Can we haz?

As ever, CCSC convened in the Satow Room last night for the betterment of our fine university. Bombastic Bureau Chief Joseph Milholland was on hand to report.

After the hectic excitement of the first few weeks – a new school year, the Senate election, BC divest – this week’s CCSC meeting found a groove for itself. The meeting’s first order of business was to officially vote Marc Heinrich in as a University Senator.

The council then heard from the Native American Council about a plaque to commemorate the Lenape. There are similar commemorations to historical events around campus, such as George Washington’s 1776 victory in the Battle of Harlem Heights. Dean Martinez supports the plaque, and the Native American Council got student support through a petition on Indigenous People’s Day.

Then came the inevitable round of updates. The E-board is working to improve WTF Columbia. The council congratulated the success of the pep rally and Bwog for saying that the rally “actually was a nice event.” The Class of 2014 is still working on finding a Class Day speaker and will hold an Oktoberfest for CC seniors only. The Class of 2015 will have “1200 servings” of Ben and Jerry’s for free on October 28 in Schapiro. The Class of 2016 is holding a “Major Discovery Series” on November 15 to give students info on majors. The Class of 2017 is working with other class councils on events.

One issue raised during this meeting was about Title IX’s rule that school officials, including RAs, must report accusations of “gender-based harassment,” but people at events like Take Back the Night may want a safe space where their accusations are not reported. The council is looking into this.

The meeting included an extensive discussion prompted by Deantini on what to do with Columbia College’s official website to make it more useful for students, possibly by highlighting the wealth of Columbia’s resources available to students. Council members brought up that there are already so many student websites (haaaayyyy) that it would have to be really useful for people to visit it. One solution would be to create a portal to all useful websites for students, but Offices and Departments compete with each other over what content, including links to their websites, goes where, so coordinating such a thing would be difficult.

The council also looked at a proposal to create a permanent CUIT Advisory Committee that would advocate for such things as open data, improvements to the printing system, and Google Drive on LionMail. The Advisory Committee will be composed of a small group of representatives that hold the major responsibilities as well anyone else who wants to join the meetings and propose ideas. The council will vote on the proposal next week.

All 2014 wants via Shutterstock