This year Student Senate has been taking a bigger initiative to be more accessible to the Gustavus community and their students. They have changed a number of different aspects since last year in order to accommodate student’s wants and needs. Some of those changes even included the way senate interacts with the students.
“Instead of senators having designated hours to be available in their dorms or in the lobby of their building, we changed our office hours policy this year, in which, now we have senators tabling every Monday from 5-7 p.m. before the Monday night senate meeting,” Student Senate’s Public Relations chair, Abbie Swenson said.
The Senate made this change in order for students to more conveniently voice their concerns, comments and opinions to the senate.
The Senate has been very busy this semester as the first couple meetings of the semester centered on introducing the cabinet members, forming committees, and approving Administrative Director, Senate Speaker, and the Students that attend the open meetings. A complete list of Senate members is available on the Gustavus Student Senate webpage. After the first couple weeks of introductions, the Senate had the pleasure of having a couple of noteworthy visitors stop in on their Monday night meetings.
The Senate’s Monday night visitors included: Nobel Laureate Eric Kandel, President Rebecca Bergman and new Assistant Director of the Diversity Center, Kenneth Reid. Dr. Kandel stopped in briefly on October 5th to invite the Student Senate to attend his Nobel Conference lecture. President Bergman stopped in on the October 12 meeting to answer questions surrounding Gustavus ACTS, talk about expectations she has for Student Senate, and touch on the most difficult challenges and favorite aspects of her presidency.
One of her biggest challenges is balancing her calendar and the busy schedule she has, but one of her favorite aspects of the presidency is being able to work with wonderfully idealistic, yet hardworking individuals.
The new Assistant Director of the Diversity Center, Kenneth Reid, visited the Senate’s Monday meeting this past Monday, December 7th. He introduced himself and invited the Student Senate members to stop into the Diversity Center anytime in order for them to get to know him better.
“We changed our office hours policy this year, in which, now we have senators tabling every Monday from 5-7 p.m. before the Monday night senate meeting.”
-Abbie Swenson
Throughout the course of the semester, a variety of resolutions were passed on the senate floor and distributed to the Gustavus community through email. The resolutions include: the Fair Trade resolution, Student Senate standing in Solidarity with Gustavus Students experiencing oppression and the Student Senate endorsement of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in Curriculum Work.
The Fair Trade Resolution was passed applauding all the Fair Trade work being done on campus and Gustavus is now the first Fair Trade College in Minnesota. Student Senate also passed a resolution that calls all members of the Gustavus Community to (1) engage in thoughtful reflection on privilege, and (2) participate in conversation regarding how this Community may be excluding oppressed groups from full acceptance in our Community.
The last resolution the Student Senate passed was to aid in the college’s efforts to endorse their consideration of an integrated educational emphasis on diversity, equity, and inclusion.
“Student Senate believes that a more deliberately folding diversity, equity, and inclusion into the academic experience of every student allows us to better align with our core values and and particularly, the pillars of Community and Justice,” Abbie Swenson said.
The Student Senate also brought back the Take Your Professor to Lunch event where students can claim tickets at the CAO desk and choose a professor of their choice to bring to lunch. The event was extremely successful last year and is proving to be just as successful this year as 75 percent of the tickets have already been claimed.
Since the Student Senate has been so successful this year with their accessibility regarding students’ input, comments and concern, the Senate is able to respond and take action as soon as possible. Students have brought up a variety of concerns and the Senators and committees as a whole have been working diligently to change these aspects of the college. Some of these ongoing projects include: improved Wi-Fi in the library, topic of visitation hours in on-campus housing, hydration stations in residence halls, mirrors in the weight room and additional Safe Ride vehicles on campus.
“Student Senate believes that a more deliberately folding diversity, equity, and inclusion into the academic experience of every student allows us to better align with our core values and particularly, the pillars of Community and Justice”
—Abbie Swenson
On top of all the positive changes Student Senate has brought to the Gustavus campus and its students,. it oversaw 11 budgets throughout the entire semester from 8 different student organizations. These budgets were allocated for those student organizations in oder to fund a wide variety of things including speakers, conferences, and items for campus events.
Student Senate continues to try and meet the needs and wants of the Gustavus students. Through their regular meetings with the Dean of Students and President Bergman, and a presentation to the Board of Trustees, Student Senate has been sharing some of the students’ most pressing concerns with the college’s leadership. Student Senate continues to strive for excellence in accomplishing beneficial changes and acknowledging the needs, wants and concerns of the students of Gustavus.
“The Senate has been working diligently for the entire semester to hear the voices of the students, respond to their concerns, and act as a venue for change on our campus. In my opinion, we have had a busy but productive semester as a Senate body, and will continue to work on behalf of the students in the spring semester,” Abbie Swenson said.