CCSC on a Sunday on the fifth floor of Lerner

School’s back in its full swing, so our trusty representatives on CCSC got back into their Sunday night groove last night to kickoff their first meeting of the 2015-2016 academic year. Be sure to catch each meeting’s review on the following Monday morning right here on Bwog! 

At the end of the Columbia College Student Council’s first meeting of the school year, Ben Makansi, the new president, said at the end of the first meeting of the year that he was “not oblivious” to the fact that not everyone on the council had supported his campaign when he ran under the Freedom, Liberty, and Freedom Party along with his VP of Policy, Vivek Ramakrishnan.

“We honestly don’t care,” Makansi said, emphasizing he was willing to work with anyone on the council regardless of whether they had supported him.

In addition to a few logistical concerns, the council devoted its first meeting to presentations by each of the executive board VPs on what they hope to accomplish this year. Ramakrishnan wants the policy committee to go department-by-department to expand the number of classes worth 4-credits instead of 3, as well as continue work on combating food insecurity and securing thicker toilet paper.

VP of Finance Sammer Mishra seeks to ensure spending on certain areas – such as senior week and facilities and securities fees – remains sustainable. He also wants to expand the list of approved vendors for clubs and give every student a digital subscription to the New York Times.

VP of Communications Grayson Warrick wants to revamp CCSC’s (currently defunct) website, expand the council’s social media presence, and do student polling. He’s also hoping to renovate the space the Communications Committee uses.

VP of Campus Life Kelly Echavarria was at Passport to Columbia during the meeting, so she will not give her presentation until next week.

Updates:

• In addition to the first-year class council, the fall elections will also choose the new Inclusion and Equity Representative, as well as a new Class of 2018 representative, as Kaz Costello recently resigned.
• Makansi noted at the meeting that although there were many recent events which CCSC members were encouraged to volunteer at – the screening of The Visit, Passport to Columbia, the Lawn Party, and food insecurity tabling – only 10 members of the general body signed up to volunteer at these events. Makansi called this number “pretty horrendous” and told the council that it shouldn’t just be members of the Campus Life Committee who sign up to go to these events.
• In a discussion about publicizing how council members vote (which they did for the food insecurity proposal recently), the council decided they would make votes for impeachment and appointing people to positions like the elections board private. However, they also decided to implement roll call voting for other decisions at general body meetings (previously, the council had voted through hand raising, making it difficult to determine who exactly voted for what).
• As for the food insecurity proposal, Swipes is going through the app store’s review process, and the council is trying to find people to contribute to the emergency meal fund.

Glowing with ideas via Shutterstock