Newsmakers

UVic plans to have international students make up 10 per cent of its enrolment within a decade, up from the current level of six per cent, says Dr. Jim Anglin, director of international affairs, in an interview with CanWest News Service that appeared in several Canadian newspapers on April 29 and 30. Anglin emphasized that international students are not preventing domestic students from accessing spots at UVic. The article mentioned how the university has committed $1.6 million of revenue from international student fees in the upcoming academic year to establish a building fund on campus.

Ideas have values but "unless there is a dollar figure, people don't always take it seriously," said Dr. Smaro Kamboureli, UVic's associate dean of humanities, in discussing concerns over attracting research funding to humanities and social sciences. Kamboureli was commenting to the Times Colonist (April 4), in a story that also mentioned how the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council is re-examining its role. The council is considering, among other things, how it can be seen as more relevant to daily life in Canada. "What we do is everywhere," said Kamboureli, "yet it is not immediately apparent to most people."

Dr. Kathy Sanford, an education faculty member, said "Boys are clearly more capable and well-versed with technology, and that's not seen in the formal schooling situation as literacy" in an interview in the Globe and Mail (April 10) on initiatives to improve academic records of boys. The article outlined programs throughout Canada that use teaching methods that appeal to boys. The article also mentioned that Sanford and fellow researcher Heather Blair from the University of Alberta are working with local school boards to make curricula and reading materials more appealing to boys, but don't know if their efforts will be effective. "People really don't seem to know how to respond to the issue," said Sanford.

UVic's health information science program was cited as one of the hot jobs for graduates in a story about top careers in the Vancouver Province (April 22). Grads in health informatics are being snatched up for jobs paying from $40,000 to $45,000 to start, said the article, which also mentioned a 2003 study showing that 98 per cent of UVic mechanical engineering students had jobs in their field five years out of school, compared to 97 per cent of students in business and law.

"We have a legacy and particularly young women need to know—all of us need to know—what's happened in the past so we can really assess where we are and work on the future," said UVic archivist Jane Turner in an article in the Times Colonist (April 25) about the archives of the Victoria women's movement at the university. Turner said the archives are seeking material such as newsletters, flyers, correspondence, photos and posters for the archives' collection.