SAMRU seeks students’ signatures
Signed letters will be sent to the government demanding funding
Dayla Brown
News Editor
Students Association of Mount Royal University president Eric Queenan, (left) and vice-president student life, Zoe Sulsar, show of a selection of letters they collected from concerned students on MRU’s main street.
Photo by: Kaity Brown
On Oct. 8 Students Association of Mount Royal University (SAMRU) executives set up a booth and called for students to sign letters to Don Scott, Alberta Minister of Innovation and Advanced Education, and Jim Prentice, Premier of Alberta, demanding the government follow through on funding they’ve been promising since 2009.
SAMRU executives are aiming for 1000 letters to be signed, and according to SAMRU president Erik Queenan, they already have 300-400 letters ready to be sent.
“We’ll be setting up our booth next week as well,” says Queenan, “We’re going to start sending them at the end of this month.”
Originally the letters were attended for Don Scott only. Zoe Slusar, vice-president student life, said that the level of engagement has been higher than expected among the student body.
“Based on how positive the response has been we decided to send some to Jim Prentice as well, to be as effective as possible.”
Queenan also says, “We thought about it and at the end of the day Jim is the Premier and this is his responsibility and should be his concern. We want to make sure the concern is raised with the right people.”
Slusar says the letters will be sent in increments, starting with one letter one week, increasing to 50 the next, then up to 100 the following, and so on.
Earlier this month proposals for market modifiers were announced to students, resulting in a campus-wide backlash. Last Thursday students paraded the hallways protesting, holding signs and chanting, “The students united will never be defeated!”
The deadline for the proposals was on Oct. 15, and a decision on the market-modifier increases is expected mid-Nov. Queenan says he’s “cautiously optimistic.”
“Very, very cautiously. Proposals have been rejected in the past. I wouldn’t be surprised with any result on whether the proposals will go through or not.”
