GPSA Meeting Minutes
Monday, March 26, 2007
Big Red Barn
5:30–7:00pm

I. Call to Order

J. Vertesi called the meeting to order at 5:34pm.

II. Committee Reports

J. Vertesi added two ad hoc things to the meeting. Review minutes from February 26, 2007. Any questions or movements to accept minutes?

A. Gezler moved to accept. K. Nagel seconded. Minutes were approved.

J. Vertesi said the second addition to the agenda is to call on Dean K. Hubbell about the movement with the Graduate Community Initiative (GCI).

K. Hubbell said since the assembly met with President Skorton on March 12, they have met and reviewed the vision statement for the GCI working group and would like to move ahead immediately. This is the way they would like to expect the committee to be formed with the assembly’s agreement. Sunny Powers and Susan Murphy would co-chair the committee. He would be on the committee, someone from the Provost’s office, some designee from Cornell Weill, a few other faculty, and five or six representatives from the student’s side of the house to join the committee. The idea is to go to work immediately and have a report to present at latest by the end of Fall 2007. He said the assembly did a wonderful job and certainly got the University’s attention.

J. Vertesi welcomed questions. In terms of similar committees, how is this formed? Having the Provost, Dean, and so many students involved?

K. Hubbell said this will be a big committee with 11–15 people because it’s a big job and it needs broad representation to do its work. President Skorton would love to think it’s one University, so having a Cornell Weill designee involved is an effort to deliver on that.

J. Vertesi asked how soon a timeline they could give the assembly. Do they need representatives now or can the assembly wait until next core meeting?

K. Hubbell said the co-chairs are going to draft up a charge and in the meantime, the assembly can decide what students should join. The assembly shouldn’t waste time.

J. Vertesi said there will be a discussion about structure and how to appoint people later, but for now, they will move onto the regular structured meeting.

a. Executive Committee

J. Vertesi said she stopped at the Weill campus and met with their counterparts during Spring break and toured the school. She was pleased to see a lot of shared issues that they have in common. They were very delighted to get copies of the GCI. At Weill, they don’t have a Dean of Students to take care of issues such as housing, childcare, etc. stuff the assembly takes for granted here. Another big issue that has affected Weill is that traditionally, they’ve had 400 students in the Medical program and 50 in the Ph.D. Now there is about 400 Ph.D. too. This change has not been accompanied by a change in infrastructure. The two entities don’t ever meet or come together, and they are very separate. One of things we decided was for more communication between the two bodies: someone will report to Weill from GPSA, so GPSA remembers who Weill is and why that’s important. The assembly doesn’t have jurisdiction over Weill Cornell, but she did learn some things about the Geneva campus, and they can put some things into play. She is pushing for greater integration.

T. Pardo asked what a student would have to do to go down to Weill and talk to the Ph.D. group down there.

J. Vertesi said she wrote the President and told them she was the President. Making those connections, that’s how we met up. Maybe the assembly should consider having something stronger there. Students from Ithaca campus can go there and stay overnight? Any infrastructure to set up is better than nothing.

T. Pardo asked if the assembly could start some kind of GPSA get-together, not really conference, but something along a weekend? Graduate student assemblies can meet at one place with rotating meeting places and hang out for a weekend get to know each other. From there, everyone can branch out etc. How could we institute something like that, like a retreat?

J. Vertesi said that’s a great idea, even though many people might not have the time, but it would be worthwhile. She suggested talking about it in the future to see if the assembly could make it happen. At the Ivy Summit, she realized they should have invited someone from Weill at least to that meeting.

b. Elections Committee

M. Walsh reminded everyone that elections are coming up and he is in charge of the elections. He needs volunteers to help out; they are going to have a caucus system where the assembly will break up into social sciences, biological sciences, physical sciences and humanities departments. He needs volunteers preferably one from each group who is not running themselves to help run those caucuses. He’ll give instruction, and it’s pretty simple. You just need to hand out ballots and tally votes. Who isn’t running?

M. Bhaduria, A. McNamara, M. Moyer, and A. Gezler raised their hands.

J. Vertesi said the whole executive board is outgoing, and she thanked everyone for working with them. She reminded the assembly that they managed to get the administration’s ear with this GCI, so the assembly needs good people to stay on and carry this forward. She encouraged everyone to step up and take on these positions. She also encouraged people to talk to the executive committee. She has great confidence in everyone on this assembly.

M. Walsh said it should really be straightforward next year.

J. Vertesi said the assembly found ways to say to the community, “here is how to meet our needs,” etc.

M. Walsh also reminded everyone that institutional memory will still be around. Elections will be in two weeks.

c. All other committees

E. Spero said they have DJ and a band�they are having a jazz band in beginning and then a DJ at the end. The DJ is Ramadan from Level B. If anyone has song suggestions, she asked them to email her so the DJ can start making his playlist. She is still looking for people to help out with publicity. They will start selling tickets next week.

K. Hubbell asked if it was still in Willard Straight Hall.

E. Spero said it will be in the Johnson’s School Atrium.

J. Vertesi clarified that the days available in the Straight weren’t available with us.

C. Hamann also reminded the assembly that it’s on April 27th.

M. Walsh suggested using the next CoR meeting to beef up the publicity.

E. Spero said we will also have tickets then.

M. Walsh had a question about the budget. In recent years, they have always had to approve the budget.

E. Spero said it’s part of the overall budget we submitted earlier. It’s the same as last years, but the only difference is space. It is pretty close to the estimates we had when we submitted them in the beginning of the year.

M. Walsh was just wondering for technical reasons.

Y. Yu also updated the assembly for the finance commission. She reminded everyone that tomorrow is the workshop in the Big Red Barn from 6–7pm. It’s an annual workshop for all leaders and treasurers explaining how the activity fee is spent. The workshop is working everyone through the application procedure and what activities can be funded, how our refund procedure works, etc. The finance commission has two big changes and a bunch of small changes, which she’ll present today. They also plan to collect responses from the organization leaders and from everyone. She said she’s going to present it today and collect your feedback. P. Beach and some other representatives from the Office of Assemblies will come to present how to post an event on the University event calendar. The are looking forward to purchasing software to upgrade events calendar and make it possible to link events from other websites. They want to be able to post on the website and make it show up on multiple sites.

C. Hamann asked who the contact is for posting.

Y. Yu said P. Beach and Karen. She will give the contact information later.

III. Open Forum

J. Vertesi said the next meeting is the CoR meeting, and the last meeting is traditionally an election for the next set of people. She is trying to organize a party afterwards. Two years ago, Brian Holmes had an end of the year wrap up and she’d like to see that tradition get resurrected.

Z. Wang said she got a lot of used computers from different departments. Instead of sending to recycling, she wanted to redistribute to schools in South Africa or local communities. She talked to a person from CIT who wanted to come talk to student representatives next time, but she doesn’t know what the schedule looks like. Can the assembly find a time slot for him to briefly talk about what he’s doing?

J. Vertesi said to send M. Walsh his information.

D. Thompson wanted to thank everyone who pushed the graduate survey because over 700 people responded. In one week, she’ll send out the restaurant certificate winner. They will incorporate some information into the orientation this year. This year they’ll include, a Welcome by the Deans, an overview of the function of graduate schools, an introduction to graduate services, an introduction of incoming students to their graduate advisor, and an introduction to Gannett and accessing services. She is requesting student participation between 30 and 50 volunteers to staff graduate student panels so incoming students can ask questions. The panels will be broken into disciplines and about identifying first year experiences. The other panel is about balancing graduate and personal life in graduate schools. They will host a social hour where graduate students with children, spouses, and partners can come socialize. If anyone will be here August 19th, she will circulate a sign up sheet, and she will send emails over the summer with more information.

E. Spero asked if there will be other events like undergraduate orientation. Will there be an introduction to clubs or organizations on campus? Usually they have events and try to put them on the orientation calendar. It was hard to get into last year. She clarified that she was talking about the brochure for graduate orientation that had a calendar in it.

D. Thompson said the brochure is being designed now and all dates, etc. much be sent over to them by the end of March. An online version will be available this year. Email to me at dt269. If you want your event posted in the printed version, she needs it by March 30. For the website, just send it to her email before the event and they’ll post it.

E. Spero asked for clarification about the date that she needed volunteers to help sit on the panels.

D. Thompson said it would be on Sunday, August 19th. She is sending around a sign up sheet for all events.

IV. Discussion of Housing Survey proposal

J. Vertesi said there is movement on the GPS housing. The housing office has asked for the assembly’s feedback, so please take two minutes to look it over.

A. Gezler said the estimates for the cost of housing are much higher than the Ithaca housing market. If this is something that is to be given to graduate students, it might not be a good idea.

A female representative said she disagreed. They are much more expensive than $600. She also asked why they left out Cayuga Heights because lots of people live there.

J. Vertesi said good point.

A. McNamara also asked about South Hill.

R. Harbison said if incoming graduate students were to get this survey, they don’t really know where everything is. How will they define that? It’s more of a concern for first year students.

J. Vertesi said they should include a map or something. Where they are going to build, etc.

A. McNamara said for some of the questions, they don’t have any place to indicate what your choice is.

J. Vertesi said this is a draft, so it’ll turn into something with drop downs, etc.

T. Pardo said it can include an attachment of a map to address the location issue. Some sort of general pictorial map of Ithaca. These are very limited selections. Are they doing that on purpose? She is also interested in putting an “other” box for questions like number one: what is their potential highest cost they would pay. There are a few other wording issues.

Z. Wang pointed out that a lot of the questions don’t have the option of “other.”

A. Gezler said for questions about where you going to live, maybe they should ask something like, “why do you prefer to live off campus?”

M. Walsh made a comment that it seems like a lot to give out in prizes. He asked where that money is coming from.

R. Harbison made an expansion to the off-campus thing. It’s a lot different between someone who has an apartment off-campus, or someone who owns a house off-campus. They might be much less likely to move into a dorm if they lived in their own house before.

T. Pardo said question 11 is a little redundant. Number 13 for off-campus: if someone clicks off-campus, there can potentially be another question to say where or what particular neighborhood.

J. Vertesi said they need to move on because they have a full agenda. She wants comments today because she is going to draft this up tonight. If there’s something else anyone wants to add, she asked them to send her an email right after the meeting.

Y. Yu said she wanted to design a survey to ask about job hunting and surveys for people graduating this year. How would she get help on such a survey?

J. Vertesi said ask K. Hubbell.

K. Hubbell said the institutional research office noticed that one of the real challenges is that many students are getting surveyed to death. It may be better to try to think of ways of gathering information without using surveys. Focus groups, etc. are useful but not as burdensome to students. Stack of surveys online that students are asked to take and number of participants are dropping because people getting survey fatigue.

J. Vertesi suggested talking about this offline, but thanked Y. Yu for bringing it up.

K. Hubbell said the institutional research office might have information for you.

J. Vertesi moved Resolution 13 and 14 up to right now because both M. Ye and S. Kong have to leave to a class at 6:30pm so at least they can present. Seconded by A. McNamara. No dissent.

V. Change in agenda order

a. R.13 Resolution on Student’s List (M. Ye)

M. Ye presented his proposal of the Student’s List, which is equivalent to the Dean’s List. The Student’s List is to recognize professors who have higher course evaluations than 4.5. There are many teaching awards at Cornell, but none are managed directly by students. This is totally based on students. There will be three categories. One will be for young teachers, who are not so good at the beginning but make rapid progress, so there’s a separate list for young teachers to encourage them to have more progress. A Distinguished Student’s List is nominated based on overall score. We need a committee because lots of words and narratives can’t be decided by a computer. A committee considers qualitative responses and tracks progress over several years. Recipients will be listed in The Daily Sun and they can have a plaque in WSH.

K. Duch is cosponsoring the resolution, and she presented it in front of the SA. This is another way to provide information on professors. It passed unanimously in the SA. She encouraged the assembly to consider.

R. Harbison didn’t know how evaluations are administered. From her experience, each evaluation from each class is very different. Is that the case at Cornell? It would be difficult to compare.

M. Ye said for many schools, course evaluations have been standardized. For every college, course evaluations are the same. It’s compatible.

A male representative said in formal course evaluations, the rating given to the professor is often very correlated with the grades that the students get. Young teachers who get 2.0, but then improve to a 3.5 maybe just learned that they laxed their standards a bit.

M. Ye said there is no correlation between the professor’s rating and grades in large schools. In lesser schools, it has been found to be a problem.

The male representative said he’s seen otherwise.

Z. Wang said to look at this from a scientific point of view. If you apply logic, difficult courses wont get as high a vote.

M. Ye said the committee will have students of all years as well as young alumni. Everyone is involved so they will be able to overcome the bias of that score.

J. Vertesi moved to table the resolution until later in the meeting. R. Harbison seconded.

b. R.14 Resolution on the Campus Code of Conduct (X. Kong)

S. Kong said the CJC and the UA have reviewed the proposal of the major changes that B. Krause wanted to do in code of conduct. He wants to concentrate on maintaining civil rights; the proposed changes did serious harm to students’ rights. On the first page, he circled things that violated students’ rights. In the current version, if someone is accused simultaneously in the University and court, the University can stop procedures until the court makes a decision. Krause proposed that the University can do it independently of the court. If the court says you’re innocent, the University can still dismiss you. On the next page, there are sanctions that say that some serious offenses that threaten educational mission will end in dismissal. This is not very appropriate. To punish someone, you need clear and convincing evidence. B. Krause said the University should take preponderance. This means that if it is more likely than not that you’re bad, then you are bad. This deprives the students of the right to remain silent. There is restricted right of a complaint to appear and of accused to appear. What kind of person has the incentive to appear? Peole who are innocent have more incentive to appear. If you deprive this right to students, it’s not appropriate either. He is against changes to students’ rights. It is bad to the Cornell community too if students don’t feel fairly treated. They might take Cornell to court. It’s not good for the honor of the University. He is calling for support, not only the for students, but for the University and the basic principles of the US.

J. Vertesi said he mentioned a lot of concern, the CJC and the UA have done their jobs, and the GPSA is behind this process. There is also concern behind the revocation of the right to remain silent, etc. He tried to address this in the resolution. She opened the floor to discussion. The resolution was tabled to the end of the meeting.

VI. Old Business

a. FC regulation changes (Y. Yu)

Y. Yu said the changes that were made are highlighted in yellow. There are two major changes, one of them is adding summer funding for this summer. Firstly, the bylaw says that GPSAFC is only sponsoring events from the first day of the academic year until commencement. A lot of other students stay on campus and do events during the summer, so the FC proposed we do other funding and use the academic year as a funding circle. If we don’t use up the fund, all funds come back to the GPSA at the end of year and is reallocated next year. What the FC proposes is to set aside certain amounts of money for the summer. It doesn’t matter who gets it, but they should apply before the end of the semester. Program events or how to spend funds, the member of the FC will get together to decide what to give and how much to give. Her point to raise for discussion was how much money should it be for this year? The GPSAFC has about $135,000 to allocate across 200 groups. If the assembly wants to set aside $10,000, it’s possible. How much is appropriate? Should we just open it up for application and see how many groups apply? Then, the FC can see how to tabulate for next year. The amount will be flexible because this is a trial period. Next year, it will be written into the bylaw. The second major point is they want to require groups to post program events online. If they don’t do this before a certain amount of time, they can’t get funding. This encourages participation and free publicity.

M. Moyer asked if program events must occur on campus. Geneva campuses apply for funding every year.

Y. Yu said they’re still on campus. This doesn’t apply only to the Ithaca campus. She can make a wording change to require all groups to post program events online. Maybe some groups will forget or it’s not clear how to do it, but then the FC will decline funding requests. Previously, they only put funding at beginning of year when allocated to groups or when special project requests came in. It used to be the groups would go have their events and then come to us with their receipts. This encourages them to post events and let other people know what’s going on with the activity fee. Should it include all events or just program events? How long should we give them to post online? Should the time limit be before the event happens by an hour or a day? If it’s a serious event, should they plan ahead by a month? Some people say a month is too long because nothing is finalized. Now the FC is saying two weeks. Is it too short or too long? She asked for feedback. Everything else is just minor changes.

A. Gezler had a question about a minor change. What was it before? There is a part that says you cannot be able to transfer funds to social category.

Y. Yu said this has always been practiced, but it’s never been explicit. It has never been allowed. Yearly, we allowed funds to be transferred out of social, but now it’s clear. There is no transferring between categories

J. Vertesi asked about giving tokens to speakers instead of money. Does this go into this?

Y. Yu asked if we can include that. An honorarian is allowed a larger amount of $1,000, but if they ask for gift money, it’s up to $20.

J. Vertesi asked if we have to pass they by today.

Y. Yu asked for clarification if she meant by the assembly or the council.

J. Vertesi said they need to pass this by the assembly. They need Appendix B.

Y. Yu said there is a problem becausae they need to collect feedback from organization leaders tomorrow.

J. Vertesi asked if the assembly should add a special breakout session before they enter into the caucuses? That would be last time the assembly could vote it through.

M. Walsh said this doesn’t need to be voted in because it’s bylaws for the GPSAFC. They don’t have to be voted on by the assembly, but Appendix B does have to be. This is part of the funding bylaws. We need to approve Appendix B of our charter. That’s the funding guidelines for all organizations.

J. Vertesi said the assembly will have to figure that out at the next meeting.

M. Walsh said they might have to add an emergency meeting.

Y. Yu said another point is they might require all program events to be held on campus, but here, it is specified that it’s up to the committee. If a group wanted to hold a program off campus, they can apply.

E. Spero said they might want to have something about summer�an addendum of some sort. For on-campus business, a lot of other centers are booked with conferences, etc. The only thing that is open is the Big Red Barn during nights. It’s hard to book space on campus and it’s very possible groups will have to go off-campus during the summer.

Y. Yu said before it wasn’t allowed, but now it can be discussed.

M. Moyer said almost everything in the Geneva campus is off-campus because there are not many facilities. Because social events must occur in the “greater Ithaca area,” that might not work out.

Y. Yu said she can specify.

R. Harbison asked if Section V in paragraph 2 is missing a word or something.

Y. Yu said the major meaning is anyone can get social funding.

J. Vertesi said any further comments should be mailed to Y. Yu. But the assembly needs to approve bylaws if they change. This is what the executive committee proposes�one more meeting at the next council meeting. It will move to a quick executive meeting for five minutes to approve Appendix B for our charter. She said she doesn’t feel comfortable moving for that today because they don’t have the document.

A. Gezler said she moves to not do that. People would get annoyed if they want to run for positions and we’re doing executive business. We should do it earlier.

M. Walsh said the meeting’s on April 9th.

T. Pardo said she can’t make it.

J. Vertesi said she could send her vote in earlier. Everyone agreed to meet five minutes earlier.

b. R.8 Resolution on committee staffing (M. Walsh)

M. Walsh said it’s the same idea, just outlining staffing procedures for external committees. There are a couple changes. Instead of creating a whole subchapter, they put it all under section 9.2. It’s pretty much just inserting the whole process as well as the list of the committees into there. He added one thing to the President’s responsibilities. The President will serve on this committee.

M. Walsh said he knew C. Hamann had a question of a black box with no names in it. He talked to A. Chatterjee about it, and they suggested getting a lot of applications on the computer and trying to match it up. He put in here to alleviate that: a requirement that the Secretary present the process for appointment at the September council meeting. Then they can get feedback on the process, and it’s also great advertising to get people on the committees. The process should be wrapped up by the end of the September meeting.

J. Vertesi asked for questions, comments or debate.

Y. Yu wondered if byline funded groups can have someone from our assembly there.

M. Walsh asked if she meant like a liaison.

J. Vertesi said for byline funded groups like athletics, etc., the assembly doesn’t normally do that.

M. Walsh said it’s something the assembly should leave out now, but it could be thought about next year

K. Nagel moved to approve. T. Pardo seconded. The resolution was approved.

c. R.10 Resolution on slope day involvement (J. Vertesi)

J. Vertesi said this hasn’t really changed. It says the assembly should put graduate students on the Slope Day Steering Committee, and it just elaborates who those people should be. If the assembly should continue to fund them, the assembly should have a student representative at those meetings. Questions, concerns, or issues?

No questions. Moved to debate.

M. Walsh said it changed from 9.9 to 9.2A, and now 9.8. What’s this new section here 9.8a? The charter doesn’t have a 9.8.

J. Vertesi said 9.8 is Events. Someone needs to find section 9.8 that we approved last year for the charter that apparently never found its way into the charter.

K. Hubbell said they wanted to create a Slope Day Finance Commission. The assembly should get in touch with L. Rapoport. They are looking for clever entrepreneurial people maybe from the business school.

J. Vertesi asked for debate. K. Nagel moved to approve. M. Moyer seconded. No dissent. The resolution was approved.

M. Walsh moved to have Resolution 15 and 16 moved above in the meeting because people presenting needed to leave. T. Pardo seconded. No dissent.

VII. New Business

a. R.15 Resolution on Ithaca — Weill Cornell Relations (J. Vertesi)

J. Vertesi said since there are many things in common under the GCI, the assembly should continue to work towards integration. It would be a good thing to improve relations and add Presidents to our listservs. If the assembly keeps their events on our calendar, it would remind students that there are people out there. It should include the graduate ball and the possibility of hiring a bus. There will be some kind of presentation from Weill students at meeting either in person or through teleconference. Executives will try to visit each other’s campuses. GPSA wants to adopt a student price from Ithaca to Weill, and the assembly will examine options for staying in NYC. This resolution is to encourage better exchange academically and community-wise. It also calls for an improvement in the video-technology software. She also wanted to add a friendly amendment to her own amendment about having a delegate from Weill medical school at the yearly Ivy Summit.

A. Gezler commented that she didn’t know how to resolve to require Weill students to make a presentation. It should be changed to something that should be encouraged or raised in a more encouraging and less demanding way.

J. Vertesi asked, “Be it resolved that the GPSA recommends �”? She takes that as a friendly amendment.

A. Gezler suggested making it a reciprocal thing.

J. Vertesi said that might be something they need to approve.

K. Nagel asked how many delegates usually attend the Ivy Summit.

J. Vertesi said last year, there were five.

Y. Yu said their student activity fee is not jointly managed by us, so if they send delegates, they should sponsor their own delegates.

J. Vertesi said that’s a good point because the funding is not coming from the same place. “GPSA extend an invitation to a Weill representative�” can clarify that GPSA can’t provide funding, but she think it would be beneficial.

Y. Yu said this has been a funding issue. How many people are we sending�is it only executives that go? Who is going or how many can go, etc.

J. Vertesi said the change will be, “GPSA extends an invitation to a delegate from the Weill medical school to attend the yearly Ivy Summit.” Any debate? Move to vote?

A. Gezler moved to call the question and it was seconded by another member. The resolution passed unanimously.

b. R.16 Resolution on HIV testing services (T. Pardo)

T. Pardo said free HIV testing was voted and passed at the SA, and now it is brought to the GPSA .

C. Selth introduced himself as a liaison from LGBTQ.

G. Arana introduced himself as a graduate student in Linguistics. He went to Gannett to get an HIV test and he was surprised that they charged for that. He sent an email to a student advocate. They charge now because of a change in NY state funding. To summarize, there is social stigma surrounding HIV, and symptoms are not immediately present so people think they’re perfectly healthy. Major AIDS researchers have encouraged routine testing on part of all Americans. This resolution doesn’t ask GPSA to solve problems, it asks the graduate and professional student community to support having free HIV testing. It will give us leverage to meet with the administration and Gannett representatives, and it will become something that the community is asking for.

T. Pardo added a few quick points. If the University adopts this, it will cost less than a dollar per student if there were to be a fee to have this service provided for all Cornell students. It’s a protective measure, and it raises awareness for this health concern. It shouldn’t be something that is left to every student for their own devices to deal with. As a community, we can collectively power everyone to have that kind of service. The assembly should support to have this service, on behalf of all the students.

J. Vertesi moved to extend the meeting by 15 minutes. R. Harbison seconded.

C. Selth explained why HIV testing opposed to all other testing should be free. There really is a strong social stigma, and there are many barriers and obstacles. You could go downtown and deal with having insurance or not, but that is so much more of an obstacle. People may be worried of having a bursar bill or a charge and having their parents see. Having free HIV testing isn’t necessary for a University to have, but he directed the assembly’s attention to point number four: a choice that a community makes on its perspective of sexual health and benefits community. Several other Ivy leagues offer this service until the cut in state funding. If this resolution receives support from the GPSA, they will take it to the EA and the Faculty Senate and then to the UA.

K. Hubbell suggested taking it to President Skorton. He will be sympathetic.

M. Bhaduria suggested making it mandatory. Maybe this should be something that should be mandatory or added to that list. There are some pretty impressive stats about the benefits of getting tested.

T. Pardo reminded that it does cost money to get tested, and people shouldn’t be tested unless they have a reason to get tested. It’s more imperative to educate the community about risk. If you think you are at risk, the service is available, but not mandatory. It will reinforce the stigma if we make it mandatory. We want to say that this is something the University supports as an important health measure. The University should know when and how you can get tested, and you should be able to go to Gannett to get tested.

G. Arana said discomfort discourages people. They worked around the finances that Gannett has had, but he’s not sure how much it would cost to make everyone get tested.

A. Gezler said a mandatory service is not a service; it’s a punishment.

M. Walsh asked why the state funding was cut.

G. Arana said they wanted to direct funding to more at risk communities like urban areas and minorities�at least that’s what Gannett representatives said. In the absence of state funding, Cornell should take on that burden.

M. Walsh said it seems like a lot of states and healthcare programs offer free testing. Maybe Cornell should temporarily take care of this until the state reassumes?

G. Arana said he’s not sure this will be temporary. If it’s not available on campus, Gannett shouldn’t outsource the responsibility they have to the students at Cornell. It’s a pain for students to go off campus.

Y. Yu asked if this requires students to have health insurance. Is this powered by health insurance? She suggests that maybe health insurance should cover this.

C. Selth said it’s something that should be clear at Cornell. We can just add $1 to Gannett fees and that way, it can be covered by financial aid. There are different mechanisms for insurance to cover this because the testing is done by the county lab, not by labs here. The point was just to restore this basic service.

M. Bhaduria asked how much it would cost if the entire University got tested. $18,000?

G. Arana said at the level that people went in for free testing in the past, that’s how much it would cost in the future. Not everyone in the University gets tested. Around 400–500 students go per semester. Realistically, not everyone is going to rush and get tested.

J. Vertesi moved the discussion to debate.

C. Sander moved to call the question. T. Pardo seconded. A vote was taken and there was no dissent. The resolution passed.

J. Vertesi returned to the tabled resolutions. She asked for questions, debate, concerns with Resolution 13.

K. Nagel moved to call the question. M. Moyer seconded. 8–3−2. Resolution passed.

J. Vertesi said with Resolution 14 on the CJC report, is there debate on issue or changes?

C. Hamann asked what the resolution was about other than identifying the points of contention.

J. Vertesi said the resolution says the assembly supports the CJC report, the assembly wants to maintain civil rights, and the assembly suggests adding an appendices to understand all the legalistic terminology. She moved to strike “whereas there is no clear evidence that the delay of cases are caused by the current judicial appeal system.” M. Walsh seconded.

C. Sander said she had less to do with this than other law students.

Since there was no more debate, a vote was taken. 13–0−0. R14 passed.

VIII. Adjournment

J. Vertesi adjourned the meeting at 7:15pm.