Graduate and Professional Student Assembly Minutes Big Red Barn March 24, 2003 5:30–6:30 p.m. Attendance: 2002–2003 GPSA Members 8/26 9/30 10/21 11/25 1/27 2/24 3/24 4/21 Shaffique Adam P P P P P P P Daniel Dadoyan P A A P A E P Gerod Hall P P P P P P P Gavin Hurley P P P P P P P Lauren Mangiola P P P P P P P Kurt Massey A P P P P E Timothy McConnochie P P P P P E P Andrew Miller A P P A A A Joan Moriarty P P P P P P P Bryan Preston P A P P P P P Daniela Raik P P P E P P P David Schmale III P P P P P P P Andrew Schpak P P P P P P Nab Sharif A P P P P P P Ariana Vigil A P P P E P P Robb Willer P P A P E P Heather Wynder A P A P P P P

I. Call to Order J. Moriarty called the meeting to order at 5:35.

II. Open Forum Susanah Schmid, the new Law school representative, was introduced.

H. Wynder said that every Thursday, from 12:30–1:15 Lincoln Hall offers free music concerts.

III. Committee Reports

IV. Business of the Day B) Extension of Meeting Time Resolution

J. Moriarty said that they discussed changes at the last GPSA meeting. She introduced it with 2 friendly amendments. The first resolve clause, change 1 to 1.5 hours and in the last line of the resolution, it should say 5:30–7:00pm.

There was a call to question and 2nded.

The resolution passed.

A) Election Resolution

J. Moriarty wanted to point out that since there are only 12 people here, everybody needs to say yes for the resolution to pass.

G. Hurley said that we discussed the 3 options.

H. Wynder asked for point of clarification, who votes for the officers? GPSA or COR?

J. Moriarty said the GPSA does.

D. Raik asked does majority mean real majority, or plurality?

J. Moriarty said majority = 50% + 1.

T. McConnochie asked does abstaining count as voting?

J. Moriarty said yes.

H. Wynder said they should clarify that because it was an issue last year.

J. Moriarty said that abstaining is a vote, you are voting not to vote.

B. Preston said he sees it as requiring 9 because the total GPSA count is 17.

S. Adam said they should use “seated” if they are to include all members.

G. Hurley said he echoes S. Adam’s sentiments.

B. Preston said he thinks the language is important — he doesn’t want somebody to misinterpret seated versus present members.

H. Wynder said that she would prefer majority of seated members.

D. Dadoyan said he agrees.

G. Hurley said he can accept that as a friendly amendment.

H. Wynder said that takes away the ambiguity of option A.

J. Moriarty said they are considering 2/3 versus majority and present versus seated.

G. Hurley said seated will go through all 3.

A call to question was made and 2nded.

J. Moriarty said we are voting on amendment A.

Amendment A fails.

S. Adam said he would like to propose B because it is important for the President to get a 2/3 mandate because in previous elections it was very close.

B. Preston said it would be nice but it would create a challenge and majority or seated members is sufficient.

D. Dadoyan said they should follow up B with A.

S. Adam said he is not keen on A because if a group is stalemated, they could always agree on the 2/3 mandate informally because it has happened before. It doesn’t need to be in the charter.

H. Wynder said she doesn’t see it to be feasible based on last year’s experience.

S. Adam said not everything needs to be in the charter and they can agree informally to mandate 2/3 after a majority vote.

H. Wynder said she wants to second what B. Preston said.

J. Moriarty said she would like to second what H. Wynder is saying.

N. Sharif asked is the majority what we informally agreed on?

J. Moriarty said yes.

A call to question was made and 2nded.

Amendment B fails.

A call to question was made on the main resolution and 2nded.

The resolution passes.

C) Planning Committee Resolution

G. Hurley said he got the impression that funding is the real issue here, not the formation of the committee. He still likes the resolution the way it is.

J. Moriarty asked for comments and said we are reviewing whether or not funding should come from the endowment.

B. Preston said he fully endorses the idea of the committee but doesn’t want it to be a standing budget. They should elect a chair and then the chair will come up with a budget and present it to the GPSA for approval.

J. Moriarty asked is that an actual resolution proposal? He should make it an amendment and lay it on the table.

B. Preston said he is essentially proposing eliminating the last 2 resolve clauses.

H. Wynder said she doesn’t feel like we need to have a committee. She has nothing against it but if people want to do it, they can without a committee. She likes it ad hoc because she wants to see people serious about other things.

G. Hurley said that few committees are directly aimed at the grad students and B. Preston’s points are fine. He explained at the last meeting how the endowments arise and feels it’s our personal responsibility as stewards of the fund to do something for the students with their money.

J. Moriarty said that it is important to have a committee oriented at this because they need to have more roles for people to play. It is good at getting the GPSA name out and getting grad students together. She doesn’t see any harm in its formation.

T. McConnochie said he wanted to ask Lauren what was easier, having it be a standing or ad hoc committee? Until now they haven’t had a good idea what to do with the endowment and he thinks it’s good for people to do things if they know they’ll have the money to do it.

L. Mangiola said she feels like we need to have a committee because it is good to have a set of people who will do the job. For example, the holiday canned food drive was difficult in getting COR to participate. If she had a committee, she can rely on members for help. Having order is good, like goals, deadlines, etc.

B. Preston said he is concerned with accountability of the funds. They should keep the resolution as is but add a clause saying leftover money will be added to the general fund.

G. Hurley asked is that GPSA general fund?

B. Preston said he was thinking GPSAFC.

V. Blodgett said that she is concerned about having a committee treated differently from any other grad group and by line funded group. It is important for the GPSA to figure out how it wants to be viewed. The idea of putting a budget together would make sense.

H. Wynder said she likes what she said.

D. Dadoyan said it would benefit the entire Cornell community. How would you figure out which grads’ interests to target? How do you gauge the popularity of the events chosen?

N. Sharif asked how does it matter how the GPSA is viewed? The ice skating event was well received and he doesn’t see how we’re viewed affects the formation of the committee.

J. Moriarty said we should close discussion on the money.

D. Raik said they can’t have money if there is no committee.

J. Moriarty said we’ll keep the resolution and add B. Preston’s amendment.

G. Hurley said he finds it friendly.

A call to question was made and 2nded

There was dissent.

G. Hurley said he is concerned and wants to know if people could be persuaded to change their vote.

Resolution C fails.

D) Pay and Benefits Resolution

J. Moriarty said they want to codify the Pay & Benefits committee as a standing committee. They discussed this last time and she thinks it being co-chaired will be a good idea.

G. Hurley said he would like to propose an amendment — in 9.7 strike co and replace one of co-chair with the chair.

D. Raik asked why?

G. Hurley said this isn’t in response to this year’s efforts. He is concerned about the division of authority. He thinks it’s better to have a single person when a contentious issue arises. He understands it’s lots of work but he doesn’t think the extra work is just for co-chairs, it will include all members.

G. Hall asked how does one become chair of a standing committee?

J. Moriarty said that they were going to add that committees choose it’s own co-chair.

H. Wynder asked to clarify.

J. Moriarty said they would leave it this way, and have the GPSA approve the appointments. She thinks co-chairs are necessary to have because there is lots of work to oversee and they need to create opportunities to lessen the elitist body and make things more hierarchal.

T. McConnochie said they should have a chair and vice-chair, both which need to be approved. This is a good compromise to all the issues.

G. Hurley said he finds that amendment friendly.

L. Mangiola said this committee encompasses a lot so having co-chairs is beneficial. She’s never heard of a vice-chair.

B. Preston asked is there anything to keep the committee from deciding themselves on the number of chairs?

J. Moriarty said legally they can’t call 2 people chairs because it violates the charter.

A. Vigil said she would like to echo L. Mangiola’s sentiments about co-chairs. It would encourage novice involvement and cuts down on hierarchy.

H. Wynder asked are there special privileges if one has a title? She doesn’t mean to be facetious.

J. Moriarty said probably no. It’s more on who makes the calls.

H. Wynder said she has been the chair and co-chair on other organizations and name doesn’t affect what people do and how they work. If the committee is busy, they will delegate work. She agrees with G. Hurley that it is weird for a committee to have co-chairs when others don’t.

C. Taylor said she doesn’t understand the debate on power. Chairs need to go to the GPSA for approval anyway. It’s nice to have somebody doing work with you.

G. Hall said they should have a co-chair system if necessary in decentralizing.

G. Hurley said they are splitting hairs here. He feels a single person mediating a situation is better than having a deadlock between 2 co-chairs.

T. McConnochie said that having to resort to Robert’s Rules is the only situation where it’s important to figure out who has authority.

C. Taylor said she doesn’t want the resolution to die just because of the co-chair thing.

J. Moriarty said let’s do a straw pull, will people vote no just because of the chair issue?

The general sentiment was no.

J. Moriarty said on the table is chair and vice chair.

H. Wynder asked is the amendment here so people will let go of the co-chair issue?

T. McConnochie said it’s a compromise.

The amendment for chair and vice chair passed.

A call to question was made and 2nded

There was dissent.

G. Hall said he feels like a committee should decide their chairs and have the GPSA approve, not appoint.

A call to question was made and 2nded.

It passed.

A call to question was made on resolution D and 2nded.

Resolution D passed.

E) Election of Professional School Members of GPSA Resolution G. Hurley said that this is just for notification and it is important that it passed. If it does not, it will disenfranchise the Professional schools for next year. This will be discussed at the next meeting.

F) BRB TGIF in the Summer J. Moriarty said that GPSA can have TGIF at the BRB this summer — 12 times. Every Friday�$225/week. Should the GPSA should do it? Should they do it all summer? Every other week? Location? They must decide today.

T. McConnochie made a motion to allocate to the BRB $3000 to have 12 TGIF over the Summer.

H. Wynder asked if the $3000 included publicity.

T. McConnochie said yes, it included everything.

H. Wynder wanted to know if they could have something else besides beer, like watermelon. Can they give BRB more money to get other things?

Nab said that TGIF is not new. The only thing that they are deciding on is if it should continue over the Summer. It already works and has a proven track record with what they provide.

H. Wynder made a motion to add $500 to the budget for fruit.

J. Moriarty seconded.

The motion did not pass.

J. Moriarty said that they are voting on giving $3000 to the BRB.

It passed.

G)  GPSA Election

J. Moriraty and G. Hurley are available to answer any questions or concerns about the election procedure for this year — to follow the Charter.

V. New Business

VI. Announcements L. Mangiola said that there will be golf shirts for GPSA COR on sale. In black, white, or red. They are $17.50 each and 20 members will be about $350 total. She proposed to sell to COR members and that the GPSA would subsidize.

G. Hurley said that he thinks everyone should have to pay something.

G. Hall agreed.

Everyone liked the idea as a whole.

L. Mangiola said that there are 60 members total.

There was a discussion as to how much to charge.

L. Mangiola made a motion to have people pay $7.00/shirt and GPSA will put $600 towards them at most.

Nab seconded.

Motion passes.

VII. Adjournment A motion was made to adjourn.

The meeting was adjourned at 7:10.

Respectfully Submitted, Tyng Tsuei. Office of the Assemblies