University of Winnipeg opens Muslim prayer room

The University of Winnipeg has recently opened a place for Muslim students to pray. The Masjid, a Muslim prayer room, is the product of a collaboration between the university’s student association and the Muslim student association, and is located in the university’s Wesley Hall Basement. Muslims pray six times a day during Ramadan, and five times a day the rest of the year. University officials commented that the Masjid was established not only as a place for students to pray, but to encourage intercultural dialogue between students.

With files from CBC

U of T is falling down

Due to excessive maintenance deferral, the University of Toronto falls short of structural standards. Just this past August, attention was called to the severity of the issue when the ceiling of the Graduate Students’ Union building collapsed on the main lobby. Brad Evoy, the internal commissioner for the GSU, remarked upon the collapse, saying “We weren’t expecting it — no one had noticed there was an issue with the ceiling at the time, from our side or the university’s.” In a 2012 Deferred Maintenance report it was estimated that the university is behind over $484 million in maintenance fees and would have to spend $19 million a year to maintain its current conditions.

With files from The Varsity

STU goes “Trick-or-Eating”

For Halloween, St. Thomas University participated in the national event, Trick-or-Eat. This entails dressing up and going door-to-door, but not for candy. STU students collected non-perishable food donations for charity, allowing them to participate in the childhood Halloween experience while giving back to their community.

The goal of Ben Lord, the organizer of the event, was to collect 1,000 lbs of food. He met his goal three times over, as over 3,000 pounds of food was donated. After the event, Lord said, “The amount of food raised was nothing short of phenomenal.” The proceeds of the event were divided, with 70 per cent going to the Fredericton food bank and 30 per cent to STU’s campus food bank.

With files from The New Brunswick Beacon