Secure obscured

I have been tired of hearing a lot about sexual assaults, robberies, violent assaults, vandalism incidents on campus. It is ridiculous to attend such a great university, yet I feel very insecure about stepping out of my house to go out for a walk around the block.

When future students and parents ask me about York Security system I feel like lieing to them. Yes, it is true that we count with services like GoSafe that goes around campus to pick and drop-off people, CCTV's, blue light emergency phones, indoor safety phones, foot patrols and escorts, etc. Yet, there is at least one report of harrassment, sexual assault or theft every week. Are security staff doing enough?

On facebook I was invited to a group called "We Want A Safer York", started by students who are rallying and making petitions to reinforce the security system at York. Big part of the concern was that there are not many security staff patroling the Village area, a private non-property of York. Whereas the Village mostly encompases students living there, there are also women and children who inhabitat in these residences that are equally put in danger.

In my experience, I have barely seen any security staff around the Village at York. I aknowledge the presence of security bodies wandering around campus, but definetly not beyond the university boundaries. And it is in the Village where most sexual assaults and robberies occur. Yeah, there are plenty of cop cars and (well take a guess) parking enforcement police. But when it gets dark at night, it is mostly students walking on the quiet dark and lonely streets of the Village. Some women are careless enough to walk by themselves late at night. I don't even want to imagine what happens on every thursday that is Pub Night, where some girls get drunk and some guys get a little frisky.

I don't know about the GoSafe operations, but in my experience, it is a very poor security service offering to students on campus. First of all, this year they changed the type of transportation. Last year they were couple vans going around campus. This year they changed those vans into a SINGLE mini bus that comes by every half an hour. This is what I find ridiculous! If anything they should ADD on more vans or mini buses, not pack couple vans and compact it into one mini bus. There should be dropping off people to wherever they need, not picking up a few spots for pick up. And hours of operation should be EXTENDED, not diminished. A lot could happen on 30 minutes waiting for the mini bus to come. This reminds me of the time I called the service to pick me up by Winters College because I needed to get to the other side of the campus, Calumet College. I called, and I waited all by myself at like 10pm for like 45 minutes and they never came. I was so frustrated for waiting so i walked by myself. This is not the only case. Most of the times I have called them, it always took them a while to get me. There was one time, when I was at my friend's apartment, a little bit over the Village. I called them at 1.40am, and they said they stopped their service already, when on the website it clearly states that their working hours is until 2am. They also told me that they could not do anything beyond the York Boundaries. But I Need To Get To My Residence On Campus!!! Can't they even like, wait for me in one spot so that they can walk me back to res? ugh. And aparently I am not the only one with bad experiences. heard from a friend, who was trying to help a drunked friend to get back to residence, that the GoSafe people told them that they wouldn't take that person because they don't want any puking in the van. If anything, they are the ones who really need the van. There was also this time when couple friends wanted to get a ride to the Village from campus. They said they could take the ladies, but not the guys. Hmm...as if guys were in less danger of getting an assault than girls. I was also reading on the facebook group, and someone commented that even the mini bus driver was being mean.

I know the GoSafe can't be that bad, can it? I can't totally bash about it because a good friend of mine used to work for it. I mean, I know they try what they can do. They make sure to follow the good instructions they received, but sometimes you gotta look further, thinking about helping out somebody with their safeness, rather than thinking it is 'just' a job.

Although I still think that York security system should be reinforced. Also, people should stop walk by themselves at night, leave their expensive belongings alone, dress provocatively, listen to ipod and stop paying attention to their surroundings, be mischief. People should stop being stupid.

Vote for me, my friend

It didn't take me a current election period and campaign posters all over university to realize one thing: that student elections are mainly accounts of popularity.

Ever since I was in middle school, it was usually the kid who was the most popular who won the elections for president in school. Wearing the colours of your friend's campaign is sign of support, and if you went to the other candidate, it was like a friendship betrayal.

Needless to say, that it's all about the candidates' public image, how they protray themselves to others publicly. I remember when I was young in like grade 5, I was torn between two campaigns because my friends group got divided into two: one going for purple and green, and the other for yellow and orange. Did I know what their slates were about? Nah-uh. But the puple and the good looking guy running for president was enough to attract my attention...and my vote.

As I grew older, things changed slightly. With the campaigns going on this week at my university, it was inevitable for me to notice two guys I had a crush on are running for one slate. Yes, I voted for them. But also, one of my friends was running for the opposite slate. I voted for him too. So I basically voted for people I knew. But contrary to my younger years, I did read what each candidates were proposing to improve university and student life. Thought I didn't really care much since I am going to be out of this place next year anyways.

But elections, let me emphasize it, it's about popularity. Even I have experiences that before, in the good way. Last year I ran for VP Communications for my college, and through a series of clever posters, fond speech during candidates debate, and friendly socializing mostly with residence people (which accounts for a vast amount of people as potential voters), I won the position. I didn't win because people were more interested about my visualization of the college compared to my opponents, but because I sold myself to them to vote for me. The results were pretty close, but I think the big advantage I had was that I had the vote from residence people, whereas my other two opponents have little contact with the new residents. I can say I had 75 friends at that time.

At least this kind of elections happen majorly in student elections. At least some people do take politics as a serious issue, and study the candidates well before electing them as rulers. It's a shame most people don't take it seriously.

4th year and you suck at basics!

I just can't believe how some FOURTH YEAR students at UNIVERSITY still cannot make a good class presentation. And even worse, a power point presentation.

SO basically you get 5 different kinds of boring presentations and presenters:

#1 The "You-can't-read-my-slides"
This kind of presenter tends to read everything from the slides, and by everything I mean EVERYTHING.


#2 The "I-Just-Wrote-Everything-Up"
This kind comes prepared for the presentation and came to class with only a written component in form of long notes or the summary they made, and decide to read it in front of the class. This is usually due to fear of public speech. Or not knowing what a boring presentation means.

#3 The "Quoter"
This person tries to fit eveything into a slide as much as they can with quotes because they are 'so important'


#4 The "Distractor"
This person make use of pictures in order to cover up for the bad content of the presentation.


#5 The "Monotone"
This person has the skill to keep one voice tone throughtout the whole presentation. The person does not express any sort of emotion at all. Clearly, the person was assigned with a topic they hate or was the last one to pick the topic that nobody else wanted.


This is university, you should be able to make a good class presentation by now. How are you going to be a successful public speecher if your slides suck and nobody is caring what you are saying because you are boring? even if you can't make an interesting presentation, picture yourself listening to your presentation.

Thank you. *insert applause here*