From the Editor: Our latest issue has been disappearing, why protecting student journalism is more important now than ever
Issues of The Runner have been taken from news stands and thrown in the garbage across KPU campuses. (Abby Luciano)
If you’ve walked around Kwantlen Polytechnic University’s Surrey campus over the last two weeks, you may have noticed our last issue, Vol. 16 Issue 13, on stands, or you may have seen no issue at all.
This is likely not because our issue, which has the headline “KSA President permanently banned from CASA due to sexual harassment allegation” on the cover, is popular, but instead many are disappearing and some being tossed in the garbage.
We’ve seen our issue vanish from stands across KPU campuses, but mainly at the Surrey location. The purpose of this editorial is to not only inform the KPU community about the disappearing newspapers, but to spread awareness about the attempted censorship taking place.
The Runner published the cover article online on Feb. 28, and in print on March 12 to inform students who may not frequently check our website about this news.
On Jan. 12, the Kwantlen Student Association announced in a council meeting that they potentially wanted to leave the Canadian Alliance of Student Associations (CASA). At a meeting on Feb. 2, they announced they decided on such in an in-camera session during that previous meeting. This left The Runner to question why, as the decision to leave CASA wasn’t publicly announced on Jan. 12, and each KPU student is a member of this organization, which advocates for post-secondary students on a federal level. But more importantly, why this decision was made in private.
As The Runner questioned over the next few weeks, the storyline didn’t add up. We received varying reasons as to why and when the KSA discussed wanting to leave CASA. We also anonymously received documents stating the KSA president was permanently banned from CASA in August due to a sexual harassment allegation filed during a conference in mid-July. The KSA didn’t discuss wanting to leave CASA until September after looking at the publicly available committee minutes on their website.
In journalism, it’s important to do your due diligence, research, get every possible side of the story, and report on your findings to your audience, which for The Runner are KPU students. We thought about the importance of this story given the severity of the topic before publishing. We gave sufficient time for people to respond to our interview requests and questions, and we published the facts we knew. Journalism requires facts, and sometimes they are ones not everyone wants to hear.
The Runner is operated under Polytechnic Ink Publishing Society (PIPS), a non-profit organization, where we publish the student newspaper, and our creative writing magazine, pulp MAG. KPU students pay an optional publication fee each semester, which allows us to operate and publish news. Stopping paying students from reading important news they should be aware of is not only a disservice, but hinders them from making informed decisions about KPU and the KSA.
Vol. 16 Issue 13 also consists of other important articles KPU students are entitled to know about like the KSA’s annual general meeting details and passing the fate of student programs to a referendum, KPU’s first Indigenous designer-in-residence Pamela Baker, the new “Relearning Gender” Moodle course, the Model United Nations Club winning five awards at a conference, and so much more.
The Runner attending KSA council and executive meetings is the only way many students know what is going on with the association, whether it is new changes they want to implement or events they are planning to host on campus.
With The Online News Act, it is also harder for The Runner and other student newspapers to share articles through social media. We rely on our print issues to spread news to KPU students. Students pay for us to report on the news they care about and should know. It is a waste when our issues are thrown in the garbage, especially when they hold people and groups in positions of power accountable.
The Runner reached out to KPU security to look into the matter and check the external cameras as there are no internal ones. While no person was found, The Runner found the issues in three separate garbage bins inside the Surrey campus, which leaves a cause for concern as it hasn’t been a problem in the past.
If you would like to pick up copies of this issue, please stop by The Runner office in Birch 106 or email editor@runnermag.ca asking for a physical copy.
We have a job to do at The Runner, and not everyone is going to like what we report on, but it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t do it.
