september 2009.pdf - CBS OBSERVER

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4 0 After a resounding defeat in a Rental Review Board ruling and subsequently being portrayed in the press as a greedy landlord this January, CBS got a three quarter turnaround in the appeal this summer. The original ruling was that CBS should return three-quarters of the rent paid by a student plaintiff, 17,406 out 23,946 DKR for a five month period. In the appeal-ruling, the Rental Review Board practically reversed their position, finding a rent of 19,620 DKK appropriate for the five month period and ruling that CBS should return 4,326 DKR to the plaintiff, amounting to about a quarter of the rent paid. The legal battle, however, is far from over. The initial ruling On January 7th, 2009 Huslejnævnet i København (Copenhagens Rental Review Board) reviewed the complaints filed by CBS undergraduate student, Julia Engelhardt. She was renting a 12.5 square meter room plus access to common facilities on Hammerensgade, a property administered by CBS International Office for housing international exchange students. She complained primarily about problems of cleanliness and lack of service. The Rental Board reviewed her case and found that CBS was operating reasonably but was overcharging her, based on her amount of living space. After what can only be described as a rather unfortunate blunder, notices were lost and CBS failed to respond to the charges by the requisite time. Therefore a ruling was passed that Engelhardt should have her five months rent reduced from 23.946 to 6.540 DKK. In the wake of Julia Engelhardt’s case complaints were made by 15 other renters in CBS-administered properties, seeking rent reductions and refunds. Collateral damage When the ruling came out, national broadcaster DR ran several stories portraying CBS as a greedy landlord. This caused a huge backlash, creating a public relations nightmare for CBS and even threatened CBS’ corporate sponsorships, some of whom would rather withdraw their financial support than be party to overcharging students. This connection was relevant because a part of CBS’ income from corporate partner sponsorships goes towards covering mortgages through CBS’ Boligfond, a financial trust established in order to provide housing for international exchange students and scholars. Politicians also weighed in on the issue, demanding a review over how CBS could charge such high rents. CBS vehemently responded to charges of profiteering, citing the high costs of guaranteeing housing and acquiring well situated student housing at the height of a volatile housing market in Copenhagen, where incoming international students have absolutely no advantages in the free-for-all competition with the better connected Danish students. Shedding light on the issue Bringing these facts to light in the appeal resulted in the Appeals Board reversing the Rental Review Board’s initial decision and tripling the amount considered to be an acceptable rent. In the Engelhardt case the rent was raised to just over 19.620 DKK. CBS is paying back the difference and is awaiting further appeals on the remaining cases. - We are not predators here, we are barely able to cover our costs. Giving guarantees on housing is extremely expensive and we do everything in our power to cut costs, explains CBS International Office Director, Robin Jensen and adds: i n - h o u s e n e w s p a p e r f o r co p e n h a g e n b u s i n e s s s c h o o l Rent-appeal saves CBS money – and image Just after the New Year, CBS took a beating in Copenhagen’s municipal Rental Review Board. The rent that CBS’ charged for its international student housing was ruled to be four times as high as reasonable, and CBS’ image took a battering in the media. The appeal this summer, however, has mostly acquitted CBS of any wrongdoing l a n d l o r d i s s u e s By William Tylander Photo: Rafa Irusta, Dreamstime.com ‘We are operating our facilities at cost. If we are forced to lower our rents we will not be able to honour our lease agreements and will have to seriously reduce our available housing. That is not something we can afford to do. Peter Pietras University Director After CBS took a beating in the first ruling from the municipal Rental Review Board, the Appeals Board raised the ‘acceptable rent’ by almost 300 percent. - It’s a quandary. We cannot just shrug our shoulders and leave our international exchange students to find housing on their own. CBS operates under a government mandate to internationalize, but we are not provided with the resources to do so. In a city unable to provide the most basic need of having a place to stay for an international student without knowledge of Danish and without any personal connections in Copenhagen, we have done our best to deliver a solution. But in order to do so we have to charge rents in line for what it costs us to operate. Unsupported commitments In 2006 Denmark took on broad multi-lateral economic and political agreements to achieve greater internationalization, with the education sector as a committed key component to these plans. CBS had at that point already ‘While it was of some comfort that the Rental Review Board raised their position on acceptable rent almost 300 percent from their initial decision, the acceptable rent still doesn’t come up to the amount that it costs us to rent out those rooms. Robin Jensen International Office Director worked on expanding the school’s international profile for a number of years, an aspect of this being entering into reciprocal student exchange partnerships with foreign universities. A key component of these partnerships has been a guarantee on student housing. CBS’ International Office had explored all available options in the public sector before going out on a limb to secure properties for their exchange agreements. Placement in established student housing has been very hard to come by, as these generally operate at very full capacity, on top of which there has been a building freeze on establishing new units. CBS has taken part in discussions about subsidies and spots in public housing locally with Copenhagen’s and Frederiksberg’s municipalities to no avail. CBS has also addressed the predicament on a national level to the ministries of Housing and Science both. And the use of income earmarked for education and research to subsidize student housing is completely out of the question as it would violate CBS’ mandate as a publically financed university. - We are operating our facilities at cost. If we are forced to lower our rents we will not be able to honour our lease agreements and will have to seriously reduce our available housing. That is not something we can afford to do, explains University Director Peter Pietras, who notes that losing housing for exchange students will have serious consequences, reducing CBS students’ opportunities abroad. The fight goes on With the first of CBS’ sixteen student housing cases seeing a substantial turnaround on the appeal, the outlook for the future of CBS’ ability to offer housing is better. But CBS is still far from break-even, and thus the fight is not over. - While it was of some comfort that the Rental Review Board raised their position on acceptable rent almost 300 percent from their initial decision, the acceptable rent still doesn’t come up to the amount that it costs us to rent out those rooms, explains International Office Director, Robin Jensen. CBS’ cases will now go on to be heard in civil court, where CBS hopes for an even more realistic ruling than the Rental Review Boards appeal-ruling. Finding a tenable solution to the international student housing question however must also happen outside of the courts and in the political arena. - What is needed is for officials on all levels and in the different ministries to sit down together and work out a comprehensive solution, notes Robin Jensen. Although Robin Jensen deeply regrets the bad will and lack of trust that the media coverage of this issue has generated, she hopes that there now finally will be efforts at the highest level to help the universities solve the problem of how to house their international students in a fair and decent manner. 1
c b s o b s e r v e r 6 s e p t e m b e r 2 0 0 9 4 1 f o r e i g n a f f a i r s By Alexandra Bode Photo: Rie Neuchs New international name, new international profile – no? 16 months ago, the future of student representation at CBS looked very promising. The two previous, competing student unions – De Studerendes Råd and Moderate Studerende – had merged, and the reorganized CBS Students was the single student representation of CBS’ students. All the outdated internecine student organization warfare could be left behind once and for all, and CBS’ student organization could focus on getting the ball rolling for projects and efforts aimed at improving the student experience. Tricky track record An enthusiastic Vice President and head of the International Committee proclaimed ambitious plans for the future in CBS OBSERVER. CBS Students seemed to be well en route to effectively representing all students at CBS – finally making an effort to include the internationals. CBS Students’ efforts since then have left hardly any mark and a lot to be desired. Hardly any of the intentions were realized, and CBS’ international student body still can’t count CBS Students as an organization directed towards servicing them outside the Study Boards. Especially the integration of international students – something that is mostly left to the International Office regarding exchange students and basically just neglected regarding the international full time students – is a duty CBS Students has done practically nothing to fulfill. Through the last two years many of the student initiatives and organizations that do seek to target the international students, such as the International Choir, CBS Sports etcetera, have sought to benefit and contribute through joining or collaborating with CBS Students. The main support towards establishing,promoting and developing themselves, however, has come from CBS’ official Diversity@CBSinitiative’s financial assistance with CBS Students contributing very little so far. Ready… set… stuck There are reasons for this. CBS Students took a structural detour, and the international focus was just one of the things that got lost along the way. In order to make for greater professionalism in the organization, CBS Students established a new structure, based on a moderately salaried president and vice presidents for four key areas. Instead of improving things this turned out ‘Our experience is that volunteers who are not in it for the money are highly motivated and will work hard because they know what they are getting into. Our job at CBS Students is to make the volunteering experience as enjoyable as possible and leave the boring parts to the paid members. Anders Bech Bruntse CBS Student member and also working for the International Office CBS Students have so far failed to communicate effectively in anything but Danish, but this has now changed with the launch of cbsstudents.dk which is entirely in English. CBS Students welcomes international students to join them, says Chairman Jenskumar Sivagurunathan (picture left) and member Anders Bech Bruntse (right), who is actively involved in the International Office’s exchange student initiatives. CBS Students go international… again With a questionable track record up to now, CBS’ student organization aims to reinvent itself once again. On their quest to become the unified voice of all students at CBS they seek to gather all other student initiatives as allies, but have yet to plausibly include the international students to be ineffective and make things more disorganized. - The culture of getting paid for doing things led to getting paid and not doing enough. We had high expectations on the new structure, but we didn’t get much in return from it. It’s a rough area if you are not experienced in the management of building an organization, a senior CBS Students member explains. So instead of focusing on reaching out, CBS Students had to turn its focus inwards and go back to the organizational drawing board. No pay, more volunteers The new team around CBS Students’ fairly new president, Jenskumar Sivagurunathan, took up the challenge again this year. Working from the conviction that fresh minds and ideas are what is most needed in turning CBS Students around; the organization’s recipe for success is a more volunteer orientated member body with no paid vice presidents – and the new online portal, cbsstudents.dk. This key element of CBS Students’ new strategy is the first website that the organization has set up entirely in English. While other student initiatives at CBS have been working with English version websites for quite some time – or even communicate purely in English, such as CBS Sports or AIESEC – it has taken CBS Students years to get around to doing the same. Once the decision was made, though, it has taken only since March to set up and launch their new wonder weapon website from scratch. With a new corporate color, a fresh green, the portal is meant to incorporate information on all student initiatives and events at CBS – accessible with the students’ e-campus login data and linkable with their Facebook profile. - We want to be where the students are. In order to be their first point of reference, we have listened closely to what all student initiatives have had to say about the portal possibilities, CBS Students’ president Jenskumar Sivagurunathan comments on the development process. CBS Students’ representatives’ meetings with the student initiatives have certainly helped to spread the word about the new platform – and the fact that it is designed specifically to benefit the collaboration, communication and interaction between CBS Students, student initiatives on and around CBS and the student body at large. Giving and sharing In order for the enthusiastically marketed platform to succeed and be the meeting point that Jenskumar and his team want it to be, everybody definitely has to contribute and share their knowledge and ideas. CBS Students’ new strategy, once more relying heavily on volunteers, is logical, but might prove a risky bet. Not according to Anders Bech Bruntse, member of CBS Students and actively involved in the International Office’s exchange student initiatives: - Our experience is that volunteers who are not in it for the money are highly motivated and will work hard because they know what they are getting into. Our job at CBS Students is to make the volunteeringexperience as enjoyable as possible and leave the boring parts to the paid members, he says. Jenskumar emphasizes that CBS Students welcomes everyone and wants students of all nationalities and backgrounds to join. Also, the old sleaze of friends recruiting friends and making it difficult for new people to find a place in CBS Students’ activities is to be completely abolished – even to the extent of formalizing a mild negative bias towards members’ close friends joining up in order to get involved in the same projects. ‘We want the best people to come and support us in making all students thrive in what they do. The portal is our chance to gather all the experience, initiative and motivation our students have to offer. Jenskumar Sivagurunathan chairman CBS Students - We want the best people to come and support us in making all students thrive in what they do. The portal is our chance to gather all the experience, initiative and motivation our students have to offer, Jenskumar posits but acknowledges that the organization has to be realistic in its assumptions on what it will be able to achieve in the future. Another new start For now, the enthusiasm of CBS Students is infectious and may just prove that the time for a change in outlook has been recognized. All of CBS’ 3,000 new students have had a presentation on and the offer to actively contribute to CBS Students, making a conscious effort to also target the international students, as part of this year’s introactivities. This development should be closely watched and preferably actively supported by this semester’s new internationals and their senior co-students. An international business school, where many international students are neither supported by nor even aware of the existence of their main student organization, should have been something of the past several year ago. 1
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