Yesterday I returned to the uni to buy a hideously overpriced parking decal. My righteous indignation was compounded by the fact that the place was crawling with bright eyed and optimistic soon-to-be first years touring the campus for orientation week.
Damn them with their youth and promise and... youth.
Our uni vice chancellor is an out-of-touch former tech company CEO who decsended from on high to take over the management of our little institute of higher learning after the quakes.
What I first learned of him was detestable to me; he tried to stop my friend from speaking out on rape culture because he said some people with ovaries had already talked about women stuff earlier that year and that was enough.
He also decided to jack up the student parking fees to $400 a year.
He said it was to encourage us to use alternative means of transportation.
Some of us have children to deal with and can't just load them all up on a bike.
Some of us also live more 30 minutes away from campus with said children.
He also claimed the hike was to improve the current parking situation.
I call bullshit.
I've been at the uni for three years and there has been no work to improve or add to the current parking offerings.
The decal doesn't give you the right to park it merely gives you the "right to hunt" for a place with hundreds of other stressed out students who have all arrived at the same time.
And woe betide you if you should visit the uni without this decal. Your vehicle will clamped by our overzealous security staff, a large infraction notice will be taped to your driver's side window and you will be required to pay an immediate ransom of $50 to have it removed.
This will involve a walk of shame back to your car and a short wait while the security staff disembarks from their golf cart and fumbles with the clamp.
It's bad enough when it happens to students but it has also happened to several distinguished resident scholars and visitors who were never informed of parking protocol or provided with any visitor parking. It's a very bad look for our school.
But none of this bothers VC Rod Carr.
He doesn't have to worry about such things and he earns far and away more than anyone at the school so even if he did...he wouldn't.
A huge poke in the eye was an article in The Press the other day where they interviewed Rod and he mused over the lack of radical action from his students nowadays.
At the beginning of summer I met with a professor who challenged me to research Rod's authority and write a letter of complaint to him about the price hike of the fees. I was to request a lowering of the fee and if that didn't work, the professor and I would seek a judicial review.
I spent hours pouring over city statutes and ordinances. I came to the realization that Rod was pulling rules out of his ass and betting that no one would challenge him on it. The fees the uni is allowed to charge the students for levies and tuition are legislated, the fees for parking are not. The control of such things rests with the University Council of which Rod is a member.
The fees that Christchurch City charges for the most egregious parking violations are $10 less than the get-out-of-clamp fee charged by the uni. Also, the city penalty is payable in various methods over a period of time unlike the uni where you must pay then and there or have no access to your own vehicle. I seethe when I think of all the emergencies and health and safety issues this might raise.
Most of all I resent having to take this on by myself.
I'm already trying to fight against a wrongful conviction that a friend of mine is dealing with and researching parking issues and running the risk of pissing off the man who controls your school is emotionally exhausting.
Basically, wah wah, why does it have to be me?
I know I could do it but it's so much work. I need to start a Facebook movement but I hate Facebook, Twitter and all the rest, refuse to use them and so I'm cut off from potential support.
I just wish I could sit this one out while someone else takes the wheel but in this respect Rod seems correct- there aren't a lot of students ready to take radical action (or any other kind) against the wrongs of the uni.
Can't someone else have an epiphany that the school is there to serve us and not the other way around?
Damn it!
Why don't some of these damned youthful kids get in there and let an old timer like me take a knee?
Also, get off my lawn, in my day we did thing better, the kids today don't know, etc.
Damn them with their youth and promise and... youth.
Our uni vice chancellor is an out-of-touch former tech company CEO who decsended from on high to take over the management of our little institute of higher learning after the quakes.
What I first learned of him was detestable to me; he tried to stop my friend from speaking out on rape culture because he said some people with ovaries had already talked about women stuff earlier that year and that was enough.
He also decided to jack up the student parking fees to $400 a year.
He said it was to encourage us to use alternative means of transportation.
Some of us have children to deal with and can't just load them all up on a bike.
Some of us also live more 30 minutes away from campus with said children.
He also claimed the hike was to improve the current parking situation.
I call bullshit.
I've been at the uni for three years and there has been no work to improve or add to the current parking offerings.
The decal doesn't give you the right to park it merely gives you the "right to hunt" for a place with hundreds of other stressed out students who have all arrived at the same time.
And woe betide you if you should visit the uni without this decal. Your vehicle will clamped by our overzealous security staff, a large infraction notice will be taped to your driver's side window and you will be required to pay an immediate ransom of $50 to have it removed.
This will involve a walk of shame back to your car and a short wait while the security staff disembarks from their golf cart and fumbles with the clamp.
It's bad enough when it happens to students but it has also happened to several distinguished resident scholars and visitors who were never informed of parking protocol or provided with any visitor parking. It's a very bad look for our school.
But none of this bothers VC Rod Carr.
He doesn't have to worry about such things and he earns far and away more than anyone at the school so even if he did...he wouldn't.
A huge poke in the eye was an article in The Press the other day where they interviewed Rod and he mused over the lack of radical action from his students nowadays.
At the beginning of summer I met with a professor who challenged me to research Rod's authority and write a letter of complaint to him about the price hike of the fees. I was to request a lowering of the fee and if that didn't work, the professor and I would seek a judicial review.
I spent hours pouring over city statutes and ordinances. I came to the realization that Rod was pulling rules out of his ass and betting that no one would challenge him on it. The fees the uni is allowed to charge the students for levies and tuition are legislated, the fees for parking are not. The control of such things rests with the University Council of which Rod is a member.
The fees that Christchurch City charges for the most egregious parking violations are $10 less than the get-out-of-clamp fee charged by the uni. Also, the city penalty is payable in various methods over a period of time unlike the uni where you must pay then and there or have no access to your own vehicle. I seethe when I think of all the emergencies and health and safety issues this might raise.
Most of all I resent having to take this on by myself.
I'm already trying to fight against a wrongful conviction that a friend of mine is dealing with and researching parking issues and running the risk of pissing off the man who controls your school is emotionally exhausting.
Basically, wah wah, why does it have to be me?
I know I could do it but it's so much work. I need to start a Facebook movement but I hate Facebook, Twitter and all the rest, refuse to use them and so I'm cut off from potential support.
I just wish I could sit this one out while someone else takes the wheel but in this respect Rod seems correct- there aren't a lot of students ready to take radical action (or any other kind) against the wrongs of the uni.
Can't someone else have an epiphany that the school is there to serve us and not the other way around?
Damn it!
Why don't some of these damned youthful kids get in there and let an old timer like me take a knee?
Also, get off my lawn, in my day we did thing better, the kids today don't know, etc.
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