Sajila Nudrat | Health Editor
Featured image courtesy of Jasmine Wiradharma
This year’s YFS election saw an 11 per cent turnout voting rate. With last year’s 12 per cent turnout, the question remains: what went wrong?
When asked why she didn’t vote, an anonymous third-year student replied: “I didn’t know anything about the election, I didn’t know who was running or the parties involved.” A response that seems to be the general consensus among the student population. Some students hold a ‘what would one vote do?’ attitude, while others seem to genuinely lack interest entirely.
If those reasons don’t seem to hit the nail on the head, then it’s not from a lack of interest, but more from a lack of knowledge in the political happenings of the school that led to a lackluster election. An anonymous third-year Schulich student didn’t vote because she said nothing ever changes. Last year, YFS’ biggest accomplishment was the procurement of a Fall reading week—something that felt inevitable given the fact every other all post-secondary institution has one.
During the three years I’ve been at York, YFS has been promising a fight for free tuition, with no progress made. The unrealistic goals of the student government not only deter students from participating in school politics, but makes student government seem like a hoax. It seems they spend the year planning for a welcome-back concert that ends with a last-minute obscure artist, who most students have not heard of and have no interest in seeing. They spend a compounding period promising to eradicate tuition. Not only is this a far-fetched dream that is both unreasonable and highly unattainable; it’s a mockery of student government.
By championing themselves throughout the year as the voice of students dedicated to making a change, but having no concrete results at the end of the year, shows no progress. How can students become more interested, when there’s nothing for them to see?
Voting during election period is also a hindrance as there’s no access to online voting. In the age of technology, not providing a means for online voting is almost as counterproductive as promising free tuition, only for OSAP funding to be cut.
The YFS does not publicize debates, which effectively keeps students in the dark. No one really knows what’s happening behind the scenes. YFS has been contacted numerous times, but without fail, have always refrained from speaking to the media. How can students be informed or aware of what’s happening in their own student government, when the government fails to disclose such information?
The fact of the matter is, we don’t really know what goes on behind closed doors—where our tuition money goes, or whose pocket it goes into. Unfortunately, that just seems to be the way it is. Nothing is permanent and everyone comes and goes (just recently, the University of Ottawa’s administration terminated their agreement with the student union due to corruption).
So here’s hoping the new student government does better—while we accept that things will very likely stay exactly the same.
