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Minutes

April 27, 2014 Minutes

Present: Anna Kalinsky, Emma Rosenblum, Carolyn Jacoby, Colin Bauman, Pamudu Tennakoon, Anna Sargent, Molly MacDougal, Jancy Munguia Odeymarys Garrido, Jenna Myers, Kayla Bondi, Alex Francendese, Sarah Gilmour, Danielle Arad-Neeman, Dani Weisman, Sofia Oleas, Chrystyna Colon, Rachel Feynmen, Christine Newville, Jessica Ferriera, Lucy Gleysteen, Kaeun Bae, Meg Sumner-Moore, Natalie Zamora, Phoebe Jordan, Celeste Gambino, Xavia Miles, Lindsay Burak, Emma Burke,

Absent: Karina Siu, Sarah Lovegren, Erin Saladin, Rhett Rhichardon, Sara Kim, Christina Tse, Ivy Drexel, Sam Terry, Frankie Leech, Jennifer Mendez Alba, Noor Masanat, Karunya Venugopal, Angela Blatz, Rhett Rhichardson, Erin Salidin, Emily Garcia, Nina Shmorhun, Danyelle Phillips,

Roll Call

Announcements:

Sophia Dauria ‘15 and Hayley Burke ‘15: We’re customs co-heads. Thanks to everyone who supported us as a committee. Thanks to everyone who applied. We had our first bico customs meet up yesterday. We’re having office hours in the next two weeks for two or three hours. We haven’t figured out when yet. We encourage anyone to talk to us about how to improve customs week.

Alex Francendese ‘15 and Kaeun Bae ‘15: Hey, we’re the 2015 class presidents. We have two events: we’re hosting a surviving finals tea tomorrow 7-9 pm in quita woodward and candy grab bag tea next week.

Carolyn Jacoby ‘14: I’m the Student Curriculum Committee head. We’re looking for proctors for self scheduled exams. We need at leas three proctors per slot, otherwise that time slot will be canceled.

Anna Sargent ’15 and Pamudu Tennakoon ’15: May Day is Sunday. We hope you come. Please give Athena gifts for good weather. It’s going to be warm but not super warm. Also the scrolls will be in your mailboxes on Friday along with a special gift around 1pm.

Xavia Miles ’16: Sisterhood is having a culture show on May 2nd in TGH “Not By Popular Demand” at 7pm.

Syona Arora ‘15: Applications for undergraduate student representatives for the diversity council go live tomorrow. There are at least three positions. The diversity council is an action planning committee that works in conjunction with the Diversity Leadership Group. Please apply. Tell people who you think will be good to be on the council to apply.

Your Two Cents

Alexis De La Rosa ‘15: Brief recap on Board Of Trustees meeting last Saturday. After a yearlong search, they’re adding a young alumna ’07 to the Board Of Trustees. They’re accepting nominations for new candidates, looking to diversify the board over the next few years. The current board chair will be stepping down at the end of this year. There will be a new head in the following year. There was a brief recap of the Haffner construction. The plan is that Haffner is to break ground in in July, weather permitting. It should look like everything will go well. They also talked about the nonprofit sector. There are financial board members they’re using a group for audits in the 2014 year that works with academics and non-profits. The annual fund is up, they’re hoping to have 100% participation in the board in the silent phase of fundraising. Already they’re at 54% in Board of Trustees participation. In terms of silent phase of campaign, they’re collecting a fair amount of money. There was a Saturday presentation of fulltime faculty done by Bob Dostal and the new rep to the board.

Carolyn Jacoby ‘14: Mike noel is probably the guy.

Alexis De La Rosa ‘15: They’re looking at the age range of full time faculty. The average is 67.5, and they looked at race diversity. Right now its 26 people of color. That means 16.9% of faculty, which is below our women’s college peers (>20%) and co-ed peers. We’re making benchmarks to incorporate more diverse faculty and staff as people are retiring.

Aleja Newman ‘17: I’ve started a Pescetarian diet, and I’ve found that it’s hard to get more protein in the dining hall. We want to find sufficient source of protein outside the salad bar.

Sarah Lesser ’14: I’ve noticed the same thing. I know that the pescetarian/vegetarian options are the same thing every day.

Syona Arora ’15: Would you like to take a straw poll ?

Carolyn Jacoby ’14: how does anyone proceed to communicate this conversation to dining services? What are we thinking of doing? We don’t have a rep to them.

Emma Rosenblum ‘14: The Resident Council heads meet with dining services at Tuesday group.

Syona Arora ‘15: If you wanted to see student support, approach someone in dining services saying that you had SGA support. Another way would be to talk to Anna Kalinsky and Emma Rosenblum.

Emma Rosenblum ‘14: Bernie Chung Templeton is usually at Tuesday group.

Syona Arora ‘15: It could also be a larger conversation to get student voices.

Namita Dwarakanath ‘15: I went to the budget meeting with the investments subcommittee of the Board of Trustees. The gist of things is that we’re ending the financial year with deficit because of all of the snow days, because we had to pay staff during that day. We’re also moving from natural gas to oil, which is taking resources, but gifts are 25% ahead. Tuition is rising, but at same rate as our peer institutions. For 2015 and incoming class of 2018, we’re looking at 370 students with discount rate of 46%, which is back up from what it used to be. The discount rate for 2017 is below that. There is 1.3 million dollars more in financial aid. There has been a 83% raise in faculty salary pool.  The biggest concern is maintaining a high discount rate. It is 46.9% for 2015, 46.6% for 2016, and 44.1% for 2017.

Meg Sumner-Moore ‘15: Did you say we are switching from natural gas to oil?

Namita Dwarakanath ‘15: Yes.

Honor Board Hearings Recap

Melanie Bahti ‘16: I’m giving an honor board report from spring semester. It’s going to go out with the minutes. It’ll also be on the honor board page tab. This semester there were six hearings conduct. Of these, Four involved use of resources on papers and projects. The other two involved unauthorized use on class and quizzes. The resolutions usually involve culminations of a lot of different components. Component parts of resolutions for this semester grades of zero, grade caps on assignment or exam, written apologies to professor, reflective written pieces on academic integrity and honor code, which are submitted to honor board and dean to undergraduate college. The resolutions give supports to students to meet with deans. There haven’t been any social cases this year. Looking over cases the past few years, I want to reiterate the importance of asking questions and asking for help right now. Asking for help and clarification from professors and support can help you avoid situations where you compromise academic integrity. Encourage you and encourage constituents to reach out.

Namita Dwarakanath ‘15: How do these cases compare to previous semesters/years?

Melanie Bahti ‘16: Last semester there were 10 cases and last spring there were 8. We don’t have details for previous semesters, so this semesters hearings were less than fall and less than last spring but not hugely significant.

Aleja Newman ‘17: I didn’t hear you mention like expulsion or probation, are those not consequences?

Melanie Bahti: They can be consequences, but they weren’t consequences this semester. You can read abstracts if you’re interested in that. If you want to talk to me more about this, email me at mbahti@bmc.

Introductions of Elected and Nominated positions.

Syona Arora ‘15: Shout out to Alexis de La Rosa and Molly MacDougal for running appointments and elections!

Pamudu Tennakoon ’15 & Anna Sargent ’15: We’re the social committee heads.

Sofia Oleas & Anna Kalinsky: We’re the residents’ council heads

Celeste Gambino ‘16: Honor Board

Grace Kim ’16 and Chanel Williams ‘16: We’re the 2016 co presidents

Pam Grassman ‘16 Dijia Chen ’16 : We’re the traditions mistresses.

Miranda Smith ‘16: I’m the McBride rep

Jenn Thoman ‘15:  I’m the 2015 Honor Board representative.

Falastin Issa  ’15: Fall plenary committee

Jonetta White ‘15: Bryn Mawr Concert Series head and Conflict Resolution committee

Rachel Ofili ‘16: I’m the 2016 songs mistress.

Eun-young Park ‘15: Honor Board Member through write ins.

Swetha Narasimhan ‘15: I’m the Civic Engagement Office rep

Meera Jayaraman ‘17: I’m the 1-year 2017 honor board representative

Christina Tse  ’17: I’m the SGA webmistress, member of the Outreach and Communications Committee, and the health center advisory board.

Serena Dunlap ‘16: I’m on the Outreach and Communications Committee

Kristal Sotomayor ‘17: I’m on the film series committee.

Odeymarys Garrido ’17 and Aleja Newman ‘17: We are the 2017 class presidents

Carolyn Jacoby ’14: Heidi Gay ’15 is the new Student Curriculum Committee head.

Charlie Bruce ’16: I’m on the Conflict Resolution Committee

Syona Arora ’15: I’m the 2015 songs mistress. Welcome to your new positions!

Molly McDougal ‘16: The 2015 class presidents are abroad, Mariam Slocum and Michaela Forester.

Syona Arora ‘15: Thanks for coming and introducing yourselves! We’re excited to get to know you

Exit Reports from members of the rep council

Syona Arora ‘15: This comes from the request that members of rep council don’t know what other people do. So we’re asking that everyone get up to a few things about their position. Co-held positions can speak together.

Carolyn Jacoby ‘14: I’m the Student Curriculum Committee head. I attended SGA and SCC meetings. I’ve represented student voice on the curriculum committee, and now I’m trying to get you to proctor for finals. We need at least three people per timeslot, or we’ll cancel the sessions.

Danielle Arad-Neeman ‘15: Erin Saladin and I are the Faculty representatives. We attended SGA meetings and faculty meetings. We’ve been asked to speak to faculty a couple of times and when you have questions for faculty we bring them to them.

Colin Bauman ‘14: I’m the soco tsar. I attempted to get my committee to respond to my emails. Tried to do Halloween, it was poorly attended. I have thought about ways of restructuring my position, which I will be passing on to the new position.

Christine Newville ‘15: My co holder of this position (Nina Shmorhun) has been detained. We met with Lillian Burroughs and meet with public safety. We held teas with COPS reps in the dorm. We sent out surveys. A lot of things that came up were how Campus Safety addresses the student body. We want to change the gendered addressments. They’re going to go to Pensby. Campus safety also has an announcement: Its illegal to smoke drugs. If a member of campus safety sees you with open containers, they do have to confiscate it. There are no kegs. that’s also illegal. There are no tents. No one can go dance on the dj platform. Don’t let your friends get too drunk. It’s illegal to do illegal things. So I want to try and be respectful.

Natalie Zamora ‘14: I’m one of the Pem West Dorm Presidents… I’ve improved a lot. My co-dorm president and I held teas and attended Resco meetings. We had a mentali-tea where one of our customs people’s fathers held a tea on Buddhist meditation. We had an east west party. Go pem west!

Anna Kalinsky ‘15 and Emma Rosenblum ‘14: Resco heads, we come to sga and run Resco meetings with dorm presidents attend meetings with Angie Sheets, dining services, environmental, deans office. We attend Board of Trustees meetings. Anna had idea to do mock room draw, we added to room draw emails. We brought a lot of information to residence council to Tuesday group to discuss how to handle snow days. They were very responsive. We started bringing the COPS heads to Resco meetings, since it’s part of the constitution.

Anna Sargent ‘15 Pamudu Tennakoon: We’re traditions heads emeritae. We meet with Mary Beth Horvath, Vianna Bernard, Campus Safety, Dining services, facilities, housekeeping. We set up mtgs. We planned parade night, hell week, and May Day. New things were digitalized forms for hell week. We made sign ups for performances be more accessible. Things flowed more smoothly. Also we are working with hell week to make it more accessible and enjoyable for whole community. No tents no open containers during May Day. Water bottles are the way to go. At the same time don’t take off shoes. Use sunscreen.

Alex Francendese ‘15 and Kaeun Bae ‘15: We’re 2015 co presidents, we attend SGA, we provide hot beverages, and we host teas.

Celeste Gambino ‘16, Chrstina Tse ’17, and Xavia Miles ‘16: we met with secretary and did SGA EBoard. It’s fun but we can do more.

Jancy Munguia: 2014 I’m one of the class presidents for 2014. Class presidents do budgeting for senior week and senior cocktails. We had a t-shirt design contest. Lucy’s design won. We provide champagne. We collaborated with Traditions for May Day hoop sale. Also we collaborate with senior gift committee.

Odeymarys Garrido ‘17: Everyone was really helpful for me in this position; it was great having the community support. In the fall, we had a tea with the sister class. In the spring we hosted sophomore/ first year mixer for hell week. I’ve hosted teas and I’ve sent out emails to inform my class of what’s going on at Rep Council meetings.

Syona Arora ‘15: I have one more report back. Angela and Karunya emailed a short summary. They hosted a cookie decorating tea in the fall before finals. They hosted a lot in the spring, hosting the heller/hellee mixer and organizing many key components of hell week shout out to traditions mistresses and everyone else for their help. They finished the year with doing a class tea with sophomore and falls. They are abroad next semester but hope to be involved again in the spring.  Thank you everyone for presenting. We did this to hope that people understand how people are involved and fill the gaps for representatives to voice their opinions and encourage collaboration between students.

Old Business

Natalie Zamora’14 and Alyssa Young ’15: a couple of SGAS ago we did multicultural education SGA inclusivity project.

Natalie Zamora’14: We did a project for multi cultural education class about the ways in which SGA can be inclusive/exclusive. We came up with six questions. We split the SGA into six groups. We wanted to give you all feedback about what’s been happening with that.

Alyssa Young ‘15: we talked to sisterhood, saw, and leverage. We sent out survey to other affinity groups, but we didn’t get many responses. A couple of concerns came across through meetings.

Natalie Zamora’14: One of the four main ones was SGA representation. How do we chose our representatives, how do we know representatives are speaking for us? How do we contact our constituents about decisions made at plenary. Concern about plenary: it’s a space to talk about communicate and passing resolutions. It’s hard to hold space for discussion when there’s a time pressure to pass resolutions.

Alyssa Young ‘15: we talked about different meanings of what it means to be a part of SGA. SGA is often a part of the Bryn Mawr experience, but does this represent everyone? Some people felt that they either subscribe to Bryn Mawr experience or don’t and those who don’t often are in a difficult position. We also talked about where power is on campus. We heard from community groups that their understanding and recognition of balancing representation between student body and administration. There’s a sentiment of a lack of power among students.

Natalie Zamora’14: As far as solutions, a lot of groups said that assembly should have members of affinity groups to be a part of SGA meetings. How would that happen? Could that happen?

Alyssa Young ‘15: One idea that they didn’t understand was why people needed to be members of SGA. Encouraged more advertising to give more of an understanding why and how people are in SGA. They suggested a poster campaign.

Natalie Zamora’14: rough stuff, we talked about information today. If you’re interested in seeing our paper, please contact nzamora @ bmc.

Syona Arora ‘15: I will email you all with the paper once its done. They reflect conversations have ways of addressing SGA. I want to read the paper. It will be informative and helpful in next academic year and our term.

New Business

Aleja Newman ‘17: What is the representative council?

Syona Arora ‘15: It’s all elected positions that have voting positions. (not honor board, Songs mistresses, or Outreach and Communication Communities). There are a lot of different offices and parts of reps represented. We have several different ways for students for students to be represented. There are people elected to represent offices and students on campus.

Falastin Issa ‘15: I heard that there was talk about changing about changing this in the dining hall. I would like to introduce Hillel Meat and Kosher meat.

Syona Arora ‘15: Aleja brought that up; I’d love to talk to you all about how to change meal options.

Senior Appreciation

Namita Dwarakanath ‘15: We wanted to thank all of the seniors who are a part of SGA and we have roses. Please don’t leave

Meeting is adjourned at 8:01PM