Roll call:
Present: Lucy, Vera, Hayley, Bobby, Pam, Elizabeth, Shayna, Michelle, Lena, Durga, Neil, Aiden, Angelina, Eliot, Kara, Myles, and Amanda
Absent: Lindsey, Madison, Brian, Jay
Michelle: First we need to approve the minutes.
Myles: Second
Motion Passes by silent consent
Chair’s Report:
Michelle: First thing, Karen Lawrence has invited us to come to her house for a holiday party. It’s a really wonderful event. She invites us to join her at her house. I’m going to pass out a sign up sheet, just put in your email and phone number. I hope everyone had a happy thanksgiving. And I also just want to know how many of you will be attending the inauguration, it’s on Tuesday the twentieth, I think we need to know if we should change Senate
Mary: We don’t have senate that day
Michelle: Ok just kidding! So we don’t need to do that. There are four free tickets to the nutcracker for tonight
Treasurers Report:
Michelle: Hayleigh isn’t here to give a treasurers report can someone who was at SAS last night fill us in
Elizabeth: We funded all the proposals, we funded Red Pill, Human Rights Day and a Junior Class Event
Myles: what is the event?
Lily: We’re going to be showing it’s a wonderful life in Titsworth Lecture hall and selling various things
Michelle: We should send Rebecca good vibes and possibly e-mails
We are actually going to suspend committee reports because there’s not enough time for them because we have so much to go over today. I know there was some discussion over this, if anyone really wants to get their report in, they can e-mail them to me and then I will include them in the minutes.
EMAILED COMMITTEE REPORTS:
AAOD: Alcohol and other Drug. Didn’t meet week of Thanksgiving. Met week before and discussed finalized everything. Met yesterday and signed letter with finalized report to send to the president.
Curriculum Committee: We were faced with the challenge of deciding which 2 out of the 5 tenure-track positions we will hire for this year. The costs of the searches themselves and of salaries for tenure positions are substantial, that’s why we could only do 2 out of 5. The other 3 positions will be filled by guest professors and are top priority for next year. The important point is that it’s not like the positions for any of the 5 won’t be filled, they will just be filled by guests until we can do more tenured searches. All of these positions have been approved by General Committee for tenure-track.
We discussed the Microbiology, Chemistry, American Politics, Psychology and Science, Technology & Society positions. We received several letters of recommendation from faculty as to why we should hire for each position.
Microbiology, being a new position, was taken out of the running by Science Department. They de-prioritized it in the face of the other departments which has more pressing needs.
After very lengthy discussion, we all agreed that each of the four positions are equally essential for the school at this time, and we switched to discussing the cons of filling each position, which was a difficult task in and of itself. There are several factors beyond student demand/enrollment numbers that needed to be considered; such as Donning and FYS teaching needs, service to the Graduate program, coordinating sabbaticals, total numbers of empty positions in each department, and more.
We ultimately decided to proceed with tenure-track hiring for Psychology and American Politics.
We are prioritizing next Chemistry, Science, Technology & Society, Microbiology; in that order. Future searches (that have not been approved yet but are coming up) are for Public Policy and Anthropology, specifically a Latin American studies professor.
We are setting up priority lists and considering making them semi non-negotiable for next year’s Curriculum Committee, so that no position can get pushed to the side in future years.
Student Life:
Student Life talked briefly about 24 hour study spaces and the library. Many voiced that there was not enough 24 hour study spaces but that the library during conference time is too loud and unsuitable for studying.
Fundraiser request for the Blues and Booze benefit for hurricane survivors was approved.
Collection box during The Story of Suzanne for donations to My Sister’s Place approved.
On campus filming request by Aaron Edwards to film in the Blue room was denied after much discussion. Committee felt it could not give permission for a student to film in a non-reservable space.
Student Life continued talks on the blood mobile ban. Proposals submitted by professor Rachel Cohen and Bobby Philips. After much discussion the committee voted on continuing the ban until the FDA changes legislation and for Rachel and Bobby to collaborate on a joint proposal with suggestions for what action the student body could take on possible activism.
We are now going to move into the Bylaw changes
BYLAW CHANGES:
Jasmine: It basically says that if a club chair misses a meeting, they can come to the Executive meeting
Emily: I just was wondering if work is included in this
Jasmine: WE feel like you can get out of work
Angelina: I’m in support
Elizabeth: I motion to approve
Second
Aiden: I object
Kat: Friendly amendment, there’s a typo
Aiden: I feel like restricting it to only academic is making it too strict, I know that we think having them come to senate shows there commitment to their club, but I think asking them to skip work, and miss a shift is something we can ask them to do. I’m not sure if they really need to come to senate
Elizabeth: I understand why there should be other things that could prevent club chairs from coming to meetings, but I still think that they should come to senate, it helps us get to know them, and we’ll have a better connection to them because we need to get to know them since they’re part of the community we’re approving.
Lily: Part of the thing we’re saying is that we’re saying it’s going to take too much time, so a loose proposal would be to have an isolated meeting just for club recognitions, or just do a separate meeting to approve all of them. I mean there must be a way to make it more optional, there are a lot of different reasons they can’t make it, and we should try and provide times that they are all available would help.
Vera: I think that we know it’s important that clubs come here. This bylaw arose because we did not approve the one that stated the clubs would only go to exec in order to be recognized. I think we should keep the present one and the word academic because that gives us a greater flexibility
Aiden: I would like to point out that clubs do not need to be recognized in order to get funding. They need to get funding if they need more than a thousand dollars.
Bobby: I call to question
Nineteen in formal
Michelle: So we’re going to vote on voting
19 Yes
Unanimous
Michelle: so the motion passes, and we’re going to move on to this discussion on Student affairs and Student Senate. This is a chance for us to decide, on it’s most basic level whether or not Mary should sit at the table, it’s an opportunity to hash out the details between that relationships
Angelina: I think we should let her sit at the table, we let everyone else sit at the table who’s a part of discussion, so I think we should let Mary sit at the table. Can I make a motion?
Kara: We can’t really make a motion there’s nothing that says she can’t in the first place
Lily: I think she should, just because it’s a student group doesn’t exclude her, she is included in our decision making process.
Jasmine: I’d like to send an invitation to Mary to join us at the table. Do you want to?
Mary: Yes
Myles: What’s your title
Mary: Dean of Students
Myles: I don’t think she should sit at the table. I think this is a group of students, I think she is not part of the decision making, I think she is an advisory role. It’s nothing against the DOS but she’s not a student, and her voice should not be considered in the same right as all of ours
Vera: I don’t think this is a comfort issue, and I don’t think that inviting her to the table would make her role change to an uncomfortable level
Mary: I just want to clarify, that two years ago the senate chose that they wanted the table to be all students. I will sit where you want me to sit, and I will be here or there for you no matter where I am. My choice to sit here is a result of the choices of students in the past
Kat: I just have a question what the actual relationship between Senate and student affairs and what would change if Mary did sit at the table
Michelle: Mary advises us. She just gives us advice, she helps us when needed.
Mary: And I haven’t had to do this, but the trusties put me in charge of making sure that if you violate the bylaws, or the bylaws of the college, it would be my job to correct that.
Bobby: Just to address Mile’s point, it is an open meeting to anyone in the community, so at any other point in the future or past, anyone can come and sit down at the table, for example at Student Life, we had a lot of guests at the table I’d like to take and informal poll.
Most in favor
Lena: Would her roll change in any way?
No
Lena: So if her roll doesn’t change I think … wait really, it’s just positioning? Would she like to sit at the table? If nothing is changing it’s just inclusion
Kara: I’m sad Brian isn’t here, because he asked why Mary couldn’t sit at the table. I’d just like to echo what Bobby said that she’s welcome. Also I don’t think it’s appropriate to make a motion because Senate cannot say who can sit at the table
Neil: The problem in the past was that we need to separate Administration and student issues, since we haven’t really touched upon these this year it really hasn’t been an issue. I think that it’s just like in an administrative meetings It’s a tactic in getting what needs to get done I think we don’t have the same scrutiny, as in board meetings, but it’s solely a student thing.
Durga: Lena I wanted to address your question, I think it’s more in a sense of the symbolic nature of this being a student senate represented by student but I think that it’s because Mary doesn’t vote and that she has to scoot her chair up to speak
Jasmine: I’m inviting her again, I think that to continue conversation is trite. Come Here!
Mary: okay, but if you want me to go back, just say “Mary, go back”
Elizabeth: We also have the right to have Mary to not be here when we’re discussing something, so remember that you as a senator have the right to be asked to leave
Lily: I think that just because we function on a majority decision we shouldn’t ignore the opinions of the people who were not in favor of this, I’d recommend you speak up with your being unhappy with the decision.
Myles: My one concern is, yes I do see a symbolic nature, and I think that’s important, but also I think that the Dean of Students sitting at the table will make us depend on her now. I usually forget she’s here, and that’s fine because she’s not a member of this body like we are. I objected because I’m worried about our dependence on her.
Mary: my involvement isn’t going to change, but the use of me may, so I think you should be aware of that and revisit that. You could do an email exchange to make sure that I’m continuing my role as an advisor
Elizabeth: So at Student life, there’s people at the table and the people that sit around the outside, so the people at the table vote, (yes) and the people at the outside are they there every week but don’t vote (yes)
Jasmine: Yes all the voting members do sit at the table but not all people at the table vote
Michelle: We’re going to move on to the next item on the agenda which is the Senate time, proposed by Neil
Neil: SO I know that there have been so many events at one thirty and three thirty, because it’s the time when there’s no class, I’m thinking it seems inconvenient, a lot of people go straight to class, or have to leave early to go to class. I don’t know if people feel uncomfortable with choosing a time which we can commit two hours to is
Angelina: I know where you’re coming from. I found it stressful that everything is going on at the same time. Logistically it didn’t work out when doing election packets and filling out class selections. But I know that I scheduled my class around when senate was. I just know it will be incredibly hard to do
Eliot: So we can’t really do anything until we know what our schedules for next semester
Shayna: originally I was all for it, because there were so many events, but I know that for me personally I can’t find two more hours that I don’t have class. missing events is one thing, but rehearsals is different
Bobby: originally I didn’t think about the people who have theater thirds. I think a pm. meeting might be more enjoyable, and it would be nice. But it might also help for club chairs. I’d like to see if we could push it to some p.m period after dark
Kara: I just would like everyone to know that when exec was elected, we sent out a survey asking when most people would be available,
Neil: there were only forty of those together, it really wasn’t considered because there were so few votes
Kara: apparently I wasn’t really informed about that, I think though that since Shayna just said she couldn’t reschedule mean this discussion is over because it’s not fair that one person can’t come
Lucy: I remember it used to be at night and Alex Eddlemen couldn’t come a lot, I just was wondering when it changed?
Neil: last year
Lucy: I mean I understand the thing with theater thirds, but career counseling does a lot at this time and I’ve missed a lot
Lena: I agree with Angelina. I also know I only came to senate knowing that I could make this time. It might be too late to change the time, I think we’d need to do it for next year I think if we changed it would be harder.
Myles: I like the idea of the evening, but I understand the whole thing about theater thirds, but what about Sunday evenings. Is the opposition because people don’t want to meet or is there a reason
Lily: I think that people view this as more academic because it’s something during the day, but I feel like the nighttime is when I do my homework, night is not a part of the school day, so I feel like meeting at night, just because it’s not during the day doesn’t make it less of an academic conflict
Neil: I know it’s difficult, but it’s also possible, but I don’t think it’s acceptable that we have two senators that can’t come to every meeting, but I don’t think it’s acceptable that we’ve never had a meeting with everyone here. If people just think about whether or not we want to, or if it’s worth it, and stop thinking about how hard it is, we should do it.
Aiden: I think we should remember that people do have classes at night. I think we should stop talking about nighttime as free time because it does have various commitments.
Durga: in reply to Myles, I have a meeting on Sunday nights. I disagree with lily because I think that people should have to make choices and prioritize, we should make people decide on senate and decide to make the commitment, and I think we should make sure that we have everyone here. For example that huge economic forum, I missed it because I have senate, but I think that there are a lot of way that people choose other things over senate, it seems like some people take much more responsibility than others, and that we should have to make a priority, and there’s a lot of things we can work around so that can choose.
Michelle: I’m going to close the call list
Jasmine: I agree that having meeting where not all people can come is bad, but I don’t think events are a reasonable excuse for missing Senate. I think saying that events are a reason for missing senate is bullshit. I think we should do a doodle once everyone knows what their schedules will be like next semester.
Michelle: We’re out of time. We’ll do a doodle and see when everyone could meet. How does that sound to everybody? Final words really well
Lily: Can we get to the call list?
Neil: can I move to extend the time for three minutes?
Michelle: I’m going to let you extend the time, is there a second?
Second. Pass by silent consent
Bobby: we get our schedules on the ninth, we should then go from there and fill out a doodle. I don’t know everyone’s schedule but I think we should make time to do this
Michelle: this discussion of everyone listing their personal commitments is unproductive and we should use constructive conversation
Emily: we ran knowing the times, I think that people should maybe have to sign up with their schedules. Though I understand plays are optional, we have to do tech credits. I have a problem with the doodle since we don’t know play schedules in January
Lilly: there’s always going to be a choice, there’s so much going on this campus, there isn’t a time where everyone’s not going to have to make a certain choice.
Elizabeth: If even one senator can’t come, the conversation should end. And we’re talking about theater and music, but people came here to do those things. Those things are just as important as some classes.
Neil: I think the fact that you said us choosing is bullshit is really not fair. Participating in such events is important as a part of us being a part of the community, we’re here to represent the student body, but it’s harder for us to do our jobs if we’re not getting out there and taking part in the community.
Michelle: We’re going to go back to the roll of the parliamentarian. In your packet, Kara and I put together information about the history of the parliamentarian. You can see the bylaw change made stating that the parliamentarian is a non-voting member. There was never a final copy made in Neil’s year and Lauren’s year, and then the bylaws for last year, stated that the parliamentarian was a voting number. So we need to decide with the starting point. There are charts at on the wall where we can start with the original bylaws from 2006 before the alterations, or we can start on option b with the 07-07 bylaws, which we’ve been under. We can call to question and take a roll call vote, then we will say option A or option B, and that’s how we’re going to choose our starting point. I know everyone wants to talk about neutrality, but I promise we’ll get to it. Let’s open for questions and opinions/statements.
Elizabeth: I have a question about what all the emails are?
Michelle: Okay so the first email is from Neil to Mary, it’s the proposal that was passed to be included to the bylaws. The second was an email from me to Lauren, asking what had happened to the bylaw, then there’s one from Mary confirming what Lauren had said. So basically there’s a lot of murky areas.
Elizabeht: When Ben ran during Neil’s term, did he run as a non-voting?
Michelle: we haven’t found a packet that would say what he did run for. Anymore questions? Okay let’s move into discussion.
Eliot: Based on the information provided it seems like option B is the result of error and that we should move to option A
Kara: I didn’t run under option A
Myles: I concur with Myles, I think we need to go with what we do know, we’re a democratic body, and option b is not an option, we should move on with the decision the democratic party made
Neil: I agree, it doesn’t matter what happened in terms of what my year did in terms of putting things together, but the final say is what people voted on. We can’t give any effect to decisions that weren’t voted on.
Emily: I support option B as a starting point because that is what Senate functioned on. And if we went with option A would we need to go back and look at all decisions made last year and count the votes
Vera: by voting for option A we do not need to go back and re assess all the bylaw decisions made last year. We don’t need to go back to look at all of those things, I think we need to look at just the starting point and go forward from there. We don’t just accept something because that’s what we were doing
Myles: I’d like to call to question
Seventeen yes.
Two no.
Michelle: we will say A or B, is everyone clear? Okay now we’re going to vote.
Roll Call Vote: (majority vote needed)
A:11
B:6
Michelle: So we’re going to go back to Neil’s bylaws which as they stand that the parliamentarian is a non-voting member. The discussion we’re going to have is about voting. Ten minutes we’re going to discuss the issue of voting.
Vera: this just seems like an opportunity for people to refute an issue we just decided on so I’d say we move forward. It just seems like an opportunity for someone to overturn the bylaw
Aiden: I don’t think it’s going to take ten minutes because I’ think we’re generally happy with it, but I think it’s important to for people to have eth opportunity to say that we do think that the parliamentarian should have a vote
Lily: I think also that it’s important that by doing what we just did, we just swept over the idea of doing it this year or next year, I think we were in consensus about the non-voting, but not in the immediacy. I want to take an informal pole to see if people are not happy with this because the immediacy since there is people
Amanda: I think we can’t say that we can discuss immediacy because this was not a right that should have been there
Eliot: I don’t think it’s fair that the parliamentarian ran under the impression that she had a vote we should continue to discuss it
Angelina: I concur with Eliot. But the issue is that something has been ruled illegitimate, but is there anything else that we can rule as illegitimate, if this comes up again are we going to be dealing with this all year are we going to have to look at the entire set of bylaws as illegitimate.
Myles: my argument is for the immediacy and keeping the bylaws the way they are written. When we recognize that there’s a problem, I don’t see any reason not to reconcile the problem. Because we can fix it now, we should just fix it now. Because the current parliamentarian has said she doesn’t mind loosing the vote I don’t think it’s an issue of loosing the vote. In terms of issues with the rest of the bylaws, I think we should make a taskforce to go through it.
Bobby: aside form making a taskforce for the bylaws, I think it was important to discuss the parliamentarian now, I think we should look at the bylaws when it impedes with the way we are run as a student body. I don’t think change immediately is bad, I don’t think change in the future is bad, but we need to look at the issue, by changing it later, are we just pushing the issue to later.
Vera: the parliamentarian does not have constituents, the way that everyone else does. Therefore if you’re changing the role of an exec member that has no constituents and they’re here only for making these meetings run more smoothly, then we can change it now
Aiden: I think that you’re only referring to a five quarters missing of votes. It’s something that we’re looking at in our bylaws, we have the outgoing seniors vote in place of the incoming first years vote, and that’s something we did to have exec positions made as democratically elected as possible I think that’s a different discussion than the one we’re having.
Neil: if someone ran for a position, we have a tendency to want to stick by that out of a concern for individuals, but I think that as a senate we need to look for a change when things aren’t working. We need someone to step up and put personal needs aside, in order to do things for senate. If senate needs something to make it better, we do have to put away certain personal needs. If we need it we have to do it. I didn’t go through the bylaws looking for a problem, but it was an apparent issue, and we were trying to vote on something that was never in existence in the first place. I think we need to realize that we need to step up and do what’s best for senate
Lily: I disagree with what Vera said; I think it’s more just a pretense just like the parliamentarian ran under pretence, and now it’s difficult that we change it. Now we’re saying that because of issues we are going to change it, isn’t god in terms of consistency. Looking at the budget, considering that there was a difference between the two, but still there’s an issue of consistency, it’s inconsistent.
Kara: I’d like to move on to neutrality
Michelle: We’re going to look at neutrality now.
Myles: I think its’ an important detail. I think that we need to have neutrality. I think that not voting is just the tip of the iceberg. I think by adding non-voting and neutrality, we will be solidifying that it will be a role to ensure that we are a neutrally run body.
Bobby: the fact that the chair of senate doesn’t vote is important because they run the meetings in an unbiased way. Now that we’ve removed the vote from the parliamentarian I think it’s important that we put the parliamentarians role into the same context.
Vera: I have a lot of faith in us this year, but that it’s going to be hard to get this accomplished. I have a chart. There is an equal and spread out neutrality agreement and role sharing of responsibility within the exec committee.
Lucy: I’m in to neutrality, but how do you plan to force this or apply this? There are a lot of little things, for example Michelle’s use of eviction when discussing hill house. I’d like to bring up there’s already a lot of discussion about how the rules are hindering discussion, and we’re asking for that to be the only thing Kara does, and we were already complaining about this so
Aiden: I think the parliamentarian should be more similar to the secretary. And I think that the parliamentarian being only able to say point of order would keep her from being a senator.
Angelina: there seems to be some issue in defining what neutrality is if the parliamentarian is using the rules to hinder the discussion, then that’s an entirely different issue, that would be a really big problem that isn’t happening. I think that if the parliamentarian is stating her opinions on certain issues is different. We all have the power to sway one another to vote. Everyone has the right to do this, that’s why we’re here
Lena: I agree, it’s not about, I think everyone is allowed to say things, that if things are being said that are changing opinions it should be brought up
Neil: I don’t think it’s about them swaying people, I think it’s about the distraction which forming opinions creates in terms of applying the rules. There are lots of things that aren’t even considered now for the parliamentarians job, there’s a lot more to their job that we don’t’ recognize, it’s different from the chair. The chair is talking to administrators and liaison, the chair is like a president in that way, we need another person in that sort of neutrality. We can’t have a judge who’s making opinions over the meeting. I think if you have a voice on the issue you can’ be a judge.
Michelle: We’re out of time
Elizabeth: Parliamentarians in other bodies/other schools are neutral and that is important. At training, is neutrality an issue? We don’t have to talk about this like it’s the first time we’ve ever talked about it.
Michelle: We will continue this discussion next week. Take time to look at other schools and how this issue is handled.
Bylaw proposals recommended
Announcements:
Hispanic culture
It’s a Wonderful Life
Conference Work in Christian meeting room
Men’s ball game on December 10th
Nutcracker