Vicious Precisely Because

Online Home of the Fishbowl on CKUW 95.9fm in Winnipeg

022 – Mr. Brown Goes to Ottawa

In this — our first episode on the new summer monthly schedule — we sit down to with Geoff Brown to talk about the recent Canadian Federation of Students Semi-Annual General Meeting. Geoff is the Vice-President Internal at the Univeristy of Winnipeg Students Association (UWSA) and the Local 8 Representative to the CFS and CFS-Manitoba. The UWSA is Local 8 of the CFS.

Similar to our discussion with Murray Jowett regarding the November 2007 CFS AGM, we ask Geoff how the discussion went on some of the more interesting motions that were brought forward at this Ottawa meeting. We’ll be adding a document containing the motions as well as updates on how all the voting went to this post as soon as we have them.

Download: 022 – Mr. Brown Goes to Ottawa

Mid-May Update

First things first: The Fishbowl will be airing once per month over the summer, on the final Wednesday of each month.  We’ll be back to a regular weekly schedule once Fall session has begun on campuses across the country.

To fill the empty weeks, we’ll be doing a few things around here, including putting the entire archive back online as well as trying out some new ideas for the website.  Stay tuned to the site (or subscribe to our RSS feed) for more.

And lastly, The Fishbowl was recently nominated (and won!) for “Best Spoken Word Show” in the 2008 Best of CKUW awards!!  Thanks to everyone for listening and sending in your ideas and comments — we’re always trying to make the show better, so thanks everyone for helping us get to this point.

021 – Global Warming? But It’s Freezing Here!

After the technical difficulties, we had a short show today. Today’s interview more than makes up for the length though, as we spoke with Diane McGifford, the Minister of Advanced Education and Literacy for the Province of Manitoba.

Local newspapers and interest groups (students included) have been buzzing over the past week about the possibility of the Manitoba’s nine-year freeze on tuition fees disappearing in today’s provincial budget. We talked to the Minister to clarify what’s going on and to clear up some of the rumours that have been floating around since the announcement.

We’ll post all the details surrounding the announcement following this afternoon’s release of the budget.

Download: 021 – Global Warming? But It’s Freezing Here!

[Note: When sharing the show, please link to this post, not the files directly. The file locations might change, but this post will always point to the updated location.]

019 – Who Do You Love?

In our quest to better understand what’s happening with students inside our three coasts, we look this week at Simon Fraser University, where their student society recently held a referendum on the continuation of their membership in the Canadian Federation of Students and the Canadian Federation of Students-British Columbia.

The in-show interview is with J.J. McCullough who, as Chief Electoral Officer for the Simon Fraser Student Society’s Independent Electoral Commission, oversaw the referendum. We also have a supplemental interview with Amy Fox, the External Relations Officer for the Simon Fraser Student Society. A representative from the Canadian Federation of Students was not available to come on the show.

[Note: When sharing the show, please link to this post, not the files directly. The file locations might change, but this post will always point to the updated location.]

Download: 019 – Who Do You Love? (53.4MB)

The interview with Amy Fox will be available on Monday afternoon.

018 – What’s the Frequency, Cameron?

A big ol’ hallo to all you who have patiently waited for the downloads to reappear! We’re finally back on sturdy ground with our web hosting, so we’ll once again be putting new episodes online as they air, and over the next couple weeks we expect to have the archives back in full form.

Episode 18 features a chat with Cameron Derkson, Chair of the Board of the University of Winnipeg Students’ Association, giving a general overview of what the UWSA does at the organizational — or board — level. We also talk about the upcoming Annual General Meeting of the UWSA — what it is, why anyone should care about it, and how individual students can direct the priorities of the Students’ Association.

Download the show by right-clicking here.

[Note: If sharing the show, please link to the post, not the actual file. The link itself might change in the future, but the file will always exist and be linked to in the post.]

If you have any questions about the UWSA, the board, the AGM, or anything else talked about in this episode, you can contact Cameron via email at chair@theuwsa.ca.

The State of the Show

Okay, it’s been a while since we’ve put the show up on the site. We’re still having issues with our host, so the downloads are still out of commission and we haven’t been able to upload any new episodes of late. The show has gone on, and we’ve covered some incredible stories over the past few weeks, such as:

  • the leaked plan of the Canadian Federation of Students-BC to keep three B.C. schools in the CFS,
  • Voter-Funded Media as used in student elections at Simon Fraser and University of British Columbia,
  • and the attack by CFS-MB on the salaries of university presidents in Manitoba.

We’ll be putting all of these episodes online as soon as we figure out new hosting, but in the meantime, you can download the show through the CKUW website, at ckuw.ca. Click on “Program Schedule” and then download Wednesday’s People of Interest, which is the show during which The Fishbowl is broadcast.

Speaking of CKUW, the station that hosts The Fishbowl is currently in the middle of its annual funding drive — which is when they ask the listeners to support the station by giving toward this year’s goal of $45,000. It’s a week-long event, but it keeps the station on the air and running smoothly for the entire year — and it will only succeed with your support. Check out fundrive.ckuw.ca for information on all the gifts/incentives that you can get by donating the to station. The shirts are great — trust me.

In the tradition of FUNdrive, we at The Fishbowl have whipped up a great incentive for anyone who donates $60 or more to our show — you’ll be entered to win coffee and dessert with Dr. Lloyd Axworthy, former Minister of Foreign Affairs and current President and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Winnipeg. Only people who donate to The Fishbowl will have this opportunity to sit down and chat with the man behind the school, while enjoying a tasty coffee and dessert free-of-charge! For every $30 you donate in addition to the $60, you’ll get an additional entry into the draw.

If you’d like to pledge to the show, there are a few ways you can do it:

  • you can email us at fishbowlshow@gmail.com with your contact information and how much you’d like to pledge;
  • phone (204) 774-6877 either during our show (Wednesday8:35am-9am GMT-6)
  • pledge on-line at fundrive.ckuw.ca

NOTE: Pledges to the station are always accepted, but to be entered into the draw for coffee and dessert with Dr. Axworthy, you must pledge to The Fishbowl by 9am on Wednesday, as the draw will take place immediately after Wednesday’s show.

A brief update

Unfortunately, the show downloads are not working right now. We’re looking into the problem and will update this post once they’re back in commission. Thanks to those of you who let us know about it.

As for the Fishbowl in general, we’ve been on a bit of a break for the holidays, but don’t worry — the world of student politics has been moving along at a steady pace and there are interesting stories galore that are lining up to be told. We’ll be back to our regularly scheduled programming shortly.

Keep in mind, if you’re a student at the University of Winnipeg, the 2007-2008 general election cycle begins on February 1 with a week of nominations. We’ll have more information for you soon, but if you’re interested in running, now would be a good time to start thinking about it.

012 – Apa…whatever

Originally, we were supposed to talk to Ben Wickstrum, the legendary country singer, but when he cancelled we got the next best thing: Ben Wickström! Ben has been involved in numerous capacities on campus, including the sitting as both Director of Student Living and Chief Elections Commissioner for the University of Winnipeg Students’ Association (UWSA) Board of Directors, Mouseland Press, and both the University Board of Regents and Senate. Ben, just send anyone who is trying to hire you to this site because we’ve basically posted your CV here.

Recently he wrote an article for the Uniter about the UWSA and the implications of student apathy. We talked to him about that article for this episode.

To download the show, right-click here and select Save As.

UMSU News

Check out the latest goings on at the University of Manitoba Students’ Union, courtesty of The Manitoban. There are definitely some interesting changes that will impact the way that people interact with the Board of Directors.

011 – For Every Action…

Downloads are temporarily unavailable. See this post for more information.

Well, we’ve had a bit of a lag recently due to various essays, exams and practicum adventures, but we are back with another episode of student politic goodness.

In this episode we talk to Max Silverman, the Vice-President External Affairs for the Students’ Society of McGill University about such things as the recent student strikes in Quebec, as well as the recent decision of the Canadian Federation of Students to axe their membership in the organization.

We were also lucky enough to have a guest host in Devin’s absense. Former University of Winnipeg Students’ Association President Kate Sjoberg joined us and talked about her time at the University as President.

You can download the episode by right-clicking here and selecting “save as.”

There was so much content however, that we couldn’t include it all in the show. Below you will find some insightful extras from our conversation with Max Silverman that we couldn’t fit into the show due to time restrictions.

Max Silverman on…

Police/Student Clashes

SSMU at the CFS AGM

The Future of the Quebec Student Strike

Quebec’s Social Contract with Students

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