The Peak

The question is biased

By Kristen Soo

The SFU Graduate Student Society (GSS) elections start this week, and along with voting for the future president, secretary, and treasurer, graduate students can vote on three referendum questions, as noted by David Procter [Grad Student Society to hold first contested election, March 15]. Questions one and two are minor by-law changes; however, question three is about funding to The Peak. As found on the GSS website, question three is written as follows:

“Do you agree that the Society discontinue collecting the special membership fee for the Peak Publication Society, effective Fall 2010, resulting in a reduction of $4.90 per full-time student and $2.45 per part-time student per term in the Graduate Student Society Activity fee?”

The length of this question renders its meaning unclear and the negative phrasing introduces a bias that can influence the way students will vote. While this may seem a trivial issue to some, I see this wording as completely unnecessary and it may be a tactic employed by the GSS to influence voters against continued funding for The Peak.

Firstly, this question is phrased in the negative, which is less straightforward than positive phrasing. Also, by placing this question after two ‘yes’ questions, this can incline voters to automatically say yes to the last question to finish quickly. Furthermore, if you look at the GSS minutes from September 2007, this very question was part of the referendum that year, but the council endorsed a ‘yes’ vote for funding to The Peak. Why was a simple ‘yes’ vote changed to a ‘no’ vote this time around?

I recently wrote to my GSS representative voicing this concern and asking how the question’s wording was determined. His reply was, in part, “There was quite a bit of discussion regarding the wording . . . the vote was . . . around 60/40 in favour of the [current wording of the] referendum question. There are . . . many members on council that have very strong feelings towards The Peak and the content . . . from this paper.” While I respect the right of council members to hold their own opinions, I have to ask this: if they are opposed to continued funding for The Peak, is it essential or fair to impose that opinion on other graduate students by writing this referendum question as they have?

Secondly, by adding the fee reduction and thus making the question rather wordy, voters are discouraged from reading it fully enough to realize what it’s actually saying because already-busy graduate students will likely want to take as little time as possible to vote. Why did so much information have to be packed into one sentence? Perhaps the GSS wanted to give graduate students a fuller picture of the issue, but I don’t see the need to put it in one very long sentence.

Based on the two points above, I believe the GSS is trying to bias graduate students to vote against funding for The Peak. Let me be clear and say that I am not trying to malign the Society — I’m glad they exist and look forward to what will happen after this election in terms of moving forward. I simply believe that question three ought to have been presented in a fair and concise fashion and that this type of thing should be avoided in the future.

Lastly, to my fellow graduate students: regardless of whether you like The Peak or not, be sure to vote this week and to read all the questions carefully before you mark your ballot.