GPSA Meeting Minutes
February 26th, 2007
701 Clark Hall
5:30–7:00PM

I. Call to Order

J. Vertesi called the meeting to order at 5:39pm and took attendance.

Not present: A. McNamara, M. Bhadauria, E. Spero, G. Curtis, C. Hamann

Present: A. Gelzer, J. Vertesi, R. Harbison, M. Walsh, A. Chatterjee, K. Siler, D. Day, Z. Wang, T. Pardo, K. Nagel, Y. Yu (arrived late)

Others present: D. Mitaratonda, D. Thompson, A. O’Donnell, N. Chou Ku, K. Hubbell, P. McPheron

II. Approval of the Minutes

D. Thompson pointed out that she should be referred to as “Interim Director of Graduate Student Life in the Graduate school.”

R. Harbison moved to approve the minutes, A. Gezler seconded. The minutes were approved.

III. Committee Reports

J. Vertesi presented the Executive Committee report about the Graduate Community Initiative. She said people are really interested. During the breakfast with President Skorton, she said it was really going somewhere and there is a lot of interest. She was approached by Campus Life with a survey about graduate student housing — what to buy and what to build. The timeline was pushed back, so it will go out around spring break. She will draft and circulate the document, maybe through email, if not at the next GPSA meeting. Going from Campus Life to all graduate students. They met with the Council of Mental Health and Welfare to chat with leaders from the University, Gannett, and CAPS as well as a representative from each professional school and graduate school to discuss what works to help deal with problems and how to fix them even though things are very fragmented and issues are different.

M. Walsh presented the Communications end because C. Hamann asked if we could get Business students the GPSA information. C. Hamann sent out an email to the Business students in the Johnson school describing the GPSA information and asking if anyone was interested. Within one day, he got 25 people, and the information list is expanding. We want to do the same thing for all departments, programs, and any other listserves you are on. Forward to all listserves and people will join. He asked members to do this.

Z. Wang brought up the issue with the Merrill Schwabb and the international students housing coordinator. She said now they actually have an off-campus housing coordinator, so students have someone to go to when they have landlord-tenant conflicts.

J. Vertesi said having an off-campus housing coordinator is good, and we got something done that you brought before the GPSA last semester so congratulations on accomplishing that.

She presented for E. Spero about the Graduate Ball. It’s been reschedule for April 27th in the Johnson atrium. There were scheduling issues with Willard Straight Hall and the committee, and they have to go with this date. Revise your dates and mark on your calendars. The Events Committee is pushing for volunteers and help, advice, etc.

J. Vertesi welcomed any more comments or questions. She then welcomed Chris, a student representative from the Student Assembly.

Chris said the SA passed a resolution on Thursday to fight for free HIV testing. The test used to be free, but it is no longer free from Gannett. It costs $25 per test, and it saves Gannett about $18,000 a year. We want to encourage the administration to fund this gap for free testing. He is asking the GPSA to follow suit in the future.

T. Pardo suggested inviting Calvin Selth to make a formal graduate version that is more comprehensive to present to the administration.

IV. Open Forum

K. Nagel said the Vet school is doing another date action scheduled for April 20th at 7:30pm, where you can date a vet student and raise money for their fundraising and philanthropy event. Last year’s philanthropy was St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital, but this year will be different. Half the profits will go to the philanthropy and half to the Vet fraternity.

D. Thompson has a written feedback form centered around activities and workshops — academic-wise, career-wise, and social-wise. It was sent out the week of the snowstorm, so the turnout was low. They converted it to electronic and she would like to it also go through GPSA. She asked the representatives to please talk about the electronic form within their respective fields. They will use the information to develop seminars centered on feedback received from students to meet all academic, social, and career needs.

V. Old Business

a. FC Regulation Changes (Y. Yu)

J. Vertesi tabled the resolution. Y. Yu is driving from NYC at the moment and cannot present the resolution. It was tabled until decision later in the meeting whether she would be able to make it or not.

b. Resolution on Committee Staffing (M. Walsh)

M. Walsh said there was some work left to do on this resolution like process, eliminate some defunct committees, etc. He would also like to know what the members want to hear of actually staffing committees. He tabled it until next meeting in March.

c. Resolution on Slope Day Involvement (J. Vertesi)

J. Vertesi tabled this resolution too because it relies on the committee staffing resolution.

d. Resolution on the counsel of the assembly (M. Walsh)

M. Walsh said this is relatively straightforward. Since the Archivist position is defunct because the Office of Assemblies is doing a good job with the website — our archive, minutes, actions, etc. He proposes to replace the position with a counsel for the assembly, an idea that he got out of the Ivy Summit. Harvard and a few other schools have similar positions. It is an Emeritus position for former Presidents and Vice Presidents to stay members or working members of the assembly on call of the Executive Board to give advice. It keeps the idea of continuing certain precedence and policies through the administration. Cornell has legal counsel that tells what they can and can’t do. This is very similar because this position will advise the Executive Board that this is what’s been done in past, goals, etc. Also, the person holding this position will have a good idea of what the charter says because they will have been working with it for at least a year and they are qualified to give advice to that effect. The only major change from last month was he took R. Harbison’s advice to make sure the person must be matriculated at Cornell.

J. Vertesi moved to debate. She welcomed comments, debate, etc.

Z. Wang asked for clarification about making sure the person holding the position is on-campus. Off campus is not qualified.

M. Walsh said they would experiment and try this out for a year or two. Something new and different.

J. Vertesi said she doesn’t feel that former presidents can take on a task whenever they want to as is suggested by the wording of the statement in the resolution. The wording should be changed to, “unless that task is required at the request of the assembly.”

M. Walsh put the statement there to say that the Executive Board can’t put all their work on counsel.

T. Pardo asked if this was an established position or a trial position.

C. Sander said the first statement that says, “GPSA shall” and then it says, “may,” is a grammatical or substantive problem. GPSA does not have to elect the counsel if they don’t want to. We should address the concern if it is a trial or not a trial.

R. Harbison pointed out the last line says, “may.”

T. Pardo said we should change the first “shall” to “may.”

J. Vertesi wanted to remove the 2nd “may” to correct grammar. She said we should strike, “Unless the counsel feels that it is his or her role to take on that task,” and replace it with, “unless at the request of the Executive Board.”

A male representative asked about changing it to a “may” doesn’t make it a Sunset clause. It wouldn’t make it a trial period, but it would make it a discretionary period for the Executive Board.

J. Vertesi asked if they wanted this in the charter or in the bylaws. Do you want to create this as a standing rule for next year?

M. Walsh said they can’t create it as a standing rule for next year. Each assembly must create their own each year.

C. Sander asked if it was possible to vote it down in the future.

M. Walsh said yes, you can vote it down. The assembly has full control over it regardless of the year.

J. Vertesi said the Executive Board votes for the counsel.

C. Sander asked what if there was a situation that the assembly wants something different from the Executive Board.

M. Walsh clarified that the Executive Board nominates and then the assembly votes on that.

C. Sander then clarified that the assembly can’t nominate people for this position.

A. Gelzer then suggested that it should not be stated as an election, but an appointment that will be ratified by the assembly.

C. Sander said the statement should read, “The GPSA may, on the request of the newly elected committee, ratify a counsel to the committee upon the request of the Executive committee.”

M. Walsh clarified that Office of Assemblies now takes care of the Archivist’s responsibility for making sure files don’t move.

J. Vertesi said there’s a gap between the local knowledge and the technical collection of documents. We have lots of archival documents automated to the website with our full support staff in the Office of Assemblies, but we don’t have executive perspectives. For example, I was part of the craziness of setting the activity fee of earlier this year, but people who were there won’t be there in the future. What’s the local knowledge? It’s the counsel-level knowledge that needs to continue, not just the technical documents.

T. Pardo asked if any previous president or vice president could hold the position or does the counsel need to be specifically from last year.

M. Walsh responded that it could be any.

No more debate, so the assembly moved to vote.

10–0−0. Resolution passed

VI. New Business

a. Climate Change Resolution (E. Rochon & M. Walsh)

J. Vertesi introduced Emily Rochon to present the next resolution.

E. Rochon gave a background in climate issues since 2001 when the Bush administration pulled out of the Kyoto protocol. They asked the Cornell administration to sign in to the Kyoto protocol, and it resulted in the storming of Day Hall, where all the students camped out. The administration agreed to sign, and we were the first University to do to sign on to KyotoNOW! It sparked across the nation to follow suit. At least 30 KyotoNOW! chapters have spawned since then, but it originally began here. Pride started the whole ball game, but now we need to keep it rolling. The Kyoto tax team formed to help meet the emission reduction targets that were set. In February, the administration announced that Cornell is on target to reach its 2010 reduction emission targets and provide heat and electricity on campus. We want to launch beyond and commit to climate neutrality. We have been joined with over 80 campuses to become a climate neutral campus with net zero emissions on campus. That’s where this resolution comes from today. We are asking for a formal statement of support for the administration. We want to acknowledge efforts to research, reduce emissions, and move forward. This resolution commits the GPSA to investigate this body, and graduate students can research to take action and become more involved. There is a one-year timeline to come up with something and put something into play. She spoke with some graduate students who are more than happy to lead and take charge. There is a meeting this Wednesday at 6PM to join and begin discussion. We want to move forward with a more formal process.

She also wanted to address her Letter to the Editor from last Thursday in The Daily Sun. The goal was to draw attention because she is very passionate about this issue, and there are so many exciting things she wants to contribute.

M. Walsh said that a lot of other students do a lot, but the point was to commit the next five years to research climate change. Efforts such as carbon mitigation workshops and carbon emission in Tompkins County to alleviate the problems are a good start.

J. Vertesi reminded the assembly that there are first questions, then debate, then a vote. This is not a charter change so it can be done all at once.

D. Day said if they are looking for a strategy plan how to get Cornell more motivated, they could go to the Johnson’s school and talk with Professor Hart to get a different perspective and get more students involved.

J. Vertesi said they are always pushing on the transportation button for flexibility, carpooling, and other options. What else could we do? Graduate students are most likely to take those offers. Another platform we could take is how you could help us as well as help this resolution. Give us more options. She clarified that questions are items you don’t understand and debate is when you discuss things you want to change.

A female representative asked how this affects transportation: more bus services at night? Administration will say that buses are big and no one is on them. We have to look at the economic and planning issues. This might hurt the graduate students on the transportation front. Why is the GPSA doing something with climate control? There are so many other groups out there that are more tailored for this issue. Why does GPSA as a body have to investigate these avenues? I don’t feel like it’s necessarily a graduate issue; it’s more of a campus issue. I fully support the first resolution, but with the second one, I don’t know.

E. Rochon said this is the body that represents graduate students as a whole; it sets the standard. There are many other efforts in other ways, but it’s a gesture of good will for the GPSA to take formal action. It may ignite the graduate students. The SA passed a resolution in support of $5 to purchase energy on campus. They didn’t have to do it, but they approached KyotoNOW! and took a stand on it. We worked with them to create a referendum as an act of good will. It shows the administration that we are supportive of climate neutrality. Since they have passed that resolution, I feel like the GPSA should follow suit.

The female representative said she supports the first part, but she doesn’t think the whole graduate student body should be taking it upon themselves.

J. Vertesi stopped the debate because the time was just for questions. It’s not debate yet.

A. Gezler asked how the investigation will be done.

E. Rochon said the GPSA can do whatever they want, even though it is near the end of the session. She will submit a white paper at the end to GPSA and they can take action on any, none, or all of steps. The white paper is the bare minimum that comes out of the process.

Since no more questions, J. Vertesi moved the discussion to debate.

D. Mitarotonda said he supports the resolution wholeheartedly. He feels the GPSA does represent all students, and it’s a good step forward, like we’re ready to do something about it. For example, Bush said they weren’t going to make a formal statement about this issue. It takes collective action and leadership from the GPSA to help every one keep working towards it. We should help find solutions for it�I don’t know exactly what it is yet or how we will be involved, but we should support it.

T. Pardo agreed that we should investigate. It should be left to the discretion of the GPSA to determine how exactly we want to investigate. With whatever activities we pursue as a representative body or community, we should keep these issues in mind. We can cut greenhouse gas emission with whatever activity we participate in, invest in, create, think about; the point is we should always be thinking about these issues. These are concerns we should have when pursuing future activities. It’s a behavioral process.

C. Sander said the 2nd part of the resolution concerns me. For example, what if we had an activity that we needed to take a bus to get to a different place, but there is emission via busing. This is moving us to a role that we’re not ready for because there is a diversity of viewpoints. It’s one thing to take a position about housing, transportation, or points of graduate student life. Political statements not related to the GPSA.

T. Pardo agreed. But we would bus instead of everyone driving separately. We do that instead because it helps with this issue, not because we won’t fund the event because it’s the better option. We get to determine how we wish to interpret or investigate. We could or could not set up a committee to think about, particularly about the initiative. We should keep these things in mind as we set up proposals.

J. Vertesi brought up an old issue when the Engineers vs. a sustainable world group didn’t have money to go to a conference, and no one would give them money to go. We were bound by our charter that we couldn’t fund them. This puts us in a complicated bind; maybe in the future, we can’t support for other reasons or we might have to support.

A. Gezler suggested revising the wording in that part of the resolution. It’s better to make it clear what you are looking for. We are not really ready to propose a revision because we’re not sure what we want, but we should absolutely revise. All these concerns we have should absolutely be revised.

C. Sander asked if we could do this in two stages. Vote on all of it without that part and then figure out the rest later.

J. Vertesi said we can propose to strike that section and then come back with a different revised resolution next time.

Kim said I don’t think we should approve this because it is a political statement. The GPSA shouldn’t be investigating climate change. The part that says we should be taking tangible action is opposite of what should be said. Even if white paper is written, something has to be done, something has to be changed with what has been written in the resolution. I agree that section should be taken out before the conclusion.

E. Rochon said her intention was not only to say something, which is good, but also to do something good. Genocide, sweat shops, etc. are bad, but just because we say that doesn’t change our behavior. Passing a resolution without action is hollow. We should put our money where our mouth is. This is a “Yes, you can” resolution. The language in second part states that plainly. It’s not because we won’t fund you because you want to take a bus; that is just asinine. Consider the reality. This isn’t a political statement. This just makes us committed to be carbon neutral, which is part of our mission. We are moving towards sustainability, and this just falls under central mission in passing the resolution. There is nothing about sociopolitical, democrats, etc. here. We are acting as more responsible committee members, looking for other ways that we can support Cornell to conserve more energy. We could give everyone compact fluorescent light bulbs. This doesn’t make life any worse, but it makes our environmental footprint a little smaller. If the language leaves the door more wide open, I suggest we make should make amendments, but I read it this way. I don’t think it’s good to strike it. If we just pass that as the resolution, it’s just a hollow gesture.

K. Siler moved to call question. A. Gezler seconded, and there was no dissent.

9–0−1. Motion passes.

b. Trustee Resolution (D. Mitarotonda)

J. Vertesi introduced D. Mitarotonda to the assembly.

D. Mitarotonda said the student trustees are supposed to interact with GPSA in general. As an ex-officio member of GPSA, I thought it would be good to highlight the relationship between GPSA and student trustees. It would do good things for the graduate and professional student body. This doesn’t change anything, it just highlights the relationship. It is the responsibility of both to work together, and it allow for good communication paths in terms of working what they’re doing, etc. This is not a change in procedure, it’s just putting in writing somewhere that this should happen and it’s a good thing that should happen.

M. Walsh didn’t have anything to add. This is simple, quick, and small.

D. Mitarotonda wanted to change wording by taking out graduate and professional student trustees and just change to student trustees�make it plural to let them attend meetings. Both are still elected by the whole student body and one will be from each constituency.

There were no questions or debate. C. Sander called for the question, and T. Pardo seconded. No dissent.

10–0−0. Resolution passed.

M. Walsh said since Y. Yu is still not here, we will table her regulation changes. He will present a few of her concerns because he talked to her on the phone before the meeting. Y. Yu wanted more feedback about summer funding and the events calendar. She met with some resistance from groups because they don’t want to post events, citing that it takes too long and no one reads the events calendar. Groups also don’t want everyone coming to their event.

J. Vertesi said even though it’s in their contract about funding.

M. Walsh said the events calendar is moot because we are heading towards a unified calendar system in the next year or year and a half that will require all events to be on this registered calendar. From this central database, we want to see all the events that are funded by GPSAFC on our website.

A male representative said posting on the website is unrealistic because it says events should be posted on the events calendar one month before the event. He is part of many groups that get GPSAFC funding, and it’s hard to know one month before event all the details about the event. The deadline is too early. The setup in pretty easy; it’s not too hard. You also have to remember in clubs, it’s hard to get people to do things, and it’s nice when people organize things for the club. If we say you only get money if you do this or do that, it puts additional hurdles that clubs have to get over.

R. Harbison asked how much work this would be.

J. Vertesi said the form is online. You choose from a drop down list of who funds the event, the date, the time, etc. Then you click submit; that’s it. It seems pretty easy, but she’s aware that it’s difficult to get people to do things.

C. Sander said there are events in terms of GPSAFC items that are social events and only open to club members. Program events must be open to everyone, but social events don’t need to be. Maybe that’s the stuff they don’t want everyone showing up to. Some stuff falls only under social events, and we should distinguish between social and program events.

J. Vertesi moved the discussion on. Any more information or comments should be sent to: yy235. She also wanted to draw the attention to the letter for the Board of Trustees on the 9th of March. We are going to present to the Board our activities, and we will highlight the Graduate Community Initiative. If there is no dissent, she wanted to adjourn the meeting early and hold an informal discussion about the Graduate Community Initiative. She wants people to contribute and wants to talk about it and get feedback. She will put it together this weekend. There was no dissent.

VII. Adjournment

J. Vertesi adjourned the meeting at 6:40 pm.

Informal Discussion: Graduate Community Initiative

The GPSA had an informal discussion that ended at 7:01pm.