Campus Center 308 | University at Albany, SUNY | Albany, New York 12222

GSA Officer Reports – December 4, 2015

Treasurer’s Report – Hina Thalho

Budget as of 11/24/15
GSA ACCOUNT BALANCES & REPORT SUMMARY
Expected Revenue 2014-15 / $165,000.00
Carry-over from 2013-14 / $122,000.89
Total Expected Revenue / $287,000.89
Total Allocated / $258,164.00
Total Unallocated / $28,836.89
Total Deposits / $122,000.89
Total Paid / $29,488.99
Adjustments: See attached Sheet / $0.00
Actual Account Balance / $92,511.90
Expected Account Balance / $257,511.90
BUDGET SUMMARY
Amount / Amount
Allocated / Paid / Balance
SERVICES
Room Reservations / $1,000.00 / $0.00 / $1,000.00
RGSO Awards / $40,000.00 / $1,290.64 / $38,709.36
Grant Awards / $45,000.00 / $0.00 / $45,000.00
Contingency Budget (at 5% of projected revenue) / $8,250.00 / $0.00 / $8,250.00
GSA Welcome/ End Year Events / $4,000.00 / $337.67 / $3,662.33
Allocated from Previous Fiscal Year / $15,814.00 / $6,677.22 / $9,136.78
Food Pantry / $5,000.00 / $0.00 / $5,000.00
OPERATIONS
Contractual Goods and Services
Liability and Theft Insurance / $2,000.00 / $0.00 / $2,000.00
Printer Contract/ Lease / $17,000.00 / $3,874.87 / $13,125.13
Non-contractual Costs
Paper / $5,000.00 / $0.00 / $5,000.00
Office Supplies/Expenses / $1,000.00 / $593.26 / $406.74
Phone and Fax / $100.00 / $0.00 / $100.00
Water / $1,000.00 / $125.40 / $874.60
Officer Stipends
Stipend-President / $4,500.00 / $1,125.00 / $3,375.00
Stipend-Vice President / $3,500.00 / $875.20 / $2,624.80
Stipend-Treasurer / $3,500.00 / $875.20 / $2,624.80
Stipend-MCAA Chair / $3,000.00 / $750.00 / $2,250.00
Stipend-Programming Chair / $3,000.00 / $0.00 / $3,000.00
Stipend-Grants Chair / $3,000.00 / $750.00 / $2,250.00
Stipend-Lead Senator / $1,000.00 / $0.00 / $1,000.00
Stipend-Senators / $1,500.00 / $0.00 / $1,500.00
Stipend-University Council Representative / $200.00 / $0.00 / $200.00
Stipend-Assembly Speaker / $500.00 / $0.00 / $500.00
Stipend-Assembly Secretary / $500.00 / $0.00 / $500.00
Stipend-Judicial Board / $2,500.00 / $0.00 / $2,500.00
Stipend-Senate Council Representatives / $3,500.00 / $0.00 / $3,500.00
Administrative Support
Office Managers / $20,000.00 / $4,672.81 / $15,327.19
Public Relation Manger / $2,500.00 / $0.00 / $2,500.00
Parliamentarian / $800.00 / $500.00 / $300.00
PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
NAGPS / $16,000.00 / $6,626.36 / $9,373.64
Strategic Plan Funding- President / $6,000.00 / $166.99 / $5,833.01
Strategic Plan Funding- MCAA Chair / $3,000.00 / $0.00 / $3,000.00
Strategic Plan Funding-Programming / $13,000.00 / $248.37 / $12,751.63
Strategic Plan Funding- Vice President / $1,500.00 / $0.00 / $1,500.00
INVESTMENT
Future Technology Purchases (Printer for Uptown) / $20,000.00 / $0.00 / $20,000.00

Note#1

We have to create another line for Payroll Expenses. We always pay employer portion tax expenses but we never show in the report. Those expenses are material and should be separately listed. Last year, we paid around $3245 for tax expenses. I think, we should allocate around $3500. I came up this amount based on the previous expenses and current wages. Above amount is best estimates and it may vary by the end of year little bit.

President’s Report – Bob Beach

Sexual Assault Prevention Training

Several students expressed concerns about the sexual assault prevention training at the last assembly meeting. Caitlin and I met with Chantelle Cleary to discuss these concerns. We have made tentative plans to hold a final makeup training session in February (information to follow, on the listserv). More importantly, we have communicated your substantive concerns to Chantelle and we will be working with her office to schedule adequate training for graduate students from this point forward. I thank you all for your input on this important subject.

Public Engagement Council

The Public Engagement Council met in October and have just come out with several working groups for which we are going to have input and membership. Our Vice President, Public Relations Director, and myself have identified potential candidates already, but if students are interested in being involved in one of these working groups, please let me know. The list of working groups and their chair follow:

-Scholarship – Phil Nasca

- Data & Assessment – Bob Bangert-Drowns & Bruce Szelest

- Institutional Engagement/Big Projects – David Rousseau & Mike Christakis

- Communications – Lee Serravillo & Karl Luntta

- Carnegie Preparation – Darrell Wheeler & Sue Faerman

Ban the Box

Please attend the Ban the Box Ted talk and panel discussion on December 2 (see the Programming report for more details). This has been a major GSA initiative and we hope to work up a resolution for the Spring SUNYSA conference on this topic. The resolution will urge SUNY to ban the box from their applications. We can only do this with student support and a huge turnout would be an important start.

Vice President’s Report – Kat Slye

Nothing to Report

Equity and Inclusion Chair’s Report – Amani Edwards

Nothing to Report

Programming Chair’s Report – Lisa Cassidy

Events in November

Two programs have been provided in the past month. The first was the Social Permaculture program with Lisa DePiano. The event went quite well with 17 participants representing Philosophy, Sustainability, and Ed Psych RGSOs as well as reps from the E-board, Senate team, Judicial board, International Student and Scholar Services, RGSO committee, Programming/public relations Committee, GSA Office staff, Office of Sustainability, the GSA Assembly, and GSEU. Niche analyses were carried out to determine each groups resources, needs, behaviors, obstacles, and yields. Those that participated indicated that the program was helpful and reflective. We plan to replicate this program in the future for RGSOs and may bring in Lisa DePiano to the diversity conference that the EI committee is planning for the Spring. Another product of the program is the development of a “mind map” of the GSA network to help us identify where collaborations can occur to meet the needs of many groups at once. Once finished, we will be adding this map to our website and continually updating it. We also plan on creating a page on the website that includes each RGSO’s information (mission/goals) to make this information easily accessible and promote collaboration between groups as well as knowledge sharing.

The second program was the Call Congress day on November 18. We had a good amount of participation with 37 calls targeting Sen. Charles Schumer, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, and Rep. Paul Tonko. 37 calls were made out of the office. 15 of those calls were to Tonko’s office, 12 to Gillibrand’s, and 10 to Schumer’s. We reached our goal of 10 calls per hour. I would like to thank everyone that participated!

Upcoming Events

Wednesday, December 2 from 6-8:30pm we will be showing a Ted Talk by Brian Stevenson on mass incarceration followed by a panel discussion on the Ban the Box campaign which is an international campaign by civil rights groups and advocates for ex-offenders, aimed at persuading employers to remove from their hiring applications the check box that asks if applicants have a criminal record. Pizza will be provided!

Other notes

I am currently working on collaborating with the Office of Graduate Education to host a graduate finance planning seminar, which would be open to all graduate students. We might incorporate it into the spring GSA orientation. This is in the beginning stages and therefore I do not have much detail on what the program is going to look like. Topics span from budgeting, taxes, debt, compound interest, saving, investing, retirement, trainee funds etc. If there are any particular aspects of graduate student finance that you would like to hear or learn about, please email me at .

Grants Chair’s Report – John Stovall

Two brief notes comprise the Grants report for November.

First, if you have received an award letter for Fall 2015, please email your reimbursement information to .

Second, the forms for the Spring 2016 funding period will be made available on MyInvolvement by December 1st. If you are interested in applying for grant opportunities in the Spring 2016 period, please upload the appropriate files to MyInvolvement by January 31st, 2016.

Lead Senator Report – Hanna Pageau

Nothing to Report

University Council Report - Caitlin Janiszewski

Nothing to Report

Wages & Benefits Report – Caitlin Janiszewski

The Wages & Benefits Committee has continued to work on the stipend proposal. The proposal is comprehensive and could involve a series of bylaw changes. We do not want to rush this process so we are currently gathering feedback from the E-Board and will likely consult the J-Board through judicial review of our current documents. A key component of the proposal is establishing a balance between stipend which are directly paid and support which may come in the form of funded professional training to support the E-Board not only in their jobs but in their future professional lives. Another important aspect of this proposal is providing this same time of professional incentive for RGSO leadership. Aside from working on the balance of stipend vs. funded support for positions, we have developed further the way we place values on certain responsibilities. After reviewing the documents we determined that there are ten types of responsibilities:

  1. Liaising
  2. Programing/training
  3. Meeting facilitation
  4. Meeting attendance/reporting
  5. Information management (separate from finances)
  6. Recruitment/Outreach (this is specifically defined in the proposal)
  7. Financials
  8. Strategic Planning / Agendas
  9. Institutional memory keeping
  10. Oversight

More specific definitions are laid out in the overall proposal. We welcome any feedback or questions on this general snapshot provided here. We hope to have the full proposal to the Assembly by February.

Also, the Blue Ribbon Panel Report on Graduate Student Stipends was finally released. Everyone should have received it through a message from the Assembly Speaker before the last meeting. The W&B’s next task is going to be to develop a meme campaign (appropriate memes like “baffled boxer” or “success kid”) to raise awareness about the details of the report throughout next semester to apply pressure on administration to follow through with the recommendations.

UAS Report – Cassidy Drasser

  1. Dining
  • Finals Week Hours of Operation Change:
  • 2am closing of the Fountain Grill and Jazzman’s
  • Exam Snack Schedule

**** FREE for all students! SUNY ID required!

  • 12/13: Campus Center Vendor Fair/Coffee Lounge @ Campus Center Ballroom, 8:30pm-10:30pm
  • 12/13-12/16: Patroon Room Coffee/Study, 8:30pm-10:30pm (complimentary)
  • Director Steve Pearse presented a potential Spring 2016 Hours of Operation Changes for all retail services. The new hours have been extended, limited, and/or shifted based on the Fall 2015 sales. The changes will be voted on at the next UAS Board of Directors Meeting and I will keep you posted on the decisions made.
  • 518 Market: Will be open during the reconstruction of the SEFCU Bank campus center area.
  1. Facilities
  • Kosher/Halal Kitchen: planned for Indian Quad Dining Hall.
  • **** Currently no plans to include a Kosher/Halal retail option in the new West Campus Center Extension Project – please reach out to me if you feel strongly about including this dining option in the extension project so I can voice your concerns at the next meeting.
  • West Campus Center Extension Project: several retail options were discussed, but not voted on. I will keep you informed as the Board meets.
  • **** Please forward me any ideas or suggestions for retail vendors to bring onto campus.
  • Downtown Café: 4 options are currently being discussed for the dining area on the downtown campus: keep it the same, Zime, Argo Tea, and Twelve
  • Patroon Room Front of House Units: The Patroon Room renovations are now finished. UAS encourages students to utilize the Patroon Room!
  1. Banking
  • SEFCU will be open during the construction of the West Campus Center Extension Project.
  1. SUNY Card
  • UAS is working to improve technology on vending machines to include both credit card and munch money swipe.