In cities across Canada, the gap between haves and have-nots has grown steadily over the last two decades; Toronto is no exception. In the fourth lecture in the Toronto In Question series organized by the U of T Cities’ Centre, former mayor David Miller and Professor David Hulchanski, associate director of the Centre, examined rising socioeconomic inequality between Toronto neighbourhoods. They argued that if this trend is left unchecked, the city risks becoming polarized between rich and poor.

On Wednesday, police reported that a 28-year-old student at the University of Toronto has been charged with sexually assaulting another U of T student on December 30, 2011. According to a police media release, the accused, Bhaskar Chanda, listed as a grad student in the Faculty of Medical Biophysics, and the victim, a woman, were known to each other. To protect the victim’s identity, police could not elaborate on her relationship to Chanda. The assault allegedly took place at Chanda’s apartment in the area of Yonge Street and Carleton after he and the victim had gone to a nearby pub. Chanda appeared in court on December 31 and was subsequently released. Although police suspect there may be other victims, no more have been identified as of yet.

North Korea, to borrow Winston Churchill’s phrase, is “a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.” For 17 years, Supreme Leader Kim Jong Il--a.k.a. the Guiding Sun Ray, the Invincible and Ever-triumphant General, and possessor of 40 other similarly grandiloquent titles--kept a veil of secrecy over affairs in North Korea. Since his death on December 17 and his son Kim Jong Un’s succession, the situation there has by no means become any clearer to outside observers.

All the generosity towards loved ones this holiday season likely left students' pockets to light for that mid-morning caffeine jolt. If you're not eligible for a rebate on your university tuition, you may need a little extra cash to stay afloat--and caffeinated. To keep you from sinking, we sought the top five jobs on campus (rated by current employees).

In the first round of the Facebook Hackathon, an annual competition to design original apps for the social networking site, U of T grads Joey Peng and Yang Han, together with teammates from Waterloo University, developed an app which lets users display their photos and personal information as a slideshow. Known as “FaceReel,” the app earned them a place in the finals of the competition held in Palo Alto, where they competed with students from 14 other universities, including Stanford, MIT, and, the eventual winner of the Hackathon, Princeton. Although the U of T-Waterloo team came up short in the finals, their second app, Facebook Scribble, which allows users to draw on their friends’ uploaded pictures with the option of drawing together in real-time, was an impressive effort.

The City of Toronto has recently proposed that museums be made more profitable by serving as venues for weddings and private parties. The Fine Art Department at U of T is not yet in such dire straits. “We aren’t yet using our department as a wedding and event venue,” Department Chair Elizabeth Legge said. Pointing to a coffee-coloured mould stain on the plaster ceiling of her office, she joked, “Is there a niche market for people who want to get married under a stain and fluorescent lights?”

This week, the UTSU sent a letter to the Quebec Minister of Education, Line Beauchamp, to show solidarity with Quebec students and to criticize the provincial government’s plan to raise university and CEGEP tuition. In a separate statement, Danielle Sandhu, President of the UTSU, spoke out against the heavy-handed McGill campus security and police response to a protest held at McGill University in Montreal on November 10, at which 14 students and a professor were allegedly assaulted.