What is ASWOU up too??

Brought to you by your ASWOU Vice President 

What is ASWOU up to this week???

The real question is what AREN’T we up to!!

While we are approaching the end of our second week of Winter Term we have been busy! Whether that be prepping for Lobby Days in the capital, working in the food bank or getting the word out about our next bike workshop!

This past weekend a few of us attended the Oregon Student Association Board Meeting that happens every month. At this meeting Oregon State University proposed a campaign that they will be doing on their campus.

“Wear the Square” is their campaign.

With the successes of registering 50,000 students to vote across the state we also want to make sure that we are holding our legislators accountable for affordable tuition. This campaign is to raise awareness as well as educate the student body at Oregon State University and on different campuses in Oregon that are in support of this campaign. WESTERN OREGON UNIVERSITY supports “Wear the Square” so look out for information regarding this campaign!! We will be handing out squares and hoping that students will support in spreading awareness on tuition costs and how they are in constant rise.  

WHY THE SQUARE??

In February 2012 in Quebec, Canada there was a threat in raising tuition in public university students by $100 per year for five years in order to balance the budget. To symbolize their protest, they wore RED fabric squares on their clothes and backpacks. The color RED is used in ledger books to show that your balance is negative, so the students chose RED to show that they were “squarely in the red”.

ALSO!!

ASWOU will be taking a group of students that would like to Lobby in the capital on issues like:

·         Tuition Equity

·         Tuition Affordability

·         Cultural Competency

·         Schools not Prisons

·         Student Parents

·         University Governance

IF THIS IS SOMETHING YOU ARE INTERESTED IN GOING WITH US TO THE CAPITAL PLEASE EMAIL aswoustate@mail.wou.edu

If you are interested in sharing your story with any of these priority issues we are also collecting stories.