We were smoking cigarettes outside The Varsity tent at Clubs Day, observing fresh-faced frosh flock to the annual parade, their faces glowing with school spirit (amplified by Tom Cochrane’s “Life Is A Highway”) when it hit me: at 21, I’ve become the old guy. Entering my victory lap during what my parents pray is my last leg at the University of Toronto, I no longer feel that warm and fuzzy back-to-school feeling that makes one dream of cable neck sweaters and unlined Hilroy notebooks. While the idea of a Whole New Year of pseudo post-modernist lectures, student council hypocrisy and crushworthy Diablos baristas should fill me with glee, I mostly feel nonplussed. For all those students edging their way onto senior year and beyond, I have one question: if it’s a victory lap, what exactly are we celebrating?

The university experience contains multitudes, and carries no guarantees. As much as I would love to, I can’t promise you, dear reader, that the co-ed of your dreams will ask to borrow your pen in Art History class, or that your kooky roommate won’t have sex on your bed without asking permission first. There’s no assurance that you will graduate from this fabled institution with a 4.0 GPA and several offers to American graduate schools, or even that your ANT 100 professor will know your name by the end of first semester. Truth be told, you probably won’t graduate without a debt of several thousand dollars, and even if you occupy the President’s office you might end up in jail. This university has many deeply rooted systemic problems on top of a boatload of bureaucracy, and even for those who stay behind, it’s hard to feel that the real world is any kinder.

But don’t jump off the top of Robarts just yet, for I have a novel solution—write for The Varsity. Sure, multitudes of inferior publications across campus are offering you the same dazzling opportunity, but what they don’t know is that we matter. In attendance at a Governing Council meeting (mostly for the oatmeal cookies), I ran into President Naylor, who assured me that he makes his way through the paper every Monday and Thursday. “While I found it really hard to get through before, now I make a point to read it,” he boasted. While I’m fairly certain our content is on par with a Grade 9 reading level, I did appreciate the vote of confidence.

Think your $5,000 tuition fee is bullshit? Write an editorial. Hate the fact that your residence makes you attend Hawaiian-themed suite events just to get back in? We want to know. Ever feel prejudice because of your skin colour, sexual orientation, class background, or the way you look? We’re here for you. At The Varsity, we’re bored as hell and we just can’t take it anymore. Complacency might be rampant at U of T, but it sure as hell isn’t here. With the same student politicians running the show for years now, this publication might provide the only opportunity for an honest dialogue on how things really work around here. And if something in this paper makes you feel impassioned, for better or for worse, write me a letter at [email protected]

You’re paying $1.25 of your tuition fees to fund this historic, and, let’s face it, ego-inflated publication, so it might as well be yours. State your views in The Varsity and state them often. And quit smoking while you’re at it.

Yours truly,

Chandler Levack

Editor In Chief

The Varsity Newspaper

2007-2009