A notable lack of red glasses

ESC reconvened for the fall semester last night. Bureau Chief Aparajita Maitra was there to get the updates.

ESC is back in action! The first ESC meeting of the year began with introductions of everyone on council and the usual welcome back message from the president. Replacing Sidd Bhatt as the new ESC President, Brian Wu conducted the first portion of the meeting. Only the iconic red glasses were missing.

Members of the ESC student council had incredibly exciting and productive summers, from working on Google Glass, to working at Harley Davidson in mechanical engineering, to studying abroad in China, and to inventing and patenting something in six weeks.

Special guests from GSSC, CCSC, and SGA joined us last night to share thoughts from each of their councils. GS brought in the youngest class ever this year, completely changing their demographic. Among other issues, SGA will work on trans student admittance at Barnard and sexual violence and gender based misconduct this year.

The first issue discussed at the meeting was the replacement of Lerner Boardrooms with the new Sexual Violence Response office in Lerner. The SVR room was in the works for a while, and Lerner seemed to be a good location since students already feel comfortable there. Some student group meeting spaces had to be relocated, and there are now three additional boardrooms in SGO, one room in Broadway, and one in Schapiro for extra meeting spaces.

Some updates:

• VP Policy Malini Nambiar says last year’s honor code was a success and that they will be working to standardize recycling on campus this year.
• Columbia’s leave of absence policy is a 1-year minimum for medical reasons.
• Update from the Class of 2015: the first Lerner Pub is this Thursday for all seniors!
• There is some discussion about graduate and undergraduate students being graded on the same standards. SEAS will be getting data from the dean’s office to ensure fairness on grading curves.
• Sophomore Edo Roth joined the meeting to give a small presentation—to add a Math minor to his SEAS degree. The requirements are the same as the concentration for CC. If ESC votes yes and all is approved, a math minor will be available to all SEAS students.

The meeting ended with everyone on council rising and reciting the Honor Pledge together in unison. Harry Munroe directed the crowd, and a chorus of SEAS students echoed through the Satow Room.

ESC will be out at their retreat starting Friday—bonding, doing fun engineering things, and of course productive council work. So, there will be no ESC meeting next week.

Friendgineers via Shutterstock