Camosun students pass through the college extremely quickly, so it’s important to commemorate our place in time at Camosun. At Nexus, we do this through a year-end recap of our top 10 most-read stories of the year over at nexusnewspaper.com. This is my first—and most likely last—year at Nexus, so this year is of special interest to me. Over my time here as a writer, and as part of the Nexus Publishing Society board of directors, I’ve come to understand the importance of student newspapers. They show what matters to Camosun’s students. Our paper also gives students a great opportunity to become more immersed in their city, both as readers and writers. Speaking from personal experience, I’ve never felt more connected to our community.
This year, the most popular stories focus on the arts. Interestingly, art is used as a means of healing throughout many of these stories, which shows both where Camosun students’ interests were this year and also where students were at, and where they were trying to get to. Hopefully our stories helped.
Coming in at number 10 this year is a preview of artist Maurina Joaquin’s exhibit at theDock, Natural Transformations. In Joaquin’s exhibit, she expresses her difficulties with healing from a brain injury through artistic expression.
“The silhouette heads [used in pieces in the exhibit] represent the individual struggle to not just belong, but to come back to this society,” Joaquin said in the piece. “In the state of chaos, in the height of recovery, sometimes you don’t think you’re ever going to get anywhere.”
Joaquin has worked within the community of those recovering from injuries similar to hers through the Victoria Brain Injury Society. Her artwork in this exhibit was an extension of her outreach work in a sense since it further connects people over her experience. Through her pieces, Joaquin exemplifies how artwork can be used as a medium for personal healing, and by exhibiting her work it helps others who are also struggling. To get this in-depth look into the concept of her work, Nexus writer Daniel Ellerton spoke with Joaquin for this revealing story.
“We are all dealing with a similar thing—what does work look like for us? Who’s going to hire us?” said Joaquin. “That’s where I thought about what I could do to help them figure out what they needed to figure out—through art—because many do not see art as a medium of healing.”
Our ninth most-read story of the year also revolved around art. For this one, Nexus staff writer Lane Chevrier talked to Camosun student Alisha Parks, who had recently given the college a gift of artwork. Parks had gifted the Lansdowne library with her piece Gifts of the Heartberry, which we also ran on the cover of the issue this story appeared in. Parks told Chevrier she was encouraged to engage with community in her Indigenous Education classes; as an Indigenous student with disabilities, Parks also wanted to share her experience.
“As a person who has dealt with a lot of oppression, it was very important for me to try and bring this to people because of the impact it had on me, so I also felt that I wanted to try and do this project in a way that spoke in the language that I’m most fluent in, which has always been art,” Parks told Chevrier.
Similar to Joaquin’s use of art, Parks’ message in her gift is that of understanding. Parks hopes to help individuals with disabilities; in the story, she explained that many Indigenous languages don’t have words for disabilities. The difference in linguistics affects the speaker’s perception of disability. Parks believes that through this difference people with disabilities can be empowered.
“It changes your perspective. Instead of seeing disability as a deficiency within the individual, it shifts it to saying, actually, it’s the way in which we structure our social networks, and how we structure the systems that we utilize that create that, and it doesn’t need to,” she said. “We can do that differently.”
This story originally appeared in our November 30, 2022 issue.
The subject of managing personal hardships through artistic expression continues here in our eighth most-read story of 2022. Staff writer Nicolas Ihmels’ coverage of director Lauren Taylor’s rendition of Kindred: A Fairy Tale for Adults sheds light on this. The play exhibits several different kinds of difficulties related to becoming more mature.
“[The play is] about how they negotiate their very busy lives and try to find themselves in the face of separation, and sort of go through the hardships of co-parenting and separation and what that means, and also coming out the other side of that, so working through all those difficult and complicated situations in order to move on with one’s life,” Taylor told Ihmels.
Broadly speaking, everyone has dealt with issues relating to growing up at some point in some way. Audience members connect and reflect on their lives as attendants of Joaquin’s exhibit and viewers of Parks’ painting and, here, Taylor’s play.
“I hope that people will come away having had a good time out,” said Taylor. “But I hope that they get a bit of hope, the idea of atonement, and joy, and relief, and also just maybe a nice time with each other at the theatre after this tricky two years that we’ve had. It would be nice to feel like we’re a community coming back together again.”
Breaking from the focus on arts in the list so far, our seventh most-read piece of the year is this news/human-interest story written by Lane Chevrier. Thanks to Camosun’s work with the World University Service of Canada, nine refugees were brought to Victoria from Kenya in an employment-linked sponsorship program called HIRES. Students in Judith Hunt’s English Language Development class were inspired to give back to society, so they organized a fundraiser for Doctors Without Borders (DWB), and raised $2,500.
“They were super eager and enthusiastic about being able to raise money for somebody in need, and so with all their enthusiasm, I said, well, if you want to, we can do a fundraiser,” Hunt told Chevrier in the story. “I’ve never done one before with a class, but it just seemed like the motivation was so strong it seemed like a good thing to do.”
Mohamed Abdinasir, one of the nine students, said that the class chose DWB because of the help the organization has provided to Kenya. And by putting together public-service initiatives like this, these students are putting into action the goals set out by the artists in the other pieces we’ve already discussed here.
“We’ve been here in Canada for just three months, and we already did a donation, and we felt good, and the future looks bright,” Abdinasir says. “You can do so many things together. Everyone is very proud of that fundraising. We really feel proud of Camosun, and we feel like Canada is our home now, and we’ll thrive here.”
It’s impressive that this piece about children’s group The Wiggles’ return to touring hit number six here, as it was published mere weeks before this list was assembled. Although less conceptual than some of the other artists we’ve talked about so far, The Wiggles share the aspiration to help people. Very young people, that is. For this piece, Nexus’ Ihmels got to speak to newest Wiggle Tsehay Hawkins.
“I guess The Wiggles’ message has always stayed the same,” she told Ihmels. “They have just always wanted to inspire children and eat healthily, you know, ‘Fruit salad, yummy yummy’? I think The Wiggles have stuck to what they believe in and they haven’t changed. They’ve obviously changed over time to fit different audiences, like including me, like diverse representation on screen, but I think The Wiggles have always been about entertaining children and helping them learn and grow. I think that’s why they stayed around for so long,” says Hawkins.
By coming back to Canada for the first time since 2019, The Wiggles were able to entertain audiences of kids and their parents who’ve missed the opportunity to go out to enjoy a concert together. This is an opportunity that’s just as important to its performers now that shows are happening again. Although only a few Camosun students may have read this article with the intent of attending, it provides a beacon of excitement for Camosun’s future performers.
“I think being part of The Wiggles, I get to do everything: I get to sing, I get to dance, I get to act. But, I’ve also got the best audience of beautiful children who are learning,” said Hawkins. “A lot of the time, when we do our shows, it’s their first-ever live concert. It’s really exciting that I get to be a part of The Wiggles and get to be a part of a lot of children’s introduction to music and live music and performing arts.”
Yet another arts-related piece landed at number five in our list. Director Brian Richmond’s Hedda Gabler at the Roxy Theatre—here reviewed by Nexus’ Celina Lessard—relates closely to the other arts stories on this list. It’s a story of suffering women re-finding joy in life.
“Hedda Gabler takes the ordinarily uneventful and spins it into something more complex. Conversations between the characters often have double meanings, and the motives of each character are not necessarily revealed in obvious statements,” said Lessard in her review. “The play relies on reading between the lines and the inference of the audience. This style of dialogue can be tricky, as many audiences are unused to such personal deliberation mid-show, but Hedda Gabler manages to convey so much more with what isn’t said rather than what is.”
The theme of healing was woven into the performance’s production, and the audience was placed close to the actors, investing the viewer further into the plot. It forced them to connect and personally reflect on the inspiring aspects of re-inventing one’s life.
“There’s a certain intimacy as the audience acts as the fly on the wall to the unfolding events,” wrote Lessard. “Both the look and feel of the set illustrate the privacy (or the lack of it) in different scenes between characters, which adds to the metaphor-esque nature of the production.”
Theatre seems to be the most popular form of art on this list, and here it is as the focus of our fourth most-read story of the year, a review of Intimate Apparel. This is another piece that was published late in the year, making its placement so high up on the list quite impressive. Maybe it’s the Pulitzer prize-winning playwright involved, or maybe it was that our writer Jordyn Haukaas nailed it with her review.
“Set in 1905, the play follows the unique journey of Esther, an illiterate Black seamstress played by Jenny Brizard,” wrote Haukaas. “Working day and night, she sews beautiful lingerie for New York’s high-society women. Esther’s anxiety is palpable after her 35th birthday as she has no romantic prospects, leaving her feeling uncertain for the future in a male-dominated society.”
Even though the story told in this play is not set in modern day, the audience can intimately relate to it here in 2022.
“Intimate Apparel is worth every penny and is not be missed,” wrote Haukaas. “Head down to the Belfry to be transported back in time, where everything may seem a little foreign but the desire to be loved is relatable through the years.”
Students were angry when Camosun changed its fee deadlines earlier this year, so we’re not surprised to see this story was so well-read. Historically, tuition was due after the first week or so of classes; this year, that changed to August 16, weeks before classes start. And students will only get a full refund if they drop a class before it begins.
The college said the change was made to create a more fair playing field for students who’ve ended up on a waitlist. Instead, it’s really just costing Camosun students more in fees, second-year Refrigeration & Air Conditioning Mechanic Foundation apprentice Aaron Hunter said in the article.
“I’m definitely against it,” said Hunter. “I think that it’s just another way to kind of end up spending more money on our education, and we’ve already spent too much.”
Not all of the changes were bad, though. The new policy allows students to withdraw without any consequence to their transcript until the last day of instructional class. So, even though the student’s bank account is going to take a hit, their transcripts won’t, as Camosun registrar Scott Harris pointed out in the story.
“Everything that we’ve been doing is with a student lens, and with students at the centre, even though it may not feel like that at first glance,” he said. “These are significant changes for Camosun, but the ultimate goals are really around students and their ability to get what they need.”
After pressure from the Camosun College Student Society, the college altered their new policy slightly: if students are able to pay at least 50 percent of their course fee by the deadline, they won’t be auto-removed from the course. This prompted two more opinion pieces in our pages, both saying these changes weren’t enough.
This story, written by Nexus student editor Zoe Mathers, covered a remarkable Camosun alum standing up for his education. Kyle Bienvenu, a retired navy reservist, attended Camosun’s University Transfer program from 2005 to 2007, and was the Camosun College Student Society’s external executive while he was at the college. In August, Bienvenu appeared in federal court after being denied the Education and Training Benefit following his 12 years of service due to the way the military calculated at-work hours.
“Really, what affected me most was that the Ministry of Veterans Affairs could diminish my service, and talking with other veterans and other reservists, the same things bothered me about this, which was that reservists are somehow not serving when they’re not part of the military all of a sudden when they’re not getting paid,” said Bienvenu in the story.
There’s no update yet on the proceedings of his case, but his story is already quite the inspirational one. College students are constantly complaining about “the man” or their institution, but Bienvenu is proving that you can fight for yourself.
“It’s not even something people think they can do, so it’s good to have that connection with the veterans to know that… it is possible to do this and take on the Ministry when something is unfair,” said Bienvenu.
And the winner is… Nicolas Ihmels’ preview piece about Blue Bridge Theatre’s Ride the Cyclone. Directed by Jacob Richmond, the play focuses on a group of teens’ less-than-fun day at an amusement park. It’s a comedy which delves into bigger issues like coming to grips with loss.
“The play fellows six teenagers who have a tragic accident on a roller-coaster,” said Richmond in the story. “They find a fortune-telling machine… and this machine gives one of them the chance to come back to life.”
If you’ve critically analyzed any of the Final Destination movies, you know that there definitely can be a level of deeper meaning in these plots. As with the majority of the arts-related pieces we’ve seen on this list, the experience of the artist, director, or performer is what holds the greatest impact. Now that live theatre performances have come back, those involved can express themselves through art once again.
“Directing is fun… and the best part is helping an actor find their voice in the world,” said Richmond. “Just working with them on honing in that voice and experiencing the joy of being surprised by that actor.”
What do all these stories tell us about the values and interests of Camosun students? To me, it says that Camosun students need some encouragement to keep moving forward. During this past year, that encouragement has been in the form of the hand of a community held out to students.
My favourite story of the year isn’t included in this list, but not because Camosun students don’t care about it. I found a sense of community through working at Nexus, at Camosun. So, my favourite story of the year is this one, as it commemorates my time here with Nexus.
This is my last feature story for the paper. I started writing for Nexus in March of this year as a volunteer contributing writer. Now, this story finishes my time here as the features writer for the paper, and I’m so grateful for every minute I got to spend working here.
LONDON (AP) — With a few daubs of a paintbrush, the Brontë sisters have got their dots back.
More than eight decades after it was installed, a memorial to the three 19th-century sibling novelists in London’s Westminster Abbey was amended Thursday to restore the diaereses – the two dots over the e in their surname.
The dots — which indicate that the name is pronounced “brontay” rather than “bront” — were omitted when the stone tablet commemorating Charlotte, Emily and Anne was erected in the abbey’s Poets’ Corner in October 1939, just after the outbreak of World War II.
They were restored after Brontë historian Sharon Wright, editor of the Brontë Society Gazette, raised the issue with Dean of Westminster David Hoyle. The abbey asked its stonemason to tap in the dots and its conservator to paint them.
“There’s no paper record for anyone complaining about this or mentioning this, so I just wanted to put it right, really,” Wright said. “These three Yorkshire women deserve their place here, but they also deserve to have their name spelled correctly.”
It’s believed the writers’ Irish father Patrick changed the spelling of his surname from Brunty or Prunty when he went to university in England.
Raised on the wild Yorkshire moors, all three sisters died before they were 40, leaving enduring novels including Charlotte’s “Jane Eyre,” Emily’s “Wuthering Heights” and Anne’s “The Tenant of Wildfell Hall.”
Rebecca Yorke, director of the Brontë Society, welcomed the restoration.
“As the Brontës and their work are loved and respected all over the world, it’s entirely appropriate that their name is spelled correctly on their memorial,” she said.
