MEETING OF THE UNIVERSITY SENATE

Ryan Osero, Student Senate Chair, stated that there are some important deadlines approaching at the state legislature. By April 4, all bills in the House and Senate must be heard. By April 29, all appropriation bills from the House and Senate must be submitted. If a student has not yet contacted their legislature, now is the time to do so.

Another item on today’s agenda is the report from the Student Senate Consultative Committee (SSCC) Task Force. More work is also being done to improve the effectiveness of the Student Senate and student governance in general at the University.

Lastly, SSCC will be holding a discussion on “The Role of the Student Experience in the Educational Mission of the University” at the next meeting. This topic should continue next year.

Judy Berning, Student Senate Consultative Committee (SSCC) Chair, congratulated Adam VanWagner as the chair-elect for the Student Affairs Committee (SCSA). She also informed the senators that yesterday Yev Garif resigned from all his positions within student government. She thanked him for the work he did over the last two years.

At today’s University Senate meeting, one policy amendment for approval concerns contact hours in classes. The proposal would eliminate the minimum number of contact hours needed for classes.

As the Student Senate Chair said, the April 17 SSCC meeting will focus a discussion on the student experience. Four key administrators will be attending to participate in this discussion. Any student senators are welcome to attend as well. At this same meeting, a discussion will be held on the Student Senate budget. Next year’s budget will reflect what students want, including more workshops and coordinate campus travel. If senators have any ideas, please talk to your SSCC representatives.

Judy Berning encouraged everyone to voice their opinion regarding the task force proposal that will be presented later today. SSCC will also discuss this item in April so that action can be taken at the last Student Senate meeting.

Lastly, she encouraged anyone interested in serving on SSCC to talk with current representatives. She reminded senators that SSCC members are elected by their associations.

Crookston – Jean Korkowski reported that the chancellor search committee has started its work of reviewing the 65 applications that have been received. The first Campus Showdown, which pits faculty against students in different events for fun, took place last night

Duluth – Nick Cecconi said that the campus has finished its food drive and collected more than what was expected. Elections processes are starting. The campus just decided not to change to full web registration for next year.

Morris – Khama Sharp stated that MCSA just finished student fee allocations and elections start next week.

Graduate and Professional Student Association – Tom Walsh said that GAPSA will be having three socials this spring and that Graduate and Professional Student Appreciation Week takes place April 7-11.

Minnesota Student Association – Judy Berning said that MSA will be holding a charity camp-out this weekend for the Boys and Girls Club. MSA also allowed the Students Against War group to place a referendum on the All-Campus Election ballot. A get out the vote rally will take place before elections start.

Reid LeBeau, Chair of the Student Senate Consultative Committee (SSCC) Task Force, said that the task force began its work last fall and has identified three main options for change. The first is restructuring the membership of the SSCC through one of two sub-options, equal or proportional representation. The second main option is to make SSCC into an advisory body composed of the student association and assembly presidents. The third main option is to turn SSCC into an advisory committee with no binding authority on the Student Senate. Additional specifics exist within each of the options as to how the committee would operate and its relationship with the Student Senate.

Once the task force developed and discussed these options, the majority of the task force recommended Option 1, sub-option 1, although the minority vote, which favored Option 1, sub-option 2, was only one vote less than the majority.

Ryan Osero thanked Reid LeBeau and the other task force members for their hard work on this topic.

A senator commented the Option 2, sub-option 2, is more of change than just membership since it proposes to eliminate the Student Senate meeting separate from the University Senate.

Another senator said that they were in favor of merging the two chair positions, as some of the options propose.

Q: Why did the task force vote in favor of Option 1, sub-option 1?

A: The coordinate campus members of the task forces favored this proposal since it would give each campus an extra representative. Members also felt that adding the student assembly and association presidents might also enhance the SSCC.

Q: Is University Senate membership proportional?

A: Yes.

Q: Currently is the Student Senate not choosing to meet with the University Senate or did the faculty ask that the students meet separately?

A: In the past, all groups met separately. In recent years, some of the grouped have been lumped together because of the number of similar issues that are raised.

A senator questioned whether the University Senate might be opposed to having the students meet at the same time instead of separately.

Senators then decided to take straw votes on each of the options, regarding membership changes, to guide the SSCC discussion at their next meeting. For Option 1, sub-option 1, there were 19 votes in favor. For Option 1, sub-option 2, there were 13 votes in favor. For Option 2, there were three votes in favor. For Option 3, there were six votes in favor. A straw vote was then taken on whether the Student Senate should meet with the University Senate, and there were 12 votes in favor.

Kathy Brown, Chief of Staff, thanked the Student Senate for the opportunity to speak about the changes to the Student Conduct Code. She said that a task force started its work a year ago to review the Code which has been in effect for over 30 years, and has worked well during this period. The purpose of the review was to modernize some of the language in the listed offenses.

She said that the Code covers students in three settings: when in the classroom, when a student is on the actual campus as defined by the geographic boundaries of the property, and when representing the University as a member of a team or association.

The jurisdiction of the Code has not been changed during this review process or during the last 30 years. There was some discussion about extending the Code beyond the geographic boundaries of campus, but the decision was made to not implement that type of change.

Kathy Brown noted that there are also several safeguards built into the system. First, the Conduct Code Coordinator reviews allegations that have been received and decides it there is enough evidence to charge the student under the Code. If so, a formal charge is made. The student then has the opportunity to an informal resolution, through an educational process, with someone from Student Judicial Affairs. If informal resolution does not work, then the student can request a formal hearing, before a panel of peers, with the Student Behavior Committee. If the student does not like the outcome from this hearing, they can appeal the decision to the President’s Student Behavior Review Panel. Throughout this process, students can challenge the merits of the case, as well as the applicability of the Code.

Q: In the last 30 years there have been actions that some might see as democratic but that others might want to charge under the Code. Might the Code, in current or proposed form, be used to restrict free speech on campus?

A: The First Amendment of the Constitution trumps any items in the Code, so a student would always have this defense. Additionally, campus is very supportive of free speech and has not used the Code to suppress these rights.

Q: Within the Code itself, where is jurisdiction defined?

A: The Code was wisely written years ago in that jurisdiction is not finitely defined in the Code itself. Instead, the jurisdiction is based on the history of its application. This is one reason that jurisdiction was not changed, since if it was changed then there would be no history or past interpretations on which to base decisions.

With no further discussion, a vote was taken and the motion was approved with 28 in favor and none opposed.

Adam VanWagner, chair-elect for the Student Affairs Committee (SCSA), said that the committee has been researching this issue, and in doing so invited David Laird, President of the Minnesota Private College Council (MPCC) to attend a SCSA meeting. He presented the MPCC vision of higher education for the state, which was very organized and thorough, so the University needs to take the proposal seriously. Their website is: www.mnprivatecolleges.com.

They propose a shift in state investments in higher education. Currently there is a 9-1 ratio of state public higher education funding to state financial aid. The proposal would shift the ratio to 7-3, which would amount to $100 million less from each the University and MnSCU. They would propose that this shift be in place by 2010, but would like the legislature to act on it this year.

The rationale from the proposal is that the emergent population is low-income, minority students who need more financial assistance to be able to attend college. While the proposal would not affect tuition rates at private colleges, tuition at the University would definitely increase.

SCSA will conclude their discussion on this topic and have something to present to the Student Senate in April.