Der be peeps fillin in. I’m tryin to find a place to sit myself, and also remember dem all from der profiles. In da peanut gallery we got de Cock (who looks like he fallin asleep, maybe he’d be a good one to sit beside), and a bunch of other student reps. We also gotta couple o’staff members who bin sucked into takin notes. Megan B. has been a Drug and Alcohol Counsellor at G. House since graduation.

Ted R. works in private practice and has also worked as a consultant to MSB-Health Canada -- Medical Services Branch, Ministry of Health and Social Services, P.W.A. Society, Workers Compensation Board.

Louisa G. is a counsellor at the Police Department under the Canadian Association of Sexual Assault Centres.

Ahh, maybe not. Looks like she havin a good laugh wid an ex-chancellor, too rich for my blood. The Warden, de Sub-Warden. De Vices. All a lotta fuckin big wigs. Da’s for damn sure. An I feel like I ain one o’dem at all. Wha da hell’m I doin here, anyway? Big business junkies an de like. Looks like everyone’s jus bout here. Der is a large, large woman and I’m havin trouble figurin out what her role (heh-heh) is here. She don seem to fit (heh-heh) in here, either. Stumblin, limpin aroun.

Guess I better get myself a seat. I’m gonna try sittin beside the Cock for a change. He’s sorta surrounded by student reps here, but I see an empty seat.

“No room! No room!”

Da’s ridiculous. Fuckin racist or some shit. Der’s all kindsa room. Jus cuz dey gotta hole up in one corner o’de room doesn mean no one else can join dem. Fuck. I useta be a studen’too y’know. I feel’ike tellin’em to fuck right off, but instead I jus’tart lookin for somewhere else to sit. Fuck it. I’m sittin wid’e students. Der’s nowhere else to sit, an I can tell da’the meetin is bout to start. Dey’ll jus hafta deal. No, wait. I guess I can sit nex’to d’ex-chancellor, maybe an de beautiful dentist. Dat wouldn be so bad afterall.

“Ahh, der’s plenty o’room.” I tell those fuckin studens, an den I go to d’other end o’de room. Right in de midst of all de big-wigs. D’ex-chancellor is right beside me. He’s lookin me up an’down.

“Have some wine,” he says openin up his jacket as I sit down. I see a flask in der. He’s takin it out discreetly an offerin it to me. He’s holdin it right up to my face. It seems pretty empty to me, an from de smell it was somethin a little stronger dan wine dat was in it in de first place.

“I don see any wine, man,” I’m sayin to him.

“There isn’t any,” he says with a very kooky kinda smile. How old is dis guy anyway? He looks like he’s bout 102 years of age.

“Then it wasn’t very civil of you to offer it,” says some kinda businessman on de other side o’me.

“It wasn very civil of YOU to sit down without bein’vited,” d’ex-chancellor is sayin to de businessman wid a wink at me. Maybe dis guy ain so bad afterall.

“I didn’t know this was YOUR row, John,” de businessman is bout to lose his temper.

“Cut your hair,” d’ex-chancellor snaps back. Dis is pretty funny cuz de businessman looks a bit like an old hippy ‘cept for his suit. He got all kindsa beeds an tattoos an stuff, not to mention a great big head o’long hair. I figure I better break in before things get outta hand.

“Hey, guys. Le’s not get into de personal remarks, ok?”

D’hippy businessman is openin his eyes very wide an den they suddenly become all squinty-like an small. He’s bout to say somethin to me, but a loud bout o’raucous laughter interrupts him. Someone nearby is tellin jokes.

“Then the patient says, ‘I coulda been a psychopath.’ So, I say, ‘Don’t worry. If you’re wrong, you won’t lose your head.’ Haa haaa haaa.” De guy is laughin so hard, he’s just about chokin.

Now de name tags bein propped up on de table. I’s funny cuz dey got dis huge-like table from medieval times or somethin, but d’whole Board is all crunched at one’nd of it. Now we see how up to date dem websites really is. Connectin the dots: the relations between all dese people. Can’t quite be read. But it look like de lovely Ms. Inwest Investments Inc. ain gonna make it today, unless she’s jettin in late. I’s gettin called to order now. Der’s gonna be another presentation today.

“Clearly, there is less opportunity for people with less money to find alternative services that are usually much more expensive when they are provided by the private sector... Overall, it has not been a good exercise for the city-state to go through.”

Dis all seems a little familiar somehow. Le’s consult Maro.

“Support the objectives of the institution… if that can’t be done then the institution will not thrive… the office does all that… look at the technologies being offered to us.”

Some slides are projected up in front of us in order to prove a point: commercialization activities. "What technologies are commercializable… downtown incubator… Angel Network of Investors…” Showin der wares.

“The economics of this city… based on international…”

-36 invention disclosures

-26 new patent applications filled

-5 new patents issued

The bottom line: $15.7 million in revenues generated.

I dunno. I wonder if da’s all a little too technical for some o’de people on de Board. Oh, holdup. I think somethin’s bout to go down here. I can feel things heatin up.

“The woman running the station was a little disappointed at the level of contributions.”

It’s Ange Wardrop, a professor in the Department o’Psychology.

But psychologists have long been aware o’dismal aspects of human behaviour: people are more honest if dey know dey’re bein observed - when’obody’s watchin, dey feel dey can get away wid murder, or at least a free cup o’coffee. Dis problem gave Wardrop and two colleagues an idea for an experiment. For 10 weeks one spring, dey alternately taped two posters over de coffee station. Durin one week, it was a picture o’flowers; durin d’other, it was a pair of starin eyes. Den they sat back to watch what would happen. A remarkable pattern emerged. Durin da weeks when d’eyes poster stared’own at de coffee station, coffee an tea drinkers contributed 2.76 times as much money as in de weeks when flowers graced’e wall. Apparently, da mere feeling o’bein watched - even by eyes dat were patently not real - was enough to encourage people to behave honestly. Wardrop says she was’tunned: “We kind of thought there might be a subtle effect. We weren’t expecting such a large impact.”

Dis paper prompted’e Townsend police department to slap’osters of eyes everywhere as part of a campaign called “We’ve Got Our Eyes on Criminals.” De researchers’tudied de campaign to see if de posters had an effect on crime and vandalism... and so on an so forth. But dat was years ago. I wonder why all dat is comin up today.

Are you aware of any personal characteristics or difficulties that may make pursuing counsellor training difficult for you at this time? Please elaborate.

Counselling Psychology Master’s student Ange Wardrop, age 26, won’t say how many partners she’s slept with. It’s not that she’s embarrassed, or coy, or even particularly modest. She’s happy to share that the average number among her age group is about 10 partners each. Also, she confided that she lost her virginity at 18, roughly one year after the Townsend average for girls. Wardrop recounted that even in her liberal, educated peer group, there are still seemingly random standards. Eyebrows raise, for example, if a woman says she’s had more than a dozen partners - especially if that number includes one-night stands. Her group expects men, however to experience between 20 and 40 sexual partners.

Wardrop, who grew up near Townsend City Hall, recalled that she and her friends were deluged with state-sponsored information about STDs and safe sex. However, she didn’t find out that sex is emotionally affecting - until she tried it all out in her early 20s. She also noted that in mapping its sexual norms, her group had little help from official sources.

“I read Cosmo for all the sex stuff,” she admitted, pointing out that popular culture fills in de gaps. “It’s [pop culture] one of the only open forums for talking about sex and making it acceptable for talking about sex.”

Wardrop has found another way: pole dancing.

“I know of nowhere else I can go where I can publicly express my sexuality in a fun, supported way,” said the Goh Ballet-trained instructor. If pole dancing endures, it’ll be one more tool for young women to help navigate the complicated world of sexual decision-making.