Amaar Fatmi | Contributor
Featured image: The proposed pub will hopefully enhance the experience of graduate students and faculty on campus. | Courtesy of YUGSA
A referendum on graduate student funding for a graduate student and faculty pub has been emphatically supported by members of the York University Graduate Students Association, or YUGSA.
The referendum posed a $3.04 levy per graduate student per academic term for the duration of the 2017-2018 year to fund investment in a graduate student and faculty pub.
90.6 per cent voted in favour of the motion, compared to only 9.4 per cent who opposed.
The proposed pub and restaurant will be situated in the former graduate student pub space in Ross South.
YUGSA is working with the York University Faculty Association, the Green Campus Co-op and York administration to get the project started.
All full-time and part-time graduate students currently enrolled at York were eligible to vote, apart from a few exceptions for students enrolled in the Schulich MBA or Osgoode JD programs.
Voting took place at polling stations located outside Scott Library and Vari Link. Students could also vote online through the YUvote platform.
In an official statement on their website, the YUGSA executive team stated their support for a “Yes” vote.
“We believe that the reestablishment of a graduate student social space will result in enhanced community within and between graduate programs, and increased collaboration and collegiality with faculty,” read the statement.
“With the completion of the York subway station close at hand, there has not been a better opportunity in recent memory for such potential improvement to the graduate student experience at York’s Keele campus,” they added.
It is believed that a “Yes” vote will give graduate students seats on the executive board of the space in order to ensure graduate interests and concerns about the pub are considered. investment
