Questions of Affiliation

I had a look through the websites of the various national and provincial organizations that represent students' unions' (and presumably, students') collective voices to government. And what interesting things one can find! Here are just a few gems:

• The Acadia Students' Union (ASU) is claimed as a member of three such organizations: CASA (Canadian Alliance of Student Associations), CFS (Canadian Federation of Students), and ANSSA (Alliance of Nova Scotia Student Associations). A model of pan-student cooperation and unity, perhaps? The only problem is that the ASU only claims to be a member of one such organization, CASA.
  
  
• Ever heard of the Graduate Students Association of Canada (GSAC)? Unless you've attended a recent meeting of the Canadian Association of Graduate Studies, probably not. They claim to have four full member students' unions and two associate members. However, the Graduate Students' Association of the University of New Brunswick has no mention of their membership in GSAC on their website. They do, however, link to the CFS - both on their main page and on their links page.
  
  Similarly, GSAC's ability to continue to claim the allegiance of the Dalhousie Association of Graduate Students (DAGS) may be in doubt. They are prospective members of the Canadian Federation of Students. Further, a recent report from DAGS' VP External casts doubts on GSAC's capabilities, noting its small size and its location in far-away Edmonton, in comparison to the Federation's large size and its location in Ottawa.
  
  
• The College Student Alliance - which represents college students' unions in Ontario - lists 23 members on its website. But look closer: the Students' Administrative Council, Cambrian College (Sudbury, ON) is listed twice. Furthermore, the Northern College Students' Administrative Council is listed three times - once representing all Northern College campuses, once representing the Haileybury campus, and once representing the Kirkland Lake campus - even though all three links point to the same website.
  
  
• Lastly, the Fédération Étudiante Collégiale du Québec (FECQ), the main organization representing Québecois CÉGEP (college) students, seems to exist presently in a state of flux. The news on its homepage consists largely of news regarding the results of referenda to leave or join the organization. According to its website:
  
  • one referendum to leave FECQ has failed
  • one referendum to leave FECQ has succeeded
  • one referendum to join FECQ has failed
  • one referendum to join FECQ has succeeded
  All of this may have something to do with the Association pour une Solidarité Syndicale Étudiante (ASSÉ). This organization, which has as slogans "For a militant student unionism!" and "For an education that is public, free, secular, high-quality, accessible and non-discriminatory!", has been in hot pursuit of FECQ members. Supporters of ASSÉ have held anti-FECQ rallies in Montreal, while one partisan has established a website (www.rocklafecq.info) solely dedicated to the promotion of disaffiliation from FECQ.

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UPDATE (2006-06-26):

• I have been informed that the ASU actually is a member of ANSSA, notwithstanding its (apparent) reluctance to claim such affiliation on its webpage devoted to telling people which organizations it is a part of....
• The DAGS (Dalhousie Association of Graduate Studies) executive appears nonplussed to the idea of being a member of either GSAC or the CFS. They officially requested that their prospective membership in the CFS be "dissolved" in April 2005, and they voted to withdraw from GSAC in January 2006. More recently, the 2005-2006 exit report of the outgoing Vice-President External recommends that DAGS not join either organization - GSAC due to its limited profile and lack of communication, and CFS due to "strong ideological differences with their policies." However, the same report also encouraged developing a "positive open relationship" with the Federation's National Graduate Caucus, and encouraged a stronger push for graduate student representation within CASA.
• As has been noted in the comments, the College Student Alliance's double-counting of members is a web site error.