91% of students who voted said yes
The newly formed University of Regina Students’ Association (URSA) has won its bid to be the official representative group for all students.
URSA announced this week that it has won the “independently held referendum for student governance” and plans to enter into negotiations with the university in the new year “over issues of student life.”
From Dec. 12-15, the University of Regina (UofR) facilitated the online referendum at the request of URSA, which emerged in recent months as a replacement for the now-dissolved URSU.
Here’s the question that was on the ballot: “Do you accept the University of Regina Students’ Association as the official representative body for the students of the University, including its federated colleges, replacing the former Students’ Union of the University of Regina (URSU)?”
According to the UofR, 442 voted yes and 42 voted no.
Referendum vote latest turn in URSU saga
URSU was formerly in charge of using student fees for the health and dental plan, the City of Regina bus pass, and various campus organizations including the Women’s Centre, UR Pride, and the Carillion.
It has also traditionally played a role advocating for student interests, including opposing tuition increases.
However, in recent months, URSU was criticized by students, campus groups, and UofR president Jeff Keshen over questions about finances and governance.
The disputes played out in court with several lawsuits involving the parties.
Meanwhile, URSU said the UofR failed to pay it money that was owed and that some of the campus groups that were suing it had failed to live up to their responsibilities on audits and other matters.
URSU later held a student referendum of its own that resulted in the organization dissolving itself.
That set the stage for URSA to make its move to replace URSU.
Student fee funds will be on the agenda
URSA has previously said one of the things on its to-do list is to access student fee funds and use them in a manner determined by students.
Amid the falling out with URSU, the U of R moved earlier this year to take control of student fee funds, which amounts to millions of dollars annually.
In the fall term, there was a student fee flat rate of $44.60 plus $5.70 per credit hour, which works out to $95.90 for a typical undergraduate domestic student with a nine-credit-hour course load.
Students also pay $90 for the bus pass and $225.85 (for the full year) for the health and dental plan.
Referendum result is valid, URSA says
URSA says it will run things differently than URSU, with more transparency and more accountability.
While the referendum vote went about 91 per cent URSA’s way, the 484 people who voted represent about 2.9 per cent of the student population.
Still, says URSA interim executive member Ben Alexander, the turnout was sufficiently large to suggest one could extrapolate the result to the rest of the campus using statistical methods and get a similar result.
“For the sake of scientific honesty, there could be other factors affecting that,” Alexander said in an interview with the Carillon.
“Students who were more likely to vote no may not have been as aware of the [referendum]. I’m going to be honest, that could be something that’s affecting this.”
The university’s chief governance officer, Glenys Sylvestre, congratulated URSA.
“The University of Regina looks forward to engaging with URSA’s interim leadership to discuss and finalize operating relationships while URSA completes incorporation and related filings.”
Sylvestre said in a written statement.
Sylvestre noted that URSA will prepare for their first annual general meeting and the election of student leaders in the spring.
URSA has put together an interim executive but says the team will not take salaries.
They also said once the new executive is elected, they will be paid less than the old URSU executive.
