1st Year Winner: The Social Change Challenge: The Unaffordability of University Education

HREQ 1880A, Social Change in Canada. CD: Maggie Quirt.

Abstract

   This assignment challenges students to depart from the standard essay form and to write a report describing a social change project that they have carried out during the course. The rationale for [author’s] team’s choice of project is well-researched and shows how the high cost of attending university, together with recent changes to OSAP, creates barriers to participation, especially for racialized minority students with low incomes. Overall, the report provides a clear account of the social change strategies used and reflects thoughtfully on what was accomplished and on steps for the future. It shows that university writing can not only incorporate research, make persuasive arguments and demonstrate critical reflection: it can do so in ways that are accessible and interesting to many readers.

   The report is especially appealing because it considers the diversity of our student population The paper discusses, for example, making an accessible Instagram series of posts: “Our Instagram account was made through an intersectional lens and took into account minority groups from the very beginning. For example, every post has an image description … underneath the caption, so that people with visual disabilities can use Siri and other reading programs to understand our posts better, as many programs, unfortunately, do not read images.”