Now That's Entertainment . . . Issue # 20 
September 29, 2000

"The Buchanan Space Programme" 

University is more than academics. It goes beyond sports, drunken fraternity parties and all-night crams for exams. University life encompasses the entire life of a university student. Between hour-long lectures, listening to a talking head babble on about Pascal's wager and cognitive psychology, students, like myself, need somewhere to relax. The overload of knowledge can be quite overwhelming, and few moments of peace are, of course, welcomed. At the University of British Columbia, Arts students, or ‘artsies' do not have adequate resting area. Artsies lack space. With that the Arts Undergraduate Society introduced the ominous-sounding "Buchanan Space Programme." 

No, UBC has not made some groundbreaking agreement with NASA. The man on the moon will not teach all Arts classes. "The Space Programme" is the proposition to add five dollars to the Arts students' fees. This money will be used to fund the development of a place for Arts students to get some much needed rest between classes. Arts has the lowest student fees of any faculty at UBC at a mere seven dollars. By contrast, faculties like Forestry and Nursing ring up more than twenty dollars, and Commerce demands an outrageous two hundred dollars in their student fees. Arts students would have space to study, to read, to get together for study groups, and so forth. Many Arts clubs have to pay other faculties to use their buildings to get together, at a great expense to its members! 

Courses offered by the Faculty of Arts at UBC are primarily taught in the Buchanan building. Well, it is not really a building as much as a complex. As an S-curve of five buildings, the Buchanan building is split into five blocks, appropriately named A, B, C, D, and E. They would create this "space" from the undeveloped first floor of Buchanan D. 

The campaign for the addition of living space for artsies has been underway for quite some time now. As a first year student at UBC, I had no idea what to expect. When I went to my orientation in August, they handed out free agendas. Inside were valuable coupons and invaluable information about campus and university life as a whole. What stuck out to me was on the back cover, there was an advertisement of sorts for "The Space Programme." It intrigued me, but no further information was found. That is, until I came to classes first day and could see nothing but posters everywhere, insisting that people vote for the addition of living space for Arts students. 

Democracy as it is, a referendum is currently underway. The ballot for the "Yes" or "No" to the "Buchanan Space Programme" accompanies the ballot to vote for new AUS (Arts Undergraduate Society) representatives. As an added incentive for being such an outstanding citizen, voters get a sticker, a bookmark, and a coupon for a free cinnamon bun. Seems almost like a cheap form of bribery, doesn't it? 

Well, I voted. In all honesty, I just wanted the free cinnamon bun.
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© 2000 Michael Kwan. Reproduction, exhibition or distribution of the preceding piece without the expressed written consent of the author(s) can result in severe criminal and civil penalties under international agreements.