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Carleton University
The Carleton Quibbler
Volume 1, Issue 1.
A Three Part Series
March 11, 2010
Carleton Students Steal from Own Pockets
RRRA fights to deter theft in Abstentions, continues making profits
anyways
By: Adrianna Banaszek
Carleton Students are stealing from
themselves when they
take a chocolate bar from
the campus convenience
store.
The Rideau River
Residence Association
(RRRA) advertises the
Abstentions convenience
store as “your store” on
their website. It is a student-run business that
puts profits directly into
student programming
and services.
Aside from being
a one-stop shop for comfort food, some students
are attracted to location‟s
easy stealing.
“So many times
I‟ve walked into Abstentions and took something
without anyone noticing.
I just hide in an aisle and
put things in my hoodie,”
says a Carleton student
who wishes to remain
anonymous.
The store is
equipped with two security cameras and mirrors,
along with signs saying
“smile you‟re on camera”
to discourage theft, but
the precautionary measures do not work well.
“It‟s so crowded
and the cameras are positioned so that you can‟t
really see everything,”
says Slevana Morcos, a
cashier at Abstentions.
Student‟s who
steal do not see the security precautions as deterrence. “[The cameras] are
there just to scare us.
They‟re probably not
turned on,” says the student who steals regularly.
These “freebies”
are well accounted for
when management reviews stock every week.
“I hear that we lose a lot
of money so I‟m guessing
yeah there is a difference
[in stock count],” says
Morcos.
Surprisingly,
even though stock is unaccountable for, there is a
rise in sales.
Abstentions sales
are up by $68,000 this
year compared to last,
says Christopher Infantry, who oversees financial matters and manages
businesses as president of
the RRRA.
“Does that mean
more people are in the
store? Yes. Does that
mean more people are
stealing? Probably. I
guess it‟s all relative,”
says Infantry, avoiding
any harsh judgments on
the student body.
When students
steal products, the irony
of stealing out of their
own pockets is unapparent.
“Students don‟t
see the direct relationship
between spending money
or supporting a studentrun business and the programming” the profits
support, says Infantry.
Infantry says
that RRRA launched a
campaign this year to
support student-run business by avoiding feeding
vending machines, known
as the “monsters” and
publicizing the irony that
theft is “stealing from
yourself.”
“As miniscule as
it, a lot of people will
make a bigger impact.”
Robbery at Abstentions has become a
major cause for concern
PAGE 2
T HE C A R LE T O N Q U I B B LE R
V O LU M E 1 , I S S U E 1 .
Carleton students trade resort bracelets
for hand tools
By Ally Foster
While most university
students spent reading week
lying in the sun and indulging
in a constant flow of Piña Colada‟s, a group of Carleton undergraduates swung hammers,
painted walls and drafted lesson
plans for kindergarteners.
The Alternative Spring
Break program, run by the Student Experience Office at Carleton University for the last four
years, sent 49 students to three
locations in February: the Florida Everglades, Mobile, Alabama and Ottawa in an effort to
help both local and international communities.
“The goal of the program is essentially to allow students to merge the things they
are learning about in the classroom with personal experiences.” says Joe Lipsett, the
program coordinator.
Lipsett acknowledges
that traveling with the program
is more expensive and more
work than an all-inclusive trip,
but the experience is rewarding.“ It‟s a journey to find out
more about yourself.” he says
“[The students] find out what
they‟re interested in, how they
can actually contribute to the
world and what they mean in
alarger frame. It helps to give
people clarity about what
should be important in their lives.”
Kristina Dunbar, a secondyear student went with 24 others to
Mobile, Alabama. There, they built
houses with Habitat for Humanity for
impoverished families and those left
homeless by Hurricane Katrina. She
explains how they worked on four different homes in multiple stages. The
group roofed one day, painted another, and framed a house during the
last day of construction.
“I loved it. I didn‟t want to
come home! You learn just so much
about yourself.” she says.
Dunbar confidently states she
wouldn‟t trade her excursion to Alabama for a relaxing vacation in the
south, despite the fact that they
worked in temperatures just above
zero. She recounts a story of seeing
two little boys playing in a new
driveway in a newly built subdivision.
“The one little boy was on
his scooter and said „Look how long
my driveway is! I have so much
room!‟ ” she says with a smile. “You
think about what they may have
had before, and now they‟re just so
appreciative.”
Next year, Alternative
Spring Break will be taking on community projects in Ottawa, Guatemala and Mexico. Applications can
be filled out online and are due by
the end of September.
Carleton Students lent and hand wherever they were needed.
Paralympic Apathy Criticized
By Ally Foster
In the weeks leading up to the
Vancouver 2010 Olympic winter games, the Carleton campus was a sea of red mittens
and “Believe” sweaters as patriotism and excitement
swelled. CTV focused on little else
during the two weeks of competition,
and the men‟s gold metal hockey game
between Canada and the U.S broke
rating records in Canada with 16.6
million viewers.
But another television record is about to be broken as the
Paralympic Games kick off tomorrow in Vancouver. CTV will be
PAGE 3
offering 57 hours of coverage, the most televised exposure
that the Paralympic Games have
ever received.
This coverage will broadcast only one live event which will
be Canada‟s sledge hockey game as
well as show recaps and highlights
from the days‟ events. If viewers
want to watch entire events, they
will have to either purchase a payper-view channel of it or download
coverage from the internet.
There is no live broadcasting of the Paralympics in both the
U.S and the UK.
Although this is the most
coverage the Paralympics has ever
received, some say that in comparison with the thousands of hours
that the Olympic Games garnered,
it is disappointing.
“I think a lot of people don‟t
T HE C A R LE T O N Q U I B B LE R
know a lot about the Paralympics…
but still, that‟s no excuse for such a
disparity. They work just as hard as
any other athletes, why are they
getting any less?” asks Carleton
student Gino Giannetti.
Giannetti is bound to a motorized wheelchair due to weakness
in his leg muscles.
“People with disabilities
have more difficulties in life and the
fact that [the athletes] can rise
above those difficulties and accomplish something so major,” he says,
“It‟s inspirational”.
Giannetti thinks the limited broadcasting is discouraging
because it doesn‟t allow Canadians
to see what the athletes have
worked their whole lives to accomplish.
“I think they should give
people the opportunity to watch it
V O LU M E 1 , I S S U E 1 .
and get interested in it” he says.
Graham Perrin from the
Carleton Disability Awareness Centre is also upset with the 57 hours
of coverage.
Perrin thinks that the
Paralympic athletes deserve more
coverage and that having more exposure would raise awareness about
the struggles and triumphs of those
who live with disabilities.
Perrin drew attention to the
hype that was built up through
commercials, clothing and advertising for the Olympics and is disappointed that all of that seems to
have died down during the two
week break between the Olympic
and Paralympic games.
He feels that the Paralympic athletes deserve equality.
“They‟re still athletes, and
they‟re fuckin‟ great athletes!”
Not The Usual Suspect
By Grace Protopapas
The University of Ottawa
Gee-Gees‟ player sprints down the
court all alone, with a quick glance
behind him he dribbles in for the
easy lay-up. But all of a sudden in
flies Cole Hobin smacking the ball
away from the hoop and shoving it
back down the throat of the GeeGee, the crowd goes crazy.
Whenever the Carleton
University men‟s basketball team is
mentioned people usually think of
players like Kevin McCleery or
Mike Kenny. But as Canadian
Interuniversity Sport (CIS) Championships approach it‟ll be third
year player Cole Hobin that Carleton looks to in order to defend their
national title.
“He‟s athletic and he makes
things tough for the best players,”
says head coach Dave Smart, “He
forces guys to work a little harder
for their points and that‟s what you
need every game.”
Hobin was recently named
Ontario University Athletics (OUA)
East defensive player of the year.
“It feels great.” says Hobin,
“It‟s nice to have a goal and then
accomplish it.”
Hobin led Carleton with 12
blocks and 31 steals making him a
standout in the OUA East division.
“He definitely deserved it.
He has a really good focus and gets
into the other guy‟s head.” says second year teammate Kyle
Smendziuk.
Hobin also collected 109
rebounds, 77 of which were on the
defensive end of the floor. Huge
blocks and sneaky steals are a specialty of Hobin‟s and usually result
in the eruption of the Carleton Raven‟s Nest.
“He always gets the best
offensive player. He‟s covered Josh
Gibson Bascombe and Boris Bakovic
and he‟s done a really good job,”
says Smart.
Both Gibson Bascombe,
OUA East player of the year, and
Bakovic lead their teams, University of Ottawa and Ryerson University, in scoring. It‟s Hobin‟s job to
shut them down and he did just
that on Saturday Mar. 6 when
Carleton defeated the Gee-Gees 7864 and Hobin was named player of
the game. He kept Gibson Bascombe to only 17 points while scoring a game high 25 of his own to
lead the Ravens.
“His energy is what makes
him great and what brings some of
our intensity to our team,” says
Smart. Smendziuk agrees.
“He‟s always demanding us
to work as hard as he tries to,” says
Smendziuk, “He definitively gets on
our case a lot but he‟s a great guy.”
Hobin has been playing
basketball since he was eight years
old.
“I love how fast it is.” says
Hobin, “It‟s constant go and you
gotta be quick.”
Hobin continued to say he
would love to play basketball after
school but doesn‟t have any set
plans so far. For now he‟s looking
towards the CIS Championships
and says his goal and the team‟s is
the exact same.
“To win it,” says Hobin.
V O LU M E 1 , I S S U E 1 .
T HE C A R LE T O N Q U I B B LE R
PAGE 4
Students Struggled for Summer Jobs, new Survey Says
By Gord Lamb
Last year, Riley Byrne went home
to Peterborough for his summer
vacation. He spent the summer
with his friends, relaxing at the
lake and even went on vacation,
but no matter how hard searched,
he could not find a job.
“I just wanted to work,”
he says.
Byrne, a second-year public affairs student at Carleton
University, spent the first 10
weeks of his summer vacation
applying for jobs. Finally, in midJuly, Byrne was able to find a job
installing office furniture.
Byrne was not the only
student who struggled to find a
summer job last year, a new survey reports.
The survey, released Monday, was conducted by the Canadian Alliance of Student Associa-
tions, an organization representing 25 university student associations in Canada. It says that last
summer nearly one-third of university students in Canada were
unable to find a fulltime job.
He had difficulty finding
a summer job because of last
year‟s recession, says Byrne.
“Peterborough‟s economy is
tied heavily to GM,” he says.
“When it struggles, we all do.”
While hunting for jobs,
Byrne says he tried to make ends
meet by chopping wood for
neighbouring farmers.
“It wouldn‟t have been so
bad, if I didn‟t have the physique
of a 12-year-old,” Byrne says.
Hatchard. After weeks of looking,
Hatchard eventually found a yearround job helping other students
find summer jobs.
Hatchard works for Employment Ontario‟s Summer Job
Service Program. The program,
sponsored by the Ontario Government, encourages businesses to
hire students by paying companies two dollars for every hour a
student works.
Hatchard is responsible
for pairing companies with summer students. He says he has
learned a few tricks that can
make students stand out to employers.
“Tailor your resume,” he
says. Hatchard explains that it is
important to have a strong resume because it is the first thing
an employer looks at.
“Even if you don‟t have
work experience,” Hatchard says,
“as long as you put down good
attributes and volunteer work,
employers will take a look.”
Hatchard also suggests
that students start their summer
job hunt early. “The earlier the
better,” he says.
This is advice that Byrne
wishes he had followed last summer.
Riley Byrne was one of many students who had trouble finding a job last summer.
Latin American Family Reaches
Out
When the secondlargest earthquake in Chile's history hit the city of Concepcion
on Feb. 27, Christina Navarro's
first thoughts were of her family
in Chile.
Her next thoughts were
of her family in Canada, the Humanitarian Organization of Latin
American Students or HOLAS.
HOLAS, founded and run
by Carleton students, is fundamentally a humanitarian and
cultural group, says President
Gabriel Estrela Pinto.
"We function in a way to
not only give a second home to
Latin American students, but we
provide an educational bridge
between people here and Latin
American," says Pinto.
The organization offers
a number of activities to members, like free lessons in Spanish
and Portuguese, salsa dancing,
and potluck dinners on top of
their humanitarian work. Each
year, the group dedicates itself
to raising money for causes in
Latin American countries. In
2008, HOLAS raised $15,000 for
By Michelle Blanchard
Friends of Honduran Children, a
Canadian organization that
sponsors orphanages in Honduras.
says their thoughts went immediately to an uncle who lives in
Cob Cue Cura, just south of the
epicentre in Concepion.
"We look for projects
that are sustainable," says Pinto.
"We put a lot of research into
how the money is going to be
used. Is it going to be administrative costs? Is it going to be
used to buy a water pump for a
community that needs more
water for a growing population?
We really look into it so the
money goes to good use."
"Immediately, we
started Skyping,” she said in reference to the popular internet
video chat service, “we started
trying to get contact, but unfortunately, because of the earthquake all the lines were down, it
was impossible to get a hold of
anyone.”
Navarro, who acts as VP
of Finance for HOLAS, was born
in Canada and raised by Chilean
parents who fled the country
during the military coup of the
1970s. Navarro says considers
herself primarily Chilean.
Finally, through a cousin
with a Blackberry Navarro was
able to confirm that all her family members were safe, though
her uncle's home was destroyed.
Navarro says she turned
immediately to HOLAS to request that some of their efforts
go toward Chile. HOLAS has re"I was always involved in sponded by extending the funds
raised from their upcoming
the cultural aspect," says
dance event for Haiti to Chilean
Navarro. "My parents were alaid as well.
ways hosting Latin events. The
stuff we eat at home is always
"When Chile came, we
Chilean."
had this brotherhood kind of
Navarro's family was
watching CNN Live when news
of the earthquake broke. She
incentive. They need our help,
we have to help," says Pinto.
Navarro says they're
looking at a number of organizations to donate the money to,
including Un Techo para Chile,
which combats poverty and
homeless in Chile.
Despite the club's diverse background -- Pinto is Brazilian, while other members
come from a variety of Latin
American countries and some
Canada‟s “Top Secret” Olympic Weapon
By Grace Protopapas
With all of Canada behind her Maëlle
Ricker jostled and carved her way down the
mountain to a gold medal in Vancouver’s 2010
Winter Olympics in snowboard cross. But, what
Canada didn’t know was that Maëlle had another support system, a top secret one.
“The project started in January 2006,”
says National Research Council of Canada (NRC)
scientist Dr. Guy Larose.
“We proposed the project to Own the
Podium.” he says, “We were helping the athletes to reach their maximum potential.”
Larose and Annick d’Auteuil, a Carleton
University Ph.D. candidate in mechanical and
aerospace engineering, worked with athletes
over the past four years measuring their aerodynamic drag.
“The goal was to help the athletes get
to their best performance at the Olympics,”
says d’Auteuil.
In sports where speed is the critical factor, athletes are always looking to shave off
hundreds of a second.
“The athletes came to the wind tunnel
in their Olympic gear and we measured the resistance of the air. We tried to minimize that
resistance or drag by changing their body position, or even their gear” says Larose.
At first the main focus of the project
was the Olympic speed skaters. The two NRC
researchers analyzed different body positions
but most importantly, the suits of the athletes.
“The suit they were wearing was really a
product of NRC research,” says Larose.
Larose and d’Auteuil were able to improve
the gear by measuring the different amounts of aerodynamic drag that came with the different fabrics, or
shapes of the skin suits. Once the best results were
found it was presented to Descente Ltd., the manufacturer, who quickly made the modifications.
“The goal was to provide the athletes with
the best technology possible so that their equipment
wouldn’t slow them down,” says Larose.
Although speed skating was the focus of the
project Larose and d’Auteuil were able to help athletes in 11 other Winter sports including snowboard
and ski cross, skeleton, luge, alpine skiing, para-alpine
skiing, nordic skiing/biathlon, para-nordic skiing, freestyle aerial skiing, snowboard and bobsleigh.
“It was all about the same thing.” says d’Auteuil, “Different sports use different positions but for
both we worked on changing the positions and their
equipment.”
It seems to have worked. Canada set a new
record in gold medals won by one country in a Winter
Games ending with a total of 13.
“We were so happy for them because we
now how much work they put into it,” says Larose.
But NRC’s job isn’t over yet. Now, after the
Olympic Games have finished, they look back to Vancouver for the Paralympics’ Games.
It‟s a Whale of a Tale
By Chris Uhlig
Her head weighs over a thousand kilograms, and measures over five metres
long. Her spine is just being assembled; each vertebra is bigger than a
human torso.
When she‟s complete in roughly a
week, she‟ll weigh 2.3 metric tonnes.
From tip to tail she‟ll be 19 metres
long.
She‟s called Tallulah. She‟s the skeleton of a blue whale, the largest species
of animal on earth, and she‟s going to
be the centrepiece of the Canadian
Museum of Nature‟s new Water Gallery.
“This exhibit, I think, will get a „wow‟
factor,” says Carol Campbell, senior
project manager for the Water Gallery
project.
Tallulah‟s story begins in 1975, when
she was found dead on a beach in
Codroy, Newfoundland. She was donated to the Canadian Museum of
Nature, at the time known as the National Museum of Natural Sciences.
Her flesh and muscles were then removed through a process called flensing.
Buried for eight years in Ottawa to
finish decaying, she was dug up in
1983. In 2006, after years in storage,
it was proposed that she be reconstructed.
Clayton Kennedy, senior collections
technician at the Museum, was placed
in charge of putting Tallulah back
together. He explains the difficult
process of reconstructing the whale,
from draining oil from the bones, to reconstructing damaged vertebrae.
“I can only say it‟s been a challenge,” he says with a laugh.
Tallulah rests on a custom-made steel frame in her room at the Museum, with wires suspending her from the ceiling. Two technicians
stand near the ceiling on a Skyjack scissor-lift, attaching more wires.
Her ribs are stacked off to the side of the room under a sheet of
opaque plastic. Her vertebrae, some of which are partly or completely
constructed artificially, are arranged in sections.
The Water Gallery exhibit will feature over 200 specimens of marine
life, as well as aquariums with both fresh and saltwater wildlife, says
Campbell. She says that having Tallulah as an addition to the exhibit
is especially exciting.
“We latched onto that idea, because every exhibit needs a centrepiece,” she says.
Tallulah also isn‟t the only thing in pieces. The Canadian Museum of
Nature has been under renewal since 2004. Tallulah‟s debut is scheduled for May 22, which also marks the unveiling of the fully renovated
museum, parts of which are currently closed.
Campbell says she can‟t wait for the grand opening.
“It‟s really a feeling of awe, and you don‟t get that from many experiences in life,” she says.
Overheard and Underthought
By Michelina Teti
Failing an exam does not
mean that it “raped you”. Your
professor might be very boring,
but he is not “lame” or “gay”.
acy, positive body image, a “kissin” promoting all relationships
not just the heterosexual ones,
and racialized violence.
The Overheard and Underthought campaign‟s aim is to
spread this message.
“Today [in the atrium]
we are presenting a Carnival of
Language that‟s incorporating a
bunch of different interactive
games with food, prizes and a lot
of fun to spread our message,”
explains Meagan Forest of Overheard and Underthought.
“We are trying to raise
awareness of oppressive language that‟s being used on campus,” says Rachel Sokolsky, one
of the students organizing the
campaign.
Sokolsky believes their
campaign is really important beShe says words like gay, cause it incorporates all forms of
lame, fat, slut, and retarded,
oppression discussed in gender
have become normalized in evestudies, like age, race, sexual
ryday language and conversation. orientation, class and gender.
“These words are really
offensive to people and create a
hostile environment,” she says.
Sokolsky and her class
members created the campaign
for their women and gender studies class called, Feminism, Activism and Social Justice. Each tutorial group created a social justice campaign to create a safer
place on campus.
out, its amazing.”
“We‟ve become so sensitized to it that we forget that
these words actually have meaning and hurt people,” says Rachel.
“Our goal is to raise
enough awareness so that the
Carleton community begins to
think before they speak and realize the repercussions of the
words and have a fun time while
learning about it as well,” says
Meagan Forest, a social worker
major at CU.
Forest‟s least favourite
comment she hears on campus is,
“that‟s so retarded”.
Today‟s Carnival in“Our goal is to increase
cluded a “popping for prejudice”
the
awareness
so all together we
balloon pop where students can
can
create
a
safe
space,” she says.
pop balloons with words like slut,
“We need to have respect”
bitch and cripple on them.
Most importantly Rachel
says, there is a display of word
bubbles where students can write
down what they‟ve heard on campus. Throughout the day a large
list of offensive comments have
appeared. “It‟s different when
Some other campaigns
created by students in the gender you overhear the words, but
studies class include media liter- when you actually see it written
Redmen end Ravens season By: Michelle Blanchard
After a 6-2 defeat from
the McGill University Redmen
on home ice that put them out
of the OUA East semi-final, it's
hard for the Carleton Ravens
men's hockey team not to feel a
little disappointed.
But going toe-to-toe
with what's considered one of
the best teams in the league isn't an all bad experience, says
forward Justin Caruana.
"We knew it was going
to be tough, because they're a
good team, so we had the
chance to put them away at
home here and we let that slip,"
says Caruana. "They're a championship team, so it was a
tough game, but the better team
won that night. It's a tough way
to lose but it happens."
The team kicked off the
2009-2010 season with a clear
goal ahead of them: the Ontario
University Athletics (OUA)
East championship. Since losing to Université du Quebec á
Trois-Rivières in last season's
quarter-finals, they were ready
to make the most out of their
more seasoned members.
But mere hours after
Team Canada's men's hockey
won gold at the Vancouver
Olympics, the Ravens saw defeat once more.
Next season's goal is
clear, says Caruana.
"We want to be that
team in the finals, where
McGill is right now," he says.
"We're looking to improve our
consistency and overall play,
learn to be a championship
team."
This season sees the departure of four veteran players:
defence Mark Smith and centers Ryan Medel, Jared Cipparone, and Derek Wells.
Recruitment is well under way, said General Manager
George Hunter in the Ravens
newsletter, and next season
looks promising.
"You always looking at
good guys and from what I hear
we've got some good players
coming in. You just look for
guys who are willing to be on
board and help out the team as
best they can," says Caruana.
After bypassing Queen's
in the OUA East playoffs,
Carleton took an early lead
against McGill, beating them 52 at the Feb. 24 faceoff.
But McGill came back
on Feb. 26 with a 5-1 win and
forced Carleton into a third and
final game. Despite goals by
Smith and Mark Byrd and an
aggressive game from the entire
team, the Ravens' season met
its end.
For Caruana, there's
nothing but to try again next
season. "You can only do so
much, right so we're happy with
what we did," he says. "We
know what we've got to work
on and what to go for next
year."
Earth Hour Fast Approaching By: Adrianna Banaszek
Linda Rossman was environmentally enlightened while
watching the evening news two
years ago. Her quest to bring sustainability awareness to Carleton
University gains momentum at
this time of year as Earth Hour
quickly approaches.
“If the Sydney Opera
House and Google could go dark
for one hour, then we should do
something in our little corner of
the world too,” says Rossman,
Associate University Librarian at
Carleton.
Earth Hour began in Sydney, Australia in 2007 with close
to 2.2 million people participating.
Carleton followed pursuit along
with many cities and organizations world-wide within a year of
the landmark trial.
Rossman brought the
Earth Hour initiative to the
Carleton library in 2008, turning
lights off for an hour on three
floors with “minimal student protest.”
This simple act of switching lights off on three floors cut
Carleton‟s power consumption by
23.6% in last year‟s Earth Hour
initiative.
Cheryl Schramm, engineering instructor, also led her
department into environmental
action after Rossman introduced
her to the concept. She was
helped by students to organize the
hour long “power-off” effort for the
past two years and is in the process of receiving permission to put
on the hour of darkness within a
couple weeks.
Schramm says she was
surprised with the amount of
“wasted” electricity at Carleton. It
took her, along with student help,
three hours to shut down the computers she had access to.
Along with the Carleton
faculty supporting the event,
Earth Hour 2010 is overwhelming
supported world-wide with over
49,463 confirmed Facebook guests
joining the movement.
Schramm believes that
Earth Hour is a process that
should carry on into people‟s daily
lives and not be strictly reserved
to one hour of the year. “If we got
into the habit of the last person
out the room turning off the
lights, lots of energy would be
saved,” says Schramm.
“Last year students
wanted to continue working [in
the library] with the lights turned
off because it put less strain on
their eyes,” says Rossman, laugh-
ing at the ease of acceptance
amongst the student body.
With faculty setting a
good example in the name of the
environment, students are urged
to follow pursuit. Earth Hour
2010 takes place on March 27th
from 8:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.
Kids Eager of Brains at Neuroscience Awareness Week
By: Gord Lamb
Within two sentences of
starting his presentation, Alfonso
Abizaid already had 14 students who
wanted to ask questions about the
brain he had brought to Orleans
Wood Elementary School.
“The brain was a real hit,”
explained Abizaid.
Abizaid’s talk was part of
Ottawa’s Brain Awareness Week, an
education campaign organized by
faculty and students from both the
University of Ottawa and Carleton
University. Students from 15 schools
in Ottawa participated in presentations that explored the power of the
brain.
“We want to teach them
something relevant to what they experience in their daily life,” says Abizaid, a professor of neuroscience at
Carleton University.
Abizaid explains that the
organizers of the week have created
two different presentations for students. Presentations to elementary
students explore how the five senses
work, while the presentations to high
school students discuss the impact of
drug use.
tion. The foundation which promotes explosion.”
neurological research, has help sponAbizaid says he is impressed
sor Brain Awareness Week for the
by
how
much
students understand
past 15 years.
about the brain. He recalls the presThis year, organizations
entation he made yesterday at Orfrom more than 75 countries are par- leans Wood Elementary School.
ticipating in Brain Awareness Week, “They could understand how our
in order to draw attention to the field brain works at least a basic level,” he
of neuroscience.
says. “They are pretty smart, those
kids.”
One of the goals of the campaign, Abizaid explains, is to correct
Response to the program
some of the misconceptions about
has been overwhelming, Abizaid
neuroscience. “When you go and tell says. “The feedback from the
somebody that you are a neuroscien- schools... has been very positive both
tist, they figure we are very complifor us as well as the schools and the
cated people and do very complikids.
cated things,” he says. “Ultimately, we
Because of the
want make sure they know we are
just trying to understand the brain.” “overwhelming” success of the program, Abizaid says that he thinks the
These presentations are
program will run for many years to
meant to be as interactive as possicome.
ble, explains Ottawa’s Brain Awareness Week organizer, Catherine
Smith.
Smith, who is working on
her PhD in Neuroscience at Carleton
University, says the best way to get
students’ attention is by letting them
participate.
“With the elementary
schools, we had lots of little demonstrations where the kids could participate,” she says. Smith explains
that to show the interaction of
senses, students are told to balance a
piece of candy on their tongue while
Ottawa’s Brain Awareness
plugging nose. When the students
Week is part of an international cam- unplug their noses, they experience
paign organized by the Dana Founda- what she has dubbed as a “flavour
“We try to choose topics
that will interest the kids,” he explains. “We want to make sure that
the topics cover things that they
might not know about.”
Vagina Monologues
The women began by
listing off a handful of names for
a woman’s “down there” – Pink
taco, kootchie-snortcher, monkey box, poonanie to name a
few.
“In Ottawa we call [the
vagina] a salty Prime Minister,”
one actress stated.
“But when a woman is
going through a dry spell she
calls it a prorogue of parliament!” another woman added.
Over 30 women came
together this past weekend to
perform The Vagina Monologues at Carleton University.
The Vagina Monologues, written in 1996 by Eve
Ensler, was originally to celebrate the vagina and femininity
but became something more.
They are now used to help foster the movement to stop all
forms of violence against
women.
Proceeds of the performance are going towards the
Ottawa Rape Crisis Center and
the V-Day Organization.
V-Day is a global movement to stop violence against
women and girls.
“I grew up surrounded
by staunch feminists,” Margot
Challborn recalls. “I remember
seeing many different copies of
The Vagina Monologues on our
bookshelf at home… so it was
By Michelina Teti
something I was vaguely familiar
with from an early age.”
When the opportunity
arose this year to participate in
the monologues, Challborn
thought it was a great opportunity to be a small, but integral
part of a production that works
to end violence against women.
Many monologues deal
with everyday issues surrounding being a woman. Whether it
be a 72 year old women’s first
orgasm, the discomfort of using
“dry cotton tampon”, to the
pain and pride of giving birth or
hair “down there”– all monologues deal with the vagina.
Although some monologues are humorous and lighthearted, most deal with very
serious matters of violence including the horrific crimes of
rape, battery, female genital
mutilation and sex slavery.
Challborn says that although it is difficult to jump into
these serious and emotional
roles, the struggle to do so successfully is well worth it because
these forms of violence “are a
reality for many women around
the world.”
One in six American
women have been the victim of
an attempted or completed
rape, according to the National
Crime Victimization Survey done
in 2004, and many rapes go un-
reported.
Challborn says, “to be
the voice… that can share some
women's story who may not be
able to share her own is an incredible opportunity.”