• Representatives present • Ricky Martin, ANT • Neven Fuckar, AOS • Alexandros Ntelekos, CEE • Adam Dunn, CHM • Jake Mackey, CLA • Chris DeCoro, COS • Xiaoling Ang, ECO • Wilfred Ndifon, proxy for Adrian De Froment, EEB • Anita Adhitya, GEO • Lindy Baldwin, HOS • Shin-Yi Lin, MOL • Steve Hassani, PHY • Daniel Raburn, PPL • Louis Lee, PSY • Cori Anderson, SLA •
• Delegates present • Neven Fuckar, GCO • Steve Hassani, MIL •
• Councilors present • Chair Shin-Yi Lin, CPUC, CPUC Executive Committee • Parliamentary Secretary Medini Padmanabhan, CPUC • Recording Secretary Annika Peter • Treasurer Jeff Dwoskin • Social Chair Megan Sullivan • Guillaume Sabouret, CPUC, CPUC Executive Committee • Karin Sigloch, CPUC, CPUC Rights and Rules Committee, Health and Life • Steve Hassani, Academic Affairs •
• Others present • Assistant Dean Lisa Schreyer, Graduate School • Phil Martin, PACE Center • Clara Tuan, EAS • Victoria Sears • Marion Riggs, ART • Samson Young, MUS • Renee Fox, ENG • JK Barret, ENG •
• Representatives absent • Katherine Bold, ACM • Swaroop Chatterjee, CHE • Ilias Tagkopoulos, ELE • Megan Ewing, GER • Jesse Salazar, HIS • Wei Ho, MAT • Samir Soneji, OPR • Brookes Brown, POL • Harvey Stark, REL • Alicia Juskewycz, SOC • Frankki Bevins, WWS •
• Delegates absent • Weining Man, CIGS • Bernice Rosenzweig, BGC • Tian Xia, ACSS • Josh Friess, BUT • Jennifer Jordan, LAW • Meredith Safran, OFF •
• Councilors absent • Corresponding Secretary Danielle Osler • Press Secretary Susan Robison • Kellam Conover, CPUC • Leslie Hinkson, CPUC • Sara Nephew, CPUC Governance Committee • Diana Hill, CPUC Judicial Committee • Fatema Gunja, CPUC Priorities Committee • Ian Parrish, CPUC Priorities Committee • Josh Friess, CPUC Resources Committee • James Bickford, CPUC Rights and Rules Committee • Canturk Isci, Academic Affairs •
• Representative seats vacant • ARC• ART• AST• COM• EAS• ENG• FIT• MAE• MUS• NES• ORF• PHI• SPO•
• Delegate seats vacant • Hibben-Magie Apartments • Women's Center •
Ms. Peter stated that there were no comments on the most recent drafts of the December and January minutes. Assembly voted unanimously to approve both sets of minutes.
There was no new business.
Dean Russel divided his time among these topics:
DCE Status
Several changes had been made in the implementation of DCE since the
new status was announced in the fall:
Graduate School Growth
The Graduate School was planning to grow the population of graduate
students in neuroscience (due to the creation of a new institute for
neuroscience at the university, as well as growth in the field as a
whole), engineering and in interdisciplinary programs in the Woodrow
Wilson School and sociology. It was thought that the growth in the
graduate student population would be proportional to the growth in the
faculty. The Trustees were considering adding a few more PhD programs,
with one likely in neuroscience. Louis Lee asked if funds would be taken
from current graduate students to pay for the new ones; Dean Russel said
no, that no one would suffer financially due to the growth of the Graduate
School. Ms. Lin asked if there would be new graduate programs in the
arts. Dean Russel said no, the university was not planning to add, for
example, MFA programs.
Ms. Padmanabhan asked if the university was planning on increasing student services if they increase the graduate student population. She said that many students are greatly inconvenienced when the undergraduates leave campus: services at McCosh are reduced and Frist closes before dinner, for example. Dean Russel said that the university was increasingly aware of the situation, and that Danny Silverman, the director of McCosh, had been advocating an increase in health services for years. Vice President Burstein was looking into meal services for graduate students, and Dean Russel thought that was probably the easiest thing to change. Victoria Sears said that the parking lots are neglected when it snows when the undergraduates are gone.
Housing Dean Russel stated that several surveys had been administered to graduate students to determine what sort of housing should be built in the future. The other questions to consider with respect to graduate housing were how much to build and where. There was recognition that the Butler Apartments would not survive much longer, and that housing needed to be built before Butler was taken down. However, there was no timescale yet for the tearing down of Butler. The university was considering a number of sites around town for housing, and needed to assess what sort of housing could be build at which sites, and the university was assessing graduate housing at the same time it was reassessing post-doc, staff, and faculty housing. He stated that it was likely that Hibben and Magie would soon be turned over completely to graduate students. He also stated that the conclusion from New Lawrence was that it was very difficult to both build new graduate student housing and charge reasonable rent for the units.
Chris DeCoro asked if more dorm-style housing would be built. Dean Russel commented that all surveys point toward students overwhelmingly preferring apartment-style housing. He said that the university was committed to determining and building the right kinds of housing for students, faculty, and staff. They are trying to figure out where to put the housing. The area near Stanworth and near the hospital are potential building sites. The land between Lake Carnegie and Route 1 would remain undeveloped for the time being. Decisions with respect to housing would be made in the next year.
Dean Russel said that the basement and Porter's Lodge in the GC would be renovated over the summer. During this time, the DBar would be closed. Mr. DeCoro asked if the Graduate School would support the DBar if it were to move during the summer. Dean Russel said he had no opinion. Dean Schreyer said it would be very difficult for the DBar license to change to encompass a new location. There are many issues involved with moving the DBar: security, entrance, license changes.
Ms. Padmanabhan asked if the housing draw system would change so that students didn't have to move every year. Dean Russel pointed out that the draw system was designed by graduate students. Ms. Padmanabhan stated dissatisfaction with the content of the most recent set of housing surveys. Dean Russel said that the university hired a firm who had some expertise in housing surveys to design the survey, but also stated that there had also been some dissatisfaction in the administration about the survey. Ms. Lin suggested that perhaps future survey-writers should look at the survey through the eyes of graduate students--for example, is graduate housing considered to be "on campus" or "off"?
Ms. Lin asked if there were some effort to reduce the number graduate housing locations. She wondered if there was a lack of community because graduate housing were so spread out. Dean Russel asked if doubling the number of people who live in Lawrence changed the social dynamic. A Lawrence resident answered no. Mr. Dwoskin suggested that some sort of common space was important, but Ms. Sigloch said that people would only use common space if it were attractive. Dean Russel said that common spaces ranked last in any survey about what graduate students want in housing. Ms. Sigloch said that playgrounds were important. Cori Anderson said that she hoped the university would build pet-friendly housing.
Louis Lee asked if the university considered tying rent to stipend levels. Dean Russel said it had been considered in the past, but that such an initiative would be very complicated for many reasons. For example, people can have external income sources.
Alumni Relations and Fundraising
The university was focusing on reaching out to graduate alumni; the first
step was to just make contact and to find out what sort of interest they
still had in the university. There are events for graduate alumni in
cities around the world, and those who come to the events are very
enthusiastic. There were events on campus day, such as Alumni Day, which
this year was to be held on February 25th. On Alumni Day, the Madison
Medal is awarded to a distinguished graduate alumnus. Graduate alumni
also frequently return for Reunions.
As a separate initiative, the fundraising office was trying to increase participation among graduate alumni. The Graduate School was focusing on Annual Giving, which supplements the annual operating budget by $35-40 million annually. Last year, graduate alumni donated more that $1 million to Annual Giving for the first time. Ms. Peter stated that graduate students in the past had been asked to help with the Annual Giving campaign, but that graduate students were reluctant to participate because they viewed the proceeds from Annual Giving as going to undergraduates instead of graduate students. Dean Russel stated that many alumni also donate money for specific causes, such as the Dean's Fund for Scholarly Travel. The Vancouver, B.C. club wants to invite all admitted graduate students to events at its club. Ms. Sigloch stated that she hoped that there would be a sort of facebook for graduate alumni to more easily connect current graduate students with alumni.
Mr. Dwoskin stated that he had received one funding request, from the QGC for their semesterly wine and cheese social. He recommended funding the event for the full $200 requested even though it qualified as a very small event in the funding guidelines. There was a lot of extra money in the co-sponsorship budget. Mr. Lee asked why Mr. Dwoskin was recommending $200 for this event even though the GSG usually funded Butler events, which had much higher attendance, at a lower level. Steve Hassani asked if everyone was welcome to attend, the answer to which was yes. The event was funded for $200 with only one no vote.
Ms. Padmanabhan stated that there were 40 nominations for the officer elections, but only two people accepted: Alex Ntelekos for Treasurer and Shin-Yi Lin for Chair. Assembly approved the candidates. Mr. Hassani asked if the GSG would go on with only two officers. Ms. Lin said yes, but slowly. She encouraged people to run for or recruit people to run in the officer by-election that would likely be scheduled for April. Ms. Padmanabhan announced that there would be open houses for the referendum and for the candidates.
Mr. Sabouret wrote a new section on the GSG for Rights, Rules and Responsibilities to more accurately and fully explain the GSG. He received some comments from Dean Montero on his draft. Ultimately, the Graduate School has the final say on what goes into Rights, Rules, and Responsibilities about the GSG. There was a long discussion within Assembly about the strength of the first paragraph of Mr. Sabouret's statement: should the GSG REQUIRE that the Graduate School go through the GSG to get graduate student input on issues, or should the GSG REQUEST that the Graduate School consult the GSG? Ms. Adhitya stated that stronger languate might be better because, in the past, when the Graduate School wanted opinions from graduate students, it would approach individual graduate students. The GSG had been concerned about the fairness of this practice. An informal vote was taken that suggested that Assembly preferred somewhat stronger language when it came to the first paragraph.There was also some discussion as to whether the various committees of the GSG should explicitly be mentioned in the document. Ms. Adhitya stated that committees change, but that this document should be written to be lasting.
Ms. Sullivan stated that the Valentine's Day Dance would be held on Friday, February 10 from 10 pm to 2 am in the Frist Multipurpose Room. Snacks, pizza, beer, wine, and alcoholic beverages would be served free of charge to graduate students. There would be a dance floor and a separate section for people to talk. She had secured funding from a variety of sources, including Frist and the APGA. She sent around a volunteer sign-up sheet.
Ms. Sigloch and Mr. Hassani were requesting $200 for the Natural Science Alumni Mixer. Ms. Sigloch, one of the organizers of the event, stated that invitations to the mixer had been sent to alumni who are not professors at research universities. The event would be held the following Wednesday at 6pm in Guyot Hall. An announcement had been emailed to all natural science departments that day. Assembly voted to approved the funds, to come out of a separate line of the budget than funding requests.
Mr. Fuckar spoke on behalf of the Graduate College. He said that currently, people were preoccupied with the housing draw and with the GC renovations that would take place over the summer. He stated that the Housing Department had not released the statistics from last year's draw. There was also some confusion as to when the housing draw would take place. Dean Schreyer stated that the housing draw would come online in late February or early March, and that the GC room draw would take place in April. Mr. Dwoskin stated that in general, the Housing Department was trying to move the draw process earlier in the academic year, and that the GC room draw would be electronic next year. Mr. Ntelekos asked if new kitchens would be built during the summer renovations at the GC. Dean Schreyer said no, that it was currently economically prohibitive to build handicap-accessible kitchens. Those kitchens are included in the master plan for GC renovations, but there was no money yet for such renovations.
Ms. Baldwin spoke on behalf of History of Science. She stated that her program was growing, with five new graduate students and two new assistant professors this year. Graduates have been doing well on the job market. She said some people had issues with DCE, but that there was a discussion within her program about DCE. She said that graduate students were concerned with the availability of affordable housing, and that they like Butler. Several students had problems with lease extensions over the summer. Students were also concerned about stipend levels with respect to various costs, and that students were happy about the reduction in cost of dependent health care.
Ms. Lin made the following report:
As I was out of town for most of January, Jeff Dwoskin was acting Chair during my absence. Annika Peter attended the winter Alumni Council meeting in my place. Jeff Dwoskin attended a dinner with the Board of Trustees for me. The Executive Committee met two times since the last Assembly meeting. We have been busy with helping the Election Committee prepare for Election and continuing our discussions about DCE. Per our February meeting, we plan to work with the Committee Chairs to come up with a prioritized list of graduate student concerns as they relate to Campus Planning. We have also been asking for graduate student volunteers for the Advisory Board to Healthier Princeton, the Dillon gym focus group, and the Campus Club working club.The next CPUC meeting is next Monday at 4:30pm. It will be the closest to an open town meeting for this year (where President Tilghman will have a question and answer period), so I would encourage you to get your consituents to attend. President Tilghman will be talking about the relationship between academia and the government.
There are two things that I would ask Assembly representatives to do during the next week or so:
1) GSG Election and Referendum: Please email all of your constituents and publicize the election. Also, encourage voting during Feb 23-Mar 7. If you have time, consider setting up a voting booth somewhere convenient.
2) DCE and Re-enrollment: We realize that not all departments have been talking explicitly about the upcoming DCE status. Since re-enrollment is coming up at March, we think it's important for these discussions to happen. We ask that you email your DGS and your DGSC and ask that an email is sent to the graduate students about it or set up a intradepartmental meeting. Also, Dean Redman has offered to run a Re-enrollment town meeting -- do we think this is worth doing?
Ms. Riggs asked what the best resource was on DCE? Ms. Lin said that the departmental representatives would be the best resource, and that outdated information could be found on the Graduate School and Graduate Student Government websites. She stated that the DCE handbook would be online soon. Dan Raburn reminded Assembly that the GSG did have a DCE Taskforce, and that those people who had questions about DCE could email him for more information.
Ms. Lin stated that the Executive Committee was also working on a campus planning priority list for graduate students, as per the request from President Tilghman at the last Assembly meeting.
The meeting adjourned at 7:50 pm.