In Brief
No Smoking Zones
Photo by Karen Herland
This student does not seem concerned by the “no smoking” zones designated around certain doorways on the Sir George Campus and intended for a handful of buildings at Loyola as well.
The project was developed at the initiative of a student who complained to Concordia’s central advisory health and safety committee last winter about having to pass through a throng of smokers huddled in doorways to get to her classes.
Susan Magor, Director of Environmental Health and Safety, said Concordia has had a non-smoking policy since 1993, before any of current laws against smoking in public buildings were enacted.
The decision to act at Concordia was reinforced by new legislation that will make it illegal to smoke within nine metres of the doorway of any educational institution by January.
Magor said that the current initiative is a test run and she has not received any negative feedback.
Some smokers have privately complained that the yellow lines reinforce their sense of being social pariahs. At least one smoker argued that she should be able to make choices about her health without interference.
“Not when that compromises other people’s health,” Magor said. She added that those with respiratory problems should not have to “run that wretched gauntlet” through smokers to get indoors.
In any case, all doorways will be off limits for smokers come January. Individuals and the institution itself will be subject to fines for non-compliance.
JMSB students win at U of Texas
Steven Bento, Christian Bonneau, Elissa Morrissette and Ian Selvarajah earned first place at the eleventh edition of the International Business Challenge (IBC) held recently by the University of Texas at Austin.
The four undergraduate commerce students were coached by Professor Mark Haber and veteran IBC competitor Cameron Fortin.
Twenty of the best international business schools competed in this annual competition, including Harvard, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, University of California, Berkeley, and Case Western. For this competition, students were given 60 hours to research, analyze and solve a case reflecting a current problem faced by a major corporation.
This year’s case required teams to decide what strategy Ford Motor Company should pursue in order to restore its profitability. Students then presented to a distinct panel of judges, headed by Professor John N. Doggett, senior lecturer at the University of Texas at Austin, as well as representatives from established corporations such as Ford, Dell and General Electric.
JMSB advanced to the final round after defeating the University of Edinburgh, the University of Hong Kong, Purdue and the University of Florida in their divisional preliminaries.
The Montreal team then went on to compete against the three other finalists: Queen’s, University of Washington and Georgetown University. In addition to being selected as the winning team by the panel, JMSB was also awarded the Students’ Choice Award, determined by the votes of all competing teams.
Weekly series on political theory
This semester marks the inauguration of the Philosophy and Ideologies lecture series. Travis Smith initiated the ambitious weekly series to address various “approaches to political theory and the history of political thought.”
Smith began teaching in the Political Science Department last year, after earning his PhD at Harvard. His doctoral dissertation was recently awarded Harvard’s Robert Noxon Toppan Prize for the best essay or dissertation on a political science subject.
He developed the lecture series with two ideas in mind. “First, I imagined a venue for attracting quality scholars and making them accessible to Concordia students and faculty.”
At the same time, he wanted to create an opportunity for Concordia’s researchers to present their own work and get feedback on it.
Paul Thomas, from the University of California at Berkeley was the first speaker on Oct. 26. The last speaker of this term will speak on Nov. 30.
Next semester’s program is still being developed. “Bryan Garsten, from Yale, will be here to speak about political rhetoric — in defense of it, no less!”
Those interested should keep checking the Department’s website, http://politicalscience.concordia.ca
Karim Boulos wins seat
FILE PHOTO
Congratulations to Karim Boulos, Concordia alumnus and business director of the John Molson Executive Centre, who won a seat as district borough councillor (Peter McGill) in last Sunday’s municipal election, earning more than 50% of votes cast.
Boulos was for 13 years chief coach and director of the Beaconsfield swimming pro-gram, and worked with the provincial and national teams.
In June 6, 2002, Concordia’s Thursday Report reported that he was the first winner of the $10,000 Bourse Émérite, given by the Quebec MBA Association, AMBAQ.