Working Groups
QPIRG McGill is looking for NEW WORKING GROUPS for the 2010-2011 year!
For more information of how to apply click here.
DEADLINE FOR RETURNING WORKING GROUPS:
SEPTEMBER 7th, 2010 at 5pm
DEADLINE FOR NEW WORKING GROUPS:
SEPTEMBER 17th, 2010 at 5pm.
WORKING GROUPS 2009-2010:
Anti-Gentrification Group
From Milton-Parc to St. Henri to the Mile End, university students are in the vanguard of gentrification—the replacement of one population by another, in which ethnicity, class and power play determining factors. Help us enable students to recognise and fight gentrification, before they start their apartment hunts. We believe that promoting involvement in local communities, and knowledge of tenant rights and the collective responsibility to use existing tools to keep rents low among students is good for them and their neighborhoods.
Contact: antigentrification@gmail.com
Barriere Lake Solidarity
A volunteer collective that supports Barriere Lake, an Algonquin community 4 hours north of Montreal, which has been trying to regain control over their traditional territories, protect their forests from clear-cut logging, and fend off the Canadian government’s interference in of their traditional governance system. We do popular education, organize demonstrations and direct action, and are developing a community radio station on the reserve.
Contact: barrierelakesolidarity@gmail.com
Campus Crops
Campus Crops is urban gardening initiative on McGill University’s downtown Montreal campus. We aim to procure space (be it roof tops, back yards etc.) to create vegetable and herb gardens for the campus and surrounding community. It is be a volunteer driven, non-hierarchical group dedicated to educating and providing opportunities for those interested to learn about and partake in an organic, community gardening endeavor. The working group will attempt to collaborate with other community gardens city wide, and utilize the resources of other city gardening projects. The harvest will be split between the volunteers and a campus vegan lunch collective.
Contact: campuscrops@gmail.com
Chaotic Insurrection Ensemble
Born for the May 2006 “Status for All” demo in Montreal, the Chaotic Insurrection Ensemble is an activist street band that organizes according to anarchist principles. We play songs of a political nature in remembrance of worldwide struggles against oppression and to inspire our communities. All are welcome to join!
Contact: maggieschreiner@riseup.net
Coalition Justice for Adil Charkaoui
This group came together as a community response to the arrest of Montrealer Adil Charkaoui under a “security certificate” in 2003. Security Certificates allow the government to detain non-citizens indefinitely, without charge or trial, under threat of deportation to torture. The goals of our campaign are: 1) the immediate release of all Security Certificate detainees, 2) a fair trial (if any case exists), 3) an end to deportation proceedings against the five, 4) the abolition of “security certificates”, 5) an end to deportations to torture and 6) an end to the racist scape-goating of Muslim and Arab communities. The Coalition also demands the closure of “Guantanamo North”, the high security prison that was opened in April 2006, specifically for people held under security certificates, further institutionalizing the illegal security certificate regime.
Contact: justiceforadil@riseup.net
Filipino Solidarity Collective
The Filipino Solidarity Collective is a anti-racist, anti-imperialist student group which takes a multi-sectoral approach towards social activism by focusing on human rights issues in the Philippines, Filipino migrant workers in Canada, women’s issues, and the Filipino community in Montreal.
Contact: filipinosolidarity@gmail.com
Forum Against Police Violence and Impunity (FAPVI) Organizing Committee
This group is made up individuals and groups organizing against police brutality, profiling and impunity. The purpose of the FAPVI is to bring together people who have suffered/suffer from police violence and those who organise against police violence and impunity in Montreal, to resist police violence and take concrete steps towards building a society based on justice and dignity for all.
Contact: forumcontrelaviolencepoliciere@gmail.com
FAO-Montreal
FAO-Montreal is a Canadian section of the Mexican Frente Amplio Opositor, which is struggling to defend the ecologically and historically important site of Cerro de San Pedro from destruction by Canadian mining company New Gold (formerly Metallica Resources). FAO-Montreal works in coordination with the rest of the FAO to stop the mine, and to form links with other struggles against similar Canadian mining projects around the world.
Greening McGill
Greening McGill is an environmental group dedicated to promoting environmental awareness and activism at McGill. We do this by organizing annual events such as Car-Free Day, as well as working on long-term projects such as the ‘Principled Purchasing’ campaign to promote sustainable and ethical purchasing habits.
Contact: greeningmcgill@mail.mcgill.ca
Montreal Indigenous Sovereignty Week Organizing Committee
The Montreal Indigenous Sovereignty Week Organizing Committee is a group dedicated to organizing educational events around Indigenous struggles in Canada. We take our direction from Defenders of the Land, a network of indigenous communities spanning all three coasts, united in opposition to policies of dispossession, assimilation, marginalization and criminalization, and united in support of Indigenous peoples’ rights to their traditional land.
Contact: courtneykirkby@gmail.com
Indyclass Collective
The Indyclass Collective facilitates the creation of student-run independent-study classes inside and outside of Montreal universities. These classes attempt to create an alternative to normal academia, allowing for autonomous collective self-education while striving to make education socially relevant and open to all.
Contact: indyclass@gmail.com
KANATA
KANATA is focused on creating a space and a vessel for conversations that affect native-newcomer relations in Canada. We seek to expand Indigenous Studies at McGill by publishing student essays and research papers on these topics, lobbying for a minor program in Indigenous Studies, utilising academia and going beyond its walls by acting as a portal to student’s studying these topics seeking out other forms of knowledge, organisations, and activist groups .
Contact: mcgillnativestudiesjournal@gmail.com
March 8th Action and Coordination Committee of Women of Diverse Origins
The March 8th Action and Coordination Committee of Women of Diverse Origins is made up of feminists who are united in our struggles against patriarchy, capitalism, colonialism, war, imperialism and other forms of reaction. The committee organizes public events to educate and discuss global economic policies and the situation of women locally, to denounce injustices and to demand that everyone be able to live with dignity.
Contact: tess_iwc@yahoo.ca
McGill Global AIDS Coalition
McGill Global AIDS Coalition is an HIV/AIDS advocacy group dedicated to the eradication of HIV/AIDS and to the realization of the universal right to health. We are committed to helping to create an effective student advocacy network in Canada and to educating the McGill and Montreal community on global health issues.
Contact: director@treatthepeople.com
QTeam
QTeam is a radical queer collective that aims to address the intersections of oppressions and consciously unsubscribe from the corporate versions of queerness that devalue queer realities. We are committed to anti-imperialism, anti-racism, short shorts, queering activist spaces, the downfall of single issue politics, raging queer pervy dance parties, destroying all prisons, opening all borders, burning pink dollar$, and keeping on keeping on.
Contact: qteam@riseup.net
STAC (Students Taking Action with Chiapas)-Montreal
STAC (Students Taking Action with Chiapas)-Montreal stands in solidarity with the struggles of indigenous peoples in Mexico (particularly the Zapatista movement in the southern state of Chiapas) through education, direct action, and fundraising.
Contact: stacmontreal@gmail.com
Tadamon!
Tadamon! (Arabic for “solidarity”), is a Montreal-based collective which works in solidarity with struggles for self-determination, equality and justice in the ‘Middle East’ and in diaspora communities in Montreal and beyond. Tadamon strives for a world in which every human being is free to live and flourish in dignity and justice.
Contact: info@tadamon.ca
TapThirst
Our working group is an initiative dedicated to promoting awareness of the social, environmental, health, and monetary costs of the bottled water industry. We aim to empower people at a grassroots level by supplying them with the information and tools necessary to question the bottled water industry and its impacts on our environment and communities.
Contact: tapthirstmcgill@gmail.com
Tar Sands Free Zone Montreal
Montreal’s biggest refinery is now owned by tar sands giant Suncor. A proposed pipeline project would bring 200,000 barrels of tar sands oil to Montreal. Meanwhile, communities downstream are watching their loved ones die of cancer and rare diseases. In solidarity with downstream communities, Tar Sands Free Zone Montreal aims to shut down the tar sands, starting in Montreal.
Contact: dru@dru.ca
Young Jews for Social Justice
Young Jews for Social Justice is a group of Montreal Jews who take action on racism, inequality in our communities, and injustice in the Middle East, and participate in cultural and artistic activities. We feel the broad spectrum of opinion among Jews is not represented by existing organizations, and we provide a safe environment for young Jews to express their views without fear of marginalization or charges of ethnic disloyalty. We carry out popular education and advocate for an end to the Israeli military occupation, dismantlement of settlements, respect for international law, and self-determination and security for Israelis and Palestinians. We are signatories to the Independent Jewish Voices-Canada basis of unity. We are also engaged with issues of Jewish culture and identity (cultural, religious / spiritual and more), both within Jewish communities and as individuals engaged with, and living within, a wide variety of other communities. We come from a wide variety of backgrounds when it comes to politics, cultural participation and affiliation, and religion. And we have potlucks and a klezmer band! (The Jewstice League Ensemble) We are hoping to have new and more events – cultural and political! – in this coming second year of our existence. New people and, especially, fresh ideas are always welcome!