Last Week in Senate: Welcome back

By Mikayla Boyd, Editor-In-Chief and Hannah Wiley, Managing Editor

On Friday, Jan. 23, the United Student Association (USA) met for their first meeting of the spring semester. The agenda opened up with general student concerns, which included the missing button on the Science Hall side of Jefferson that allows students to signal crossing the street and the water fountain in the Palisano Pavillion being red, meaning the filter needs to be changed. The senate then moved to executive reports. 

President DeGlopper announced that during their upcoming Jan. 30 meeting they would be hosting the new Title IX Coordinator, Petrina Hill-Cheatom. EVP Mulenga welcomed the new J.U.S.T.I.C.E. co-chairs Chris Tolliver and Lizzy Pike and talked about the upcoming USA elections. VPBF Peters shared that finance board has two appeals and that she is continuing to work on and refine spreading guidelines.

Next up were cabinet reports. J.U.S.T.I.C.E. co-chairs Pike and Tolliver said that they have been working to make sure their committee was sorted and setting up meeting times. Public health chair Riley shared a form from the health center and announced they are looking for feedback, with a QR code. 

Liaison reports followed with Library Services Liaison McMaster saying that there is a booking link for clubs who want to take tables in the library and study rooms, with no more than two clubs at once. The library also wants to let students run their work through AI detectors so students can see the reports their professors are seeing, due to false positives in AI detectors.They are looking into Copyleaks training to better understand the website and they are looking into a pilot of an embedded librarian in D2L in English classes. 

Next up was structured discussion. President DeGlopper asked everyone to share one good thing that happened over break, The Griffin’s representatives shared that they got a new computer and went to an NFL game for the first time (guess who is who). President DeGlopper mentioned she did a small training on concise and effective communication, as well as asking questions to guest speakers. She also talked about business casual versus business formal attire. President DeGlopper announced that the Board of Trustee approved to reduce the printers on campus from 70 to 10-12, and then opened discussion about where those remaining printers should be located. Suggestions included the commuter lounge, Health Science, Library, the basement of Dugan and Science Hall. Senate was adjourned at 3:07 pm and you can find the next senate meeting of the semester on Friday, Jan. 30 at 2:30 p.m. in Grupp.