Session of September 16th, 2021

September 16th, 2021

Minutes Recorded by: McKenzie Craycraft, Secretary

Visitors: Stephan Foster

Call to Order at 11:03 AM

Senator Crowder prays

Roll Called

Approval of the Minutes

Officer Reports

PPT Moyes: If you have any bills, please send it to PR&R and send it to the VP and me. We can talk about it in sessions and put it on the agenda. COVID is still going on, please join virtually.

Sgt. Edwards: Glad to meet all the new senators. I will get new name tags as soon as possible. No jeans.

VP Avent: There is a new email address for bills. It will send to all the appropriate people.

Committee Reports

Chairman Crowder: As for committee reports, this weekend is homecoming weekend, please help with the evening ice cream. We need as many hands as possible. We met with Ms. Lane we can go over our ideas in open forum. We want to figure out how we can best move forward. This is regarding the Glaske classrooms.

Chairman Allen: FAC the club funding bill should be ready by next week.

Chairman Crowder: The floor snacks are now in. They are in the YAC cave.

Chairman Willis: PR&R, we are meeting with Ms. Mauriello, who can inform about ice cream, and ISN, we got new flyers. They are printed. It has a QR code. We are also working putting the hours on the senate website. We are working on getting a YAC page up.

Special Business

None

Old Business

Senator Eaton: Is there any news about the letter?

VP Avent: We will have an update next Thursday.

Chairman Willis: The letter has been worked on for a while. We have agreed on it and will delivered by the VP. I will send it out later.

Dean Scott: Can I see the letter before it gets sent? It is not my desire to keep you from saying things. There are things that can be resolved that I can do.

Senator Drebot: Can it be read to us or on the senate website

Senator Rubingh: It is the same letter as was last semester. You should have been here.

VP Avent: The letter will be sent to you. It was signed by individual people last year.

Senator Drebot: Senate did a bad job advertising it existed.

Senator Berry: What are the grievances on the letter?

VP Avent: We will discuss it alter today.

New Business

Chairman Crowder: We did have a meeting with Marti Lane trying to figure out the Glakse room. In general, the rooms in Glaske can still be rented, for personal studying you are welcome to call and set up a time 24 hours in advance. For opening and unlocking the rooms, the rooms are locked after a specific time, they haven’t been locked. They are enforcing the rules already in place. You have access to Glaske rooms. The library hours are still in the works. The SI sessions are starting backup. If you wish to access them afterwards. The problem of unlocking and locking, call and reserve.

VP Avent: I would like to discuss this in open forum

Announcements

PPT Moyes: The flags are back in the library. They are back!

Chairman Crowder: Homecoming, senate ice cream from 5:30-6:30. I will do an ice cream run this afternoon. My car is not big enough so I would like to request some assistance.

Senator Eaton: Will senate ice cream be in the same place

Chairman Crowder: It will be on the patio.

PPT Moyes: We do have a sign up, so we know how many to expect.

Chairman Willis: The Buzz Word if you want to write an article, you can write it under your own name or under pen name. we are welcoming all sorts of things.

Open Forum

PPT Moyes: Regarding the letter, we could review it now, or we can send it out on discord. That way you can spend time understanding it.

Sgt. Edwards: It is up under new business. We are trying to get it moved on, there are a lot of issues in communication and trying to get it moved on.

Chairman Willis: The point of the letter is not just complaints; we want to help things flow well. We do take responsibility for this. Senate did go through a rebellious faze. The communication was chopped off because senate was very cynical. Senate is ready to serve in this manner. This letter is a simple step. It a step in the right direction.

Dean Scott: This is the concern I’m talking about. Everyone wants communication. I want to make sure we send a letter to the president that we are working with me. I am sitting here, and I don’t know what communication you want. I am here to help you. I don’t want you to go to the president when you haven’t used all your resources.

VP Avent: The meeting is on the schedule, we are not sending it right off to him, I will be in the meeting

Senator Eaton: I believe during the last semester it was of my understanding that you were present during some of these meetings.

Dean Scott: I do remember that

Chairman Willis: I think we all agree with the committees, we aren’t asking for him to fix our problem, we want to say we want to resolve some things. His communication has been valued. It is impossible to have over communication. I believe that it is a good idea to have more people in session. It is an invite. We are inviting you to come to senate session and speak to us.

VP Avent: We would like them to come to session. I can ask them to come, and I can likely get them here

Chairman Willis: There has been times which we want to broaden our communication, it’s the dean of student’s thing but we want to broaden our scope of communication.

PPT Moyes: As a note, there was talk of appointing someone to the TFO. It is like this but with facility.

VP Avent: The teaching facility senate, they have agreed, if we could have a representative to go into their meeting to bring an agenda. We can appoint a person. We can nominate. Do you want to discussion?

Chairman Willis: I would be open to a nomination if it would be beneficial, but I will be out for an internship next semester. We could allow different people.

VP Avent: I would recommend against that. We could nominate a specific position.

Senator Hofer: I think the idea is valuable. The student life committee is up to its ears.

Senator Eaton: Given that the meeting was not posted until late, I want to discuss this with our floors. We could have nominations; I think it would be better to get ideas out and act next session.

Chairman Willis: Speaker chair, do you know when the next meeting will be?

VP Avent: I do not know when they are meeting next but I do not see any harm in that.

Chairman Willis: I move that we table the discussion so we can contact our floors and tell them what this is.

Motion passes

Chairman Willis: The Buzz Word is becoming more popular. We are discussing what regulations we need to have. This will apply to most opinion pieces. Step one: submission -> PR&R-> -> published. Opinion piece that is controversial we would have a second stage made up of a staff, committee, student, alumni. It would be approved or denied from here. There are very few articles. We are just starting, but we want them to voice their grievances, but in a productive way.

Senator Berry: What if we just bring it to senate?

Senator Rubingh: Senate can be one minded, I think we need someone from faculty

PPT Moyes: Regarding the opinion committee, we need more than just senate. Some faculty are involved in this discord. There are some vocal alumni. It would be good to have some mixed.

Senator Berry: What we do with this, it needs to have some check and balances on it.

Senator Rubingh: This is a self-checking system. If people done like what you publish, you’ll hear about it

Dean Scott: I am agreeing with you, I used to be in charge of the student new paper, if I ever censored anything people would be upset about the first amendment.

Senator Eaton: The desire of checking the system so we do not have small group of people who aren’t being checked.

Chairman Willis: This is a far-out future plan, we have a small number of published things. I have control over everything that gets published. I am the man that will keep you down. The website it being coming a plat form.

Senator Drebot: The buzz word is on the senate website; would it make sense to make just a separate website?

Chairman Willis: First, I forgot to mention all the opinion pieces will have a section saying that they do not reflect the opinions of the Senate. As the public relations I would say that having as much info is good. I want to bring in building hours and other relevant material in the same place.

Senator Branch: What about moving it to buzz app?

VP Avent: It is time to end

Chairman Willis: Please let your floor now we are making the great room available.

Senator Bright: It was such a big deal there were no SI session so there were no room available. Senate can reserve rooms on a long term basic.

Session is recessed 11:53 AM