A petition to keep Athabasca University (AU) in Athabasca has been making the rounds online.
The petition is a joint effort between Alberta Union of Provincial Employees (AUPE) Local 069 and the Athabasca University Faculty Association (AUFA) to lobby the provincial government to ensure AU remains permanently in Athabasca.
Since the petition went live on Aug. 18, it has been gaining traction on social media as more and more people continue to sign and comment. Over 320 people from Athabasca and around the world signed the petition within four days of its launching.
Although the petition is only a few days old, it has been in the works for weeks, ever since the AU Presidential Taskforce on Sustainability released its financial sustainability report at the beginning of June.
The report raised flags for the unions, who feared that AU would move its headquarters outside of Athabasca or outsource its IT department. That concerned AUPE vice-president of the North-Central region, Mike Dempsey, and the 250 AU support staff represented by AUPE.
“As soon as we got wind that this was in the cards — not that a thing that would happen, but a potential — the AUPE membership were very nervous about this,” Dempsey said. “So we put our heads together to see what we could do for support.”
Dempsey said he spoke with Athabasca-Sturgeon-Redwater MLA Colin Piquette about the situation and received verbal reassurances AU would stay put, but Piquette told him the Legislature would need to see support for the university from outside the institution and in the larger community.
Comments on the petition range from people who work or study at AU, to people who live in Athabasca and call it their home.
AU pumps in millions of dollars into Athabasca as university employees spend their paycheques on housing, groceries, restaurants and shopping in town.
This benefits regional economies, Dempsey noted, by providing both accessible education and diversifying the economies outside of cities.
“When I think about the downturn in the economy of oil and gas, and how reliant places like Lac La Biche and Athabasca are on oil and gas dollars, it’s huge,” he said. “If you remove that source of income, what happens? Well, you have a lot of young people that have to go back to school again.
“Places like Athabasca University or Portage College in Lac La Biche, they can only grow through these tumultuous times, and that can help the local economy when there are times of trouble with oil and gas. I think it’s a win-win situation to keep it there.”
This is a change that not only Dempsey is noticing; he mentioned that in conversations with people in the Ministry of Advanced Education, they expect a spike in the number of people applying to enrol in advanced education, especially as the natural resource industry slows down.
A paper version of the petition will be circulating next month, and once the names are gathered, a copy will be presented to the Alberta Innovation and Advanced Education Minister Lori Sigurdson, for discussion in the fall sitting of the Legislature.
