Graduate Student Council

GRADUATE STUDENT COUNCIL

General Council Meeting

April 15, 2013

7:00pm – 8:30pm

Student Life Pavilion 412

Attendance

Rebecca Aaron-Albanese, Evan Allen, Britainy Birkhoff, Lana Blank, Allegra Conway (nominee for 2013-2014 Vice Chair), Afarin Dadkhah, Nicholas Franco (Chair), Sean Horrigan (administrator), Pamela Johnson (nominee for 2013-2014 Chair), Farheen Kaka (Vice Chair), Lauran Kawano, Megan Kennedy (graduate advisor), Annette Reyes, Lindsay Sharon, Meghan Tracy, Hayley Umayam

Last names for Simon and Thomas from GBSA?

Absent:Katharine Petrich, Daniel, Shehan, Gina Stavrakakis

Approval of last meeting’s minutes

A motion to approve the minutes from the Council’s March meeting was made by Birkhoff and seconded by Dadkhah. All were in favor and the minutes were passed.

2013-2014 officer elections

The Chair nominee was Pamela Johnson, graduate student in Doctor of Nursing Practice program in the School of Nursing. Johnson introduced herself to the group, speaking for two minutes about herself and her interest in being the GSC Chair. The Councilors then asked Johnson questions.

Q: Why are you interested in GSC?

A: I like to be involved in whatever is going on with the leadership in my community.

Q: Do you have any goals for the GSC?

A: Being new to the school and the area, I’ll like to meet with my colleagues and work together to represent everyone’s voice. Whatever goals that everyone is working towards, I would like to make that happen.

Q: How will you make time for this with your other commitments?

A: I have my position at work where I am able to delegate other responsibilities and I think I have been able to multitask for many years. I’m not going to be doing this alone and other members from the group I know I can work with.

Q: Have you come to any events or been aware of them?
A: First email I received was that you were looking for a chair. I’m planning to go to Padres in the Park.

The Vice Chair nominee was Allegra Conway, a first-year MEPN student from the School of Nursing. Conway introduced herself to the group, speaking for two minutes about herself and her interest in being the GSC Vice Chair. The Councilors then asked Conway questions.

Q: Do you have time for this?

A: No commitments aside from swim team

Q: What direction would you have for the GSC?

A: Getting more people to attend events. Participate in those regards. Need to explore more marketing strategies, and motivate councilors to get up in class and verbalize in each individual program about events.

After discussion, Franco instructed the group to vote for each candidate and that each one needed a 2/3 majority vote.

Chair: Johnson is elected, 8-3-1
Vice Chair: Conway is elected, all in favor

GSC by-laws

The GSC By-laws Committee, consisting of Aaron-Albanese, Blank, Franco (committee chair), Kawano, and Stavrakakis, proposed amendments to the current GSC by-laws, which they submitted in draft form to the Council. The committee had been working on this final draft throughout the Spring 2013 semester. Amendments included—but were not limited to—the programming and events section, budget section, GSC officer responsibilities, and mission and purpose statements. After some discussion, Aaron-Albanese called to question the proposed amendments, and Dadkhah seconded. The motion passed and the amendments to the GSC by-laws were approved.

Results: all in favor, 12-0-0

Padres in the Park updates

The Padres in the Park event committee, consisting of Aaron-Albanese, Kennedy, and Shehan, updated the group on this upcoming event. Aaron-Albanese stated that 68student tickets were sold on Friday, April 12, and less than 37 were left. The web link to purchase the student tickets (discounted at $30) will still be open until Friday, April 19 at 5pm. Yes. Franco asked if the event committee needed anything from the GSC. Aaron-Albanese replied that, ideally, they would like to have GSC members help with check in. Umayam, Dadkhah, Sharon, Kaka, Kennedy, and Johnson said they would help.

All tickets will be available to pick upin the Graduate and Law Student Commons next week Monday, April 22, and Thursday, April 25, from 2-7pm; Tuesday and Wednesday, April 23-24, from 9am-2pm.

Councilors are expected to wear their GSC polos at the event.

Graduation stoles

20 GSC graduation stoles have been purchased. Councilors must have served one year on the GSC to be eligible to receive one. They will be arriving just in time for the end-of-year celebration.

Christopher’s on Congress: end-of-year event

Kaka, the coordinator for this event, updated the group on this event. Christopher’s on Congress will be the location for the Council’s end-of-year event. It will be on Tuesday, May 14 from 6pm – 8pm. Location, time, date, food, and beverages have been secured and happy hour will be extended for us that day.

Graduate student organization funding requests

The Real Estate and Land Use Society (RELUS) had initially sent their request in February, but Kaka somehow never received it. RELUS resubmitted their request for the GSC to help fund a mixer for attorneys to find mentors and mentees. They expect 30 attendees at this event. Kawano and Allen stated that RELUS received full funding by the Law School, so they did not appear to need this money. Motion to funded zero dollars to RELUS regarding their request was moved by Birkhoff and seconded by Umayam. All were in favor, and RELUS’s request for funding was denied.

Reimbursements for graduate schools

Kaka led discussion on this item. She reminded the group that each graduate school will receive $1,000 from the GSC as approved earlier in the semester by the Council, and that these funds will need to be spent on research and/or professional development for their constituents. Kaka instructed Councilors to fill out a Funding Request Form and send back to her ()by May 10, 2013, otherwise those funds will be rolled over into the GSC’s budget for next year.

Additionally, Kaka said that the Funding Request Forms will need to outline how the school/graduate association will spend the $1,000. The money will stay in the school ultimately even if schools cannot spend it all, but there should be an effort to spend all money on professional development. Even though the formsays the request needs to be submitted 30 days prior to the event, this does not apply becuase this is a special situation.

Focus groups

E-mails will be sent out tomorrow with information about Graduate Student Focus Groups, led by Horrigan and Kennedy. The purpose of these focus groups will be to get feedback from graduate and law students on their experiences at USD, and see how this aligns with other feedback they have received this past year. There will be four different focus groups. Horrigan asked each Councilor to identify two different colleagues who might be able to attend, and that Councilors should also try to attend. Please send names, contact information, and who will attend which sessionto Horrigan and Kennedy by Friday, April 19.

Announcements

Hands of Peace informational: Tuesday, April 23 from 5:00pm – 6:30pm: Israelis, Palestinians, and Americans together to create peace through dialogue.
Report from Information Resource Committee (submitted via email)
The meeting occurred April 10. The attendees were mostly faculty members and Information Technology Services (ITS) staff. Presentations focused on highlights of the year as well as upcoming services and projects for the following areas: Library and Web Services; Network Infrastructure; Academic Technology Services (ATS); and Enterprise Administrative Systems and Services. For the most part, the developments had to do with things that are available or applicable only to faculty. However a few things that seemed relevant for the GSC:
EASS: numerous upgrades to meet new regulatory requirements for Financial Aid, Federal Reporting, Payroll, etc have been instituted; E-Signatures for Perkins and Trust Loans; Graduate online deposit process; Law School Student Faces via Portal.
Library Services: Starting June 2013, Alumni will gain access to JSTOR (this is an incentive to join the Alumni association); the City of San Diego Public Library will be joining the circuit this month
Network Infrastructure: completed network upgrade to 10Gig; outdoor wireless expansion
ATS: Completed migration to blackboard 9; Improved client service/support model and turn-around time for IT issues; plans for file sharing/storage options for faculty and students in 2013-2014

The meet was adjourned at 8:30pm.

GSC Meeting Minutes 4.15.2013 1 of 4