GPSA Draft Meeting Minutes
January 29th, 2007

I. Call to order at 5:40pm

1. 15 in attendance
   1. Janet Vertesi, Mike Walsh, Arnaub Chatterjee, Yu Yu, Ellan Spero, Ann Marie McNamara, Michelle Moyer, Anna Gelzer, Rebecca Harbison, Kyle Siler, Charles Hamann, Cecilia Sander, Kevin Nagel, Tamara Pardo, David Day
2. J. Vertesi welcomed Diane Thompson, who is replacing Richard Keeley, as the new Interim Director of Graduate Student Life in the Graduate School.

II. Committee Reports

1. J. Vertesi — CJC meeting next Monday (2/5) to discuss changes to the campus code of conduct.
2. J. Vertesi — Resolution 5 passed the Board of Trustees, which guarantees a reserved seat for graduate students in the Board of Trustees.
   1. Doug — The Board holds four big meetings during the year, once in NYC and three times in Ithaca; the resolution passed unanimously and all were supportive; wanted to mention that of the things discussed at the board meeting, one was the Krause report and changes on campus — meeting on Feb 5th
3. E. Spero — Events Committee
   1. Grad Ball date change from April 14th to April 27th (Friday)
   2. Will remain in Willard Straight, but date not confirmed yet
   3. Still plan on taking over the whole Hall with catering, a live band, DJ.
   4. If interested in getting involved in committee or with information about bands, let her know.
   5. Another option — during exam week (May 11th), but for now, E. Spero assumes April 27th is a better date than May 11th.

III. Old Business

1. Graduate Community Initiative — Retreat planning (J. Vertesi)
   1. Take into retreat format.
   2. Work through document and come together with a common cause and idea of what we want to say to the administration.
   3. Wants everyone to take ownership of final product.
   4. Monday, Feb 5th from 5:30–8pm.
   5. Will email details out by Wednesday

IV. New Business

a. Slope Day Funding Request (L. Giorgos) and Resolution 6. GPSA Funding of Slope Day 2007 (M. Walsh)

1. Liz Giorgos and Committee presented funding request; she is the Chair of Slope Day Programming Board and the Co-Chair of Slope Day Steering committee; Liz Rockport — Admin representative, handles finance; Jenna Lezar — Vice Chair of Programming Board and Co-Chair of Logistics committee.
   1. Requested $4000, as was requested and received last year; funds split equally, $2000 to talent and $2000 to Slopefest portion of event.
   2. Made effort to include graduate students as well as all undergraduate students, staff, and faculty
   3. L. Giorgos presented an invitation to any interested graduate students to join the Logistics, Steering, and other Slope Day-related Committees.
   4. First general body meeting on Feb 15th at 6pm for anyone interested.
   5. History and evolution of Slope Day
      1. Started in 1901 as a big festival/parade and everyone was involved.
      2. 1960s — not much celebration
      3. 1979 — included barbecuing on Libe slope
      4. 1980 — live music became central
      5. 1984 — drinking age increased to 21, wasn’t 18 anymore; so event shifted focus to partying on slope
      6. 2001 — Slope Day Steering Committee create to make Slope Day a safer event
      7. 2003 — Reiteration of large musical event and continually improved safety every year.
   6. To contact L. Giorgos if interested in committee, email ekg22
   7. Slope Day to still include: Giveaways, food, ring toss, cake giveaway, photo key chains, “Strike a Pose” — 3 pictures with different crazy props immediately finished in a matte photo frame, high striker, Slope Day ice cream, food tickets as prizes.
2. M. Walsh’s response: Grant request for $2000 each to both talent and Slopefest.
   1. Key points: granted same amount last year, great to repeat gesture and focus on both Slopefest and talent.
   2. Thought it was a shame that graduate students with kids continually get turned away at the door — proposed letting them in to the Slopefest portion at least.
   3. Taking part in community events creates a sense of community for [graduate students]. Cornell lacks many of these events, so they should be made open to everyone.
   4. Involvement will have positive effects, especially if graduate students are more involved in planning and volunteerism. It will take this event in a positive direction and bring up the maturity level on the slope.
   5. With more involvement, it might also highlight the impediments of how hard it is for graduate students to get to campus, as well as highlight graduate student involvement.
   6. Don’t think it’s just a lot of money to spend on alcohol; there is an economic impact.
      1. Slope Day costs the administration a lot of money, with other costs such as putting up the fence, bringing in Port-o-Potties, setting up tents, and having ambulances and security; some costs can be eliminated over time, and the money will be filtered back to other student services.
   7. Overall, it’s a good financial investment as well as a good chance for community involvement.
3. L. Giorgos’ response — Agree that Slope Day is becoming increasingly safe.
   1. There is a survey sent around after Slope Day to tally how many people attend the event, and it was also sent to graduate students this year.
   2. For graduate students, response rate was 19%; out of respondents, 59% said they attended. Proven to be a reliable research method with undergraduate students.
   3. M. Walsh — Made a clarification that survey was sent to all graduate students.
4. J. Vertesi — GPSA coordinated with Steering Committee with getting that survey out; last year more graduate student awareness and encouragement to go to the event.
   1. To achieve the bare minimum to get byline funding, 15% of signatures are needed; last year, more than the bare minimum of 15% of graduate students said they went to Slope Day, so the data is encouraging.
5. L. Giorgios — presented idea for change in marketing: i.e. posters to Maplewood and other graduate housing areas, in addition to the undergraduate residence halls.
6. E. Spero — Hard to get message out because marketing is not focused on graduate students.
7. J. Vertesi — Suggested giving posters to core representatives in graduate schools to get advertising out there.
8. T. Pardo — Recommended continually having on agenda so more time on the floor and more communication with departments; can email posters or bring to meetings to hand out — many different ways to get the news out.
9. M. Walsh — Asked if the question�”If you didn’t go to Slope Day, did you want to go?”�was placed in survey.
10. K. Nagel — Agreed because the Vet School students are in clinics by May, and may want to go, but can’t — creates artificial results.
11. M. Walsh — Law school students have same problem because they end school a week earlier so exams are actually during Slope Day weekend.
12. M. Moyer — Are young children not allowed into the event because of insurance or is there that stipulation? It may be something we don’t have control over because it may be the event’s insurance.
13. M. Walsh — In process of asking to investigate — it may be the direction that Cornell wants to take.
14. L. Giorgos — Agreed it is something they will explore, but reaffirmed that risk management is Cornell’s final decision.
15. K. Nagel — movement to vote; Harbison — seconds movement.
16. J. Vertesi — vote: 14 + 2 extra votes from Bhadauria and Wang
17. Resolution passed.

b. Resolution 7. GPSA Funding policy charter changes (Y. Yu)

1. Y. Yu’s presentation — Guidelines for funding are out of effect and waiting for review, and are currently directing the funding committee for review.
   1. Resolution about how student activity fee is spent and the responsibilities of the various groups that are sponsored by this fee.
   2. Finance commission is separately funded by the student activity fee, and it is responsible for allocating fees among the graduate student groups; can see how much each group received last year on the website
   3. Part 3 — shows general guidelines for all groups, then lists groups one by one, with how each group should spend funds.
   4. Requirements and process: Subtract specifics from application documents before applying to fee, then submit previous five years of budget/outline, the major goal of the organization, how the funds will be spent, and how the graduate student community will benefit from this financial support.
   5. Ethnic group presented already; EMS presenting on Feb 12th; other groups have not responded yet.
   6. Ideally place all applications online, but for now, only a summarized version of resolution is available to get an idea.
2. E. Spero — What are the self-programming organizations in part 3 — they are small graduate clubs, right?
   1. Events committee wants to propose the idea of regular advertising for all clubs we finance by reporting to GPSA or some centralized website.
   2. We can list all the events we are sponsoring financially together; the events committee can take the role of facilitator and create a space to communicate between GPSA-funded events and the community.
3. J. Vertesi — Reminder that the rest of resolutions cannot be voted on because they all require charter changes; debating is just to get all questions and concerns out.
4. C. Sander — How do we deal with events that are multiply funded?
5. M. Walsh’s response — Used examples from other universities like MIT.
   1. Can pull events from university website to own website because multiple funding can be displayed.
6. T. Pardo — curious what programs are funded, is there a list?
7. M. Walsh — There is a list on the website�a link to all GPSA-tagged events, but not GPSAFC (i.e. these meetings). There are also tags for GPSAFC-funded events but nothing is listed yet, and no multiple tagging exists yet.
8. J. Vertesi - When we collect the activity fee, it’s split into different bylines for different funding purposes; some programs get to pull money directly from there — from every students’ activity fee. GPSAFC is its own finance commission, and it takes a lot of money from the activity fees to allocate to different student organizations.
   1. GPSA/GPSAFC are funded differently; can be confusing.
   2. On website on the events page, there are links to byline-funded events (but the site may be confusing).
9. Y. Yu - Make it a requirement that if any student group if receiving money from us, they must put events on the GPSA calendar.
   1. Some groups are not familiar with the process and they forget. If they do, we can reject their reimbursements because they’re not on the calendar.
   2. We give warnings each year, and this is also for their benefit because they get more advertisement.
   3. Summarized changes — there is a group specific statement regarding funding and the general description is quite standard, without much change; however, each organization is promised different things every year, and old content not applicable.
   4. To get our money, they must deliver the required services.
10. M. Walsh — Concern regarding Appendix B — should be applicable to each fund in each cycle, so should be applicable now.
11. Y. Yu — Funding cycle was supposed to start last year.
12. M. Walsh — Clarification: Groups come for funding, and we tell them what to do in the contract. If they don’t uphold it, they don’t get our funding. The resolution should explicitly state that the contract expires at the end of 2008.
13. Y. Yu — Should expire by the time they get new funding or new approval.
14. J. Vertesi — Request to see highlighting or striking through of items that are proposed to change; return to resolution next week to see a clearer picture of what and why changes were made.
15. Y. Yu — Have not yet decided on meeting time with the funding committee; email is yy235 if interested in attending.
16. C. Sander — Asked what the enforcement mechanism was the plan to monitor it.
17. Y. Yu’s response — Groups must first carry out events, then bring receipts to receive reimbursements.
    1. That’s how we control this byline/procedure.
    2. Can reject reimbursement if spend out of book.
18. T. Pardo — How do we double check to know and see the events being advertised the way we require them? Safety control?
    1. Suggested requiring bringing the flyer, budget, and mission of request when presenting at the meeting.
    2. With that information, we can help advertise to graduate community as well as the community at large.
    3. If that part of requirement is taken care of beforehand, the reimbursements won’t get rejected in the future.
19. Y. Yu’s response — It is an annual budget, so they don’t come back again to apply when specific details are known.
    1. Events are applied for in the annual budget, but when applying in the annual budget, groups don’t usually have specific details.
    2. Give information afterwards with receipts, a printout of the web page, flyers, etc. with GPSA advertised on it.
    3. That’s the only possible control at the moment.
20. T. Pardo — Brought up an issue for debate — is it better to come with the advertisement after the fact or make sure that it is taken care of before the fact?
21. Y. Yu — We can only approve funding on a yearly basis because the workload is too much to do anything else.
22. J. Vertesi — People usually see Appendix B first; this can be up for debate next time.

c. Resolution 8. A resolution regarding the Staffing of Committees (M. Walsh)

1. M. Walsh — GPSA charter does not have a specific procedure for staffing of External committees, especially when other University groups such as the UA, the graduate school, and the faculty senate, give us power to appoint a person to a position.
   1. Previously had elections by general body or executive communication by themselves, but there is no single defined way to do this.
   2. Charter amendment to fix this. Asked to report if anything missing, i.e. defunct groups. Also not quite sure if even have a spot on the faculty senate committees
   3. Executive committee will make appointments to external committees if needed in the immediate future.
   4. For UA appointments, graduate and professional representatives come together with the internal committee to appoint those members.
   5. Only two big things that contradict the past 9.9A, sections i and ii:
      1. Don’t want Operations/Staffing committee to take too much power, but because of concerns dealing with confidentiality, the general body is not a proper place to select the candidate. This is the biggest change from what was done in the past.
      2. Rest of resolution — sets everything else in stone.
   6. Appointments done by Operations/Staffing committee — composed of the three executives and the committee leaders
2. J. Vertesi - Application for appointments are on the web with interests, skills, backgrounds, what you bring to the position, etc; then there will be a meeting where applications are examined and —people are placed in committees
3. M. Walsh — Operations/Staffing committee is more experienced — they know what they’re looking for because they know the committees better; may conduct interviews possibly if many candidates are interested.
4. J. Vertesi —Wanted feedback and concern because the GPSA charter says nothing about the process or how to elect students to positions.
5. A. Chatterjee — Applicants are allowed to list top five preferences, give the Operations/Staffing committee a better read on the applicants and what they want.
6. C. Hamann — If the Staffing committee is taking sole control, they should make it known about how they are going to go about it.
7. J. Vertesi — Clarified who makes up the Staffing committee and its responsibilities. By majority vote, they can elect the candidate that has applied for a position.
8. C. Sander — Asked about premature vacancies, and those that are filled before they are even publicly announced as vacant. Wanted to know the process behind filling a position that was prematurely vacated. Suggested waiting a few weeks to allow applications to be made.
9. J. Vertesi — Replied by suggested to draft a byline.
10. M. Walsh — Mentioned the CJC position that opened up midyear.
11. J. Vertesi — CJC position opened up and a person was appointed, but there was no public declaration.
    1. When something becomes open, should publicize so people can submit interest before the executive committee makes a decision.
12. A. Chatterjee — Depends on urgency of committees i.e. if we need representation. Sometimes, it is more detrimental to not have representative than to vote without waiting a sufficient amount of time.
13. C. Sander — Suggested outlining a safety hatch or emergency provision to take care of urgent situations.
14. J. Vertesi — Closed discussion due to time constraints.

d. Resolution 9. A resolution regarding GPSA Counsel (M. Walsh)

1. M. Walsh — Attended the Ivy Summit in November, and spoke to the Harvard Graduate Student Council. They had an Emeritus position for previous Presidents and Vice presidents to serve as an advisor to the council and to ask for advice and guide the council as year continues.
   1. We do have an Archivist, but now that role is done by the Office of Assemblies — archives data/etc. — so we don’t need that position anymore.
   2. Great idea to have someone with institutional memory, and it also keeps former leaders involved.
2. K. Nagel — What if no previous leaders are interested?
3. M. Walsh — There is a stipulation that the position can remain vacant.
4. Y. Yu — Should create several of these positions like for President, Vice President, etc. since there is no salary.
5. M. Walsh — For transitioning and advice, this position can be whatever the Executive committee needs it to be.
6. M. Walsh — Brought up example of Brian Holmes, who was his effective mentor and President from two years ago; prepared him for this year.
7. C. Hamann — Suggested maybe having a whole committee is better in this position than just one person; can reference from years beforehand since certain issues don’t come up every given year; it’s better to have a larger pool to draw from.
   1. Should specify length of tenure.
8. R. Harbison — Should specify if person in position needs to be on campus or a Cornell graduate student.
9. M. Walsh — Personally thinks the position holder should be on campus because it makes a difference, but will specify.

e. Resolution 10. A resolution regarding Graduate Students and Slope Day (J. Vertesi)

1. J. Vertesi — This is a follow up to the resolution on the funding of Slope Day — to ensure adequate representation, graduate students should be elected to positions in Slope Day committees.
   1. Maintain graduate student involvement.
   2. If one person is serving on these committees, they can act as a liaison to the Events committee.
2. K. Nagel — Should send out a description of committees graduate students can apply for because there are so many committees to prepare for Slope Day.
3. R. Harbison — For section 9.8.8a, does it describe a method for deciding which positions graduate students get?
4. J. Vertesi — In the steering committee, there is a possible Executive position so we can get more involved.
5. C. Hamann — If we pass, does the position go to the Undergraduate assembly?
6. J. Vertesi — For now, this is what the Slope Day committee has asked us to do. We will ask if this needs to go by the Student Assembly in the future.
7. M. Walsh — Although it shouldn’t because the Slope Day committee gave us the power to choose that person, and that dispels how the position is selected.

V. Adjournment

1. Core meeting reminder — will take place on February 12th in Clark 701
2. Adjourned on time at 7pm.

VI. Attachments

1. Slope Day Funding Request
2. Resolution 6. GPSA Funding of Slope Day 2007
3. Resolution 7. GPSA Funding Policy Charter Changes
4. Resolution 8. A resolution regarding the Staffing of Committees
5. Resolution 9. A resolution regarding GPSA Counsel
6. Resolution 10. A resolution regarding Graduate Students and Slope Day

Respectfully submitted,

Natalie Ku
Office of Assemblies Student Clerk