ampus hews EDITOR SIMRAN GILL THE VOICE, THURSDAY, OCT. 20,2016 3 New science course com- ing in 2017 Langara will be helping science students obtain transfer credits to UBC By CHELSEA POWRIE ence literacy course that will pro- vide students with transferable credits to UBC. Chemistry department chair Patri- cia Aroca-Ouellette, wants Langara College to stay in-step with UBC, so she spearheaded the creation of a new science literacy course. SCIE 1113 and 1114 will be offered at Langara in 2017’s spring semester. The two courses offer the same con- tent and credits, except 1113 is for stu- dents with a less successful back- ground in high school English who may need more support. Both will transfer to UBC as communication credits, as they are equivalent to a pop- ular course for science undergradu- ates developed there in the past de- cade. “Until seven years ago, you had to do poetry and literature,” Aroca-Ouel- lette said. “Which is great, but if you’re going into data analysis, maybe there would be another form of communica- tion that would be more applicable to the scientific, technological informa- tion that you’re going to see and touch every day.” This course will teach aspiring sci- entists the tools they need to commu- nicate their research effectively, and the skills to detect unsound conclu- sions in the research of others. Mario Moniz de Sa, biology department chair, is glad the class is finally at Langara. “This course provides a wonderful opportunity for science students to learn English in the context in which they will need it in their scientific ca- reers,” Moniz de Sa said in an email. “They still learn all the writing tech- niques, construction of rational argu- ments based on evidence and general self-expression, but the subject mate- rial is science.” Langara student Aleksa Cakalj is op- timistic about the class. “Having a science literacy course of- fered at a collegiate level is such an advantage as an aspiring scientist. Per- sonally, I am studying to be a kinesiolo- gist and this course will help me im- mensely,” said Cakalj. Le will be offering a new sci- SUSHI PRICES, CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 “T just find myself not eating on cam- pus. I sometimes take the SkyTrain down to Marine Gateway and get something cheaper.” Lee said he has seen a small decline in business since the price increase, but he has tried to keep the prices as low as possible. “This is a restaurant in a school, so more than 95 per cent of customers are students. I used to be a student, I un- derstand.” Lee said. “We tried to keep the best price for everybody.” This is the second price increase for the café since it opened three years ago. CHARLES DALE photo Sushi from the Langara Sushi Café. BALA YOGESH photo A group of international students at Langara College gather after class on the couches outside of the cafeteria for a lunch break. International students struggle with moving to a new country By BALA YOGESH lhe high cost of living in Vancouver com- bined with a lack of family support in the country can be a struggle for some inter- national students. The international consulting company, Mer- cer, has published its 22nd annual cost-of-liv- ing survey, and it ranked Vancouver as the most expensive city in Canada. Vancouver is home to almost one-third of all international students in Canada. Many stu- dents at Langara say the cost of living is at times unaffordable. “Some living expenses are higher, and some are good,” said Karanvir Singh, a computer science student at Langara. “I have some anxi- ety because my parents are living in India, and I remember them a lot. I feel alone.” Among the high costs affecting the interna- tional students, are fees and accommodations. Many students are working as well as going to school in order to afford their living expens- es. “The Canadian government allows 20 hours of work per week. So if we get paid at mini- mum wage, we can earn $700 to $800, which is enough for living. Just barely enough,” said Karan Veer Singh, a marketing student at Lan- gara. Some students at Langara said that the high cost of living in Vancouver makes it hard to do well in school. “If we work, then we do [pay] part of our fees by our self, but we have to ask our parents every time for the fees,” said Harish Kumar, a kinesiology student at Langara. “It’s one of the difficulties that we face in this country. We have accommodation problems as well, but fees are our biggest problem. It affects us in our studies,” said Kumar. Despite the high costs, these students are happy with Vancouver and their college. “The [high costs] affect me a little bit. I’m living in Vancouver, and that’s a good place for living. “I’m studying in Langara, and that’s a good college,” said Ashirwad Bishnai, an asso- ciate of science student at Langara. Langara unites with Covenant House The college is providing 13 free courses in order to support the volunteers at the Covenant House By CLARE HENNIG gram has partnered with Covenant House, an organization that helps homeless and at-risk teenagers, to of- fer free classes to some of the volun- teers. This is the first time Covenant House will offer a program that tar- gets volunteers specifically. Michelle Clausius, associate director of devel- opment and communications, said there are about 180 volunteers and their contributions equal two-and-a- half full-time positions. “We have volunteers, some of whom who have been with us for twelve years, so being able to offer them this [partnership] is wonderful,” said Clau- sius. The volunteers will have access to 13 fee-waived credits each semester, across six programs. The courses must already have reached minimum enrolment numbers and the initiative only covers tuition, not course material or textbooks. This means the program benefits the students without costing the col- lege. John Neuls, coordinator for the real estate program, came up with the idea. He wanted to do something to re- ward the Covenant House volunteers Lean Continuing Studies Pro- who dedicate their time helping oth- ers. “T thought this would be a good op- portunity to give people the benefit of Langara College at no cost,” Neuls said. “We’re doing something for an organization that’s benefiting our community, so that’s good news.” “There is publicity for both the enti- ties by partnering,” he said. A similar partnership has been in place between Langara’s continuing studies and Canuck Place since Oct. 18, 2018. Raymond Chow, program 0 SE coordinator for computer tech- ac S nology, headed the earlier initia- 1 tive and said the process has been much faster this time. It took a year and half to figure 2 out all the logis- tics the first time; this time, it 3 took three months. Volunteers from Covenant House will be se- lected in the 4 Covenant House coming months has 54 beds, 30 for and enrolled in males and 24 for classes for Janu- women. ary. There are more than 500 youth on the streets of Vancouver. A majority of home- less youth have left abusive homes. Covenant House fo- cuses on providing medical attention, food, and a warm place to sleep. Source: Covenant House website CLARE HENNIG photo Covenant House is an organization that helps home- less, at-risk youth and teenagers from the age of 16 to 24, providing them with shelter, medical assistance, counselling and food.