GRAHAM STREICH

THE MARK$FREE.99 MONDAY MARCH 24th, 2014

SHIFT IN FOUNDATION HUMANITIES

ADMIN RESPONDS TO SEXUAL ASSAULT CONCERNS

The days of choosing two courses from Fate & Virtue, Identity & Perspective, and Reason & Freedom, and then deciding between World Religions and Dimensions of Music, are nearly over. Quest’s Foundation Humanities program is undergoing a significant shift and, starting in Sep-tember, it will offer courses in Texts, Scholarship, and Culture. Students will take one of each. “The [current] model has been around since the University’s inception more or less … [and] there are some anomalies in that system,” said Hu-manities tutor André Lambelet. “Why would you trade religion against mu-sic? No particularly good reason, ex-cept that that is the personnel that we had then.” For almost two years now, Quest’s entire Humanities Faculty has been discussing what sorts of changes they might want to make to the ex-isting Foundation, and what the new Foundation might look like. The pro-posal for the new Foundation was sent

KENDRA PERRIN

Significant changes to Quest’s humanities Foundation to be implemented next fall

Editors-in-ChiefTari Ajadi & Jake SmithContributing Editors

Caleah Dean & Jonathan von Ofenheim

News EditorAlessandro Tersigni

Opinion EditorZach Kershman

Arts and Culture EditorKendra Perrin

Sports & Health EditorKevin Berna

Editors-at-large Brad Klees & Maris Winters

THE MARKTenth Edition

to the faculty’s curriculum committee for feedback in January. Then in Feb-ruary, the proposal was discussed at an all-faculty meeting and adopted by vote at the following meeting. The changes in the Human-ities Foundation were provoked by two factors. First, shortcomings in the current system demanded a response. “From our perspective as faculty, the current Foundation didn’t do a good job of dividing learning outcomes or course objectives clearly among the various courses, so we had a hard time ensuring that all students came out of the Foundation with the skills we’d like them to have in the Concentration,” said Humanities tutor James Byrne. Second, the changes are moti-vated by the University’s growth – not just in size, but also in the possible breadth of the curriculum. “As we grow and bring in more disciplines, it has become more pressing to think about how we might […] teach undergradu-ate humanities in a way that captures the diversity of these fields,” said Lam-belet. The humanities truly are a field

with diverse disciplines: there is liter-ature, language, history, philosophy, music, religious studies, theatre, and film. Right now, the Foundation Hu-manities try to do a bit of each disci-pline, but “not quite the way that we would like to,” said Lambelet. He wor-ries that students are left confused – that they finish a Humanities block and are not quite sure what they just did. The new system of Texts, Scholarship and Culture will not try to break up the disciplines; it will stick with Quest’s interdisciplinary tradition. What it will try to do is clarify that, amongst the many different disciplines of the Humanities, there are common modes of thought. The hope is that practicing these modes of thought will help students of all academic interests explore their Questions. Texts courses will focus on pri-mary texts in the broad sense (includ-ing things like films and symphonies). They will work to develop skills such as close reading, and will explore a partic-ular genre. ‘The Divine Comedy’ and ‘The Symphony’ are examples of what will be offered.

Scholarship courses will focus on a major scholarly debate in the hu-manities. “It’s looking at what scholars do, rather than looking at the primary sources,” said Lambelet. Examples are ‘Death of the Author’ and ‘Chinese Film and Transnationalism.’ Finally, Culture courses will focus on a specific culture, developing skills in cultural interpretation and fa-miliarizing students with broader theo-ries on culture and meaning. ‘National-ism’ and ‘Reading the City’ will be two of the courses offered. This shift in Quest’s Founda-tion Humanities curriculum comes during a time of widespread discourse about the overall decline of humanities in undergraduate education. Lambelet gathers that one of the reasons for this decline is a mindset of pragmatism – students cannot countenance how studying 19th century French literature will help them ‘change the world.’ How-ever, this thinking may be too simple. “Our conviction is that the humanities are not irrelevant, that understanding one’s place in the world is crucial for the decisions that people make,” said Lambelet.

Ongoing student concern surrounding sexual assault on Quest’s campus culminated in an all-student meeting on Friday March 21. The meeting informed the student body of the finalized Human Rights Policy, which is in the process of being voted on by the Board of Governors. The Hu-man Rights Policy establishes a policy for how reported breaches of the Hon-our Principle, including sexual assault, harassment, and discrimination, will be dealt with by administration. Discussions about sexual as-sault on campus surfaced online this month on March 13 when MissJustice AtQuest, the pseudonym of a group of anonymous students, created a Face-book page to discuss their reports of sexual assault on Quest’s campus. The page’s discussion ended with the idea of starting a forum on campus to dis-cuss sexual assault. Concurrently with MissJus-tice AtQuest, other community mem-bers expressed concerns to members of the Student Health Working Group. Vrindy Spencer, a member of the Stu-dent Health Working Group said, “I’ve heard all the rumors of sexual assault happening on campus, but what real-ly pushed me to talk to the Adminis-tration and do something about it was when multiple people came to me to disclose information about sexual as-sault that had happened on campus...I couldn’t not do anything.” A group of students, on behalf

of the Student Health Working Group, explained to Quest’s President Dr. Da-vid Helfand that other means of dis-cussing sexual assault, such as MissJus-tice on Facebook and anecdotal stories, are insufficient methods of community awareness, action, and communica-tion. Following the suggestion of the Student Health Working Group, Hel-fand immediately called the impromp-tu all-student meeting. In the all-student meeting, Helfand informed the student body of how the Human Rights Policy was de-veloped to deal formally with violations of Quest’s Honour Principle, saying that “a committee was formed to exam-ine our separate … formal policies on Discrimination and Harassment and on Human Rights. This committee’s work has led to a new, unified Human Rights Policy.” Following Helfand’s speech, there was a community discussion among students and faculty where at-tendees brought up issues of consent, the bystander effect, peer training, and action plans. Helfand explained via email that the policy, “has been unanimously approved by the Academic Council … [and] will (I expect) be ratified by the Board at its next meeting [April 26].” The spirit of Quest’s existing Honour Principle served as the ethos for the construction of the Human Rights Pol-icy. The new Human Rights Policy will provide an explicit outline for how to deal with future incidents, includ-

HUMAN RIGHTS

PROPERTY OF WOODFIBRE LNG: NO TRESSPASSING7km from downtown Squamish and only accessible by boat, the Woodfibre industrial site recieves a closer look--en-vironmental degredation and remedia-tion in pictures on page B3.

ing keeping statistics on sexual assault and harassment, and hiring an exter-nal investigator to mitigate conflicts of interest. However, a procedure for the prevention of sexual assaults is not ad-dressed in the policy. Moreover, incidents that have already taken place or that may oc-cur before the policy is implemented are not under the official jurisdiction of the policy. Helfand noted, “even though our new policy is not formally in place, we have opted to use this pro-cedure [the new policy] for complaints filed this year and we are confident it will yield results consistent with our principles and our values as a commu-nity.”

The Mark will follow-up this report next block.

UKRAINE COMMUNITY DAYSQUAMISH RE-BUILDPHOTO ESSAY

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NEWSA2 || THE MARK

last Tuesday that she wants to celebrate diversity at Quest “beyond the flags in the cafeteria and some of the specials.” Aida intends to draw from the profes-sional training she received in provid-ing guidance and counsel to incoming international students as a peer coun-sellor. Aida also plans to work with the Foundation and Concentration Repre-sentatives to ensure that our curriculum is reflective of our international student body.

Foundation RepresentativeThe first order of business for newly elected Foundation Representative Nessa Bryce will be to check in with outgoing representative Lonnie Wake to diagnose outstanding issues from this past academic year and begin working on solutions. Bryce anticipates that the upcoming changes to the Humanities Program will be a priority in her role next year and she is prepared to come at it with the interests of her constituents in mind. “To me, being a part of the SRC means making a point of reaching out to fellow students, asking about their Quest experience and what they need to make their experience as fulfilling as possible.” Concentration RepresentativeNigel McKenzie, who ran unopposed in this year’s ministerial elections, has some big plans for the upcoming year. McKenzie intends to gage Quest’s suc-cess in equipping students with skills to succeed post-Quest by creating an exit survey for students to fill out upon the completion of their Keystone. McKen-zie hopes that from the feedback gen-erated these surveys will give Quest a direction to move in in ensuring student satisfaction across the board. McKenzie also wants to work out the kinks in the transfer credit process, as well as to pub-lish an academic journal showcasing the work of Quest students.

With the president voted out of office, a $15 billion bailout, 88 protest-ers dead, and a seceding state, many are wondering what on earth has happened in Ukraine. This past February thousands of protesters occupied Independence Square in downtown Kiev, enraged by the Ukrainian President, Viktor Yanu-kovych, and his rejection of a far-reach-ing accord with the European Union, opting instead for Russian financial sup-port. The Ukrainian parliament ousted Yanukovych on February 21st, replacing him with Oleksandr Turchynov as the new standing president. Now Russian forces have seized Crimea, formerly a region is southern Ukrainian state, and forced the military surrender of the re-gion. While Crimeans voted to secede from Ukraine on March 18th its au-tonomy is currently in dispute. In or-der to better understand this sequence of events, a look into the long-standing social history in Ukraine is necessary to shed light on the current situation. To begin to understand the historical framework of the conflict we must go all the way back to the Kievan Rus, a conglomeration of East Slavic

tribes in Europe at the beginning of the 13th Century. Western Ukraine has its origin here. The Mongols came from central Asia and invaded this swath of land one hundred years after the forma-tion of the Kievan Rus, then ceded it to the Kingdom of Poland. Russians, how-ever, only settled Eastern Ukraine much later in the 17th century. Here is where we see the first indications of the social, geographic, and political dichotomies that continue to cause rifts in the Ukrainian region to-day. During the centuries under Polish rule Western Ukraine increasingly ad-opted continental European culture and religion. The East, however, culturally, linguistically, and religiously distanced itself from mainland Europe, choosing Russian as its vernacular and Orthodox Christianity, not European Catholicism, as its religion. The Dnieper River divid-ed these two regions until the very end of the 17th century when Prussian, Aus-trian, and Russian forces destroyed the Polish Commonwealth. This “united” Ukraine, if only politically, as a singular region under Russian control. The re-gion stayed under Russian (and Soviet) rule all the way up to the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, even gaining part of Austrian territory after WWI.

WHAT’S HAPPENING IN UKRAINE?History doth shed much light

Today Ukraine is an indepen-dent nation but still sees deep rifts with-in its population. The western half of the country speaks Ukrainian and identifies as European, while the far-eastern terri-tories speak Russian and still maintain strong national ties with the Russian state. These rifts have continued into the country’s economics. President Yanu-kovych’s rejection of the EU accord in November garnered strong outcry from his western constituents. This enforced his growing reputation within the West as pro-Russian, and sparked the protests that would eventually lead to his being ousted from the presidency. With a weakened central gov-ernment and increasing separatist feel-ings in the east, Russia took the oppor-tunity to make claim to Crimea. Despite multiple threats and warnings of eco-nomic sanctions from the international community, Vladimir Putin, the Russian President, authorized military action on the Crimean Peninsula and assimilated the formerly Ukrainian region into the Russian state. This history, albeit extremely brief, provides us with a framework to better understand the east-west dichot-omy in Ukraine that is responsible for the current crisis.

KJELL REDAL

Minister of Finance The Students’ Association elected third year student Kelly McQuade for Minis-ter of Finance. As a member of the SRC in the upcoming school year, her goal is to help foster a thriving community at Quest where students are able to fund a variety of initiatives that benefit all. “My goal is to encourage students to propose events to the SRC that they want to see happen on campus. All students are con-tributing $200 per year to the SRC, they should therefore be more engaged with how the SRC is spending their money.” Kelly is ready to take on her new respon-sibilities and looks forward to the com-ing year . Minister of Arts and CultureAs many new ministers do, Aisha Balint in second year, will accompany the cur-rent minister of arts and culture for the next month in preparation for her time in council. Occupying the role of Min-ister of Arts and Culture, Aisha will or-ganize several of the annual events like Cabaret and Dancing Bear, hopefully a second Northwest Winterfest, and she will also come up with new ideas to make space for arts and culture at Quest. In addition to that, her main goal is “to step away from the position of an ‘events planner’ and instead to mobilize other students to bring their ideas to life.” She wants to raise the students’ involvement. “We are here to represent YOUR voice, so please make sure to use your voice so that we can do our best to make it heard.”

Minister of RecreationQuest’s incoming Minister of Recreation Janali Gustafson plans to focus her at-tention on expanding Quest’s extracur-ricular sports scene beyond the scope of the field and Rec Centre to the opportu-nities for outdoor recreation offered by neighbouring Squamish and Whistler

facilities. While keeping her focus on the big picture, Janali also wants to tidy things up with intramurals in an effort to build the most equitable schedule cater-ing to the interests of the various sport-ing groups on campus. “Hooray!” Minister of External AffairsBria Mele’s first action as Minister of External Affairs will be arranging a meeting with city council to find out about the various volunteer opportuni-ties in Squamish available for students to connect with the local community. Her main projects will involve plan-ning events and outings off campus that speak to a variety of interests. She wants to make sure that everyone student gets off campus at some point and mingles with the community. No one should feel like they are “stuck on the hill.” Bria looks forward to hearing your ideas and making them happen. “I can’t wait to represent our school within the larger community!” Minister of Environmental Affairs Natalie Douglas, the new Minister of Environmental Affairs, plans to take her role extremely seriously and is honoured to be part of the SRC. She will focus her energy on fostering environmental in-tegrity on campus by promoting inno-vative student projects like researching how to maximize yields from the stu-dent garden as well as exploring new ways to reduce school-wide waste. “To be part of the SRC means that one has more power and thus more responsibil-ity to improve all students’ experiences at Quest. As Minister of Environmental Affairs I see my role as making sure that the environment is considered when student projects, ideas, and clubs are be-ing proposed.” Minister of InternationalizationNext year’s Minister of Internationaliza-tion, Aida Ndiaye, said in her speech

WOMEN’S BASKETBALL:LOOKING BACK ON 2013-14

The final buzzer sounds and the moment is surreal. The Kermode wom-en’s basketball team storms the court in an emotional euphoria, screaming in disbelief, pride, and sheer happiness. The first championship banner to be hung in the Kermode Kave had been won. No one would ever be able to take that away from them. With the yearlong hype sur-rounding Quest hosting the Men’s Na-tional Championship, it was clear that all eyes would be on them when the tournament began in March. Although the women’s basketball team was both excited and grateful that the Canadian Collegiate Athletic Association (CCAA) would be shining its spotlight on their school, not once did this distract them from their own goal. Montreal. Women’s Nationals 2014. In September, preseason began immediately. Practices were 2 hours long almost every day, and early morn-ing sprinting or weight lifting sessions were held twice a week. By November, hard work paid off with 4 straight wins. Injuries began to surface, but December break provided some much needed healing time. Come January, the teams’ only losses were against Van-couver Island University (VIU) and Ca-mosun College. February saw the wom-en gear up for provincials, with players Shayna Cameron and Katrin Sandbi-chler winning PacWest All-star awards and Abbey Piazza being named to the All-Rookie Team. On February 28, the women were ready for playoffs. No team in the PacWest was more determined to win than the Kermodes, and they demon-strated just that 3 victories against Kwan-tlen Polytechnic University, Camosun College, and Douglas College. The gold medal was won in front of a screaming Quest crowd who, unsurprisingly, out-cheered the fans of the opposition and host, Douglas College. Two weeks after their provincial accomplishment, the team was boarding a plane to the national championship in Montreal, Quebec. Upon arrival, how-ever, they struggled against Canada’s top collegiate competitors, closely losing all three of their games and placing eighth in Canada. Athletics are rarely the main reason why Quest’s athletes have cho-sen to attend the university. Like most of the student body, the school’s block plan, campus, and intimacy were key deciding factors. Quest’s athletic histo-ry barely exists, let alone compared to competing schools. Until now. As of 2013-14, the leaps and bounds made by Quest’s varsity teams have been, thus far, unparalleled. The women’s soccer team finished just two goals shy of winning their own provin-cial title this year. After coming in third at their provincials, the men’s basketball team miraculously finished fifth in the country after a successful national tour-nament on home court. They were also the recipients of the PACWEST Found-er’s Cup for having the greatest increase in total points scored, in comparison to the previous season’s total. Varsity athletes who attend Quest do not join a prestigious athletics program known for its history and tra-dition of success. Conversely, they are privileged with the opportunity to be the ones to create that tradition. Now, as of 2014, that is exactly what they are doing.

HILLARY YOUNG

2014-15 SRC MINISTERS ANNOUNCEDLULU GRIMM & ZACHARY KERSHMAN

MONDAY MARCH 24th, 2014

Your first look at incoming SRC ministers

wanted, and we still didn’t show up. So what’s up, Quest? I have two theories. Instead of taking this opportunity to deliver a rousing argument about the impor-tance of community and all the ways Community Day has the potential to foster it, I’m going to propose some-thing radical: Quest students don’t get enough sleep. Not just the night before Community Day, but in general. Every student I talked to who opted out of attending Community Day spent their morning sleeping. Some students I talked to did so because they had spent all night doing work, just get-ting to bed before fourth years started banging pots and pans together to get everybody up and moving. I don’t think this was solely because they knew they had the next day off, because I’ve expe-rienced more than one sleepless night - none of which were planned around Community Day. I also don’t think that puts me in the minority. All-nighters are a hallmark of many of the classes at

Quest. The importance of sleep isn’t up for debate. If you aren’t convinced, type your concerns into your Internet machine and it will inundate you with evidence supporting my claim. Sleep deprivation is bad. It makes retaining and consolidating information next to impossible, which is a pretty big obsta-cle as far as academics go. There is merit in learning how to produce high quality work in spite of exhaustion, sickness, and other ob-stacles. However, there’s also merit in being able to think clearly and get through the day without resorting to amphetamine abuse. I don’t want to let students off the hook, though. My second theory is that many didn’t show up out of a sense of entitlement. Milton Orris, one of the guests who ran a workshop at Community Day, put it well: “People who live in successful communities are committed to the wellbeing of the entire commu-nity. To me, that’s the essential. [That

COMMUNITY DAY CHANGES; STUDENT ATTENDANCE DOES NOT

THE MARK || A3 OPINION

The first article I wrote for the Mark was a news piece covering Com-munity Day. Four articles later, I was assigned Community Day 2.0. I was ex-cited for the chance to revisit it. I must admit that I was hop-ing people’s perceptions of the event had changed. They haven’t. Many of my interviews the first time around produced responses that sounded like variations on Summer’s line in School of Rock: “My parents don’t pay $16,000 a year for recess.” Substitute ‘$16,000’ with ‘$36,000’, and you would be left with a pretty accurate picture of how most of those interviews went. People didn’t go to Communi-ty Day last time in order to avoid paint-ing stuff. This community day featured no aspect of service. I thought with that deterrent out of the way, students would attend Community Day. But I was wrong. Less than half of the stu-dent body went. They gave us what we

One thing I never learned about in high school sex-ed classes is what’s up with the hymen. Grow-ing up, I always had this vague idea of the hymen as a small, cherry-sized, blood-pocket that would burst the first time you had penetrative sex. This probably stemmed from the id-iom: “to pop one’s cherry.” This, of course, does not re-semble what the hymen actually is. It wasn’t until several years after high school that I learned that the hymen is a thin layer of membrane partial-ly covering the vagina. Different hy-mens cover different amounts of the vaginal opening. Some folks’ hymens almost completely cover the vaginal opening, which may lead to more blood and more pain with penetra-tion. Other folks’ hymens barely cov-er the vaginal opening at all, which can lead to confusion as to why there is no blood or pain upon penetration. Many of us are led to ex-pect gratuitous amounts of pain and bleeding from the first time having penetrative sex. This can happen if the hymen tears after having been stretched too much, too fast. How-ever, it is not a given; the hymen can also stretch slowly over time. Another important thing to know about the hymen is that it nev-er just “goes away.” The hymen is not a seal that, upon breakage, shrivels

up and falls off. If a hymen is torn to shreds then there may be only a very small amount of it left, to the point of it being essentially gone, but nor-mally you have some of your hymen throughout your entire life. If your vaginal canal isn’t being penetrat-ed regularly, your hymen can slowly shrink back to where it was before. A hymen can tear in many ways besides penetrative sex. Riding bikes or horses, taking an awkward fall, or inserting a tampon can do the job. The idea of a bloody, painful “first time” is part of the whole wom-en’s-burden myth that is both archaic and damaging to folks for whom first-time anxiety can be a big deal. Car-nage doesn’t exactly spell romance in the minds of folks who are plan-ning their sexual debut. On the other hand, for folks who do not experience the promised bloodshed of first-time sex, there may be a feeling that their big coming-of-age-moment was a let-down. With this in mind, remember that a blood bath is not a requisite for an official first-time experience, but if it does happen, don’t worry! Just be gentle with yourself. Use lube, allow a lot of time for foreplay (whether you are by yourself or with a partner) and go at your own body’s pace.

Play safe,Mabel

GETTING OFF WITH A HYMEN CALEB RAIBLE-CLARK

OPINION

they are] prepared to offer their capa-bilities to make that happen, and to be of service.” Sometimes that means paint-ing stuff. Sometimes it means honour-ing the hours of work that people have put into creating an event to better the community by attending informative workshops. And other times, it really does just mean sleeping in. The sense of entitlement that seems to be all too common among the student body has made me won-der about the way Quest conceptualiz-es ‘community.’ The incidence of sleep deprivation that is equally as common has made me wonder about the block plan. Can we maintain Quest’s aca-demic rigor without sacrificing sleep? Can we sustain the sense of community on campus if we are unwilling to sacri-fice time and energy to participate in it? I don’t have the answer to any of those questions, but they’re worth asking. Love you, Quest, but we need to sort ourselves out.

MACKENZIE ERLANK

Despite revamp to Community Day, student turnout remains alarmingly low

INSTITUTIONALIZING REVOLUTIONOPINION

Quest has been institution-alizing revolution in recent days. We have a draft human rights policy which moves us towards separation between investigation and decision processes. We have a draft of a mission statement which actually includes a statement of mission (see my last article). Faculty and staff governance might cease to be hilariously opaque by next year. All that being said, one issue stands out for its neglect: institutionalized oppression. In my 4 years here, I have nev-er seen a step towards anti-oppression (e.g. anti-racist, anti-sexist) work that touches every Quest student. I have seen a few pockets of rich dialogue, and some events successful in raising awareness--even some curriculum shift for those students who wish to engage with anti-oppressive dialogue. But I have seen no shift in institutional resource expenditure to put anti-op-pression work into the conversational mainstream. To be fair, this isn’t Quest’s problem, in particular. Cultural op-pression is reflected in all academic institutions. For instance, while Quest seems to spend comparable resources for men’s and women’s athletics pro-grams, it participates in a league where women’s basketball games are always during typical dinner hours. The prob-lem is that a different blueprint doesn’t necessarily mean a different structure. For another telling example, racial diversity among our U.S. stu-dents does not reflect the racial diver-sity of the U.S. While this is not partic-ular to Quest, it is partially explicable by choices that we have made. It seems like the Quest Admissions Team, quite naturally, recruits U.S. students espe-cially from progressive schools peda-gogically similar to Quest. And, in my experience working in them, progres-

sive schools pedagogically similar to Quest tend to be white and wealthy. It is unsurprising that our student body is too. Faculty and staff diversities are comparable, except that we don’t seem to be recruiting internationally (beyond the U.S.) as much as we do for students. In a laudable first step, our faculty has recently begun a dialogue about inequity in reviews for Quest job candidates. But even a slight quantita-tive shift in demographics won’t mean anything unless we learn how to do the work of multiculturalism. Asking peo-ple of colour (faculty or students) ei-ther to act like all the white people or to serve as a holistic representation (aka token) of their entire race is not asking them to bring their true, rich, authen-tic, and complex selves. The same thing goes for people of any marginalized identity. We need to figure out how to be welcoming—not some product of a mathematical equation. Happily, there is some work in the right direction. The anti-oppression workshop I attended on Community Day brought in 40 students and 4 facul-ty. A meeting is planned for after April’s Community Update on these issues. Students will soon vote on the addi-tion of an SRC Human Rights Minister. Cornerstone workshops next year will include an anti-oppression component. People are starting to congeal and orga-nize. If their work is to be success-ful, we are going to need to learn to listen very carefully, to assume good intentions, and to sometimes put up with discomfort and inconvenience. Administration will need to take public stands, backed by real resources. People with privilege will have to make space at the table, in the agenda, and in their considerations for marginalized voic-es. We will need to stretch in order to grow.

MABEL VAUTRAVERS

MONDAY MARCH 24th, 2014

B1 || THE MARK ARTS & CULTURE

Real Estate – Atlas 4/5 Stars Real Estate is back for their third studio album, Atlas. This time, the five-some has opted for a cleaner sound with a higher quality of production. When one of my favourite bands releases a new album, I am always apprehensive to give it a listen, fearing they will have sold out their indi-viduality to their producers. Unlike simi-lar bands such as The Smith Westerns and Beach Fossils, who have taken the same course but lost their iconic edge, Real Es-tate maintains its unique sound in Atlas. Beachy guitar-rifts and Martin Court-ney’s sleepy vocals make Atlas yet another easy-listening album. The track-list in its entirety flows so well that you might not realize when one song ends and another begins, but listen to any one track on its own and it will leave you utterly enchant-ed.

TRUST – Joyland3.5/5 Stars Two years of anticipation later and my favourite synthpop band is out with Joyland, their second, appropriate-ly-named album. Let me tell you, it was well worth the wait. Although the album is not as consistent as TRST, it is loaded with

gems like “Capitol” and “Are We Arc?” and, let’s be honest, I’m always happy to have more songs to dance my face off to. You can tell the duo have spent the past couple of years experimenting and expanding their sound; vocalist Robert Alfrons shocked me with an alto pitch that I didn’t think he had in him. The mood of the album is just as the title suggests: joyful.

Vince Staples – Shyne Coldchain Vol. 2 4/5 Stars Vince Staples, the Long Beach, California rapper, exploded last year with his standout feature on Earl Sweatshirt’s “Hive”. His signature jazzy flow stole the show from Earl’s knotty rhymes and grimy beat. Arguably, he stole the whole album. Now, he is back with Shyne Coldchain Vol. 2, a ten track mixtape produced by No I.D. and Scoop DeVille with features by James Fauntleroy and Jhene Aiko. His signature flow is in full effect on tracks like “Progres-sive 3” and “Humble”, while the 808-heavy beats give the entire tape a dusky, classic vibe. However, it is the content of Staples’ rhymes that impress most on this tape. The lead single, “Nate”, tells the gritty story of a boy who idolizes his criminal father. With a mixtape this good so early on in his career, Staples could be the “Next Big Thing” in a matter of months.

Band of Horses - The Acoustic at the Ryman3/5 Stars After going big and fast with their 2012 album, Mirage Rock, Band of Horses have unplugged the electric guitars, pulled out the mandolins, and returned to their roots. Moving forward to the past, The Acoustic at the Ryman showcases the band’s most popular and obscure songs at one of roots music’s storied venues. Original-ly built as a red-brick tabernacle church, The Ryman Theater’s marble columns and wooden pews frame the stage for the bands graceful welding of indie-rock, americana, and bluegrass. The country emphasis pays homage to the history of the building and the band’s southern birthplace in Asheville, North Carolina. As a radio hub during WWII, the Ryman set the tone for radio in the south for almost 60 years, featur-ing some of the industries biggest names, from Emmylou Harris to Wilco, from Neil Young to Erasures. The highlights from the two nights of recordings include the mini-malist version of Everythings Gonna be Un-done and the aw-shucks, twangy rendition of Slow Cruel Hands of Time.

TARI AJADI, MAGGIE MCPHEE & JAKE SMITH

As Keystone stress levels run high and summer planning becomes startling-ly imminent, there’s one thing to keep on your radar before that’s all said and done. Quest’s annual Dancing Bear Music Festi-val is on April 12th, boasting acts such as Moontricks, Neon Steve, Old Man Canyon, and the Boom Booms, as well as Quest stu-dent acts The Bone Frets, The Cherry Pota-toes, and The Kate Kurdyak Band. Head Dancing Bear coordinator Ben Goldstein wanted to honour the pre-vious goals of the much loved Quest tra-dition, giving students a chance to hang out and listen to good music. “We want to create a community where Quest students come together, that’s one of the main pur-poses [of the festival],” says Goldstein. The Dancing Bear planning com-mittee originally sought to try something new, aiming for a two day festival with more high profile acts. However, the SRC, which has several ex-Dancing Bear coordinators

as Ministers, rejected funding for a multi-day event. “They strongly recommend-ed not having a two day festival because it would be a lot of work, which I took to heart,” Goldstein said. “Furthermore, [the SRC] didn’t want to spend [$20,000] on the festival, suggesting $15,000 as a number they’d be comfortable with.” “We were hoping to get some big-ger artists...to draw people from the com-munity and from Vancouver,” says Jessica Ells, this year’s primary band coordinator. “But I love the music we have, so that still might happen.” The musicians set to play at the festival echo this sentiment. “I have not played at a school before so I’m really ex-cited. Hopefully there will be lots of new ears to share my music with that wouldn’t normally get to,” says Neon Steve. Old Man Canyon is also looking forward to sharing his music with first time listeners. “I love to meet new people and get the chance to play for people that have never heard of us,” he says. “Festivals

are always more of a challenge to really get the crowd into what you’re playing, which I like. It makes you more focused and de-termined to deliver what it is you want to share with the viewer. I have driven by Quest many times, though, and it looks like a beautiful place to play!” Although this year’s festival defi-nitely promises the usual excitements, Goldstein hopes to add one extra perk. “One minor thing that we’ll do different-ly, if we are approved, is re-price drinks throughout the day.” Of course, the festival can’t hap-pen without the help of everyone who’s looking forward to it. “Dancing Bear is en-tirely student run. Students’ ideas go into it, students’ money funds it, and students do the physical work needed by volunteering,” Goldstein says. Make sure to respond to the Dancing Bear volunteer survey on Face-book early this week to help make this the best year yet!

Lights come up on a solitary fig-ure standing on an otherwise empty stage. Fedora resting atop his head, moustache impeccably curled, signature twinkle in his eye, Jon Farmer welcomed the packed au-ditorium to his production: Manologues. Initially conceived as Farmer’s Keystone project, Manologues is an orig-inal theatre piece incorporating conversa-tions he had with men about their ideas of what it means to be a man. Reminiscent of the world-famous Vagina Monologues, performed at Quest earlier this year, the goal of these conversations adapted for the stage is to open up a dialogue that challeng-es the assumptions we hold about mascu-linity. Having collected stories from a va-riety of sources, Manologues touches on a range of topics and issues encountered, but not discussed by men around the world. The show was diverse in tone, shifting from more serious pieces to hu-

morous ones that had the audience in stitches. The comedic pieces were the ones where Farmer’s writing talent shone. The Clown Sketches that were interspersed throughout the show were both clever and incisive. Almost allegorically, the pieces relayed some of the clichéd and therefore often forgotten pieces of life advice that we all encounter daily. The use of clowns soft-ened the blow to the ego when the message “People Come In All Shapes” or “Always Be Yourself ” became glaringly obvious – the audience was able to feel as ridiculous as the clowns looked. Several of the performers aside from Farmer wrote their own pieces. Geor-don McLean’s monologue Bichotomy dealt with concepts of outwardly performed masculinity and what happens when sexu-al identity conflicts with those norms. An-drew Wood and Rosa Culbertson paired up to recite a moving piece that mixed poetry and prose in recounting lessons learned on the road about loss and legacy.

While the show touched on a wide range of issues, some students felt as though they were hearing different stories from the same voice. “It seemed to me like a lot of groups were underrepresented in the show”, said first-year student Marielle Rosky. “I think the cover of the program is a testament to that – three white faces with different haircuts.” Maxwell Mills, another first year student, suggested that giving a brief introduction to provide context be-fore each story would help to diversify the voices in the show. Though there is room for the show to grow and improve, the inaugural perfor-mance of Manologues was a huge success, drawing an impressive number of students to both act in, as well attend the produc-tion. If the kind of enthusiasm garnered by the show’s first run is any indication of its future success, Manologues could very well become the international movement that Farmer has in mind.

REVIEW: MANOLOGUESZACH KERSHMAN

It’s been a big year for Kate Kurdyak: as if moving away from home to at-tend university wasn’t enough, the sing-er-songwriter also signed a record deal with independent label 604 Records on February 28th. She has been involved with the label since spring of last year, whose roster includes Carly Rae Jepsen, Mariana’s Trench, Theory of a Deadman and Tommy Lee. Did I mention she’s only eighteen? Q: Quest has a strong community of musicians, many of whom dream of one day signing a record deal. How did you make it happen? A: I won a contest that gave me a slot in a music festival where Carly Rae Jepsen and Marianas Trench played. I knew what the head of their record label looked like—he looks like a biker-Santa Clause. He’s crazy and I saw him come out from backstage and watch Carly play. I knew that I had to talk to him, but he was in the VIP section. So I ran down and one of my friends distracted the security guard while I snuck into the VIP section, and I went up and asked him how I could get from here to there. Basically he said that I could e-mail him some of my music. So I did. We had two meetings and after the sec-ond meeting when I showed him more of my work he said, ‘Alright, I like this, you can start working with my people now.” He initially said that he was going to let me develop, and then we wrote the first song and he just said “Alright. Record deal.” So that was pretty nice. It happened a lot faster than I thought it would so I feel really lucky. It’s about luck, but I think the key to it is knowing what you want before you try to get it. Q: Has anything about the music in-dustry suprised you so far? A: What surprised me was how many people go into the creation of one artist. I have a manager, two project managers, two lawyers and a stylist to help create an image—which is what we’ve been working on lately. When I talk about image I mean how my mu-sic videos look, what my website looks like, album cover, etc. I think that in some ways it is almost as important as the music itself. To me, they are so con-nected - it’s about how you connect to people and how you want to be known. It’s just kind of everybody’s project. But I like that aspect of it because I don’t think it would be as fun if it was just you… music really is about that. It isn’t just for one person but a thing that is meant to be shared. Q: What are you working on right now?

A: We’re picking a single right now so likely that will be released in late spring/early summer. Then we do a music video and photo-shoot. All that stressful stuff. The full version of the Q&A is available in the online issue of The Mark. Catch Kate at Dancing Bear festival on April 12th.

KATE KURDYAK SIGNS RECORD DEAL

MACKENZIE ERLANK

Kermode joins Carly Rae Jepsen’s label

REVIEW: NEW MUSIC

DANCING OUT OF HIBERNATIONALESSANDRO TERSIGNI

MONDAY MARCH 24th, 2014

Dancing Bear Music Festival 2014 promises to live up to past years’

B2 || THE MARK

STUDENT ESTABLISHED RADIO STATION LAUNCHESCULTURE

ARTS & CULTURE

On March 3rd, Quest Coast Sound launched. It is the first radio station on campus and can be found at questcoastsound.questu.ca. The web-site hosts not only an archive of pod-casts and jams, but also a multitude of other media. The music scene at Quest is multi-faceted, with contributors hav-ing musical influences that are as di-verse as the backgrounds of the people who consist of the student body. Updating the website daily with new ‘casts and fresh tunes, the project aims to showcase faculty-in-residence talks, lectures, interviews with student artists, and possibly live recordings of musical performances. But any student can put literally any song into a pod-cast, thanks to a liberal copyright li-cense that is non-restrictive. The project is the brainchild of

Evan Cross, James Blumhagen, Euan Sadler, Maggie McPhee, and many oth-ers. Moving forward, anybody else who is interested in contributing can submit content. Initally Cross’ Keystone idea, the idea gained traction when Blum-hagen mentioned the concept on the Quest Students Facebook page. The project would first manifest as an in-ternet radio station, before progressing into a full blown FM station. In col-laboration, the student group would draft a Human Rights Policy with the assitance of Melanie Koenderman and David Helfand. The group also recieved support from the IT department and worked through February to prepare the website. Blumhagen hopes that the sta-tion will be integrated into the com-munity: “it’s slowly getting instilled within the Quest culture, the Squamish

culture, the Squamish community. We want it to be a central hub of media and knowledge of what’s going on at Quest, what’s going on in Squamish, and re-ally connecting the two communities together. It’s going to increase knowl-edge of what’s going on at Quest, to get Squamish residents up the hill more, and then we can even have information about what’s going on in Squamish, so that Quest students can readily discov-er what’s going on in Squamish.” With only one local radio sta-tion, Squamish currently lacks options when scanning the airwaves. Quest Coast Sound hopes to change that, by providing quality, on-demand music at any time. “We want it to be this one website where people can go to find out everything that’s going on at Quest. It’s not so much just for the radio, it’s more-so for the community; to help promote Quest, and to help connect

with the Squamish community.” said Blumhagen. Even over the past three weeks, the station has seen an increase in lis-tenership. “I keep track of the views on every single post. I’ve been tracking all the listens. We have a few shows that have reached like fifty to sixty listeners, which is awesome. It’s exciting when just five people listen to your podcast” said Blumhagen. Regardless of its apparent sta-tus as a quickly budding and blooming project-endeavor, Quest Coast Sound seems to have a lot of potential to be-come a central hub of knowledge that is not just artistic, but also practical. If Quest Coast Sound is a flower, it needs the vital nutrients of a steady audi-ence-base to break out of the soil of obscurity.

Quest Coast Sound hits the ground bumping and grooving and running around the media town!

JOHN SLOAN

The decline of the few initia-tives to promote collaboration between Quest and the First Nations of the Sea-to-Sky has sparked concern among students and faculty. Members of the Squamish Nation insist that it is up to the University to initiate the dialogue. Progress is slow but there are hopes of restrengthening the dying connection. Since Quest opened in 2007, local First Nations have rarely been in-volved with the University. Some mem-bers of the Squamish Nation participat-ed in Quest’s first official convocation and graduation ceremonies, while oth-ers have run workshops on campus. Quest’s President David Helfand said that, although they have been invited, the Squamish Nation have not taken part in graduation ceremonies for the

past two years. Given the lack of official part-nerships, it is students who have been doing most of the work to establish the connection between the University and local First Nations. One of these stu-dents is Hayden Taylor, a third-year of Aboriginal descent. According to Taylor, “The connection between the University and the Nations was never strong enough to maintain a continu-ous partnership. It was easier for Quest to have someone who was Aboriginal who could connect the two. So it’s hard, with so very few Aboriginal students.” In November of 2011, Taylor organized Quest’s participation in the Squamish Nation Winter PowWow, a celebration of Aboriginal history and traditions. Last year, Taylor met with members of the Squamish Nation to organize another PowWow to be held

on Quest property. However, after the birth of his daughter, Taylor had no time to finish organizing the event. Helfand said that communica-tion between Quest and the Squamish Nation has been sparse ever since. Sophie Major, a fourth-year student and an advocate of First Na-tions’ involvement at Quest, has been enquiring into the possibility of a schol-arship for Aboriginal students. “I went into Admissions and asked whether they had considered a scholarship for First Nation students. They said they hadn’t, but that it sounded like a good idea. I told them that we really do need one,” said Major. The Squamish Nation would like to see a long-term commitment from the University involving both the student body and Administration. “Nothing at Quest strikes me as cultur-

al – nothing there gave me the urge to go back to school,” said Donna Billy, a Junior Elder from the Squamish Na-tion. She would like to see the Squa-mish Nation involved at Quest on a regular basis: “[Quest] can’t just want us there for a free show every once in a while. There needs to be a long-term cultural program. There needs to be di-alogue wanted on both sides.” Students and staff now look to newly-hired faculty Dr. Bianca Brigi-di for a restoration of this connection. “The faculty have hired a new tutor with interests in this area, and she is interested in making connections with the local Nations. We look forward to continuing and expanding our con-nections, as there is much opportunity for sharing and learning,” said Dean of Students Melanie Koenderman.

VALERIA VERGANI

LOCAL

WHAT FIRST NATIONS?Quest students and local First Nations complain about a lack of interaction.

Watching Inis LeBlanc lean comfortably against the cash desk and rattle off the 45 plus jobs she has done during her life — “everything from picking apples to working in a plastic pool parts factory to tree planting” — you would start to think that she could probably do anything she set her mind to. And you would be right. LeBlanc is the founder and ex-ecutive director of Squamish Rebuild, a not-for-profit social enterprise that sells useable, second-hand building supplies that are donated or collected. Her ultimate goal is to divert 100% of building supplies in Squamish from the landfill. This is not a job she had ever thought she would do, but it is exactly what she is happy doing. LeBlanc spent her childhood “in the woods with no running water and no electricity” on Prince Edward Island. This meant chopping wood and pumping water from a well, and this

early exposure to the outdoors and hands-on work has served her well. LeBlanc earned an undergrad-uate degree in Environmental Biology from Dalhousie University. She is no longer engaged in wildlife research — which took her as far as the phone ser-vice-less Alaskan wilderness - but her concern for environmental issues and her determination to reduce waste has endured. The path to becoming a West Coast social entrepreneur was by no means linear, but LeBlanc is a big fan of following her heart. This philoso-phy, which she thinks is sort of cheesy, has generally taken her where she has needed to go, or at least has kept her happy throughout. Following a breakup ten years ago, Leblanc left Australia (where she had moved after travelling Canada and the United States for several years) for Squamish. Years later, she read a book by David Suzuki called ‘Good News for a Change,’ which chronicles individ-uals, groups and businesses who are

doing “great things” to help the planet. One of those great things was the Re-Building Centre in Portland, Oregon, which became the inspiration for what would come next. “As soon as I read it, I was like that’s what I want to do...just a lightning bolt of clarity.” Despite this clarity, opening Squamish Rebuild on her own was still the scariest thing she has ever done. “It was a huge leap,” said LeBlanc. At the time, she did not know anything about starting a business, about social enter-prises, or even about construction. But her diverse experiences had taught her how to ask questions and learn as she goes — skills that gave her the confi-dence to take a risk like this. “Learning as you go is good. If you’re keen, then go for it! And having a mentor is also amazing.” We asked LeBlanc to share some wisdom, and she told us that it is okay to change your mind. Her dad was a fisherman for 35 years before be-coming a computer programmer. We asked her what’s the best way to spend

an afternoon in Squamish, and she suggested hiking to Tantalus Lookout at Brohm Lake, and also looking up (almost anywhere) to see the eagles. As for her faith in humanity? She has realized that most people really want to do the right thing environmentally, they just need to be given the chance. Giving that chance is what she is most proud of with Squamish Rebuild, “cre-ating a space that gives people an op-portunity to be part of the solution.”

Leblanc at Squamish Rebulid. To see more photos and read a little more about LeBlanc and her adventures, check out the extended profile on The Mark’s web-site.

GRAHAM STREICH & KENDRA PERRIN

LOCAL

GETTING TO KNOW: INIS LEBLANC

MONDAY MARCH 24th, 2014

THE MARK || B3 MONDAY MARCH 24th, 2014

WOODFIBRE LNG: A CLOSER LOOK

JONATHAN VON OFENHEIM

If you’ve ever driven the Sea to Sky Highway, which skirts the shoreline of Howe Sound on BC’s southern coast, and peeked over your shoulder on the stretch of road just south of Squamish, you might have noticed the Woodfibre industrial site across the water—a con-crete blemish between Tantalus forest and marine waters. There was once a small town located there accessible only by boat, and, without a closer look, you might be inclined to buy into the often touted ghost-town appeal of the site. However, an on-site investigation re-vealed more than a quaint relic of the boomtown era, raising environmental concerns over the site’s current state and its future industrial development. If you caught a glimpse before the Woodfibre Pulp Mill closed in 2006,

pending regulatory approvals, could be operating as soon as 2017. In accordance with the purchasing agreement, Woodfi-bre LNG has committed to a $7 million remediation effort, as the site has seen more than a century of industrial use. But what does this remediation entail, and how will environmental efforts be sustained with industrial activity ongo-ing? After its closure, the 102-year-old pulp plant remained a disheveled landscape, inactive and abandoned for seven years. Seeing the site now, one might find it hard to believe that it was once home to a bustling community—the town of Woodfibre, BC. The 1950s saw Woodfibre at its prime. A contingent of the logging oper-ations and lumber mill of nearby Squa-mish, the town, with a population of 750 workers and their families, supported two churches, a school, a swimming

you might have seen billows of white smoke erupting from smokestacks, fill-ing the valley pocket with a crude haze. Now, with the 2013 approval of a lique-fied natural gas (LNG) export license, it might not be long before a look across the Sound reveals another type of indus-trial activity. In January 2013, Asian petro-chemical giant Pacific Oil & Gas pur-chased the site for $25.5 million, launch-ing its new subsidiary Woodfibre LNG. The Singapore-based firm plans to build a $1.6 billion LNG processing and ex-port facility on the site operating, which,

pool, a bowling alley and even a movie theater. However, over time the commu-nity lost its ground to industry and Main Street was wiped clean to make way for the booming business of paper products. In the 1960s, residents were relocated to Squamish or Britannia Beach as indus-trial development expanded. Woodfibre’s history gives the impression that the site is now a ghost town, but a closer look found otherwise. A visit to the site was hardly a window into historic small-town BC. In fact, while old industrial facilities dominate the landscape, nothing of the township

remains but its waste. Woodfibre LNG is current-ly working to remediate the effects of rampant industrial use. Rusting indus-trial equipment, scattered scrap metal and other materials, landfills, piles of concrete rubble, and dredged logpiles engulf the 86-hectare property. Red al-der trees and invasive blackberry are the first to reclaim neglected areas. Much of the site needs cleaning up, but the main efforts of the current remediation proj-ect center on Woodfibre’s active water treatment plant, which is working to mitigate the effects of chemicals that have accumulated in the site’s landfill. Workers shuttled by boat on weekdays and part-time resident work-ers run this water treatment process. Water is pumped up the slope, chan-neled over the plastic sheeting on which the landfill sits, and treated for con-taminants at the treatment plant below. Among the toxins needing removal is the insulating fiber asbestos, left over from early construction at Woodfibre. Runoff from the landfill flows alongside nearby glacier-fed streams, which converge at the heart of the Woodfibre site and are channeled through its center, eventually spilling into Howe Sound. A generator at the base of the slope drowns out the sound

of a waterfall buried in the forest just tens of meters away. Sustained efforts to minimize environmental impact will be needed to ensure air and water quality if Woodfi-bre LNG is to move forward with LNG processing and export. In addition to the on-site effects of the new industri-al project, the proposal raises concerns regarding LNG carrier traffic in Howe Sound and the expansion of an existing FortisBC pipeline.

An upgrade to the existing pipeline would allow the transport of natural gas from Coquitlam to Squa-mish, but the proposed route may dis-rupt the Squamish River Estuary among other preserved environments. Natural gas pumped to Woodfibre would be liq-uefied, stored, loaded onto LNG carri-ers, and shipped abroad, largely to Asian ports. Howe Sound could see upwards of 40 LNG carriers per year. Further concerns over the Woodfibre LNG project and others of this ilk take into account the source of the natural gas. Nowadays, the product is typically extracted from the ground through hydraulic fracturing, or frack-ing—the process of fracturing rock with pressurized water to release fossil fuel deposits. This controversial technique is currently under scrutiny for its environ-mental impacts, including groundwater contamination and air pollution. BC’s natural gas resources would be a major source of the LNG processed and exported at Woodfibre. BC premier Christy Clark sees natural gas extraction and export as a major component of BC’s financial future. BC’s government currently supplies the gas industry with 60 million gallons of fresh water every day for fracking purposes. Fracking aside, Woodfibre LNG promises environmental sustainability including “management and long-term stewardship for forest, fisheries, wildlife, and water resources on the property,” according to Woodfibre’s LNG Environ-mental Assessment. A graphic on the Woodfibre LNG website depicts a far simpler facili-ty and greener landscape than the exist-ing one. Workers at the site even suggest that the company is considering open-ing parts of the site to the public, attract-ing visitors with hiking trails above the LNG facility. But Woodfibre has a ways to go before grass and trees re-root the industrial wasteland and the stench of the landfill fades. If Woodfibre LNG moves ahead and remediation goes as planned, you might be able to look across the Sound one day and see a little less of a concrete blemish on the landscape. But we must not forget the history of the site—both cultural and industrial—or the questionable extraction practices of not-so-natural gas behind our local middle-man, Woodfibre LNG; the new

face of Woodfibre is but a facade for the former buried industry, and this bur-geoning new one. To see the complete photo-essay with additional exclusive photos of the Woodfibre industrial site, visit the Mark’s website at http://thequestmark.tumblr.com/

One of many signs warns of asbestos in the landfill at Woodfibre (left). A white film coats the base of ponds adja-cent to the main landfill site (right).

A fenced-off landfill sits on plastic sheeting on the slope above the Woodfibre treatment plant.

A glacier-fed stream that may contain industrial contaminants runs through the center of the Woodfibre industrial site into Howe Sound.

PHOTO ESSAY