The following covers them meeting on April 15.
CLIMATE CHECK
President Claire Carlson, junior, opened the floor to campus-related discussion and specifically asked how registration was going for SGA members. Multiple senators described issues with getting into classes.
They recognized that associate vice president of Academic Affairs Michael Soto explained the university doesn’t anticipate canceled study abroad to affect the number of open seats in classes, but senators felt more classes were harder to get into than usual.
Carlson said she’d email Soto to get a better understanding of other potential complications.
USO BUDGET REQUESTS: TRINITONIAN
Junior Jordan Juran, business manager for Campus Publications, requested money on behalf of the Trinitonian, which requested the same amount as last year: $54,650. The full amount was approved.
MIRAGE
Juran also requested on behalf of Mirage, which requested the same amount as last year: $42,042. The full amount was approved.
STUDENT AMBASSADORS
Last week, the Senate tabled discussion about the budget for Student Ambassadors until verifying how much money they have left in their budget this spring. Student Ambassadors requested an additional $5,000 more than last year’s budget for extra programming and new uniforms. Senators voted to allow $5,000 of their remaining budget to roll over and funded all but $5,000 of their request for next year. The amount of $24,775 was approved.
TRINITY DIVERSITY CONNECTION (TDC)
TDC president Gabriella Garriga, junior, presented on behalf of TDC. The group requested $36,712.34, which was roughly $4,100 more than last year. According to Garriga, the additional money requested accounts for the growth of the group from eight members to 20, the expansion of events from one per month to three per month and the larger attendance at TDC events.
SGA decided to allow $3,000 roll over from TDC’s spring budget to cover some of the additional money and approved $33,712.34.
STUDENT PROGRAMMING BOARD (SPB)
SPB director Meghan Desai, junior; assistant director Lillian De La Rosa, junior; accountant Dennis Feng, sophomore; and adviser Shannon Twumasi presented on behalf of SPB. The group requested a total of $176,942.92. The amount was $1,000 more than they requested last year, with the extra money intended for a conference trip to Oklahoma City.
The Senate approved $175,942.92, which was all but the extra $1,000. At the last SGA meeting, the Senate voted to allow SPB to retain $35,000 of their spring budget as rollover for next year’s budget for their fall programming.
RSO FUNDING REQUESTS
President of Trinity’s Phi Sigma Pi chapter, junior Ruth Varner, requested $1,502 on behalf of the chapter to send a member to their national conference. The group is required to send a representative to maintain their chapter. The full amount was approved.
The TU 2020 Census and Voter Registration Task Force requested $5,206.44. SGA adviser and co-chair of the task force, Jamie Thompson, presented the request. According to Thompson, the money would go towards swag, advertising, educational programming and a digital platform called TurboVote.
Sophomore senator Noor Rahman, who is also on the task force, explained that TurboVote makes voting easier and would include a website specific to Trinity for voting resources and information. Thompson said SGA helped partially fund TurboVote in 2015, but she has no data on its effectiveness from that time. The Senate approved the full amount.
Alpha Phi Omega requested $2,778 to send multiple members of their fraternity to their national convention in Phoenix in December. Alpha Phi Omega financial vice president Amelia Weir presented the request. The Senate voted to approve a majority of the cost since the group budgeted for multiple people to go and are only required to send two. The total amount funded was $2,020.50.
The Muslim Student Association requested $1,749.22 for a panel they were planning to host this spring. Sophomore Dana Hatab and senator Rahman presented the request. The panel is a collaboration with TDC, and the groups plan to host it next semester. The full amount was approved.
PASS/FAIL
In the last two SGA meetings, senators have brought up concerns about the length of the pass/fail deadline in light of the switch to remote learning. Some senators spoke with associate vice president Soto about it after the last meeting, and Soto explained that any further change — a change that would extend pass/fail to all courses automatically — would have to be brought to the president and the Board of Trustees, as it would be a policy change.
Adviser David Tuttle questioned whether such a policy change would be necessary since the Office of Academic Affairs has been flexible with students’ schedules and the extension is already provisional.
Carlson asked senators to send her all of their questions and said she would decide if SGA should have another meeting to discuss it. This meeting was intended to be the final meeting of the year. Carlson will be meeting with university president Danny Anderson to speak with him about the Senate’s concerns.
