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For the first time in the U of R's history, the public will have a glimpse at what has so long been a closed door activity. In December, the Board of Governors (BoG), the U of R's decision-making body, made the decision to open its doors to the public for two meetings per year. (The BoG meets ten times per year.) Showing that they are serious about letting the public participate in the governing process (albeit in a somewhat limited fashion), the BoG decided that the topic of the first open meeting should be the debate on the U of R's 1998-99 budget. The budget is arguably the biggest decision the BoG makes annually. On Tuesday, March 31, 1998, at 2:00 pm in the boardroom on the fifth floor of the Ad-Hum building, the BoG will debate and vote on the | budget with U of R students, faculty members and staff looking on. In addition to having access to the debate, members of the general public will be able to make brief presentations, ask questions or make comments. In light of the string of consecutive tuition and fee increases implemented by the BoG, as well as the recent provincial budget, students should be eager to avail themselves of this opportunity not only to get to know their governors on a closer basis, but to get to know the reasons behind their decisions more clearly. Before the December decision, the BoG was a faceless, nameless institution, whose decisions were made behind closed doors with minutes that were not available to the general public. When a tuition hike was announced, as | far as U of R students knew, the reason might as well have been for raises for upper administrators as to maintain the quality of education. Now, if there must be tuition increases, students will at the least be able to know the reasons behind them. However, the new process of university governance will soon lose meaning if only half a dozen students show up for the meetings. The idea is that a variety of students attend the open meetings and make their feelings and beliefs, positive or negative, known to the board. By opening up two meetings per year, the Board of Governors has done their part to include the general public in the process of governing the U of R; it is now up to U of R students to do their part by participating in this process. |