By: VERONICA BLAKE
Published in The Courier. February 25, 2010

Federal Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff considered the idea of wiping out student debt in exchange for one year of volunteer work.

Ignatieff recently rapped up a cross-country tour of University campuses. His student-debt idea is not part of his platform, but it was discussed in an online question and answer session. For the most part, Centennial College students have some form of debt, whether it be from OSAP, bank loans, credit card-debt or begging and borrowing from parents.

Jennifer Romano, 25, is in her first year of the fast-track journalism program on the CCC campus. Before Centennial, she completed a four-year degree at Ryerson University. She expects to graduate with $30,000 of debt.

“I still have such a high debt…cause I still…believe somehow the government is going to pay for part of it,” Romano said. “There’s no way I can pay it off.”

Liberal Omar Ha-Redeye supports Ignatieff’s idea. He thinks that the idea makes sense financially.

“Banks have found that many of these loans default,” Ha-Redeye said. “Canadian students are already finding themselves in a difficult situation, burdened by crippling debt and frustrated that they cannot apply their education in the ways they would want.”

Beginning in the 1999 school year, Ontario high school students were required to complete a mandatory 40 hours of community service in order to receive their diploma. Ignatieff’s volunteerism for debt-relief idea would take this a significant step further.

First-year student Cecilia Olmos, 29 attended the Universidad Anáhuac in Mexico before coming to Centennial. As part of the curriculum, the students would perform social services. She travelled around Mexico providing food and clothing to the poor. Olmos valued this experience.

“It really touched my heart,” Olmos said. “I reinforced my values as a person, that we should help anybody that needs help.”

In addition to the financial benefits for students, volunteer work can be a rewarding and satisfying experience. Omar Ha-Redeye likes an alternative approach to debt-relief that marries financial help with giving back to society.

“Canadian volunteerism has been steadily on the decline and when the youth do volunteer, it’s not necessarily for altruistic reasons,” Ha-Redeye said. “This generation is under enormous pressure to succeed financially and the social burdens placed on the youth are far greater than before.”

The potential college strike further complicates matters. Ashtonbee student, Sashell Mills, 21 dreads the possibility of a strike. She won’t be able to pick up any extra hours at her part-time job, and worries that if the semester is extended into the summer like the York University strike, she’ll miss out on summer job opportunities.

“I’ll mooch off my dad, that’s all I can do,” Mills said. “I’m scared… of paying (OSAP) back.”

Omar Ha-Redeye was interviewed by CBC television, who attended the event.  He described his formal education in online communication through Centennial College, and some of his reasons for founding Law is Cool and joining Slaw.  He told viewers how they could easily create their own blogs for free on sites like Blogger, Live Journal, and Word Press.

He also defined some basic online technology terms like blog, Google, Twitter, Wikipedia, and Flickr.  The footage will be used on The National and Susan Ormiston Online in the Blog Buzz segment to help the general public understand these ideas and sites as they come up during the election.

Donna was the first person to teach Omar how to podcast and did his first recording when Donna was a guest speaker at Centennial College’s Corporate Communications and Public Relations program.

Donna said,

Thanks to Gary for inviting me, to the volunteers who shared their stories, and to Omar Ha-Redeye, who very capably handled the microphone for the recording. (I suspect he will be podcasting very soon!)

It took a few months, but eventually Omar did start podcasting and launched the largest law school podcast in Canada.