4:36 pm
Absent:
N. Saputo, V. Santana,
J. Trompke, E. Mead,
K. Chambers, S. Doiron
Arrived
Late: None
Left Early: J. Peralta
Guests: Abe Scarr (MASSPIRG), Fernando Cellazo,
Kristina
Andrukaitis, Jonathan Ring (CFACT)
No changes to the minutes.
Theberge/Leung (Unanimous)
· President Dalton explained that the new
seating plan was
only temporary so we can see which way the
group feels more
comfortable. She asked the group for
feedback and for the most
part the group liked the change except for a
few chairs who
missed sitting with the other chairs.
·President Dalton spoke about Merrowvista and
told the people who could not attend that our main goal from the weekend was to
include everyone that was not there and help them to understand what we did and
learned over the weekend. She then
opened the floor up for any input about the trip. Senator Cahill said that he had a great time and “bonded with his
buddies”. He learned a lot about
leadership while having fun and working on his “rugged good looks”. Senator Theberge said the trip was awesome,
but what was better was seeing all her new friends around campus when we came
back.
·President Dalton touched upon some ideas
that had been suggested at Merrowvista, these include a winter retreat, social
gatherings, publicizing the agenda for the meetings so everyone could prepare,
and researching some possibilities for a conference. She asked for some volunteers for these things and then told us
that Secretary Spano will be discussing them in her report. She also raised the idea of researching some
types of clothing that we can look into getting for the group. Some other things that were brought up at
Merrowvista were the idea of having a meeting once a month during community
time in a public spot so that more people can be involved and see what we do,
and getting student statistics so that we, as representatives of the students,
can know who we are representing.
·President Dalton informed the group about
the Student Advisory Council, which is a meeting with the board of higher
education. She told everyone about an
advisor spot open and she feels that everyone in our group is definitely
qualified for the position so more information will be available soon for all
that are interested.
· President Dalton spoke about the concert
and sent around a sign up sheet for the concert committee. She let everyone know that the E-Board will
be meeting with Program Council because they will be co-sponsoring the event.
MOTION: Vice
President Batastini made a motion to accept the
President’s report.
Jimenez (Unanimous)
·Vice President Batastini thanked everyone
for Merrowvista, she too had a great time.
·Vice President Batastini also thanked
everyone for going to the Leadership Induction Ceremony last Thursday. There was a great turnout.
·Vice President Batastini announced the
Viking Spirit Award on October 16, 2003, which is an award given to one male
and one female based on G.P.A, leadership, and involvement on campus. Applications are available now and can be
picked up in Room 222 in the Campus Center.
·Vice President Batastini informed the group
that on October 9, there is a Haunted Happenings meeting at 4:00 in the MLK
room,
This
meeting is mandatory. At this meeting
all groups and clubs must have a supplies list or they will not get any
supplies.
· Vice President Batastini sent around a sign
up sheet for Haunted Happenings, which will take place on Sunday, October
26. This is also mandatory so everyone
must sign up for at least one two-hour shift.
On Saturday, October 25, we will be setting up from 4:00-7:00pm and this
is also required and broken up into two shifts. Haunted happenings is the largest community service project that
SSC does and all groups and clubs get together in Vet’s Hall and decorate the
entire campus center. There are
different tables with games, activities, crafts, candy, etc… There is also a
moon bounce. This program is to give
the local children a fun and safe Halloween.
All students from local schools are invited. She reminded everyone to come in costume and to make sure that
the costume was appropriate for the kids.
· Vice President Batastini also sent around a
sign up sheet for the blood drive on Monday, October 20 from 10:30 –1:00. The goal this year is to get 50 people to
give blood. This event is also
required.
MOTION: President
Dalton entertained a motion to accept the Vice
President’s report.
Jimenez/Cahill
(Unanimous)
MOTION: Treasurer
Garvey made a motion to purchase 5 new
desks at the price of $6085.76.
Meshesha(Unanimous)
· Treasurer Garvey talked about the typical
process for distributing the speaker series tickets we receive for
sponsoring. In the past, the E-Board
gets 1 or 2 tickets and then a certain portion is raffled off within the senate
and the rest are raffled off to the general students.
MOTION:
President Dalton entertained a motion to accept the
Treasurer’s report.
Batastini/ Alfonzo (Unanimous)
· Assistant Treasurer Mazza talked about how much fun he had a Merrowvista and he feels that we don’t need Merrowvista to get close to our peers. He suggests a whole bunch of other events happening on campus this week that can help get close to peers. These included sports games, Leadership Institute, and GLBT awareness week activities. On October 1, at 6:00 in the MLK room is a program called alternatives to virginity, on October 2, from 7-9 is Rainbow Spirituality, and on October 3, is blue jean day.
· Senator Theberge added that on Thursday,
October 2, is call-in
day
in Alumni Plaza from 10:00-4:00 where there will be phones available to call
the Governor and have a voice.
· Senator Alfonzo also added the HAS dinner
on October 15.
MOTION: President
Dalton entertained a motion to accept the
Assistant Treasurer’s report
Cogliano/
Spano (Unanimous)
· Secretary Spano let
everyone know that office hours were discussed at Merrowvista and that she would like to form a committee
specialize in figuring out ways that the office hour can be spent to represent
the students. Lots of the things
President Dalton has mentioned could be done during office hours, for example,
researching places for a possible winter retreat, researching some form of
clothing we, as the SGA, can all have, and looking into some new possibilities
for our conference.
· Secretary Spano also sent around a sheet of
paper to get everyone’s phone numbers and e-mail addresses so we can have them
all in one place and so she can send pictures from Merrowvista to everyone via
e-mail.
MOTION: President Dalton entertained a motion to
accept the Secretary’s report.
Alfonzo/ Pereira
(Unanimous)
· Treasurer Garvey reminded the members of
the Finance
Committee that on October 2 at 6:00 in the Heritage room
MSA and the Catholic Student
Community are meeting
with the Committee. He informed
them that the group’s
presentations are in their mailboxes.
MOTION: Treasurer
Garvey entertained a motion to
appoint Mekonnen
Meshesha to the Finance committee.
Runyan/Spano
(Unanimous)
·
RULES
COMMITTEE
MOTION:
Chair King entertained a motion to appoint Vice President Batastini to
the Rules committee.
Runyan/Leahy
(Unanimous)
·Chair King announced that Vice President
Batastini and Chair Boucher won Constitutional Jeopardy last weekend and also
gave mention to Senator Pereira and Senator Meshesha who came in second
place. She also pointed out that
Senator Runyan and Senator Peralta who did well and studied their constitution
the whole night before. She then urged
everyone to read and know their constitutions.
· Chair King brought up the proposed
referendum and explained that to amend the constitution there has to be a 2/3
vote of the senate and that there were three ways of changing and those were to
add, delete, or substitute. Jonathan
Ring from CFACT and Abe Scarr from MASSPIRG immensely participated in the discussion
of the referendum. There was some talk
about eliminating section three under part 1A, the section on the General
Referendum, and section three under part 2A, the section on Special
referendums. Both of these parts say
that the Senate may call for a referendum by a 2/3 vote (67%). There was also mention of removing the
sections saying that there needed to be a petition signed by 10% of the full
time undergraduate day students to be handed to the Rules committee when
proposing a referendum. After much discussion it was decided that both the
sections would be accepted as is.
Senator Theberge expressed her concern about section A that stated “The
Rules Committee will design the exact wording of all referenda that appears on
the ballots to ensure unbiased language”.
She disagreed with that because she felt as though this defeated the
purpose of getting the petition signed.
Treasurer Garvey and Dr. Brossoit clarified that any proposal is just
looked over to make sure that the language is unbiased; just because 10% of
students agree that doesn’t necessarily mean the language is appropriate to
move forward (and by appropriate they mean unbiased).
MOTION:
Chair King entertained a
motion to correct the number on the top of the page so it will read Article IX
instead of Article VIV.
Peralta/
Spano (Unanimous)
MOTION:
Senator Pereira made a
motion to table this discussion.
Alfonzo (6 in favor, 12 opposed, 1
change of vote from a yes to a
no- Motion failed)
· The group took a 30-minute recess at
6:15pm, as stated in the constitution. Meeting resumed at 6:50 pm.
· When the meeting resumed Jonathan Ring
suggested that part time students should also have a say. There was some discussion about this and
then it was clarified that the rule against allowing part time students to be
included is a school rule and it oversteps our constitution.
MOTION:
Senator Pereira made a
motion to end the discussion on part time students after the current speaker
list is over because it was completely irrelevant to the referendum.
Runyan (Unanimous)
MOTION:
Treasurer Garvey made a
motion to accept the referendum as it appears.
Leung
(Unanimously)
MOTION:
Chair King entertained a
motion to appoint Vice President Batastini as Assistant Chair of the Rules
Committee.
· Chair King announced that there is a Rules
committee meeting on Tuesday, October 7 at 3:00, the place is still
undetermined, but it will be posted.
·
STUDENT
LIFE COMMITTEE
· Chair Boucher announced that she is holding a meeting on
Thursday, October 2 at 2:30. They will
be meeting in the lobby of the Campus center and, depending on the weather, may
go outside.
·
GOVERNMENTAL
RELATIONS
· Chair Lappas invited all that were
interested in joining his committee to leave a note in his mailbox.
· Chair Lappas informed the group that it was
voted to make all college materials accessible for the blind. He also told us that the House discussed
allocating funds for SAT tutorials for low-income students to ensure fair
advantage. He is interested in getting
tutoring started for the neighborhood kids so if anyone is interested in
tutoring, let him know.
·
ACADEMIC
AFFAIRS
MOTION: Chair Skorker entertained a motion to
appoint
Maura Harrington to the Academic Affairs committee.
Runyan/ Cahill (Unanimous)
· Chair Skorker informed us that he is holding meetings on
Tuesdays at his dorm. at 7:30 pm. There
are 6 mandatory meetings for his committee.
· Senator Pereira suggests that Chair Skorker
look into places to hold study sessions and maybe even working it out so that
students who attend these study sessions can receive some credit. Chair Skorker claims that Diane Lapkin
already rejected it and that it will cost money. This brought up a lot of objections so Chair Skorker is going to
look into it. Chair Lappas suggests
that we use the resources that are already available.
·
JUDICIAL
AFFAIRS
No
report
·
PUBLIC
RELATIONS
· Chair Ryer announces that she will be taking pictures for the
web site next meeting because this one was so long and everyone was tired.
· Senator Milan tells Jonathan Ring that despite
what he thinks, the senate is not
biased. It is the
Senate’s job to represent the students and that is
what they do.
· Jonathan Ring responded to senator Milan by saying that he did not feel like this senate was biased, he was just using a hypothetical example.
· Senator
Leung told the group that the Women’s Center was selling ribbons to fight
breast cancer. They are $1 and anyone
can buy them from him or from any other members of the Women’s Center.
.
MOTION: President Dalton entertains a motion to
adjourn the meeting.
Batastini/
Pereira (Unanimous)
SUBMITTED BY MICHELLE L. SPANO