Carleton residence officials are scrambling to contain the fallout after three Glengarry residence fellows resigned in December 2013 over safety and harassment issues they say were not handled properly.
Danika Moly, Stephen Humphrey, and Joshua Duivenvoorde were brought in to be res fellows after Marina Tronin, Miranda Moores, and Shelisa Klassen resigned on Dec. 9.
Moly and Humphrey have been res fellows previously and have training, while Duivenvoorde has been “receiving training from various members of our Residence Life professional staff,” according to housing director David Sterritt.
Res fellows usually receive two weeks of training at the beginning of the year, lasting about eight hours a day. This training covers conflict resolution, suicide prevention, and how to approach mental illness, among other things.
Sterritt said the new res fellows would also receive the same winter service training that all res fellows receive, but that it is more of a refresher.
“If we have to hire someone without experience, candidates are interviewed,” Sterritt said in an email. “In this case, the one selected was offered the position with the understanding that he would be required to complete training provided by various members of our staff.”
Tronin, Moores, and Klassen complained about a male residence fellow last year who they found intimidating and unprofessional.
That res fellow was fired in October 2013, but the three res fellows remained unsatisfied with how their complaints were handled and tried to unionize in an attempt to deal with their work-related issues.
The Canadian Union of Public Employees declined to support the unionization attempt, but the three res fellows said they are continuing to try to organize and are looking at other unions that might accept them.
Students on the res fellows’ floors, however, remain largely oblivious to the unfolding drama.
Ben Russell is a student on Glengarry’s eighth floor, where Tronin was later replaced by Moly.
“We didn’t really know anything, we just stopped seeing her,” Russell said of Tronin. The new residence fellow and the residence manager eventually held a meeting in January, where students asked what had happened to Tronin.
The residence manager said Tronin left “to focus on her studies,” according to Russell. No one mentioned any safety or harassment issues or the fact that the res fellows had tried to unionize.
“The students were addressed at floor meetings where the new Residence Fellows were introduced as replacements for Residence Fellows who had submitted their resignations,” Sterritt said.
