Agenda for November 23rd, 2014
Roll Call
Announcements
Your Two Cents
Updates from Representative council on their positions
Old Business
New Business
Syona Arora calls the meeting to order at 7:10 PM.
Roll Call
Present: Anna Kalinsky, Sofia Oleas, Heidi Gay, Anna Sargeant, Pamudu Tennakoon, Molly MacDougall, Mikah Farbo, Swetha Narasimhan, Xavia Miles, Rhea Manglani, Ava Hawkinson, Brenna Levitin, Miranda Smith, Mikala Forster, Marian Slocum, Chanel Williams, Aleja Newman, Odeymarys Garrido, Ann Tran, Connie Lam, Rachel Bruce, Matison Hearn-Desautels, Julia Kim, Stephanie Montalvan, Angela Motte, Shaina Robinson, Rachel Feynman, Lyntana Brougham, Jessica Bernal, Shakari Badgett, Leigh Peterson, Angie Koo, Gabrielle Crossnoe, Sneha Bendapudi, Nkechi Ampah, Carly Breen, Prerana Vaddi, Olivia Hollinger, Elaine Holehan, Modupe Olufemi, Rebecca Cook, Julie Henrikson, Linh Tranh, Natalie DiFrank
Absent: Pam Gassman, Dijia Chen, Kristian Sumner, Grace Kim, Lindsay Burak, Dani Weismann, Jillian Moroney, Cat Wagner, Alexis McDonald
Announcements
Rachel Bruce ’18: Recently, the Members-at-Large decided to initiate a campaign that will make members of the Bryn Mawr community more familiar with the SGA Representative Council and the greater organization by recognizing a member of the Representative Council each week. This week, we’ve chosen to highlight the achievements of Molly MacDougall, Head of Elections. Molly is a member of the Class of 2016 and intends to major in Psychology. For more information on Molly and her position, please check out these flyers that will be displayed throughout campus this week. Congratulations, Molly!
Miranda Smith ‘16: I wanted to announce that we’re hosting a McBride tea in Radnor common room on December 4th. There’s a dress up theme! Dress up in the decade you were born in!
Angela Motte ’17: Me and Matison Hearn-Desautels and are making the SGA bulletin board have SGA photos. If you have a photo with you with a food related item, please send it to us!
Pamudu Tennakoon ‘15: Do we need one picture or two?
Angela Motte ’17: Whichever you prefer.
Carly Breen ‘16: If you already sent one, did you need to send it again?
Angela Motte’17: It would be nice.
Syona Arora ‘15: If you do have an announcement, please line up ahead of time. Today’s hot topic will be on mental health. No SGA next week, but the week after is the holiday photo! Please come.
Your Two Cents
Rhea Manglani ‘17: Recently there was a racial profiling incident with Campus Safety. One of the students involved asked me to contact Stephanie Nixon at the Pensby Center. I wanted to reach out to you all with more feedback.
Anna Kalinsky ‘15: Would it be possible to get a Pensby email—that may reach more people
Rhea Manglani ‘17: I will do that.
Alexis De La Rosa ‘15: Point of clarification: I think there is some stuff that they cant send in an email. They might bring it up in a veiled kind of way. Look for vague wording.
Rhea Manglani ‘17: Thanks for the feedback everyone.
Syona Arora ‘15: Different two cents topic. Haverford passed a plenary resolution in the spring to pay their SGA co-presidents and co-heads of the honor council. Vassar is also looking into paying their SGA representatives. We had a brief conversation, not about monetary compensation, but about academic credit for SGA positions at Bryn Mawr. What would it look like? We want to know if this is something that we should pursue so please give your feedback or give suggestions.
Anna Sargeant ‘15: I think this would apply strongly to committees or positions responsible for annual events. That’s something that’s a documentable commitment. Especially if you have meetings a lot.
Pamudu Tennakoon ‘15: you might think about how this will effect motivation for running for a position.
Mikala Forester ‘15: You might think about getting certificate or credit that you could put it on your essay for a big event focused position.
Aleja Newman ‘17: I walked in late could you update me?
Syona Arora ‘15: We’re asking if students would be interested in academic credit for an SGA position.
Anna Sargeant ‘15: There might have to be a reflection component
Shakari Badgett ‘17: We vote for people to hold these positions. How could students evaluate their peers running for these positions?
Pamudu Tennakoon ‘15: I would suggest looking at praxis program and seeing if people running for a position could do it through that.
Syona Arora ‘15: We’re thinking of working with praxis.
Aleja Newman ‘17: I think its not a good idea because it gives people the wrong incentive for people to run. Dorm presidents aren’t paid.
Nkechi Ampah ‘15: It is hard because we’re talking about how to make SGA more accessible. A lot of people don’t participate in order to make money to go here. We should trust that people are acting integrity in applying. It might be nice to make it paid.
Michaela Olson ‘15: We’ve shifted from having it be to academic credit to paid
Syona Arora ‘15: The Eboard thinks involving money isn’t a good idea. It comes out of SGA budget at other schools, which is problematic.
Mikala Forster ‘15: We are talking about academic credit then?
Aleja Newman ‘17: I like the idea of academic credit, because a lot of people at this meeting are working.
Swetha Narasimhan ‘15: Through Civic Engagement, we have off campus work study in addition to praxis.
Lyntana Brougham ‘16: a potential problem with academic credit os what happens to people who step down half way through the semester.
Angela Motte ‘17: How would grading work?
Syona Arora ‘15: I don’t know how grading works with praxis,
Shakari Badgett ‘17: What about a PE credit? Because PE takes up a lot of time.
Oly Brookheart ‘15: For anyone beyond second semester sophomore year, there’s no benefit to it.
Syona Arora ‘15: Another conversation is how do different positions affect amount of credit. Some positions have more of a commitment than others.
Sofia Oleas ‘15: It might be better to email us directly for the positions that have a lot of meetings. It’s more concrete if you have people email you.
Syona Arora ’15: Thanks for the feedback everyone!
Aleja Newman ‘17: Acme is doing a thing where you can Cuisinart in exchange for stickers. Get those coupons and give them to me!
Nkechi Ampah ‘15: point of information: where can people contact you?
Aleja Newman ‘17: My campus mailbox is C-924 and aneman02@brynmawr.edu
Mikala Forster ‘15: Have you gotten any stamps yet?
Aleja Newman ‘17: Rhea has given me 5 and I have 5.
Voting on Special Events Budget
Pamudu Tennakoon ‘15: We’re proposing a special event. It will be a Winter formal. It will be held January 31st 9pm-1am
Julia Kim ‘18: What is level three party?
Anna Sargeant ‘15: East west was a level three party. It’s 101+ people. You need wristbands.
Aleja Newman ‘17: If you’re Trico are you guest, what’s the policy.
Anna Sargeant ‘15: Any member of the Trico consortium has one guest that they have to be responsible. You are liable for guests. They have to leave, if you leave.
Shakari Badgett ‘15: Why is the DJ 2,000$?
Pamudu Tennakoon ‘15: We want a good DJ.
Namita Dwarakanath ’15: There’s a cap for the DJ that I will explain to you later.
Sofia Oleas ‘15: How much money available is there for this event? Where is the money coming from?
Nkechi Ampah ‘15: This is from the special events budget, which means there’s a 10,000$ cap.
Prerana Vaddi ‘16: What’s a royalty gift?
Anna Sargeant ’15: It’s kind of like a prom king and queen, but non-gendered! People vote for it.
Pamudu Tennakoon ‘15: You can nominate people beforehand?
Mikala Forster ’15: Were you having photos there the whole time?
Pamudu Tennakoon ‘15: It depends on turnout.
Aleja Newman ‘17: Namita just said that special events budget is 10,000$. How are you looking to budget for all of this in addition to other special events for this semester?
Namita Dwarakanath ’15: This is only special event this semester.
Pamudu Tennakoon ‘15: It might not be annual.
Prerana Vaddi ’16: Its being budgeted for which semester?
Pamudu Tennakoon ‘15: Fall semester.
The Representative Council approved this event.
Updates from Representative council on their positions
Syona Arora ’15: This is a time for members of the representative council To take a minute and a few sentences to reflect upon and share your successes with the community! You can talk about your teas, initiatives, or goals for next semester. Please feel free to share during this time, members of the representative council.
Melanie Bahti ‘16: By the way, if you don’t do it this week, we’ll write you down and you have to do it next week.
Rachel Feynman ‘15: If your co-held position isn’t here, what do you do?
Melanie Bahti ‘16: Just give your presentation anyway.
Oliva Hollinger ‘16: As rock DPs, Elaine and I hosted a dorm tea, Halloween theme, hocus-pocus. We’re going to have a pj party soon!
Elaine Hollehan ‘16: Next semester, we’ll have an educational tea, stress buster, rock st patties. Trico guests and bmc guests are welcome.
Swetha Narasimhan ’15: Natalie and I are LILAC reps. I’ve carried messages between Civic Engagement and SGA.
Natalie DiFrank ‘15: CPD had a fall open house this week, if you’re a peer mentor
Angela Motte ‘17: Rachel, Matison and I have been working on posters, shaina and I are doing institutional memory project.
Matison Hearn-Desautels ‘18: I did SGA fun facts, hoping to do more soon!
Carly Breen ‘16: Rhoads north has held one minion themed tea with an abundant amount of food along with the despicable me 2 movie screening and an arts and crafts session.
Prerana Vaddi ‘16: Our next tea will be held in the next month. This tea will be educational. We will bring psafe to this tea in hopes to inform our constituents re: policies for future purposes.
Xavia Miles ‘16: I’m the Pensby rep. I’ve arranged weekly meetings with Stephanie and Vanessa and defining what Pensby rep is. Make sure all buildings are accessible. I’ve also been holding office hours in the cc. You can email xmiles @bmc
Jessica Bernal ‘17: Something that Shakari and I have been doing is starting a chalking initiative which has never been done before we chalk during dorm teas, hall teas, and customs teas to brighten up Erdman.
Shakari Badgett ‘17: We are also having a holiday party to celebrate as many different December events for as many cultures and religions that want to be included. It will be either the 9th or the 10th. Open to our residents and the DLT of other dorms.
Chanel Williams ‘16: I’m one of the copresidents of 2016, so far we’ve had a study abroad tea to make postcards to juniors studying abroad. We got postcards to every junior who is studying abroad. We had a sister class tea. Grace and I are holding office hours every Friday of the month.
Rhea Manglani ‘17: Hey everyone! I’m the Cops Co-head. Put out a survey via Google docs about suggestions for pub safety, safety concerns, and ideas for future events. I also met with Mike Ramsey to discuss East and West, the party policy, reworking the floor plan for East West, and weather concerns. I also met with a student over her experience with racial profiling incident. I also met with dorm reps on the racial profiling, East West, gone over the survey, discussed future events
Anna Sargeant ‘15: Pamudu and I are the Social Committee Heads. We assisted the exec board with the Bryn Mawr leadership orientation workshop.
Pamudu Tennakoon ‘15: We want to be resources for committees, so we will be doing more kinds of outreach.
Anna Sargeant ‘15: We revitalized the paid to bounce club for parties and events..
Pamudu Tennakoon ‘15: We hosted a campus center Halloween party. We’re talking with Mary Beth Horvath about alcohol usage. Planning winter formal for next semester.
Anna Sargeant ‘15: And potentially spring fling sort of event.
Nkechi Ampah ‘15: I’m one of the Radnor co dorm presidents. This semester has had a lot of things. We’ve had two bbqs, decorating teas, and this next week is our holiday tea! Radnor residents only. If you have questions, send me an email.
Rachel Bruce ‘18: Julia and I are planning logistics for sga events, and planning give a hoot day. I’m working on poster campaign to recognize different rep council members
Leigh Peterson ‘15: Right after fall break we had a dorm tea cohosted by green ambassadors. We’re having one more tea about stress management. No problems this year.
Rachel Feynman ‘15: I’m co dorm president of Brecon with Lindsay. We have had two teas, plenartea and facilitea. Plenartea was getting people excited and educated about plenary and discussing proposals. For facilitea, we invited facilities to speak about, among other things, our unusual heating system. We have also implemented new laundry room rules to keep it cleaner and better organized.
Modupe Olufemi ‘17: co dorm president with Alexis MacDonald. We’ve had three dorm teas. Welcome back, watching shondaland. We’re going to do a holiday tea. We have a going away / welcome back tea for returning and leaving juniors from abroad.
Sofia Oleas ‘15: We’ve hosted resco meetings, gone to Tuesday group ( description), where we walk with members of the administration. We’ve picked furniture for Haffner, asked the Merion lower police department to resco, along with Kay Kerr. We went to the Board of Trustees meeting in the fall.
Anna Kalinsky ‘15: we’ve got fun events. Room draw is the big one in April. Sneak peek of coming attractions: there will be a hall-decorating contest with winter theme. The resco and us will do decorating of Haffner, discussing dlt layout of Haffner.
Syona Arora ‘15: thanks everyone!
Old Business
Melanie Bahti ‘15: I made an announcement about online tutorials—for Shakari’s question, its just a one time thing.
New Business
Anna Kalinsky: DPs, after the meeting get posters from Charlie!
Anna Sargeant ‘15: When it comes from parties within dorms, it’s against party policy to smoke in the buildings.
The meeting was adjourned at 7:54PM