CCSC can work with other groups. We believe in them.

Where would we be without Joe Milholland? Much less informed about the inner workings of CCSC politics, that’s for sure. This week’s meeting included discussion of the CASV, a potential tech rep, and the quality of life survey.

CCSC’s Relationship with No Red Tape and Coalition Against Sexual Violence

On Sunday night’s Columbia College Student Council meeting, VP of Policy Vivek Ramakrishnan recommended that CCSC members work with the Coalition Against Sexual Violence (CASV) rather than create their own sexual violence taskforce, an idea brought up last week.

Abby Porter, a rep from CASV, attended the meeting, and told CCSC that while CASV is not an officially recognized group, council members are welcome to come to their meetings at 3pm on Sundays at the SGO. She also suggested a council representative to CASV.

The council didn’t go forward on making a representative to CASV, although 2016 VP Charles Sanky mentioned CCSC had a similar discussion last school year about the council’s relationship to the Mental Health Taskforce.

As for No Red Tape (NRT), CCSC President Ben Makansi spoke with a NRT rep over the phone about their list of goals before CCSC’s meeting Sunday night. The NRT rep said they weren’t even asking CCSC to endorse their proposals; they just wanted the council to publicize it via e-mail.

CCSC allows every group to publicize themselves in the event docs, but they haven’t put something like this in the body of their e-mails before. VP of Finance Sameer Mishra suggested CCSC should reference the proposal in its e-mail but not actually put the text in it.

The Tech Representative

Mishra presented a revised proposal for the tech representative on Sunday night. The tech rep would be appointed by a 5-person committee headed by the VP of Communications. The rep’s main responsibilities would be implementing maintaining CCSC’s website and implementing new technology, like an app for student group elections.

In response to the proposal, Ramakrishnan said it was strange to hold the VP of Communications responsible to finding the tech rep when CCSC couldn’t find someone to do similar work in the fall. USenator Marc Heinrich commented that it should remain the VP of Communications’s responsibility to update the content of CCSC’s website.

CCSC voted down the proposal. While 18 of the 31 CCSC members voted in favor the tech rep proposal, a 2/3rds majority was required to pass it. CCSC discussed whether to make the tech rep a voting position in order to attract more people to it, but when this idea came to a vote, very few council members supported it.

Columbia College Quality of Life

The University Senators presented data from the quality of life survey on Sunday. While much of what they presented they had already covered in the last senate plenary, they also gave some Columbia College specific information.

About 27% of Columbia College students responded to the survey, and they rated their satisfaction slightly lower than average. Funding, career preparation, physical health, and mental health were the four areas that Columbia College students identified as high-priority but had low satisfaction in.

After seeing the recommendations for low-income students, Inclusion and Equity Rep Ewoma Ogbaudu recommended events for low-income students at NSOP.

Updates (updates doc here):

• According to 2019 President Josh Schenk, the Disabilities Committee on the senate is working on a set of recommendations.
• According to Sanky, dining halls opening over holiday breaks will only cost students $4 extra.
• The senate is looking to find a new Muslim Religious Life Advisor for Columbia.
• USenator Sean Ryan is trying to streamline the process by which student groups host events with alcohol.
• After hearing from job interviews that portfolios are adequate for job candidates, Pre-professional Rep Chris George is planning on dropping his proposal to rent out padfolios through CCE.

A council hard at work doing … something via Open.Michigan, CC BY 2.0