Meeting Minutes #7

I. Call to Order

Mercedez Jones, President, called to order the regular meeting of the Undergraduate Student Government at 5:03PM on Monday,February29, 2016 in the Fort Dearborn Room.

II. Roll Call

The following persons were present: Flordalia Rodriguez-Garcia, Christen Lee, Ryan Chiu, David Lin, Asha Binbek, Sun Choi, Christian Goddard, Pooja Baxi, Xiaoyan Hu, Peter Varughese, Ahmad Albanna, Benjamin Brown, Pari Shah, Nancy Camacho, Samir Ghazaleh, Marlena Szymczak, Kiana Narvaez

III. Approval of the minutes from last meeting

Motion to approve the minutes. Approved.

IV. Approval of the agenda

Motion to approve the agenda. Approved.

V. Ceremonial Induction(s):

  • Marlena and Sam sworn in as members.

VI. Reports

Executive

Advisor / Dean DuJuan Smith / Not present
Student Member of Board of Trustees / Jauwan Hall / Not present.
President / Mercedez Jones / OCLE Classroom Setup: looking at putting in classrooms on the South End of campus and looking for different ways to arrange that room.
Detroit Game: Tickets are 40 dollars for transport, food, and hotel overnight.
Lobby Day: bus list updated, and we had to reserve a room because we are using UIC Catering so I reserved SCE 501 so we will have someone at the pier room ushering them to that room
Chancellor has office hours tomorrow from 204 so please attend if you can! I know I will!
Vice-President / Flordalia Rodriguez-Garcia / Partnering up with the Wellness Center for Safer Sex Fest, in which we will require two USG volunteers – David to help set up and Nancy to help wrap up.
Weeks of 2/29-3/4 and 3/14-3/18 will be at the library for kiosk hours. The table will be on the side of the escalators. The weeks March 7-11 will be service hours. Spring break is on 3/21-3/25 will be excused for hours.
Speaker of the Assembly / Gabriella Bedolla / Issuing two strikes to Nancy for (1) missing the 6th GA meeting without notification to any e-board member and (2) missing 3 consecutive committee meetings without notification to that respective committee’s director.
Verbal warnings to all those who missed 1 or 2 kiosks during the month of February: Ryan, Pooja, Jashaun, Nancy, Pari, Christian, Benjamin, Chris, and Mercedez
Treasurer / Christen Lee / Per request of Sun and Mercedez, breakfast has now been ordered for Lobby Day and can be picked up at the UIC Catering window at 6:45AM on Wednesday.
Have updated the budget, sent to every director (and the speaker) the amount they have remaining in their respective discretionary budgets. We have $55,644.78 remaining. Assuming all requests received as of last Friday (2/26) go through.
We have spent $40,405.22 from the allocated funds ($77,776.09) w/ $37,370.87 remaining in overall allocated funds. From unallocated (general) funds we have spent $9,000 ($18,273.91 remaining)
Director of SIC / David Lin / Resolution for shared goggle rack on the table
Will try to improve inner circle lighting and changing out the chairs
Reduce parking cost – trying to schedule meeting with Mark Donovan
Haven’t heard back from Dr. Henley regarding flagpole lighting initiative
Director of IRC / Asha Binbek / Make Mondays Matter:Next Mon 1-3pm in CSRC
Movies with USG:April 4, 2016 is the date. Want to plan movie nights with other student orgs to put our name out there as well!
USG Scavenger Hunt: Plans for scavenger hunt will begin this week! Anyone interested on working on this can come to our meeting on Wednesday at 10am.
Met with Athanasia Papaioannou, Assitant Director of the WLRC to discuss events we can plan together for Sexual Assault Awareness Month.
Will have our last two debate watch parties on 3/8 and 3/9.
Director of URC / Sun Choi / Online registration is closed now, but you can still registered by contacting Marissa, whose contact info is posted on the registration website!
Dead week proposal will be discussed during Educational Policy Senate Committee meeting this Thursday at 2:30-5pm. Let me know if you want to come
Open textbook proposal has been sent to Ms. Dooley, the senate clerk, to figure out which Senate committee can review this proposal and actually put it to some action!
Director of CRC / Christian Goddard / Commencement Cords will be ordered for graduating USG members.
Orientation presentation: I’m also going to find out about getting USG a spot during presentations that week.
In the middle of making a brochure for USG, and making good progress, thanks to Marlena!
Pari is writing a new article for UIC News.

VII.Guest Speaker(s):None.

VIII. Resolution Proposals.

  1. Resolution 2016-7S-806: Funding for American Institute for Chemical Engineers Regional Conference.
  2. Resolution 2016-7S-700: Removing the Membership Caps from Standard Committees.
  3. Resolution 2016-7S-701: Creation of a Formal Process Regarding Joining Multiple Standing Committees
  4. Resolution 2016-7S-202: The Establishment of a Shared Goggle Rack System for Laboratory Courses.
  5. Resolution 2016-7S-402: Creating an Alternative and Accelerated Option for Fulfillment of Undergraduate Foreign Language Requirements
  6. Resolution 2016-7S-802: Funding for Alpha Phi Omega Fraternity.

IX. New Business.

  1. Resolution 2016-7S-805: Request for Refill and Increase of Interpersonal Relations Discretionary Fund.Passed.
  2. Resolution 2016-7S-804: Illinois General Assembly and Governor Bruce Rauner To Preserve Funding for the Monetary Award Program (MAP). Passed.
  3. Resolution 2016-6S-401: The Recommendation on Adopting Open Textbooks.Passed.
  4. Resolution 2016-6S-801: Funding for Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority.Passed.

X. Service hours:

  • Asha and Ahmad have secured an Arab Cultural Center on campus for next year (location isn’t determined yet), and USG’s name will be on it!
  • Sam, Jashaun, David, Xiaoyan and Pooja hosted the Non-Smoking Dialogue on behalf of USG.
  • Ryan participated in the Committee to Search for a Dean of the Honors College as its only student member.
  • Christian and Ryan went to the recent College Republicans meeting.
  • Sun attended Senate Committee on Educational Policy last week.
  • Christen attended a “Policy Planning and Academic Network” meeting.

XI. Items for discussion. None.

XII. Public Forum and announcements.

XIII. Voting in New Members:

  • Chris “Anthony” Anthonyvoted in as new member.

XIV. Adjournment. There was a motion to adjourn. Speaker Bedolla adjourned the meeting at 6:55PM. Minutes submitted by Secretary Ryan Chiu.