A couple of housekeeping items before I close the day.
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Expect an Ontario college ancillary fees story mid-afternoon tomorrow. I have to do an interview in the morning to round out the story. Ontario’s Minister of Training, Colleges, and Universities gave me some decent answers this afternoon.
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My previous post talking about Ontario’s question period today, basically, those “fluff” questions are the norm of all governments in Canada. I normally tune those questions out. There were two reasons I took note. One, it was a post-secondary question. Two, the backbencher is a rising star from my hometown Hamilton. The Minister of TCU was a popular guy in today’s question period, taking most of the early questions from the opposition. I was impressed with his knowledge of his files. There were times he was off speaking points and speaking about specific training programs. He seems much more confident in his role. This is good news for post-secondary education in Ontario. A smart confident Minister is usually a powerful force at the Cabinet table.
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There are developments in the McGill TA strike that I will report tomorrow afternoon as well. I have to complete an interview for that story. What I can tell you at this point is that the university has put an offer for both sides to go to binding arbitration over the remaining three issues. I don’t know the union response to this offer yet as I ran out of time this afternoon. It be unfair of me to write a news story without an opportunity for them to respond. (A blog post saying there is a development is another matter)
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Last week, I wrote a piece about the Canadian Federation of Students granting more student media access to their conference. The articles I linked to were both behind the Canadian University Press subscriber wall. The Muse ran one of the articles here: CFS meeting boasts walkouts and wordsmiths