“The first course will be happening in the next couple of weeks here and there has been incredible demand for that,” said Martin.

At the March 15 SAA meeting, Haskayne school of business faculty representative Carmen Tsang received just under $20,000 to subsidize a Business Day Conference and renovate the Business Building clubs trailer.

“I felt like we had a really good proposal compared to others throughout the year,” said Tsang. “I was trying to bring something forward that impacted a larger group of students, in general, rather than just specific club members.”

Tsang’s original proposal had included a digital display screen at the entrance of Scurfield Hall as well as subsidizing 200 tickets to the Haskayne year-end business banquet, both of which were cut from the final proposal.

“Council just didn’t see why the SU should be sponsoring a social event,” Tsang said, explaining the SAA decision. “Proposals in the past have asked for $30,000 to cover the entire cost to students to attend conferences like this. I’m a little bit disappointed.”

Tsang said that while she still expects the banquet to sell out, she thinks students will be more cautious before attending both events.

“The council was strongly in favour of the club renovations,” Tsang said. “If I had known that going in I might have requested more.”

“We have had a proposal from kinesiology to upgrade a lab that supports a couple of courses in kinesiology that [are] currently not functioning very well,” said Martin. “It will allow for students to take a specific course that requires expensive computer materials.”

In the past, the Campus Improvement Fund has approved proposals to improve student spaces, classrooms and labs, as well as to create a Health Sciences scholarship.

“Last year there was an improvement to a chemistry study space. Before that we had the establishment of a clubs office in communication and culture as well as a student lounge,” said Martin. “Nursing had a proposal to improve the nursing skills lab which has had to do with their classes. It has purchased a lot of material that has been able to advance their ability to do medical practice.”

see CIF Funding, page 8



see Ombudsperson office, page 5

benefit a large number of students or deeply impact several students.

“Typically we’ve gone for wider impact but depth is also acceptable so it’s a fund that the Students’ Academic Assembly administers to improve the student academic experience,” said Martin.

Faculty representatives come to the VP academic with their proposals. In order to get proposals approved they have to show support from either professors, the dean of their faculty or their faculty in general. After this proposals go to the SAA for debate and approval.

“There’s pretty extensive consultation between the VP academic and the faculty representative to make sure that it’s feasible and we have whatever human resources are needed to support the project if that’s required,” said Martin.