The 18th Undergraduate Senate focused on a bill to spend $30,000 on student organization fee subsidies for low-income students. Individual Senators also reported on their personal projects and approved Ben Schwartz ’18 as the proxy for Senator Matthew Cohen ’18 while Cohen studies abroad in the fall.

Senate scrutinizes fee subsidy bill, frustrate authors

Senators remained ambivalent about Joshua Seawell’s ’18 bill to subsidize student group membership dues for low-income students, despite the amendments Seawell made to the bill since it was first presented to the 17th Undergraduate Senate.

Many Senators voiced concern about the lack of a fund allocation scheme or statistics on student needs. Senator Matthew Cohen ’18 suggested that the Senate divide the bill, establishing a working group to devise specific plans before committing to a figure for funds.

“The best way is to approve a working group rather than approve the money straight away, so we can get the ball rolling,” Cohen said.

While the Senate was in favor of Cohen’s suggestion, Seawell and Alizabeth McGowan ’16 expressed disappointment that the funds could not be approved in full.

Seawell explained that he did not want to see the working group’s plans hamstrung by a popular vote.

“I hesitate to ask a group of experts to come up with a solution that is popular,” Seawell said. “We only wanted to have them checked by [the student body President and Vice President], who are committed but freer from the political pressures of the Senate.”

Seawell and McGowan, who heads the Stanford chapter of the Sigma Gamma Rho sorority, pressed the Senate to commit to funding. They cited the number of changes the bill had undergone based on Senate feedback, such as the change from a Greek life-only subsidy scheme to one that included other due-requiring student groups.

Elections commissioner Eric Wilson ’16 supported the Senate’s decision to wait for more concrete details before appropriating funds.

“This is the new Senate’s first time seeing this bill,” Wilson said. “Just having a kind of system where we work towards some consistency before deciding on the money is a good thing.”

As the debate between the Senate and the supporters of the bill grew heated, Senator Kathryn Treder ’18 said, “I don’t really like how we are talking to each other now. I think our character is being mischaracterized.

“We have a big responsibility to be fair and responsible right now, and I do think we deserve a little bit more respect for wanting to see a working group before we approve funding,” she added.

The 90-minute discussion ended with the Senate approving the working group without committing to funding on paper. Senators Mylan Gray ’19 and Khaled Auonallah ’19 agreed to serve as the Senate representatives in the working group.

Senators on individual projects

Senators reported on their progress on the personal projects they first proposed two weeks ago. Senate Chair Shanta Katipamula ’19 said that she has been working with the Office of Sexual Assault & Relationship Abuse (SARA) to bring a sexual assault reporting app, Callisto, to Stanford.

“I’m working on building that partnership [with SARA] now, and reaching out to Pomona [College], which currently has that online system to see what process they have,” Katipamula said.

Some Senators have modified their focus. Upon finding that the University has yet to take concrete action on renaming buildings named after Junipero Serra, Senator Carson Smith ’19 has decided to tackle the University’s future support for Full Moon on the Quad (FMOTQ) instead.

“I will be part of that group of both faculty and students to come up with recommendations for [Vice Provost of Student Affairs] Greg Boardman by end of the quarter to say what we believe should happen,” Smith said.

Boardman had announced previously that the University might end funding and administrative support for FMOTQ due to worries about sexual assault and alcohol overconsumption.

Other Senators are working on a diverse range of projects ranging from support for community centers to a wider range of language tutoring opportunities.

“My first project is to get the budget for cultural and community centers to pre-2008 levels,” Gray said. “I have been in touch with one member of Who’s Teaching Us, who is also working on the same initiative.”

Senator Gabe Rosen ’19, who chairs the Academic Affairs committee, stated that he is interested in extending language tutoring opportunities to students who are not enrolled in language classes.

“It’s a big issue for international students, who may not have the same language interactions that they used to before they came to Stanford,” Rosen said.

Bill to fund the Senate

The Senate also approved bills to streamline the process for selecting a new secretary and appointing a proxy for Senators studying abroad. The Senate voted unanimously to appoint Ben Schwartz ’18 as proxy for Cohen.

“After hearing Matthew tell me so much about the Senate, I do have some knowledge of what goes on, and hope I will be able to contribute,” Schwartz said.

Contact Fangzhou Liu at fzliu96 ‘at’ stanford.edu.