SGA Meeting 03/03/13
Announcements:
Diana Tive ’15: Could all new assembly members please email a picture of yourself to me at dtive@brynmawr.edu for the SGA board by the end of spring break?
Karina Siu ’14: Community service from the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee raised over $900 for the Special Olympics by participating in a polar plunge. Also, lacrosse is playing over spring break so make sure to support them.
Natalie Kato ‘14: There will be no SGA meetings on March 10th and March 17th because of spring break, so the next meeting will be March 24th.
Your Two Cents:
Emily Tong ’13: Thank you for everybody who came to East vs. West last night. The party went really well.
Vicki Sear ’13: After this year, we plan to compile a list of notes for future dorm presidents about East vs. West as it is a large endeavor. If you have any suggestions or comments, please send them to us or say them now so we can incorporate them into our notes.
Hannah Lehman ’13: Is there any way to better keep track of capacity? There are residents who go back into the room and stay in the hallway, and there are a lot of people waiting outside. Is there a better way to get everyone inside?
Amy Chen ’14: A lot of people got sick around campus.
Natalie Kato ’14: Any other comments or suggestions?
Emily Tong ’13: If anybody has anything to add, please email us at eetong@brynmawr.edu andvsear@brynmawr.edu
College Budget Meeting Recap:
Natalie Kato ’14: College budget meetings occur three times during the spring semester. The president, vice president, and treasurer of the 2012-2013 and 2013-2014 SGA executive boards boards attended to give feedback and discuss the broader college budget and the endowment.
Amy Chen ’14: What was discussed is that we are still in a deficit. The overall meeting was about the changes of the college’s 5-year budget model, and some percentage changes. We looked at the preliminary 2014 budget proposals. Some things discussed were increases in the salaries of faculty and staff, some departmental budget increases in the discretionary spending, and they are going to continue the renovations, spending most of that budget on keeping our buildings safe. They are going to start campaigns to renovate certain areas as well as for some other causes such as renovating Park.
Natalie Kato ’14: Does anybody have any questions or comments regarding this?
Irene Shin ’13: Can you elaborate on the discretionary spending?
Amy Chen ’14: They were talking about having the president’s office accept proposals to spend about$400,000 or a little bit less. Departments will submit proposals for printing costs. Dining services might apply for some of that money.
Irene: Jerry Berenson talked about starting some campaigns to raise money. Can you expand on that?
Amy Chen ’14: I remember Park.
Vrinda Varia 13’: They spoke about the final stages of the campaign. Plan to develop or raise funds for bigger projects, like renovations to Park and Canaday, which Elliot Shore talked about last semester. These are projects that they want to see happen over the next five to ten years. Such big changes require a lot of money, so they are trying to start a lot of active fundraising. The plan is to fund all of these changes with gifts, so again, that requires a lot of fundraising.
Natalie Kato ’14: Does anybody else have any comments or questions? Vrinda and Sowmya are here in case anyone has any questions regarding finances during the 2012-2013 term. If anyone thinks of any questions or comments, feel free to email sga@brynmawr.edu.
Overview of Honor Board Academic Hearing Procedures:
Natalie Kato ‘14: We have had some questions about what exactly happens at academic and social honor board hearings and wanted to address them.
Amani Chowdhury ’14: I just laid out some basic points about what happens preceding and during an academic hearing.
Confrontation – A student or professor suspects a violation of the honor code and confront the party. During the confrontation, if the confronting party feels like there was a breach of the honor code, they ask the confronted party to report themselves to the honor board. At Bryn Mawr, it is not necessary to report everything through the code (however, at Haverford, it is). The confronted party is obligated to contact the head of the honor board within 48 hours of the confrontation. The head of the honor board will contact both the confronted and confronting parties and they must submit statements within 72 hours.
Statements – Formal statements must be as thorough as possible, including dates, materials involved, extenuating circumstances, the mindset around the hearing, pressures around the infraction, and people involved. They are submitted to the head of the honor board and viewed by everybody on the board. The statements are used for reference during the hearing.
Scheduling – The honor board consists of 3 students, 3 members of faculty, the dean of undergraduate class, the confronted party, the confronting party, and any other people deemed necessary for the hearing. If the confronting party is a student, they may choose to just submit a statement and have a professor involved sit in for them at the hearing. Also, both parties can read the material submitted for the hearing.
Hearing – The confronted party may wish to be present for the testimony of the confronting party.
Confronting party – The board will listen to the confronting party and then open the table for questions. Once they feel that they have a thorough understanding and the questions have been exhausted, the confronting party will leave.
- Confronted party – The confronted party then presents their testimony and given the chance to elaborate on their statement. Once they are finished and the board has asked all of their necessary questions, the confronted party is asked to leave with their supporting dean and must wait for the deliberation.
- Deliberation
- Delivery of the decision – Delivered upon completion of deliberation. The head of the honor board and the dean of undergraduate class deliver the decision.
Follow through
- Dean – The dean will send an email regarding the decision to the professor involved.
- Head of Honor Board – The head of the honor board must type up an abstract to be logged.
- Record Keeping – Only the dean of the undergraduate students has access to a copy of the minutes. Abstracts will be filed and will be presented according to the plenary resolution that was just passed. All academic case files – statements, decisions – are kept, but only the dean of the undergraduate college has access to these. The dean of the student may consult them if they are ever asked to write a recommendation.
Appeals – Appeals can be made within a week after the conclusion of hearing. They must be submitted in writing and can be made if the confronting party feels that the procedures were not followed properly. During an appeal, the president of the college reviews all materials of the hearing. They will not hear any new evidence, and they may uphold the decision, reverse the decision, or call for a new hearing.
Natalie Kato ’14: Keep in mind that this was just the academic honor board procedure. Amani will also present the social honor code procedure at a later meeting. We were hoping that everybody would take a look at the honor code because we will have a future discussion about that. You will receive more emails about when this will be part of the agenda.
Voting on Seven Sisters Constitution:
Natalie Kato ’14: Would Vrinda, Caylyn and Sarah like to come up?
Vrinda Varia ’13: We just want to give you a little bit of context about what the Seven Sisters Coordinating Board is. This has been a very long project. The Seven Sisters Council started about 4 years ago at an annual conference – we went last November. The conference at Barnard in 2009 sparked a lot of interest in students as they enjoyed the opportunity to interact with students from other women’s colleges especially because of the historical tie between the Seven Sister colleges. The next year Bryn Mawr hosted the conference and out of the discussion at that conference a decision was made that they wanted to formalize the relationship in the form of a council which would comprise of representatives from each college and allow the space for each group to share concerns between people that have similar college experiences. Since 2010-2011, there has been a big push to develop a formal constitution to identify particulars about the relationship. We changed the title to Coordinating Board instead of Council because we felt that it was a little hierarchical and we wanted equal representation from each college. It’s not one school taking ownership over the other. We are all sharing the experience of going to a women’s college. That’s a little bit of the background.
Caylyn Perry ’16: So what does this mean to Bryn Mawr and our SGA? The Seven Sisters Coalition and Coordinating Board are not limited to SGA members. It has been understood that SGA at Bryn Mawr is different from the governing bodies of the other Seven Sisters schools and we take into account that how we elect people on this coalition and who participate in the Seven Sisters discussions will all be a part of SGA. The current position of Seven Sisters representative (my position) is an appointed position. It’s from different people throughout the student body and brings different views into conversations with other schools. The April round of appointments will have positions available, so everybody should apply! It’s very exciting. The conversations can impact Bryn Mawr which will be discussed soon.
Sarah J Shaw ’13: I am the other Seven Sisters Council Rep. I’m going to talk about where we see the coalition going. As of now, we see it as a collaboration tool that can be used by the six schools to further initiatives and causes at each of the schools. The example we can use today is a sustainability initiative which was cited as a common issue at each of the schools. Let’s say that you want to further a sustainability initiative. You can reach out to the other schools and see how they are handling it and to further your cause at Bryn Mawr. You can reach out through the coalition to start six simultaneous sustainability movements. The bodies of the other schools could be cited as support for any issue. For instance, you could submit a proposal signed by the Seven Sisters Coalition that advocates for a specific sustainability solution. Other common issues that were cited in the February meeting were socially responsible investing diversity initiatives, sustainability, administrative financial planning transparency, and staff, faculty, and student unity.
Natalie Kato ’14: Some of the places where you could find this information would be at the Google websitehttps://sites.google.com/site/sevensistersstudents/. This website will be available on the SGA blog, or just Google Seven Sisters Coordinating Board. Another way to get in touch with the entire coordinating board would be to email seven-sisters-council@googlegroups.com, also available on the website. To get in contact with specific representatives from Bryn Mawr – email bmc.sevensisters@gmail.com . Does anyone have any questions about the coordinating board or the constitution?
Elizabeth Vandenberg ’16: I was just wondering if the fall leadership conference and the student government leadership conference are the same thing, and what is the spring summit?
Vrinda Varia ‘13: The fall leadership conference and the student government leadership conference are the same thing. In the past, it has been identified as a leadership conference. Other schools have brought student governments. We have interpreted who is involved in student government a little bit differently for Bryn Mawr students. All students are part of SGA. The way we understand who can attend the conference is whether or not you are a student at Bryn Mawr. So, yes, they are the same. The Spring Summit is a conference for just the members of the Coordinating Board. That’s for us to do administrative work, like keep up the website, how to communicate, who’s doing what, etc.
Elizabeth Vandenberg ‘16: There are heads of different conferences. How did they get the positions?
Vrinda Varia ’13: The heads have not officially been elected yet. The conference rotates in alphabetical order. Vassar is hosting the conference next year so it will be a student from Vassar who is the conference head. None of these elections have taken place yet because before we can elect we need to make sure that everyone is on board with the constitution.
Elizabeth Vandenberg ‘16: So the mechanisms are internal to the school?
Vrinda Varia ‘13: The conference head is the only one who has to be from a certain school. The rest of the positions can be for whoever has the particular skill set. A Bryn Mawr representative can hold any position when we are not holding the conference.
Natalie Kato ’14: If there are no other questions or comments, we move on to a vote. The options are:
- Yes, SGA endorses this constitution
- No, SGA does not endorse this constitution
- I abstain
Yes, SGA endorses this constitution: 27 votes
No, SGA does not endorse this constitution: 0 votes
Abstain: 3 votes (Chloe Baumann, Sarah Bristow, Morgan Turner)
Natalie Kato ‘14: SGA will endorse this constitution. Thank you! We will keep you updated about the other colleges and their votes with regard to this constitution as things pan out.