THE MARK

Volume II . . . No. 9

MONDAY, DECEMBER 15, 2014

FREE-ish

Quest Considers Shift in Financial Assistance Model

Need-blind, full-need is
President Helfands ideal
model, but budget alone
cant support it

As Quest continues to feel

the tremors of sexual assault allegations, looking to
other universities can shed
light on its own challenges.

By KENDRA PERRIN
Quest hopes to move to a
system of financial assistance
that is based only on need, not
merit, but is held back by budgetary constraints and a currently insufficient endowment fund.
Nearly every U.S. school that
ranks in the top 20 among national
universities and national liberal arts
colleges schools like Princeton
and Amherst College has a full
need financial assistance program.
This means the schools guarantee
to fill the gap between the cost of
attendance (tuition, primarily, but
also expenses like room, board,
books and student fees) and the
expected contributions from the
student and his or her family, a
number determined by evaluating
a familys size, tax data and assets.
Many of the schools that offer full-need financial assistance,
including all members of the Ivy
League, do not additionally offer
merit-based scholarships. The
admissions offer is the award
for a students merit; the financial assistance package is just
the way of getting them there.
Duke University, a highly
ranked school that does offer

By JONATHAN VON OFENHEIM

[Trigger Warning: This article contains discussion of sexual
assault on university campuses.]

MARIELLE ROSKY

merit-based scholarships, reports

feeling that offering these gives
them an edge in matriculating
top students; the scholarships
can lure outstanding students
away from other top schools.
Currently, Quests financial assistance program consists of both
merit-based scholarships (including the six David W. Strangway
Awards for Excellence, which cover tuition for all four years, and the
Quest University Canada Scholarships, which range from $2,000 to
$24,000) and need-based bursaries,
the sum of which do not exceed the
price of tuition $31,000 per year.
Only students applying for
need-based bursaries must dis-

close their familys financial

information. This means that
Quest has no way of knowing
how much a student receiving
a merit-based scholarship can
or cannot afford to study here.
When speaking to the SRC at
a public meeting on October 28,
President David Helfand explained
that, it just doesnt make sense
to be giving [merit-based] scholarships to students whose parents make seven-figure incomes.
In a conversation with the
Mark, Helfand said, the school
has finite resources, and we want
to use them to maximize the [socioeconomic] diversity of the student body. For him, this means

On Tuesday, December 2 at
4:40 a.m, smoke filled the hallways
of South Village as the fire alarm
was triggered by an overheated embedded forced air heater located on the second floor.
Security located the fire and
extinguished it immediately before
the fire department arrived and removed the heater. Complete evacuation took over 15 minutes, and
incorrect and insufficient information given to the Squamish fire department meant a delayed and understaffed staffed arrival. Although
there were no severe consequences from the fire, the incident highlighted several issues in the current
emergency protocol, such as the
evacuation procedure and communication with local authorities.
Darren Newton, manager of
Student Housing and Residence
Life, said, it is not unusual for people to spend too much time looking
for the cause in their room and not
leave the building until it is too late.
First-year student Cameron Friend said, we were petrified that we were waking up

the entire floor. It took five minutes of flailing at the wall to realize that it was not our alarm.
Trevor Krenburg, a fire inspector at the Squamish fire department, reminded residents that
its important to remember that
there are two types of alarms that
indicate a possible fire in each residence room. If the fire alarm sounds
(white/square/flashing red light/
wall), everyone must evacuate the
building. If the smoke alarm sounds
(white/round/ceiling) it is likely
to do with your particular room.
Another potential hazard is
that people sometimes assume
hearing an alarm means a drill,
not a real emergency. Ian Baldwin
said, Ive slept through other fire
alarms, I thought this one was a
drill too. After 15 minutes I started to smell the smoke and realized that we were moving pretty
slowly. The fire department does
not have the resources to spend
all their time rescuing people,
and it is therefore the responsibility of the Quest community to
learn and practice protocols that
will prepare us for an emergency.
Finally, not all students knew
where the muster point was (the
location where everyone gath-

ers in the case of an emergency).

I would not have known where
to go if my floor rep had not led
us to the tennis court parking
lot, said Ian Kearsley. It was
clear that people had different
ideas of what was supposed to
be happening. Having a muster
point that everyone is aware of
in an emergency situation is crucial for safe emergency protocol.
As a relatively small campus,
Quest has been fortunate enough
to not have experienced a large
scale emergency. It is easy to be
complacent and assume our environment is safe and free from danger, but that can quickly change.
Steve Barone, duty officer
at the Squamish fire department
and the current investigator on
this case, said that the fire department was given the wrong
address as well as minimal details
regarding the fire. This resulted
in a delayed arrival on the scene
and a shortage of personnel.
In response, Quest administration is currently is revising the
schools emergency protocols. In
the mean time, all residents on the
Quest campus are advised to familiarize themselves with the fire plan
on the back of their condo door.

NEWS

NEWS

OPINION
A2

By MACKENZIE ERLANK

If I hadnt already known what

Jason Blackman-Wulff looked like
(thanks to a pre-interview Google search), I never would have
guessed that the young, sharply
dressed fellow with slicked-back
hair was the council member I
was supposed to be interviewing at Zephyrs. Ive never taken
to municipal politics; Ive always
thought the councilors were
stuffy, their policies inconsequential. However, Blackman-Wulffs
refreshing ambition may have
managed to convince me otherwise. Is it possible that I had been
overlooking municipal politics as
a viable medium to make global changes? I wanted to find out.
Q: What made you want to become a councilor?
A: I did a graduate degree at
UBC in community planning. One
of the things that I realized is that
decision makers play a key role in
shaping the direction of their community. I always knew the bureaucrats have the technical expertise
to implement change, but when it
comes to actually shaping a communitys future, elected officials
are the ones making the decisions.
ARTS & CULTURE

B2

Our community is at a key transition point. We need to make the

kind of decisions that will allow
us to transition from a small community to a medium-sized community. We also need to deal with
climate change as a community.

Q: How can councilors affect

change?
A: The biggest thing when
facing climate change is the resilience of a community. The primary role of council is to make land
use decisions, and that has large
implications for our resilience. The
land use determines whether or
not non-motorized forms of transportation are feasible, whether
or not we live in close proximity
to where our food is produced,
and whether or not we are developing communities in areas
that have risks associated with
rising sea level or other climate
change consequences. Its huge.
Q: Does Woodfibre play into that?
A: It does a little bit, but the
environmental impacts of the proposed plant still arent clear. Some
people say were helping people
get off coal, but we havent seen
the calculations yet. Thats one of
the things we need to be doing
as a council, making sure this information is provided to the community so that we all have a clear
idea of whats at stake. Our other
Continued on page B2
SPORTS & HEALTH

NWWF Review

View From Mexico

Is Quest Diverse?
A2

Continued on page B2

A Q&A with new Squamish councilor Jason

Blackman-Wulff

A closer look at the recent fire in South Village.

Rethinking Recycling

getting rid of merit-based scholarships and, like comparable private educational institutions in
the U.S., offering full-need assistance. It is those finite resources,
though, that make such a system
currently impractical for Quest.
Financial assistance is by
far the number one expense in
Quests operating budget. This
academic year (2014/2015), it accounted for $10,300,000 of the
budget. It is a mammoth expense
for students to attend Quest, and
it is a mammoth expense for
Quest to have students attend.
As of the 2014/2015 academic
year, Quest has 657 students en-

Amid soaring reports of

sexual assault on university campuses across North America,
many institutions are struggling to
effectively handle the issue. Quest
does not stand apart in this regard,
but could do so in its solutions.
Whether or not Quest has
previously mishandled sexual
assault cases, the administration
has made strides towards managing sexual misconduct in the
future. Students have prompted
discussions and founded groups
to help mitigate and heal. However, some feel issues remain
unresolved and others face ongoing harassment. Social media is rife with flagrant dialogue.
What does the Quest community stand to learn from other
universities dealings with sexual
assault, as we reflect on our own?
Continued on page B1

Climate Is Changing,
So Must Squamish

A Smoke Signal for Quests

Emergency Procedures
By MERYIA GMEINERMCPHERSON

In the Cold
Light of Day

Off-Court Chemistry
C1

C2

A2

NEWS

Rethink, Rework, Recycle

Mess in residence recycling room prompts administration and waste disposal

company to make changes
By MAYA BROEKE
A new recycling system will
be instituted at Quest in January in an effort to reduce mess
and make it easier for students
to recycle. Recycling rooms will
be equipped with new bins and
clearer signage, and bins around
campus will also be overhauled.
Students have expressed
concern about the mess that accumulates in recycling rooms.
It gets so disgusting that you
cant even reach the bottle recycling in Riverside, said second-year student Zach Kershman.
The mess also makes it difficult
for the waste removal service.
Carneys Waste Systems,
currently in charge of removing
waste and recycling from Quest
campus once a week, suggested
the new system to fit better with
their services. The system is based
on new research on behaviour,
which suggests that people are
more likely to make a mess in
an already messy environment.
Along with keeping recycling rooms tidier, the new system is also supposed to stop
cross-contamination
between
bins, by making it clearer which
recyclables go in which bin.

Theres a lot of redundancy in the recycling rooms right

now, said Krystle tenBrink, head
of the campus sustainability team
and Student Services Officer. We
hope the clearer signage and new
bins will streamline the process.
Glass will now be consolidated
into one bin. The current system is
to separate refundable and non-refundable glass, but that option will
no longer be available. Non-profit
organizations who wish to collect
refundables for profit will only have
access to non-glass refundables,
such as pop cans and water bottles.
Another change to waste
management on campus includes

adding a fifth bin to the four bins

waste bins waste, compost, paper, and cans and bottles currently found around campus. The fifth
bin will be for metals and plastics,
such as tin cans, yogurt containers,
and tetra packs. Currently there
are no options around campus
for recycling these items except
the recycling rooms in the residence buildings and the cafeteria.
tenBrink hopes that these
changes will solve the problem of messy recycling rooms
on campus. We recognize that
the current system isnt set up
for success, and were doing
something about it, she said.

ZACHARY KERSHMAN

Who Should Be My Mentor?

Tutor departures force students to
look for alternatives
By VALERIA VERGANI
The departure of faculty at the end of each year
forces students to reconsider
their academic path at Quest.
Coping strategies involve a semester abroad, a year at another
university, or transferring altogether. For students who encounter
this problem but stay at Quest,
the lack of guidance on their
area of interest remains a central
feature of the Quest experience.
The opportunity to work with
tutors like Rob Knop was what
drew Ian Kearsley to Quest. As a
result of Knops departure, Kearsley, now a second-year student
who wishes to pursue a graduate program in physics, is planning to spend the next academic
year as a visiting student at the
University of Arizona, where
he will take the physics classes that are not offered at Quest.
The departure of Jenna
Supp-Montogmerie, Quests only
religious studies tutor who left
the university in April 2014 for a
position at the University of Iowa,
has led second-year student Ilana Hoff to question the viability
of pursuing a Question focusing
on religion. Jenna was one of
my favorite tutors. Now that shes
gone, I dont have anyone to give
me guidance in the academic
discipline Im most interested in.
Other students recognize the
absence of Quest faculty who are
experts in their chosen subjects
as the central organizing principle
of their experience at Quest. Morgaine Trine, a fourth-year student
with the Question, How did the

supernatural manifest and evolve

within ancient civilizations? says
that most classes offered at Quest
have been tangential to her Question. Nonetheless, in conjunction
with her semester on exchange
at the University of Wales Trinity
Saint David, they have provided with her with an adequate
background for her Keystone.
The departure of particular faculty has forced students to
consider transferring to different
universities. A second-year student, who wishes to remain anonymous, has decided to transfer
to a different university to pursue
a degree in gender studies. According to this student, Quests
decision to hire certain tutors
instead of others is a statement
about what academic disciplines
the university cares about and
is willing to invest resources in.
The possibility of transferring
forces students to consider what
they value most about their Quest
experience. For Trine, the process
of putting together a Keystone
in spite of these complications
was a positive experience that
added value to her Quest education. While, according to Kearsley,
Quest offers a lot outside the ability to get into grad schools. I feel
very comfortable in the schools
community and I would have a
difficult time leaving my space
here to go somewhere else solely
to pursue physics. For the second-year student who has decided to transfer, community life at
Quest is not a good enough reason
to stay; Are we paying for community? If so, we can just go live in
Squamish and not pay as much.

MONDAY, DECEMBER 15, 2014

THE MARK

Online Etiquette Is Quest Diverse?

Polarizing discourse on
social media prompts
solutions-oriented discussion among students and
Student Affairs

By KEVIN BERNA
On Thursday November 27,
members of the Student Affairs
team, Krista Lambie and Darren
Newton, facilitated a discussion
of online etiquette in response to
the recent tensions on campus.
Students were able to express their feelings about the lack
of compassion emerging from
social media outlets, while also
discussing the process of building
a safer virtual space. A year after
an investigation into allegations of
sexual assault on campus, discussions remain heated, but students
and staff alike have recently made
efforts to reunify the student body.
Newton and Lambie used
their shared experience of witnessing social media grow from
a handful of dedicated enthusiasts
to a state of global participation
to guide a discussion about its
role and impact in our community.
Although the intended scope
was broader, the discussion almost
immediately gravitated towards the
events of the past month specifically Quest student Ian Greers atContinued on page B2

Faculty Accept Lower Pay to

Teach at Quest
By NEDER GATMON-SEGAL
Like students, Quests faculty
members make concessions when
choosing to come to this unique,
seven-year-old financially insecure
institution. Among these, faculty
are paid less than they would be
for comparable positions at other
Canadian universities and must
accept non-specific guidelines
regarding what merits a raise.
Faculty salaries and benefits cost roughly $4.24 million;
they are one of the largest expenses in the $19 million budget, accounting for roughly 22%.
According to Chief Academic
Officer Ryan Derby-Talbot, who
negotiates all faculty contracts,
faculty salaries are lower than
average because of Quests tight
budget. I would love one day for
Quest to have a giant endowment
and to be flushed with funds...
Right now we work on a tight budget, and we want to do a whole
lot with not very much, he said.
Quests inability to offer highly
competitive faculty salaries both
hurts and helps the hiring process.
It causes some people we would
benefit from not to look at the position. On the other hand, people
who apply are really committed
to being here, Derby-Talbot said.
In the past, prospective faculty
have declined job offers for financial reasons. Its [Quests] mission
that draws faculty here, he said.
Tutor Rich Wildman has the
sense that faculty members arent
concerned about their salaries,
though he did acknowledge that
its hard to know for sure. Its not
cool to say I dont get paid enough,
I should be paid more than that
guy, said Wildman, but its really socially acceptable to say I
dont care how much I get paid.

People are worried about

equity among the faculty; theyre
not worried about absolute value
relative to other places, Wildman
added. He brought up differences
in pay between men and women as an example. I have no
idea if theres a disparity in other
places where salaries are public, so there might be a disparity here, but theres never been
a study on this so nobody but
David [Helfand] knows, he said.
Helfand is in the process of
compiling some data about salary equity at Quest. He said he
will provide the results to faculty
members, and that they are welcome to publish them if they wish.
The merit-based raise system
for faculty is purposefully not formulaic. Generally, Derby-Talbot and
the division coordinators make faculty recommendations to Helfand,
who then makes the final decision.
There is only general criteria for
merit-based raises. We dont want
faculty to try and tailor their job to
some script, said Derby-Talbot.
Wildman thinks the flexible
faculty assessment guidelines are
better than having a rubric. Especially when comparing Quests system to one where salary incentives
are tied to things like the number
of students in a professors classes,
he said the ambiguity feels fine.
Helfand pointed out that Quest
has criteria, just not formulas. The
principal criterion is: to what degree is each individual [faculty
member] contributing to making
Quest stronger and more effective
at delivering the best possible education for our students? he said.
Regardless of who you are,
choosing to come to Quest is
a huge risk, said Derby Talbot. Its a risk for students and
its a risk for faculty members.

By VALERIA VERGANI &

ANNA MARIE OBERMEIER
Last month a Qualitative Research Methods block taught by
John Reid-Hresko engaged in a
qualitative study of diversity at
Quest involving over a hundred
students outside the classroom.
Research results pointed to
deep-seated tensions within the
student body regarding issues of diversity. Students often had difficulty defining diversity and assessing
the way it shapes campus culture.
Based on the data collected,
Reid-Hreskos students have been
hosting informal discussions that
seek to include more of the student body in an analytical dialogue
about what diversity means at
Quest. While these discussions are
only the starting point for deeper
structural and cultural changes
being called for by the student
body, they are necessary to unveil
some of the overlooked dimensions of the student community.
Each students definition of diversity was often dictated by their
individual background. Members
of minority groups often expressed
anger at the unspoken dominant
culture which they identified
as rich, white, and Anglo-Saxon that regulates student life at
Quest and marginalizes particular
racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic
groups without being challenged.
Many students felt uncomfortable discussing racial diversity on
campus and some admitted to a
lack of engagement with people
whom they perceived to be different
from themselves. Factors playing in
a students understanding of diversity included age, socioeconomic
status, race and ethnicity, gender,
religion, and sexual orientation.
Another common theme
was the administrations constant
push to make Quest appear as a
diverse community. Interviewed
students referenced the flags in
the cafeteria as being misrepresentative of the current student
body, given that the majority of
the current student body comes
from North America. Many students also felt that Quests slogan
of intimate, integrated, international gives a distorted image of the
campus to prospective students.
Research results were compiled using focus groups, interviews, and participatory mapping.
Qualitative Research Methods
students observed dynamics
within classrooms, at community events, and in public spaces
at Quest. Each student also conducted two semi-structured oneon-one interviews with a student
from outside the class, asking
them to share their thoughts and
experiences of diversity at Quest.
Many students expressed appreciation for the opportunity to
engage in difficult conversations
about these topics with Reid-Hreskos students. In particular, small
groups of students were asked
to produce a visual representation of diversity at Quest, which
prompted an intimate discussion of
their understandings of diversity.
Many groups wished for the
conversation to continue in the
future, citing the exercise as a
starting point for more substantial
and critical dialogue on the topic.

B1

SPECIAL REPORT

In the Cold Light of Day (continued from page A1)

MONDAY, DECEMBER 15, 2014

THE MARK
By JONATHAN VON OFENHEIM

Survivors in the Sun. A flag for each of the potential 3000 women that will be sexually assaulted on a campus the size of the University of Oregon, based on national averages.
By WOLFRAM BURNER. (This photo has been altered from its original form; it is licenced under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0/).

Identifying the Problem: Surveys and other reports

Evaluating the extent of sexual assault on university campuses
is a critical first step when searching for effective solutions. However,
Canadian universities are currently
not required to keep track of the
number of sexual assaults reported to them, let alone make them
public.
Meanwhile, in the United
States, the federal government is
looking to make documentation of
sexual assault reports mandatory
as early as 2016.
This follows from a federal
inquiry in the U.S., which names
55 colleges and universities under
investigation for their handling of
sexual assault complaints under
Title IX, a federal statute on gender
equality.
As part of this process, the
government is also looking to
solutions. A White House report
released this fall aimed at pressuring schools to do more, and listed
identifying the problem through
campus climate surveys as the first
in four steps toward mitigating sexual assault on campuses.
When done right, [campus
climate] surveys can gauge the
prevalence of sexual assault on
campus, test students attitudes
and awareness about the issue,
and provide schools with an invaluable tool for crafting solutions,
the report said.
While Quest has not conducted a campus climate survey,

the administration did update its

Human Rights Policy (ratified in
April 2014), which has the important clause of reporting the complaints made to the University.
At the end of each fiscal
year, the Universitys president will
receive a report of anonymized informal and formal complaints (i.e.
potential violations of the Human
Rights Policy) filed during the year,
along with their outcomes.
The first report will not be
made until June 2015, but, when it
is, the policy stipulates that it will
also be made available to anyone in the Quest Community on
request. President David Helfand
even said he will make it public so
people dont have to ask.
However, reports like the
one Quest has promised to publish
reveal considerably less about the
prevalence of sexual assault than
surveys do. The former only documents reported sexual assaults,
while anonymous surveys also
reveal unreported incidents, and,
even then, the finding is not definitive.
In one highly regarded example covered by the New York
Times in Rare Survey Examines
Sexual Assault at M.I.T. the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
asked all 11,000 of its graduate and
undergraduate students to take
a survey. Of the 35 percent who
responded, at least 17 percent of
women and 5 percent of men said

they had been sexually assaulted.

According to MITs published results, close to two-thirds
(63%) of respondents who indicated they had an unwanted sexual
experience at MIT told someone
else about the incident(s), but
fewer than 5% reported the experience(s) to someone in an official
capacity, indicating the importance of survey statistics over reports of complaints made to universities.
While the self-selection of
MITs sample might bias the results, this just means that the institute cannot extrapolate the results to the student population as
a whole. The fact that it indicates
a problem of sexual assault in any
capacity is most important.
Sure, the data tells us things
that we maybe didnt want to hear,
said MIT Chancellor Cynthia Barnhart in speaking to the New York
Times in October. But, reported
the Times, [Barnhart] said one of
the clearest and most disturbing
conclusions she drew from the
results was that there is confusion among some of our students
about what constitutes sexual assault, indicating a need for more
open discussion.
Student activists against
sexual assault have critiqued
Quest for not promoting more
open discussion. [The University]
chokes off public discourse and relegates discussion to private rooms,

where issues will be talked about

but never truly solved, wrote Ian
Greer, a student activist, in a letter
to the community.
For Quest, and for others,
breaking the cycle of sexual assault allegations and subsequent
backlash is challenging. When a
school tries to tackle the problem
by acknowledging it, drawing
attention to it, and encouraging
survivors to report it can start
to look like a dangerous place, reports the White House Task Force
to Protect Students from Sexual
Assault.
Quests financial stability
largely contingent on its ability
to fundraise for its endowment
hinges on its public image, especially in these early stages. At
stake is not only the future of the
University, but the legitimacy of every students degree.
But if crimes are being committed, they need to be addressed;
though sensitive, these issues require immediate action.
Dean of Students Melanie
Koenderman who is currently
conducting a survey of other Canadian universities as part of her
project to compile a list of resources and best practices for dealing
with sexual misconduct and Life
Sciences tutor Negar Elmieh are
looking at ways to evaluate the
problem at Quest, among other
issues.
The two have spoken about

developing a student health survey covering a range of issues

including sexual assault. As a longitudinal study, this would build
a database of student health information essential in developing
future health and well-being programs and policies that are driven
by evidence.
To date, there is no funding for this project, so progress is
slow-going, but Elmieh hopes it will
be ready for implementation by
the fall of 2016 at the latest.
Whether or not this is as
bold as MITs sexual assault survey, it has the potential to be more
thorough than the Human Rights
Policys report of complaints. The
project is still in progress, but as
such it provides a foothold for
members of the community looking to move forward with assessing
the problem.
Due to the nature of the
Quest community, Helfand said
in a letter to students, we have a
greater possibility than many other places to create solutions to the
problems facing all North American universities.
***
How can we work towards evaluating this ubiquitous problem by applying the
strategies of other universities
in unique ways?

Developing Strategies: Sexual assault policy

While Quests Human Rights
Policy outlines important complaint procedures and provides an
avenue for publicizing complaint
statistics, it does not directly address sexual assault.
The policy defines sexual
harassment, however, as conduct, including a communication,
of a sexual nature. This definition
includes sexual assault, albeit implicitly. It also hints at a definition of
consent essential to defining sexual assault by saying that sexual
harassment occurs when a member of the community engaging in
the conduct knows or ought reasonably to know that the conduct
would be unwanted or unwelcome
to a reasonable person.
But Quest is not alone in
skirting sexual assault policy with
harassment policies that lump survivors and alleged perpetrators
into the terminology of complainants and respondents in fact,
far from it.
An investigation by the Toronto Star earlier this year found

that, of those surveyed, only nine

of 78 Canadian universities have
created a special sexual assault
policy, considered a necessary
step in dealing with the problem of
sexual violence on Canadian campuses.
In the United States, the
current stance of the federal government is that every college and
university should have an easily
accessible, user-friendly sexual
misconduct policy, according to
the White House report previously
referenced.
McGill University in Montreal, Quebec is among a handful of
universities in North America beginning to take this step. Following
a 2012 sexual assault case in which
three McGill football players were
charged with sexually assaulting a
Concordia student, the University
hired Bianca Ttrault, a liaison officer in harm reduction. Ttraults
first move: helping to develop a
sexual assault policy.
After speaking with Ttrault,
Macleans reported that any

comprehensive university policy

needs to have a clear definition
of what sexual assault is and a
pro-survivor approach, ... meaning
that academic accommodations,
counselling and other support systems are available for victims from
the minute they come forward.
Quest offers these support
systems but lacks the comprehensive sexual assault policy. When
asked whether Quest should have
a policy on sexual assault in an interview with the Mark in February,
Koenderman responded: sexual
assault is a crime under Canadian
law and this supersedes any institutional policy.
Koenderman added that
even without a sexual assault policy, the same principles which
are the foundation of our Human
Rights Policy apply: Quest has a
profound commitment to every
persons value, dignity, and potential.
Under the Criminal Code of
Canada sexual assault is a crime
and an indictable offence.

However, despite the Canadian governments Human Rights

Act and the United Nations series
of human rights policies, Quest still
has a Human Rights policy of its
own, doubling up on the jurisdiction of codified rights in one domain but not the other.
Any member of the community can make suggestions for
changes, said Koenderman in the
same interview. These would be
reviewed and considered by the
people responsible for the specific policy or procedure (i.e., staff or
faculty, or the Executive Team, or
the Board of Governors).
Quests Human Rights Policy
promises review of the document
every three years, along with immediate revisions as needed; its
initial review will take place in June
2017.
Should the University decide to adopt a specific sexual
assault policy, there is room to do
so through this revision process. In
the meantime, the Students Representative Council has approached

the issue, though not in a formal

policy.
The SRCs resources webpage provides definitions of sexual assault and consent, addresses
victim blaming, and outlines sexual assault-specific options for survivors, which, according to Ttrault,
are all key parts of a comprehensive sexual assault policy.
In McGills case, the original
draft of its pending sexual assault
policy was drafted by a student
working group. Then, in consultation with the dean and Liaison
Officer Ttrault, the students translated the priorities and demands
they had outlined into a policy
document.

Editorial: Ways Forward

on our actions, and the realities of

a situation.
Hopefully we can find moments to reflect when we have
this mindset. When consent is not
clear. When we fail to do all we
can to support survivors. When
alleged perpetrators are harassed.

When activism goes too far. When

we attack each other on social
media sites. When the Mark aids
ineffectual dialogue.
I do not stand apart. The
cover story that we wrote as a
Masthead for the November issue
provided important details on a re-

cent incident, but, upon reflection,

we feel it framed the story in a way
that was too isolated from context
to be as productive as it could have
been. This piece is coming too late,
but it is my attempt to supplement
last months article with solutions
journalism. My hope is that it pro-

vides just one more perspective

on ways to move forward.
As an institution, as a community, and as individuals, lets try
to open our eyes to the cold light
of day.
***

Looking back on something

in the cold light of day means
doing so calmly, unimpeded by
emotions that can convolute clear
thought. It means taking the opportunity to dispassionately reflect

***
So should Quest have a
specific sexual assault policy
or is the Human Rights Policy
sufficient? If students expect
more, policy change can stem
from grassroots.

B2

MONDAY, DECEMBER 15, 2014

THE MARK

NEWS & OPINION

Mxico: a Story of Social Media,

Violence, and My Family
By DORAH PRIETO
I am sitting at the table peeling
chiles in our beautiful adobe home
in San Miguel de Allende with my
stepmother Cristna and my father
Juan. My ten-year-old sister Jazmn
is asleep; she has school tomorrow.
In perfect Spanglish, Cristna says,
no me gusta poner nada en el
Facebook, I always untag myself
and it pisses me off when people
tag me in the first place. I throw
a chile in the basket and ask why,
and, in doing so, unwittingly open
a conversation that grips my heart.
Bueno Dora... Cristna
responds, and she tells me about
some recent events. She tells me
how, in October, the popular anti-cartel twitter journalist Felina
in Tamaulipas kept tweeting despite threats and media blackouts.
One day, her new posts were a
series of photos of herself tied
up, ending with a coup de grace
bullet wound in her face and the
threatening words we are closer than you think. She tells me
about a Facebook event for an
upper-class beach party in Acapulco; each bourgeoisie guest had
RSVPd via Facebook, inadvertently notifying the cartel that the
richest Mexicans would all be in
the same place at the same time.
The government does nothing. It is widely believed that they
are part of it. In late September,
the mayor of Ayotzinapa and his
wife fled after collaborating with
police and the cartel to kidnap
43 student-protesters. The investigation of this incident revealed
mass graves surrounding the city.

DORAH PRIETO

These 43 are now part of the

23,000 people who have disappeared. This violence that I dont
understand is part of the same
Mxico that helped raise me, and
that continues to house my family.
Cristna finishes peeling a
chile, then says, As que, I dont post
on Facebook. However, the cartel
goes through phone books, too.
They called my dad one day.
Imagine a little girls voice, crying,
Pap? Pap?! My father says
Ests bien, que pasa (are you
alright, whats wrong)?, to which
she whimpers in a scared voice,
a man here wants to talk to you.
That is Jazmns voice; he is sure.
There are gruff male voices in the
background Tengo a tu hija (we
have your daughter)! They hadnt
referred to her by name and so for
a moment my father is able to shed
his paternal fear that conviction
that his daughter is in trouble
and hangs up the phone. Five minutes later he is at Jazmns sealed

Financial Assistance Cont.

By KENDRA PERRIN
Continued from page A1
rolled. This means that each student receives an average of $15,677
per year in financial assistance
(whether in bursary, scholarship,
or a combination of the two).
If every one of the 657 students
enrolled at Quest this year had
paid full tuition, that would have
amounted to $20,367,000. Instead,
the student body collectively pays
about 50% of this total possible tuition, and then Quests financial assistance fronts the remaining 50%,
straight out of its operating budget.
This 50% figure is called the tuition
discount rate, and it is the total aid
granted by the institution divided
by the total tuition and fee revenue if everyone paid full price.
Quests numbers are not so
unlike comparable private institutions in the U.S. (the U.S. makes for
a better comparison, because tuition discounting has traditionally
been a practice amongst private
institutions and, other than Quest,
Canadas secular universities are
all public). Private schools down
there aim for around a 40% tuition discount rate, meaning 60%
of the total tuition is paid by the
student body and the remaining 40% is fronted by the school.
The difference between Quest
and its American counterparts,
though, is its endowment fund
(or lack thereof). An endowment

fund is a pile of donated money that sits in a safe investment

and generates interest, which
can help fund the financial assistance a university provides.
At Helfands alma mater, Amherst College, the endowment
fund sat at $1.823 billion USD in
2013. Quests is just over $100,000.
With interest rates as low as they
are, Helfand suspects Quests
will need to be in the hundreds
of millions range before it starts
generating interest that is significant relative to the size of
Quests financial assistance budget
Without the cushion of an endowment, Quest cant run the risk
of offering full-need, need-blind
assistance because it might not
be able to afford it. If too many
of the students who accept their
admissions offers can contribute
too little towards tuition (Quest
admissions doesnt know a students financial situation when
offering him/her a spot, making
the process need-blind), Quest
wouldnt be able to afford its
promise to cover their full-need.
Despite the fact that Quests
tuition is almost six-times as high
as the average tuition for Canadian universities in 2012/13 ($5,581),
its cost per student is exactly the
same as the median for these Canadian universities. The difference,
of course, is that there are no government subsidies; Quest students
pay individually for that cost.

and heavily guarded elementary school, where sure enough,

Jazmn is there in her classroom.
I imagine my fathers sigh of relief
to know she is safe, followed by
a furrowed brow at the reality of
commonplace ransom calls a
tactic for lifting quite a lot of money and information these days.
My friend Jos sends me a
message from Mexico City, Was at
protests. Gruesome. Tell you more
when I see you this weekend. I
dont ask my information is now
part of the data pool. For a second
I chuckle with dark humour at myself, realizing that I sound just like
the conspiracy-theorists Ive come
to dismiss back in BC. However, my
family in Mexico does not have
this luxury, because they have
knocked at their very doorstep.
Cristna pauses, her face has
changed, and I understand what
she means when she says over
the phone when I call from Quest:
Mxico is getting dangerous.

Q&A Cont.
By MACKENZIE ERLANK
Continued from page A1
role is representing our communitys concerns to the proponent.

Q: What do you think

you will bring to the Council?
A: Having worked in public
and private sectors in planning,
I have more knowledge than a
layperson would coming in. Anybody can acquire the knowledge
I have over time, but I am able
and ready to provide knowledge
right away. Im also able to help
offer new perspectives and drive
change on specific things that
are important to me, like public
transport and cycling infrastructure. But its a collaborative effort.
Q: Climate change is obviously an important topic to
you. Are there other councilors who share your passions?
A: There are definitely some
allies and the new mayor takes
climate change quite seriously. I feel this council will be able
to move that agenda forward.
Q: Are municipal politics a viable medium to make
an impact for Quest students
who study climate change?
A: Absolutely. Id be interested
in convening with people as an individual councillor. Its about minimizing resource consumption and
increasing our resiliency. I think it
would be good to have a group
who can be that voice and provide those perspectives to council.

A Conversation Manual

How to listen (to people less privileged than you)

By MARIELLE ROSKY
Weve all had conversations that feel more like a series
of speeches, or worse, lectures.
When speaking with someone
who has comparative privilege to
yourself, this can range from insulting to oppressive. The tips below
are meant to help Quest students
of privilege learn how to create an
anti-oppressive intellectual classroom and social environment.
A conversation which endeavors to illuminate an idea or
experience requires that all parties involved fully listen to their
peers. Conversations are not a
platform for persuasion; they are
a platform for the unearthing,
sharing and digesting of ideas.
Rule 1: Try to understand. Listening is a tool for understanding.
Ask yourself before you begin to
listen, Do I want to understand
what this person is about to say?
If the answer is no, politely excuse
yourself from the conversation and
go about your merry way. If the answer is yes, the following advice will
help you maximize your listening
(and thus understanding) potential.
Rule 2: Your responsibility to listen changes based on who you are,
who you are talking to, and what
you are talking about. The politics
of listening draws heavily on the
concepts discussed in last months
article on bodies existing politically
in space based on visible and invisible privileges and oppressions.
As a person of relative privilege at Quest, I have a greater
responsibility to listen more to
my peers of an oppressed status.
This becomes especially important when I am discussing issues
that my privilege blinds me from.

My perspective is and has been

skewed by a lifetime of comfort.
I need to listen to the oppressed
perspective in order to better
understand the topic being discussed. As a white person who
has taken courses on race and
ethnicity, I still know nothing about
the lived experience of racial oppression and must make room for
the oppressed voice. At the same
time, I expect my counterparts
make room for my thoughts on
issues that relate to my lived experience as a queer, Jewish woman.
It is important to prioritize the
oppressed perspective not only
because it has inherently wider
scope, but because the oppressed
voice has been cut off, hushed,
or interrupted for far too long in
too many discourses. Listening is
more active than hearing. When in
a conversation, most of us have a
tendency to mostly ready our own
monologue for our turn to speak.
Rule 3: When someone else is
talking, every ounce of your energy should be put into attempting to
internalize what it is theyre saying.
Though interruption is a by-product of a heated discussion, its also
a message that says, my words are
more important than yours. Only
use interruption in emergency cases when something oppressive is
being said. Even then, waiting for
the person to finish her thought
is more conducive to helping
her realize why it is problematic.
Rule 4: Before you respond,
clarify what you think youve
heard so that the person youre
speaking to feels understood or
can correct you. Avoid using the
phrase, So what youre saying
is... Tell your peer what youve inContinued on page C1

Online Etiquette
Continued
By KEVIN BERNA
Continued from page A2
tempt to start a dialogue and
the difficulty associated with its
discussion in a public virtual space.
The students recognized
the challenge of creating a structured debate on the issue. You
cant just call someone out as
easily as you can in class, one
student said, so the original post
gets lost in unrelated comments.
Fourth-year student Tari Ajadi, who attended the discussion,
pointed to the Liking of comments, which he said creates
factions that leave the computer
screen, essentially dividing the student body. These Likes are a way
for people to semi-anonymously participate in the discussion,
but they inevitably create sides.
Facebook is not the only social media outlet that has recently
been active with posts regarding
the aforementioned events. Yik
Yak the Twitter-like app that
has become extremely popular
on college campuses throughout
North America for its component of anonymity is location
based, resulting in a feed that is
almost strictly Quest-related posts.
In the November 27 forum,
a participant noted that posts on
Yik Yak were much more brash,
and attributed this reckless-

ness to the complete anonymity

the app provides to the poster.
Its something that Quest students crave, the participant said.
As a conclusion to the discussion, the group decided to
implement something that would
make the collective student body
responsible for social media etiquette. On December 5, Newton
posted on the students page to invite community members to share
their ideas about what our safe
online spaces should look like.
When asked to comment further
on his post, Newton stressed the
importance of implementing expectations, rather than regulations.
Well see what the post yields,
says Newton, but I think the most
important thing to remember is
to always check your own comments and be sure that they dont
shut down discussion or silence
individuals or groups on campus.
The Quest Students page has,
at times, exemplified how the discussion of multidimensional human topics cannot be effectively
managed through social media.
As Lambie stated in the meeting,
physical conversations require a
level of empathy that online ones
dont, and hopefully the expectations constructed and upheld
by the student body will help to
achieve this necessary compassion.

C1

ARTS & CULTURE

Album of the Year: RTJ2 by Run The Jewels

By TARI AJADI
The first time I heard the beat
switch in the second half of Oh
My Darling Dont Cry, the second single from Killer Mike and
El-Ps new Run The Jewels album
RTJ2, I had to take off my headphones and back away from my
laptop. The flip was so grimy and
so visceral that I had to pause and
check if my head had exploded.
Run The Jewels have been
making music together for the past
three years, dropping some of the
decades best rap releases so far
with their eponymous first mixtape and Killer Mikes 2012 album
R.A.P. Music. On RTJ2, El and Mike
surpassed themselves, releasing
for free, no less the best hiphop album since Kendrick Lamars
good kid, m.A.A.d city in 2012.
El-Ps production has blossomed from a dystopian take on
Public Enemys sound to a genre
unto itself, with equal parts New
York boom-bap drums, Southern
squelchy, funky synth leads and
sub-bass seemingly mined from
the core of the Earth. His rapping
has improved too; he has sharpened his verbosity to use like a shiv
instead of a slab of granite. On All
My Life, for instance, he sounds a
little like Ludacris if Ludacris was
white and grew up reading Philip
K. Dick novels and watching Alien.
As good as El-Ps rapping is,
however, it pales in comparison
to Killer Mikes. On every single
track, Mike displays technical, conceptual and comical virtuosity
from the alliterative sucker-punch

Helfand on
Science and
Humanity
By ANDREW SIMON
Co-Edited by KENDRA PERRIN

A provocative question about

whether science could furnish a
moral code led into discussion
between Quest student Andrew Simon and President David Helfand
about the rift between Science and
the Humanities and the state of our
intellectual culture at Quest. This
discussion will be published as a
two-part series, with the full version
forthcoming on the Markwebsite.
The departure point for this
conversation is a classic article
called Science and Complexity
by Warren Weaver, which I (Andrew Simon) had proposed to Helfand as a Cornerstone reading. The
article describes developments in
the history of science from the
nineteenth century onward and
questions whether science alone
can solve the complex problems currently facing humanity.
Helfand: I was just rereading
the Weaver article and 98% of it I
agree with, but I think he underestimates our reductionist capabilities. This was written in 1948, and
one of his points is: genetic inheritance is this inherently complex
problem when, in fact, its really
pretty simple! We know every one
of the three billion base pairs and
we know which are genes and we
know if you change one
base pair in one gene you produce cystic fibrosis or some

of Blockbuster Night Part 1

(choice quote: Top of the morning / my fist to your face is fucking Folgers) to the anarcho-punk
rampage of Close Your Eyes and
Count To Fuck (feat. Zach De La
Rocha) to the razor-sharp privilege-check of Lie, Cheat, Steal.
His words hit hardest on
the standout track Early (feat.
BOOTS). Here, Mike heartbreakingly chronicles a scene where
a police officer arrests him for
having a dime bag of weed, only
to kill his wife who comes out to
stop the arrest, all in front of his
child. El-P chimes in with insight
into a bystander paralysed by the
system of disaffection and privilege he is trapped within. The duo
wrote the track before events in
Ferguson and New York (among
other places) kicked off, but to
paraphrase Mike, the story of Early has been the story of Black
America for a long, long time.
Skipping between masterfully
technical toilet humour and incisive social commentary, backed
by beats that bump so hard they
could trigger a tsunami, RTJ2 is
easily the album of the year, and
one of the best of the decade so far.

North West Winter Festival Review

Annual arts event turns two on a hugely successful evening

JACK LAMBERT

By ALESSANDRO TERSIGNI
This years North West Winter Fest (NWWF) brought together
staff, students and alumni to enjoy
live music, art and general merriment.
Featuring The Bone Frets,
Claire Mortifee and Good for
Grapes, the end-of-semester bash
was a cozy celebration, even in its
underground parkade venue. This
was perhaps because of how the

events three spaces were successfully integrated, while maintaining

their distinct vibes.
People watching the live artists and admiring the art submissions had a place to go and be
calm, says NWWF co-coordinator
Aisha Balint. On the other hand,
there was some awesome dancing
going down by the stage, where
most of the high energy was. It
was also possible to meet up with
friends and sit back and watch

the whole event unfold from the

beer garden. This array of space is
something I would call a success.
Although the student artists
exhibiting their work in the art
auction made roughly a quarter
of last years profits, the art was
widely enjoyed and the exhibition space featured live art and a
lounge section.
The bands were also a hit; according to NWWF co-coordinator
Michael Powell, Good for Grapes said
it was their best show of the year.

that humans have evolved to cooperate within relatively small

groups, and now we find ourselves submerged as individuals
in these highly complex societies?
Helfand: Yes, this is a huge
problem. I mean, nation-states are
one of the most disastrous inventions ever, because they create
these false, totally emotional attachments that then bring out the
opposite kind of behaviour that
we need. For example, look at
countries trying to decide about
climate change mitigation. There
is no agreement; there is just
self-centeredness but centred
on 300 million people (roughly
the population of the U.S.), not
just 30 people. A small group of
people could make mistakes and
die out and that would be fine in
the grand scheme of things, but
you cant do that on the scale of
nation-states. People dont appreciate at all that in the last 50
years things have fundamentally
changed, because humans now
completely dominate the ecosystems of the Earth, and that wasnt
even true 50 years ago. Yet we
have these nineteenth century notions of manifest destiny occupy
the whole continent, that was the
1850s U.S. philosophy. These ideas
are deeply at odds with the survival of civilization, yet they continue
to be promoted because of these
artificial groupings which, as you
point out, are vastly larger than
what weve evolved to deal with.
Its a bad evolutionary mismatch.
Simon: Bringing it home, I
know the same problem plays
out here on campus around
Community Days. When we had

a smaller student body, there

was a lot more involvement.
Helfand: Thats right, everybody used to show up, and now its
down to a hundred people. Thats
why were absolutely determined
to keep the class size at 20, because thats the natural size where
people collaborateand it works.
The number 20 wasnt a randomly chosen number, you know.
Look for the second part in
the January issue of the Mark.

WIKIPEDIA

genetic disease. So that has

gone from a slightly mysterious thing to a pretty thoroughly
understood thing. Now there
is a huge amount still to learn, but
what I dont like is Weavers notion that problems of organized
complexity whether they are
sociological, ecological, biological are inherently intractable
problems. While it is true that
statistical mechanics is easy and
two-variable problems are easy
and the stuff in between is complex, I am very uncomfortable with
Weavers notion that this complexity is something mysterious.

Simon: There is a romantic

spirit at work here.
Helfand: There is, and I guess
I am an anti-romantic. As to the
issue of morals, I dont think science is anywhere near producing
a scientific basis for understanding morals, but I wouldnt rule out
the possibility, and I think there is
a virtue in pursuing it. First I will
tell you why I wouldnt rule out
the possibility, and then Ill tell you
why there is a virtue in pursuing it.
Virtually all organized religions
have some variant of the Golden
Rule: do unto others as you would
have done unto yourself. These
versions of the rule come from
very different cultures. You might
say, Well, thats just a coincidence,
and that would be pretty disturbing, right? So if its not a coincidence, where does this universality
come from? E.O. Wilson has a good
take on this in the Social Conquest
of the Earth. In this book, he has
some theorems, and the theorem
I like best is: a selfish person will
always outcompete an altruistic

MONDAY, DECEMBER 15, 2014

THE MARK

person, but a group of altruists

will always outcompete a group of
selfish people. This strikes me as
patently true and also historically
accurate. So you can see, over a
million years of hominid evolution,
that the ones who collaborate,
within their group at least, are going to do better than the ones who
try to kill each other all the time.
As a consequence, it seems to
me not at all implausible that this
is an inherent property of the human brain. Thats why I dont think
it is crazy to think about morals
scientifically, and the reason I think
its important to think about them
this way also has to do with the
evolution of the brain, which has
evolved for the majority of time
to solve the simple problems of
living on the interface between the
jungle and the savannah, right?
You have to avoid being eaten and
you have to find food, etc., and
that leads to what is popularly
referred to as the reptilian brain
the quick response to things.
There is a book called the
Robots Rebellion in which Keith
Stanovich shows that, while you
think youre smart and youre going to get it right, time after time
you get it wrong because your
amygdala responds too quickly.
To embed those kinds of responses into a highly complex, rapidly
changing technological society is
highly problematic. So I think its
a little scary that one would insist
that the important things in life all
have to come from some mysterious place, because that strikes me
as that kind of primitive thinking.

Simon: So, in that context,

what do you think of the notion

Conversations Cont.
By MARIELLE ROSKY
terpreted from his words and ask
them if that interpretation is correct. Give people the space to affirm or correct your interpretation.
Rule 5: Be humble. Assume
someone has something valuable
to tell you that you didnt know
before, and couldnt have conceived of without her pointing it
out. The chances are, if you are
privileged in relation to your peer,
that assumption is warranted.
Remember that because of
intersectionality, no one is altogether oppressed or privileged.
During a conversation that may
address a number of issues, the
participants will have to constantly re-gauge their responsibility to
listen. It is also important to keep
in mind that privileges and oppressions are both visible and
invisible. Even if your peer looks
like you, do not assume that the
person with whom you are speaking is like you in any way. This is
where asking questions becomes
particularly useful. Read next issue
for tips on how to ask questions.

C2

SPORTS & HEALTH

MONDAY, DECEMBER 15, 2014

THE MARK

The Real Deal

A Healthy Dose

Friendship off the court leads to some of the Kermodes best basketball ever

An inquiry into depression at Quest

By KEVIN BERNA
Following the conclusion of
the first third of the 2014/2015 basketball season, which saw both
teams quietly climb into the top ten
of the Canadian Collegiate Athletic Associations national rankings,
Quests basketball program is out
to prove that last years success
(provincial gold for the women and
bronze for the men) was no fluke.
Heading into the holiday break,
the women sit atop the Pacwest
standings with an undefeated record, while the men are in second
place with just a single blemish in
the loss column. Players from both
squads acknowledge that a strong
team bond is a major contributor
to their recent, and future, success.
Just how good are the Kermodes right now? Both teams
entered the mid-season break on
a high note after a pair of wins
against Douglas and Langara on
November 21 and 22. The most
recent national rankings have
the women in fifth, while the men
sit seventh both record highs
for their respective programs.
Dylan Kular, fourth-year student-athlete and one of the captains of the mens basketball team,
commented on his teams recent
play and the resulting thrust into
the spotlight. We dont want any
praise! he said jokingly in response to a request to be interviewed by the Mark. After some
convincing, however, he obliged.
We know that to get to nationals we have to win games,
Kular said earnestly. Everything else is just a bonus.
Some of this bonus praise was
recently directed towards first-year

Getting Off
Tips & Tricks

By CALEAH DEAN &

SAMANTHA THOMPSON
I dont know what dinner conversations look like at your apartment, but for us subjects can range
from Nietzsche to the intimate
workings of the BDSM community. The following is a compilation
of our favorite sex tips and tricks
from our latest dinner guests.
Coconut oil is the best lubricant if youre not using latex condoms. Its antimicrobial, it makes
your genitals taste fantastic, it
balances the bacteria and it softens the skin. But get the extra virgin stuff. Its cheap, you can cook
with it and use it in your hair too!
Pay close attention to
peoples
vocal
reactions
and when in doubt, ASK!
Use dirty talk to figure out
what a partner likes. Use it to
check in and make sure your
partner is comfortable or to
see what theyre up for trying.
Oil degrades latex. Dont
use oil-based lubes with latex
condoms. Also, do some research about which lubes work
best with different types of toys.
It would be devastating to destroy an expensive toy by using
the wrong type of lube with it.
Explore erogenous zones
like wrists, behind peoples ears,
the crook of the elbow, ear-

point guard Theo VandenEkert,

whose performance in Quests
two most recent victories earned
him the honour of Pacwest male
Athlete of the Week. Scoring 28
points (a team-high) in the victory over Langara is not something
VandenEkert could have done
without the help of his teammates.
From day one theres never
been any friction on this team,
VandenEkert said. Whether they
were telling me what coach Shook
likes and doesnt like or helping
me adjust to the culture up here,
Ive always felt like part of a family.
Fellow first-year and Washington State native Dallas Searles
echoed VandenEkerts comments
on the team helping him through
the culture shock of transferring to
Quest from a mainstream post-secondary institution. Being at Quest,
youre strongly encouraged to
be part of the community, said
Searles. There are those times
when its hard because youre in a
bad mood and you want to keep
to yourself, but the guys have always been really supportive.
According to captain Kular,
this comradery off the court has
translated into better team play. Its
helped a lot on defence, he said. If
I get beat, I trust that theres going
to be someone there to help our
defence is the best its ever been.
The women have a reasonably good defence themselves.
The Kermodes were able to stay
undefeated in their final two games
with help from second-year Miriam Baumann. Baumann kept the
ball out of enemy hands by posting a combined 25 points and 28
rebounds; she also earned Athlete
of the Week honours for this feat
giving Quest a sweep of the podium.

Everyone is playing so
well right now, even those who
dont get noticed as much on
the stats sheet, said third-year
forward Aimee Johnston. It
all starts with [coach] Dany.
In his third year as head
coach of the womens basketball
team, Dany Charlery has made
Quest a perennial contender in the
Pacwest by building a strong relationship with his players. Its very
casual, explained Johnston. We
all feel comfortable going to Dany
or [assistant coach] Kim [Land] if
we have a problem with anything.
Casual isnt usually the first
adjective youd think to use when
describing the coach of an undefeated team, but Johnston wasnt
mixing words. He wants us to enjoy our university experience and
realize that it is a privilege to still be
playing basketball, said Johnston,
who can be found leading her team
in a friendly game of charades on
a rare weekend off. It takes a lot of
pressure off us as players when you
have a coach who understands
that were also regular students.
With the women attempting to repeat their provincial gold
from last year and the men starting to compete with historically
strong Pacwest opponents, both
teams are in a fairly new position:
they are the ones to beat. By encouraging each other to embody
the spirit of a student-athlete in
the Quest community, the basketball teams are creating some
real chemistry on the court.
The teams play away for the
month of January, but will end the
season with seven straight home
games in the Kave. Be sure to
support your home teams as they
look to better last years results.

lobes, the base of the spine, or

behind the knee. The tongue is
your best friend. Also, try sucking on your partners fingers.
When youre eating someone out, try cooling your lips
on an ice cube or cool water.
The G-spot is not scientifically proven to exist, but that doesnt
mean you shouldnt look for it!
At a certain angle, at a certain
depth, theres SOMETHING there!
Dont assume that you
have to start giving a blowjob
right away. Play around that
area with your tongue, play with
nipples, play with the butt hole
[but only after talking about it!].
Keep your nails short but
dont penetrate someone right
after cutting them! Rub them on
your clothes a bunch or something first. Or do the dishes.
Right underneath the balls
is the perineum, and if you kinda
push on that or play with that it can
externally stimulate the prostate.
Be gentle with this area and
make sure theres a lot of communication. Its also a thing on women. It can be accessed through anal
penetration with the same sort of
gentle, come hither hooking motion that usually finds the G-spot.
Sometimes when youre
going down on someone, people get clampy with their legs.
When they do that, just go with
it. Move with the body. If you try
to move against the body youre

in serious danger of neck strains.

A tip for being on top is practice on your friends first. Angles
matter when youre on top. Riding
someone requires active participation from both parties. No energizer bunny! Try a fluctuation between fast and slow. Having a kind
of rhythmic nature to it is the best.
People confuse fast with
hard [in penetrative sex].
Learn
the
difference.
If youre having anal sex for
the first time, get a set of butt plugs
and work up to it. Do not go from
zero to hero. That will not end well!
Go to the bathroom before
anal sex. You clean up, you lube
up, and baby wipes are excellent.
For those just getting into
bondage, bondage tape is your
best friend. It doesnt stick to skin,
it sticks to itself so you can just
whip it out whenever and tape it
to a bed spread. Its only $10 and
its reusable and its just a roll of
tape there, no one will know!
As far as group sex
goes, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk.
Like all the way through.
The best piece of advice out
there, and the only one we can
say will be universally beneficial,
is communicate. No matter how
experienced, inexperienced, confident or uncertain you might
be, communication will lead to a
better experience for everyone.
Play safe,
Sam & Caleah

By MAYA GREENBERG &

AYLA RAABIS
As people living with depression, we are constantly reflecting on
how depression affects our experiences at Quest. We know that we
are not the only Questies dealing
with this, and we were wondering
what others had to say about how
depression affects their day-to-day.
Depression is a prevalent
mental illness that affects 8% of
Canadians, so we werent surprised that when we put out a call
for opinions, we received many
responses. While the opinions
shared here are in no way all-encompassing, they provide insight
into what Quest does well and
does poorly when it comes to depression, and what we can do as
a community to better support
those with ongoing mental illness.
The block plan, perhaps
Quests most distinctive feature,
is flexible and makes it possible
for those with depression to take
a block off when having a particularly hard time. Almost everyone we interviewed echoed the
freedom they feel in being able to
drop a block without ruining an
entire semesters work. Another
benefit mentioned was the singular focus of the block plan, in that
depression often makes it challenging to focus on multiple tasks
(or sometimes any tasks) at once.
The distracting busyness of the
block plan was also mentioned by
multiple people as a benefit. As
transfer student Abby Lawson put
it, on the block plan I feel like Im
always accomplishing something.
However, this busyness also
proves to be a challenge for some
interviewees, because on the
block plan you dont really have
time to not be ok. As first-year
Scott Brunelle reflected, even if
you hit two or three days of feeling
really terrible, its almost impossible to catch up and get a mark
that reflects your actual ability in
that short of a time. One of our interviewees, who has chosen to remain anonymous, repeated many
times that the block plan, particularly work-heavy blocks, do not
leave room for self-care. Self-care is
important for everyone, but particularly for those with mental illness.
So what do we do to support
people with depression at Quest?
While all interviewees reflected positively on the presence of multiple
counselors, they were consistent in
noting the extensive wait times to
actually see a counselor, even for
those sessions reserved for urgent
matters. We were also told about
Quests proficiency in handling
emergent situations, but their lack
of resources in helping those who
have ongoing conditions, such as
depression. Perhaps this is an area
in which the Quest community can
move towards providing resourc-

es through a culture of support.

In terms of academic support,
interviewees agreed that some tutors are very approachable. However, Brunelle noted that there is
a massive guilt complex that goes
along with telling your tutor you
have an ongoing mental illness...
It feels like youre using an excuse
right off the bat. Interviewees
main concern about reaching out
for support from tutors was the
unpredictability of the response
they would receive, and the fear
of inadvertently damaging their
relationship with their tutor before
the block had even started. Interviewees also seemed to feel an allor-nothing possibility for handling
their depression academically if
it was bad enough they would
drop a block, and if not they would
suffer through with little support.
Beyond the classroom, we
talked with interviewees about
the culture at Quest surrounding
mental illness, and whether this
is different from the dominant culture outside of Quest. While it was
noted that there is more discussion about mental illness at Quest
than other places interviewees had
been, they did not feel that there
is any less stigma. Interviewees
noted that, often, they had been
reluctant to reach out for help for
fear that they would be seen differently. Brunelle noted that there
is an incredibly high value put on
constant positivity at Quest, and
stated, I think its important to create a culture thats positive, but a
culture thats positive on the surface is one thing, a culture thats
positive because it has underlying
honesty is probably a lot better.
So what are some possible
solutions for the lack of resources
at Quest? Multiple interviewees
said that they would feel more supported academically if there was a
clear and accessible system for
addressing mental illness with tutors. Three of the people we interviewed, including second-year Ian
MacDonald, mentioned support
groups as a solution to long waittimes for counseling, and as a way
to create community-based support. These support groups have
particular potential for those with
chronic mental health conditions,
as organized groups would provide the ongoing and stable support often needed in these cases.*
While it is easy to find quickfixes for the symptoms of a stigmatizing culture, we also need to
address the underlying issues.
We Questies with depression are
calling you to action; think about
it, talk about it, and do something
about it, because its real and its
here and we deal with it every day.
*The creation of these support groups is currently being
worked on. Contact the Quest
counsellors for more information.

CALEAH DEAN, Editor in Chief

JONATHAN VON OFENHEIM, Editor in Chief
ALESSANDRO TERSIGNI, News Editor
ZACHARY KERSHMAN, Opinion Editor
KENDRA PERRIN, Arts & Culture Editor
KEVIN BERNA, Sports Editor
R. MARIS WINTERS, Production Manager
MORGAN HILLIS, Production Assistant
JORDAN ROSS, Media Guru
TARI AJADI, Editor at Large