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This letter was submitted late Monday, May 7th, with 105 signatures. We’re still welcoming employees to sign as a show of solidarity.
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Open letter from the undersigned VIU faculty and employees to VIU’s Senior Management Group, Chair of the Board, and Chancellor.
Cc: VIU Palestine Solidarity Encampment, VIU Deans, Hwulmuxw Mustimuxw Siiem, VIUFA, CUPE, BCGEU, Federation of Post Secondary Educators (FPSE), VIU-area MLAs and MPs
We, the undersigned Vancouver Island University (VIU) faculty and employees, are alarmed by the extreme measures threatened by VIU’s Administration in response to the peaceful student protest encampment on the Nanaimo campus. Our student protest in the Nanaimo campus quad is part of an international anti-war student protest movement that has emerged in solidarity with the Palestinian people.
A letter, dated May 2, 2024 and addressed “to whom it may concern,” signed by Mark Egan, was hand-delivered to students of the VIU PSE (Vancouver Island University Palestine Solidarity Encampment) on Thursday evening. It clearly threatens to “pursue all enforcement measures authorized by the BC Trespass Act, up to and including arrest and/or removal of personal property,” as well as “suspension, expulsion, [prohibition] from graduation and convocation activities” if those addressed continue their “overnight camping.”
VIU Administration cannot claim that it “fully supports the right to peaceful protest, freedom of assembly and expression,” while also actively undermining the exercise of those rights through the enforcement of policies and bylaws that significantly degrade the student protestors’ efforts to sustain a safe and hygienic environment. For example, Mr. Egan’s letter orders the immediate removal of shelters and VIU’s “enhanced security measures” include locking down buildings and thus removing student access to bathrooms and water between 12 and 9 AM. These measures are inhumane reactions from a public institution that claims to support both our students and their rights.
By organizing an encampment and governing it in a collaborative and peaceful way, our students are in fact demonstrating many of VIU’s Graduate Attributes. Prominent among these attributes are critical thinking, ethical reasoning, and civic engagement. These are the same values that have guided paradigm-shifting protests and acts of civil disobedience in recent history, acts that explicitly did not follow certain contested policies and laws, but which we now deanrecognize as having served an integral function in struggles to generate a more just and equitable society.
As faculty members and employees whose goal is to empower students to become engaged global citizens, we should not be threatening our brave students with police action and academic sanction.The students in VIU PSE model our Graduate Attributes through a collaborative leadership structure, which includes a de-escalation team, a sanitation team, a food team, and a team to plan activities (e.g., yoga, crafting, book club, camp library). Some of us have witnessed these students regularly reminding everyone of the camp rules that show clear regard for health, safety, and VIU property. They also respect the rights of others, regardless of whether those others agree with their demands.
Over the last half year, these particular students have clearly demonstrated their committed desire for dialogue with VIU Administration. By asking for meetings with Administration, they have taken VIU at our word that our first “key value,” as we say in our 2021-2026 Strategic Plan, is “understanding.” VIU writes in the Plan that this value is expressed by an “openness of mind and [...] curiosity of spirit,” and by the “capacity to engage in respectful relationships” (as articulated in VIU’s Graduate Attributes). Rather than engage in dialogue, VIU Administration has reacted with either pointed indifference or extreme measures, including building lockdowns, intimidation, and threats to bring in law enforcement.
While VIU Administration claims that these measures are necessary for “safety,” BIPOC, queer, and trans students, colleagues, and researchers tell us that heightening law enforcement and security service presence makes many individuals less safe due to the racism, colonialism, queerphobia, and transphobia that are systemic in law enforcement and often inform the use of force by uniformed officers. Let us not follow the lead of Columbia University, which reacted to its student encampment by calling in New York police officers, who arrived in riot gear. As TIME reports, it is the conduct of the police, not the students, that made the students unsafe. Columbia University is also facing an investigation by the US Department of Education into allegations of discrimination from an earlier police raid on the student protesters.
VIU Administration would be well served to look to the models of negotiation between administration and student protesters at institutions such as Northwestern, Rutgers-New Brunswick, or, closer to home, Thompson Rivers University. As The Guardian reports, at Northwestern University, administration agreed to a number of protesters’ demands, including the disclosure of university investments. In exchange, the Northwestern Divestment Coalition agreed to dismantle its encampment on Deering Meadow. “This agreement was forged by the hard work of students and faculty working closely with members of the administration to help ensure that the violence and escalation we have seen elsewhere does not happen here at Northwestern,” the University said in a statement. At Thompson Rivers University, the senior executive team agreed to meet with student protesters. According to a May 3rd public statement from the People’s University of Gaza at TRU, “Thompson Rivers University in British Columbia is the first university in Canada to reach an agreement with students regarding disclosure of investments and commits to reviewing a divestment plan with representatives of the People’s University of Gaza at TRU.” This case is proof of concept: it is both more ethical and also more effective for administration to demonstrate respect for the right of protest by agreeing to negotiate with student protesters.
In light of these examples of peaceful and successful negotiation, we call on VIU’s Administration immediately to undertake the following actions:
Signed,
Warren Heiti, Departments of Philosophy and Liberal Studies
Sonnet L’Abbé, Departments of English and Creative Writing and Journalism
Magnolia Pauker, Department of Studies in Women and Gender
KJ Reed, Department of Studies in Women and Gender; Library Administration
Paul Watkins, Department of English
Kelly Black, Adjunct Faculty, Department of History
Shahriar Hasan, Faculty of Management
Evandra Panych, Department of Interior Design
Chris Alemany, Faculty of Arts and Humanities
Sarah Lovegrove, Bachelor of Science in Nursing Program
Vicki Nygaard, Department of Sociology
Ashitha Khan, Financial Assistant, Arts and Humanities
Jocelyne Praud, Department of Political Studies
Melissa Stephens, Department of English
Robert Willis, Emeritus Professor, Faculty of Management
Lorna Kaufman, Faculty of Management
Dana McFarland, Library Administration
Ingrid Ruth van der Kloet, Bachelor of Science in Nursing Program
Katharine Rollwagen, Department of History
Adda Besseghieur, Department of Modern Languages
Carla Shukaliak, Bachelor of Science in Nursing Program
Kaia Scott, Department of Liberal Studies
Duane Friesen, Department of Chemistry
Amelia Horsburgh, Department of English
Imogene Lim, Department of Anthropology
Sarah Crover, Department of English
Dawn Thompson, Department of English (Retired)
Juliane Collard, Department of Geography
John Hinde, Department of History
Heather Matthews, Library Administration
Melisa Bergeron, Library Administration
Joy Gugeler, Departments of Creative Writing and Journalism, Media Studies
Whitney Wood, Department of History
Lucy Kiester, Library Administration
Eliza Gardiner, Theatre Department
Jeanette Schmid, Department of Social Work
Emily Russell, Administrative Assistant, Arts and Humanities
Jenn Bolstler, Library Administration
Marni Stanley, Departments of English and Studies in Women and Gender (Retired)
Kathryn Barnwell, Faculty Emerita, English and Studies in Women and Gender
Courtney Neidi, Studies in Women and Gender
Mary Crable, Bachelor of Science in Nursing
Katharina Rout, English Department (Emerita)
Emily Kaliel, Department of History
Dean Slonowsky, Department of Mathematics
Natalie Hajduk, Library Administration
Crystal Lee, Centre for Experiential Learning
Shirley Mahood, Accessibility Services
Deborah Torkko, Department of English
Paula Waatainen, Faculty of Education
Martin L Martens, Faculty of Management
Tina Schultz, Practice Education Technician, Health Sciences & Human Services
Sameer Mustafa, Faculty of Management
Gregory Norman Joseph Ball, Department of Visual Art
Anna Atkinson, Department of English
Nicole Klan, Department of English
Robin Davies, Media Studies
Peter Lange, Faculty of Management
Craig Taylor, Creative Writing and Journalism Department
Murat Inan, Department of History
Cynthia Tang, Centre for Experiential Education
Meghan Hilborn, Faculty of Science and Technology
Charles Schell, Faculty of Management
Finn Meyer Cook, Department of Social Work
Jane Wodlinger, Department of Mathematics
Stephanie McKenzie, Department of Psychology
Johnny Blakeborough, Information Technology Services
Joanne Falvai, Department of Criminology
Julia Fisher, Professional Development and Training
Tawnya Hoff, Systems Administrator, Experiential Learning
Bernie Heise, Student Campus Employment
Annette Woolf, Administrative Assistant, Arts and Humanities
Sierra Connell, Faculty of Education
Ari Rivas, International Admissions
Sue Culver, Records and Registration
Jannine Grant, International Services Representative
Neil Surkan, Department of English
Zora Soprovich, Department of English, Tiwsemawtx Campus
Robin Boxwell, Theatre
Kim Switnicki, SRCA
Gary Spannier, Automotive Trades
Terri Doughty, Department of English
Alex Bowman, Center for Experiential Learning
Lauren Mayes, Department of Criminology
Emma Morgan-Thorp, Professional Development & Training, tiwšɛmawtxʷ
Elyse Freeborn, Professional Development and Training
Lea Cohodas, Scholarship, Research, and Creative Activity Office
Albert Seinen, Counselling Department, Cowichan Campus
Meara Kimball, Centre for Innovation and Excellence in Learning
John Hill, Writing Centre
Xochitl Hernandez, Professional Development and Training, tiwšɛmawtxʷ
Robert Pepper-Smith, Honorary Research Associate, Department of Philosophy
Jerry Hinbest, Department of Sociology
Tiffany McLaughlin, President, CUPE Local 1858
Suki Dhillon, Student Services
Lauren Touchant, Department of Political Studies
Chelsea Horton, Department of History
Bryn Skibo, Department of English
Wanda Erikson, Student Services, tiwšɛmawtxʷ Campus
Andrea Tolentino, Advancement
Michael Lait, Sociology
Sandra Johnstone, Earth Science Department
Tracy Giles, Coordinator, Cowichan Student Affairs
Kirsten Bergen, Campus Development Officer
Kim Warkentine, Second Vice-President, CUPE Local 1858
Names Added After Submission of Letter
Caroline Korbel, Librarian, Copyright and Open Licensing Coordinator, Library Administration
Jodi Latremouille, Faculty of Education
Gail Sumakote, WEST Program
Kenneth Duggan, History
Jocelin Teron, Professor, Forestry, Faculty of Science and Technology
Teresa Farrell, Faculty of Education
Natalie Stewart, Information Technology Services
Jay Ruzesky, Department of Creative Writing and Journalism
Theo Finigan, Department of English
Laura Buechler, Office Manager, VIUFA (affiliate)
Caroline Variath, Bachelor of Science in Nursing Program
Tracy Tunstall, Student Services, tiwšɛmawtxʷ Campus
Jean Blackburn, VIU Library
Susan James, Program Assistant, Health Sciences and Human Services
Payton Berrigan, VIU Student Residence
Carmen Lavoie, Department of Social Work
Elodie Button, Centre for Innovation and Excellence in Learning
Wade Nickerson, VIU Student Residence
Don Alexander, Honourary Research Associate, Department of Geography
Helen Brown, Department of History (Emerita)
Colin Ballard, Library Administration
Amanda Wagner, Canada Research Chair, Faculty of Education
Holly Bradley, Department of Social Work
Anna Lawrence, Faculty of Social Sciences
Carol Matthews, Human Services (retired)
Do you want to be added to the letter above? Please email your name and department/area to VIUopenletter@proton.me to be added. The address VIUopenletter@protonmail.me cited in several emails does not work (wrong domain - should be proton.me)