SGA Minutes
7:10 – Sophie Papavizas ’11 calls the meeting to order
Roll Call
Assembly Members Present: Katie Dahl ’11, Liz Ritchie ’11, Aki Snyder ’11, Jennifer Savage ’12, Blair Smith ’12, Sarah Kelley ’11, Gabby Marangell ’12, Malina Toza ’13, Priya Gupta ’13, Julie Gorham ’12, Sarah Aubrey ’13, Lindsey Turr ’11, Heather Taddonio ’12, Kyle Aguilar ’13, Akshyeta Suryanarayan ’13, Keshia Koech ’13, Ali Raeber ’13, Joo Park ’11, Hope Wayman ’13, Kate Gould ’11, Mary Margaret Peebles ’13, Jordan Cottrell ’13, Sarah Schnellbacher ’13, Tanvi Surti ’12, Sarah Abbasi ’12, Anna Parrochi ’12, Emily Zhao ’11, Vrinda Varia ’13, Naznen Rahmen ’13, Sarah Capasso ’11, Priya Saxena ’12, Katharine Woolls ’12, Sarah Henkind ’13, Tiffany Olszuk ’12, Callie Jensen ’11, Sumehda Niranjan ’11, Kerlyne Jean ‘11
Assembly Members Absent: Miranda Hansen-Hunt ’11, Sam Salazar ’11, Jenny Wang ‘13
Community Members Present: Zandra Martinez ’11, Sarah Sherman ’11, Ariana Hall ’12, Sarah Ann Jordan ’13, Aya Martin-Seaver ’13, Elizabeth Olecki ’12, Ashley Hahn ’14, Amanda Beardall ’14, Amy Zhao, Adelyn Kishbaugh ’12, Amanda Kennedy ’13, Elizabeth Held ’12, Samantha Lopez ’13, Duong Nguyen ’13, Hyelim Han ’13, Emily R ’11, Kate Ciarlante ’14, Elena Nikonova ’14, Saima Iqbal ’14, Emma Rosenblum ’14, Lynn Moss ’14
Announcements
Lindsey Turr ’11: Thanks for attending the 1st Senior Cocktails- Smashing attendance. We hope everyone had a great time and are pumped for everything else we have planned for the rest of the year. The 125th Kick-Off Concert was AMAZING!!!! I hope everyone had a great time. White Panda told me they had a lot of fun with the over 340 people who came out for this wonderful dance party!
Sarah Kelley ’11: Elections start tomorrow on Blackboard at 9 and run until 5 on Tuesday.Email me if you have any questions.
Adrienne Webb ’11: Speaking on behalf of Art Club, we’re hosting a Welcome to the Art Club event on September 21 at 8:30. Please invite as many freshmen as possible.
Jennifer Savage ‘12, Blair Smith ‘12: If anyone wants to create tea invites, please email us.
Gabby Marangell ‘12: The Athletics Association is having bring-a-buddy meeting. We want to have as many non-athletes as possible. The meeting is this Wednesday in Thomas 224.
Laurel Lemon ‘11: All of the clubs budgets aren’t ready yet due to Blackboard issues. Also, this Thursday, Ace of Cakes is coming with a cake shaped like Thomas Great Hall, and ten sheet cakes. Thursday is Bryn Mawr’s actual birthday and the start of the conference, which is why the event is scheduled for the middle of the afternoon. Everyone is invited, so encourage your professors to let you come out. The rainsite will be in the Campus Center.
Yong Jung Cho ‘12: Applications for Appointments are due tomorrow at 5. Interviews will be on Tuesday and Thursday.
Sophie: We sold out of the fabulous Seven Sisters shirts that we’ve been selling, so we’re probably going to order more if there are enough people interested in buying more.
Samantha Lopez ’13: I’m a rep for Mujeres, and I just wanted to let everyone know about an upcoming event, with a visiting professor from Arizona who is coming to talk about the immigration laws. The talk will be in Dalton and there will be flyers coming soon.
Your Two Cents
Emma Rosenblum ‘14: In case it happens in the future, if there’s another big conference going on, would it be possible to clarify communication a bit? I didn’t hear much about the Heritage and Hope Conference at all.
Sophie: Who wasn’t aware that there was going to be a conference? Oh wow, that’s a lot. I’ll give a brief explanation of what’s happening, we’re hosting a conference about women’s education in the world. It’s an academic conference, but registration is free for students, which you can find from the main page of the Bryn Mawr website.
Elizabeth Held ‘12: Point of Information – students can register up until Wednesday. All of the panels are free, unless you want to attend the keynote, which involves food.
Laurel Lemon ‘11: Point of Information – if you click on the link that says 125th Birthday Events there’s a list of everything happening related to the 125th.
Discussion about the Arts Space Website with Mary Beth Horvath
Sophie: Mary Beth Horvath from student activities office is going to talk to us about the new arts space.
Mary Beth Horvath: Hi, I’m Mary Beth.
Rose Bochansky: I’m the technical director of Goodhart.
Mary Beth Horvath: We’re going to talk about the Arts Space website and Goodhart use policies. We’ll give an overview of the website and allow time for questions. You can see what the various uses are of the space. There are a couple different venues, like the formal spaces and alternative ones, some of the spaces have more requirements for use than others.
Rose Bochansky: You’ve probably all been to the main auditorium, which is for formal events, and bigger audiences. The Teaching Theater is mostly for curricular stuff, but there have been Greasepaint shows there, and receptions. The music room is a lovely space, and can be used for a lot of things. Be imaginative for what you want to use the space for. As long as space is available, it’s up for grabs.
Mary Beth Horvath: Our goal is to help you and your club to find best space for your events. If you’re thinking about doing something in the theater, you need to talk to Rose, and Conferences and Events. You should talk to me if you’re holding any events that involve money, because we need to do a contract.
Rose Bochansky: You can get lots of information from Conferences and Events, to see if there is space available.
Mary Beth Horvath: I don’t know how many of you have used Virtual EMS, but that’s a good way to find space, and reserve it at anytime. Always have space reserved before advertising your event. There’s an online technical questionnaire that you need to fill out if you want to use Goodhart spaces.
Rose Bochansky: I think it’s likely that you’ll fill one of these out for your events, to help figure out what you might need for your events. The form is probably going to change a bit.
Mary Beth Horvath: Not all these questions will apply to everything you want for your event, but we need to know what your plans are. Fill out questionnaire and then meet with Rose.
Rose Bochansky: This form is mostly just for more complicated events, like dance concerts. If you want to come talk to me about any events, you’re welcome to. We’ll make up an agreement of what we’re both providing from that discussion.
Mary Beth Horvath: After meeting and creating the agreement, you’ll get a confirmation of event reservation. Get me the contracts and rider so I can figure out what we need to get if it’s not available on campus. The message for reserving space is: plan ahead. I really need outside contracts as soon as possible. There’s a section on the site about communication and accountability. Someone needs to be in charge of meeting with us, and also needs to be at the event. You’ll need to have staff.
Rose Bochansky: When you have events, there are certain people you need to bring to have things go smoothly. Ushers are really helpful to get people into their seats. If you’re doing something more complicated, like for theatrical productions, you need a stage manager who can talk to the light director. You my need a light board operator/sound person. In line with that, the way we can make this available to everyone is by charging a technical staffing fee.We’re refining the way people are using the space, and what were going to charge for or not.Goodhart has this great fancy equipment, but we don’t really have any money to fix anything if it breaks, so we want to prevent those risks. It’s really complicated, so it’s helpful to have someone know what they’re doing. We’re not trying to squeeze anybody of anything, but we need to have someone to oversee the process. I think the level of assistance if very high for the fee. The technical questionnaire is really important.
Mary Beth Horvath: It’s not that we don’t trust you with the equipment. I don’t even know how to use it. It’s just pretty complicated, and that’s why we have to hire somebody. There are floor plans online for you to look at for the spaces you can use. Talk to me if you need help with like ticket sales. Immediately after your last performance, you need to strike it. There’s a fast turnaround time for the space.
Rose Bochansky: After figuring out all the stuff, you’ll be asked to sign a legal agreement. Are there any questions?
Mary Beth Horvath: We also have a list of other reserveable spaces, inside and out. I also just want to mention that the Activities digest sent out a bunch of stuff this past week. I’m still trying to work it out myself, there’s still an option to get individual emails if you really want that. The other thing I want to say is, this week the cars are live, Zipcars are now available for you to use. There will be links on the student activities website about it. Email studentactivites@brynmawr.edu if you have any questions.
Budget Approval
Sophie: We’re moving right into budget approval now. If you have any questions, just ask about as we scroll through the list.
Blair Smith ‘12: Seven Sisters in China? Nimbus? Amnesty international?
Laurel Lemon ‘11: Seven Sisters in China is a new club, Sam’s decided to do budgeting next semester, and I need to see Amnesty. Some of the numbers look different because people ask for more money than we have. We also give money to a lot of other places on campus.
Jordan Cottrell ‘13: What are the dashes on the spreadsheet?
Laurel Lemon ‘11: Those are for clubs that didn’t follow all the requirements.
Sophie: So we’re going to vote on approving the budget now. The vote will be: yes to approve, no or abstain.
Budget Approved.
Clubs can now start spending their money
Discussion with Dean Rasumussen
Sophie: Dean Rasmussen is here to introduce herself and then there will be time for questions.
Dean Rasumussen: Good evening, can you hear me? I’ve met some of you, but for those of you who don’t know, I’m the new dean. I thought I would give you an overview of what I want to do this semester. I would like to say I’m not formally holding office hours this semester, because I still want to get a feel for how things are run. The best way to talk to me is by sending me an email, my schedule is pretty hectic right now, so I’m not always in the office, but emails will always be read. My email is mrasmussen@brynmawr.edu. If you think “no muss no fuss”, that’s how you pronounce my name. When the president hired me she made it clear she was looking for certain things for the new dean to accomplish. My focus right now is looking into student experience/life on campus. There’s been some attention to the issue of whether Bryn Mawr is as vibrant as it could be. To be honest I think this is a vibrant place, so I don’t know where that concern is coming from. I’d be interested in hearing what that means to you. I’m interested in making this a holistic experience, I know we’re known as the the “intellectual sister”, but the Administration can support your efforts to have fun, as long as they’re legal. I want to help make the campus what you want. I’ve been in higher education long enough to know that any mandates from my office will not really get you to have fun. You know what you want. I want to support Bryn Mawr being a holistic experience. I also really want to infuse opportunities for experiential learning. Taking opportunities outside the classroom to learn. I’m interested in working with the academic deans and the Civic Engagement Office. It doesn’t matter what your future plans are, I think everyone should take advantage of the opportunities Bryn Mawr has to offer. I think the Bi-Co CDO is a great asset. Another area I’m interested is making sure we have proper resources for freshmen and sophomores, because they’re new, and it’s a tough transition. From what I’ve observed, we have lots of academic support, but I don’t know how well it’s coordinated. I’m really keen to work with different groups on campus to get support services adequately delivered. Another broad area I’m interested in is our international student population. President McAuliffe is very interested in making Bryn Mawr known in the world. I know that as our demographics change, as we become more international, we have to make sure we’re supporting these shifts. We have the biggest cohort of international students ever this year. Some students are coming to the United States for the first time, and we want to support them as much as possible. That’s just a quick overview of what I’m going to be paying attention to this year. So far I’ve been attending a lot of meetings. I’m currently meeting with all the departments and getting to see what the departments are like. I regularly meet with Dean of college at Haverford, and I hope to meet with the Swarthmore Dean soon. I’d be happy to answer any questions.
Regarding plans for incoming students, do you have a plan for how current students can help out?
Dean Rasmussen: My impression is that the approach academic deans have taken a reactive approach rather than proactive. I’m interested in knowing about midterm grades for first year students. When I was at Duke, we had a robust early alert system for first year students. We found it was helpful to identify struggling students early, not to single them out, but to help them find the resources they need. I want to make sure students don’t feel like they’re on their own. I want to give students personalized plans to help them improve. I want to coordinate more, and I think we need a better system. I definitely see opportunities for more resources in this area. The last thing I would like to share is that I’m really sincere when I say email me. I really do want to hear from you. My worst fear is that I’m going to be sitting in my office with nothing to do. I’m here for you. Please, please, please let me know. I am yourdean.
Old Business
Sophie: Last week we met in small groups, does anyone have any updates from those groups?
Liz Ritchie ‘11: I was in the group talking about increasing student attendance at events. We brought up a big calendar at our Tuesday group meeting and meeting with Angie Sheets, and it sounds like they’re in the beginning stages of working on that.
Katie Dahl ‘11: I was in the summer storage group. We’re bringing it up again at all the meetings we go to. Angie said we should talk to Facilities, and we’ll keep working on it.
Sophie: I brought up all the issues we discussed with Dean Rasmussen, so she’s now aware of them all.
New Business
8:08 – Meeting adjourned.