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GSC meeting 2009-02-25

Wednesday, February 25th, 2009

Proceedings of the February 25th, 2009 GSC meeting

Agenda

1) 5:45 FOOD (thanks Shane!)

2) 6:00 Welcome with introductions and Announcements (Polina)
i. Please be aware that all meetings are audio recorded and will be made available on the GSC website.
ii. Approve minutes from the last meeting (2/18/09)
iii. Winter retreat will be in San Francisco this Saturday, February 28th.

3) 6:05 Funding (Lan)
i. Israeli Student Organization
ii. Pakistanis at Stanford

4) 6:10 Programming (Justin and Adam S.)

5) 6:15 Flicks (Zeng)

6) 6:20 Senate Report (Ryan)

7) 6:25 ASSU Update (Jonny and Fagan)
i. Service Group Bill
ii. Czar appointments

8) 6:30 NomCom Report (Eric)

9) 6:50 Public Financing Bill (Ryan, Jonny and Fagan)

10) 7:10 NAGPS Lobbying (Fen and Ryan)

11) 7:30 New Business (Polina)

Attendance

Voting members present:
At large 1: Aleksandra Korolova (proxy Adam Sciambi present)
At large 2: Adam Beberg
At large 3: Nanna Notthoff
At large 4: Ryan Peacock
At large 5: Mary Van der Hoven
Earth Sciences: Justin Brown
Education: Shane Moise
Engineering 1: Polina Segalova
Humanities: George Bloom
Law: Andrew Park
Medicine: Maria Spletter
Natural Sciences: Fen Zhao
Social Sciences: Hanna Muenke

Voting members not present:
Business: Rick Thielke
Engineering 2: Addy Satija

Other people present: Moran Bercovici, Jonny Dorsey, Fagan Harris, Simone Manganelli, Donna Winston, A. Danowitz, Matt McLaughlin, Etosha Cave, Lan Wei, Eric Osborne

Minutes

1) 5:45 FOOD (thanks Shane!)

2) 6:07 Welcome with introductions and Announcements (Polina)

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i. Please be aware that all meetings are audio recorded and will be made available on the GSC website.
ii. Approved minutes from the last meeting (2/18/09) by consensus.
iii. Winter retreat will be in San Francisco this Saturday, February 28th.
iv. Any items for grad announce should be sent to Polina by Tuesday.

3) 6:08 Funding (Lan)

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i. Israeli Student Organization – having a party on March 7th in Havana Room. Teamed up with Jewish organizations in Bay Area. Having a costume party for Purim, with DJ and Israeli band. Most of funding goes to equipment for band. Some money from Jewish organization for DJ and snacks. Starts at 8pm. Recommended $2400 initially. Now realized that they need to pay to rent stage and light from Events and Labor services, and would like to add $400 to the request for that. Fen asks for details about the equipment rental – it’s some pretty extensive stuff, in comparison to the equipment needed for the Stoplight party. Fagan thinks it’s strange that the band doesn’t have some of that equipment for themselves, concerned about possible reflection on band quality. Group representative thinks they practice at a studio as a hobby, where most of the equipment is available. Total rental for Stoplight party music stuff (like amps) from SCN was only about $200, so would like to recommend that the group and band re-consider whether the expensive rentals are absolutely necessary.

Mary suggests that the group get info from Fen about what she got from SCN for equipment, and then ask the band if that’s sufficient.

Polina requests that they get more info about equipment rental, and come back next week to ask for the appropriate amount. Representative concerned that they wouldn’t have enough time to wait for us to talk next week, need to have plans solidified now in order to work with the band and advertise the event. We aren’t anti-equipment rental, just want to be sure that it’s the best deal, and if that if it is, we would likely approve it next week.

For now, considering $1200 of the original request (all but equipment rental) plus $400 for stage/lights, and $300 for sound equipment (covering what Fen got for the Stoplight Party). Giving $1900 passes by consensus, and they can ask us for more money next week after solidifying rental plans if necessary.

ii. Pakistanis at Stanford. Having speaker Shuja Nawaz, who is a political and strategic analyst. Last week asked for $1000 for room rental, didn’t have events and labor services estimate at the time for equipment and technician. Funding Committee recommends $900 for that stuff. Giving $900 passes by consensus.

4) 6:25 NomCom Report (Eric)

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Filled all but three or four spots on University Committees this year, about 98% of committee seats. Did make an appointment to Board of Judicial Affairs recently, but haven’t actively been pursuing other open spots this quarter, given that they already spent many months previously doing so.

One new thing this year was a big training dinner they held in November, with 90 of the 150 total people appointed to committees attending. Had some speakers, and talked about roles of students on committees.

Tried to institute a better system of reporting this year, but it’s still only half in place. There have been some misunderstandings in the last few months in regards to reporting. Initially Eric was told that students didn’t really file reports and that the GSC and Senate didn’t really read them, and wanted to change this to create more of a back and forth. Couldn’t get it together this quarter, and they finish their term soon.

Looking for a new NomCom chair to start first day of spring quarter, which ExComm committee is mostly working on. Thinks it would be helpful if new NomCom person met with GSC and Senate to figure out exactly what it is that is desired in terms of reporting, because the Bylaws are not clear on this. Hopes that new person will continue the training event, which was successful this year, and move forward on a reporting system.

Nanna wonders whether it would be possible for us just to have the contact information of the people on the committees, and then we could get in touch with the ones that are of interest. Eric thinks this information is up on the website. Nanna also recommends getting people who came to the training to give feedback for next year.

Jonny does encourage getting in touch with committee members, but thinks that a system of passing through the chairs is probably best, rather than individual students getting in touch with the members.

Adam B. says that a lot of the committees are very secretive and can’t report, and some of the other ones we have members on anyway, so we get updates. Thinks going through NomCom chair to reach members when desired is best.

Ryan thinks NomCom should be able to decide how things go, and not let outside bodies have too much influence, as they should be separate. Thinks also that for even secretive committees, some information may be releasable and should encourage that.

Justin reminds us that some of the members of the grad relevant committees have come to talk to us in the past, would like to see that happen again.

Fagan thinks there needs to be clearer separation of the legislative bodies from NomCom and students on committees, given that students were selected in order to exercise their own good judgment.

Mary wonders about why ASSU has oversight over NomCom but why we then don’t have say on the committees and results. Eric points out that we only oversee NomCom, which has the goal of placing students on University committees, but the committees by themselves are independent entities, and include faculty as well. These multiple components make oversight difficult sometimes. Eric shares example of committee where the chair passed away, students on committee sought out Eric to look into finding a new chair, but all he can accomplish is choosing the student members.

Eric thinks that once they get new NomCom committee, will encourage the whole group meeting with GSC to discuss expectations. Polina recommends that this happen at the Spring GSC retreat.

Polina recognizes that we mostly care about reports from particular committees, but encourages people on all committees to write reports about what happened while they served on the committee to give to the next person taking that position, to get more of a history going.

Ryan thinks it would be good for GSC Chairs to be at training dinner, so that students know who they are. Thinks it’s pretty clear in guidelines that NomCom is only responsible for appointing students, but thinks the University needs to do more to manage their end, for example, having only one administrator overall to oversee committee formation. Polina thinks this is unlikely.

5) 6:45 Programming (Justin and Adam S.)

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Moving along on Formal. GSPB is having Mafia event this Friday night with pizza and beer. On Thursday night there will be grad night here, will have trivia night, modeled after Rose and Crown events. Beer prizes available. They have planning meetings Tuesday at noon in room 121 in Old Union and there is lunch there. Basically if you have an idea, they can help make it happen.

6) 6:47 Flicks (Polina for Zeng)

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Milk is showing this Sunday at 8pm. Zeng would like volunteers to help distribute donuts and juice at 7:30pm for the 8pm movie. Shane and Etosha volunteer to help.

7) 6:48 Senate Report (Ryan)

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Ryan and Polina went to Undergrad Senate meeting yesterday. Yet again, a long meeting. A few key points:
– They gave the Service Division a thumbs up.
– Caps bill did not get majority. They had a very intense conversation about this, Polina and Ryan were disappointed about how the discussion went.
– Passed Public Financing scheme, with some amendments from Lucas, which we’ll consider later in the meeting.

Polina thinks we might be able to pass a caps bill if we try to do that for next year. They’re concerned about freedom of speech implications in bill, but thinks if we can work out more of the details, and then talk to Constitutional Council about concerns about freedom of speech, that they might approve it for next year.

Simone thinks that we should ask students to report their spending, so we get a sense of what they spend money on, even without official caps. They are supposed to do this already, but Polina thinks they don’t report accurately. Simone concerned if there’s already problems with reporting what will happen if there’s an official cap in place.

Fagan thinks there is some good will for passing caps, especially if we think about it for next year rather than trying to push it for this year.

Mary wonders about how this knowledge of campaign spending is disseminated. Etosha reports that all candidates need to submit a spending form, which the Daily often report.

Fagan asks how much Grad students spend on GSC seats, answer being zero. Senators tend to spend a few hundred. It’s really the Execs that are the big spenders.

Fen thinks that if the main betting chip is later salary for the Exec, that if it’s lower, people might keep spending down because there’s less of a financial reward for winning. Others think though that people are running for the prestige of the job, not necessarily the money. Right now total pay is $10,000 per Exec, some of which they move around to pay other Czars. Jonny says this is just a bit more than RAs get compensated, so thinks it’s fair. It does get some more people to run perhaps, who might otherwise seek out another job.

8) 6:59 ASSU Update (Jonny and Fagan)

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2009-02-25A-Bill to Charter ASSU Service Division

i. Service Group Bill- This is basically an Undergrad Special Fee to create a group that puts together services for students that previously Execs had spent their time on, but want our approval too.

Also encourage us to check out bystander.stanford.edu, and to give any feedback on how it might better relate to Grad students.

12 for, 0 opposed, 1 abstaining. Passes.

ii. Czar appointments. About people that they’d like to appoint to help them out in specific areas. Not sure if we need to do approve this, but voting just in case. There are no objections, so it passes by consensus.

9) 7:03 Public Financing Bill (Ryan, Jonny and Fagan)

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2009-02-25B-Bill to Add Public Financing

Can get the funding for this as a payable out of next year’s exec budget, so will be funded from that source for the current election cycle.

Undergrads made a few changes, and did approve this bill at the Senate meeting yesterday.

Adam B. concerned about this bill, especially since the caps bill didn’t pass. Thinks that by giving money now, we’re just pouring gas on a fire, because students are accepting a $1500 cap by accepting the money, and thinks they’re not going to be able to compete with someone spending much more.

Mary asks for specific examples of what Execs have done in the past to win that we might need to consider in our regulations. One story is that there are two factions in the Senate, and they in the past manipulated the fair campaign rules when they had an Elections Commission on their side. Mary doesn’t think that someone spending $1500 should be at such a huge disadvantage compared to someone who could spend more. It was only recently that spending got so out of control, and groups did win when spending lower amounts of money.

Polina asks Jonnny and Fagan how much they spend. It was $3700 all told, with about $2000 towards t-shirts. Fagan thinks that you need some money to be competitive, but it’s not just money that lets you win. The $1500 is a deliberate choice as an amount they think will allow candidates to be competitive. Given that the money is coming out of future Exec budget, not any of our money, think it’s worth a gamble. Fagan thinks Public Financing is the honey, while the caps would be vinegar. Can work with either or both.

Polina in support of this bill, thinks Fagan hit the important points.

Fen thinks it’s worth trying, that we’re not losing anything, that it might encourage grad students to run.

Etosha thinks that it’s kind of late, given that petitioning ends on March 1st, in just a few days, so concerned that it may not be fair to change the petitioning rules and signature requirements now. Briana isn’t here, but did say at yesterday’s Senate meeting that she was in support of this Bill, getting the word out, and letting people try to meet what they need to. Okay with the new supervisory role this gives the Elections Commission, though Etosha disagrees with this.

George thinks caps bill makes more sense overall to make things fair, but Fagan doesn’t think it’s going to get through Undergrad Senate for this year, especially in the current time fram

David thinks winning the race with $750 (what public financing would give) is possible, $1500 (total spending cap if accepting public financing) should definitely be possible. Also thinks that they should be able to get petitions done in time. Fagan thinks it’s a good option to allow students to spend some of their own money if they so choose, part of the compromise of the bill.

George thinks that it would be very frustrating for students if $1500 is not enough to be competitive, so not worth doing if they’d be likely to lose without being able to spend more.

Adam B. thinks that if we don’t put caps in now, they’re never going to happen. Also, thinks that it’s a problem that co-terms count towards the required “grad signatures” because reaching them doesn’t really show reaching out to the larger body of grad students here who were not here for Undergrad.

Briana sent an email out last night to ASSU candidates to make them aware of the potential changes with this bill, so they do at least know now of the possibility. Might be missing some late entrants, but thinks that people who need to know probably do.

Andrew wonders how we’re going to reach the students who didn’t enter because of financial constraints, who would particularly benefit from this change. Yes, it’s a bit short notice, but Polina thinks we might as well try.

6 for yes, 3 opposed, 4 abstaining. Does not pass.

Polina asks for major concerns for people voting no or abstaining.

Justin abstained because he thinks the system still requires too much emphasis on spending $1500, which some people can’t meet. Mary thinks it’s good that those students would at least get $750 to spend. Justin thinks we really need to have overall caps for everybody to level the field.

Nanna thinks we need caps for everyone, doesn’t think $750 is enough and that not everyone has the $750 extra to spend. Also thinks the details of full caps bill were better. Last logistical issue is that officially we don’t approve the minutes until next Wednesday, which would be past the current petitioning deadline.

Andrew thinks that if the point is to allow people without means to join, and the goal is to get new people, we really don’t have time to make this happen. Also thinks it’s too late to impose new campaign rules now.

Polina wonders whether it would be better if we pushed back the deadline to get petition signatures.

David doesn’t think the t-shirts (often the expensive part of the budget) are the deciding factor of the election, that he had more shirts made but that didn’t get him the win. Someone did approach David wanting to run if this campaign finance option goes through, thinks there may be others like that. Also doesn’t think it’d be a problem for a good candidate to get enough signatures.

Ryan conflicted about this bill right now. Thinks there are a few small things, including getting things in before the deadline. Also concerned about the rules, wonders whether anyone could challenge the timing of when this is applied.

Etosha wants to make sure that if the deadline is extended that it’s clear it is not because of Elections Commission. Will try to get in touch with Briana to see what she thinks.

Doesn’t seem that we need to vote on changes to the elections timeline.

If we change anything about the bill itself, then the Senate needs to revote next week, then it wouldn’t be approved until two weeks from yesterday, again too late, so should consider the bill as-is.

Fagan is really disappointed that this hasn’t passed right now, as this is an important issue to him. They’ve been working on this issue all year, including many meetings in the past few weeks to try to come to consensus. Doesn’t think that logistics should be stalling this at this point, that we should be voting for the bigger idea, and can make small changes later. Thinks the concerns brought up now should have been brought up earlier in the process. At the least, thinks we should approve things for next year, rather than letting the issue drop completely.

Etosha reports that they could extend petitioning for a week, until March 6th.

Ryan asks for whether there’s someone else who would change his/her vote following the discussion, to see if a 2/3 majority (necessary to overturn the previous vote that did not pass) would vote yes. Seems possible by straw poll.

Nanna moves to revote.

9 for, 1 against, 2 abstaining. The Public Financing Bill now passes.

10) 7:54 NAGPS Lobbying (Fen and Ryan)

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Presentation about plans for Legislative Action Days this spring.

NAGPBS coordinates spring and fall lobbying trips to DC. Stanford hadn’t done these in last two years, but did go this past fall. They coordinate meetings with UC Davis (another California participant) to talk to CA representatives and senators. They try to focus on people representing nearby districts, or people who are on particularly relevant committees.

There are some suggested NAGPS wide issues to advocate about, but each person can focus on what they in particular care about and what most impacts their constituents.

Some recent issues:
– Research funding: increase funding agency budgets; green energy initiatives should start with universities.
– Loan programs for graduate education: recently, an undergrad loan program was renewed, but the grad aspect was not. Also, even grad loans are based on four year Undergrad timeline, which does not fit with grad school always. Representatives are not always knowledgeable about basic facts like this.
– Immigration: H1-B visa
– Healthcare: dependent healthcare is a big issue for California schools, interesting to talk to other schools about this as well, along with the representatives. One of the nearby representatives serves on both education and family concerns committees, and they’ll try to set up a meeting with him.
– Graduate stipends: return graduate stipends to tax exempt status. They did use to be tax exempt.

Adam B. thinks a bunch of these things have changed in the last few weeks, with stimulus money. Also a lot of recent issues with H1-B visa related to stimulus rules (for example, requiring those taking stimulus money to hire only US citizens). Right now, Universities are exempt from H1-B visa hiring quotas, so also want to make sure we don’t lose that.

Last time, they met with 3 members of congress in person. Met with staff members for 2 senators, 10 representatives for congressman, and Committee on Education and Labor. Had constructive conversations relating to all issues, and gathered information relating to current legislation.

Changes for this visit: New administration, democratic control of both houses of Congress, stimulus package affects funding agencies and University. Take lessons from last time and improve our advocacy.

Plan of attack: Meetings being scheduled in conjunction with UC Davis for CA reps and senators. Three pronged attack: Local area reps, members of Committee on Education and Labor, moderate democrats. Think this will have the greatest impact within the limited time frame.

Local people they’re seeking out:
Senators: Barbara Boxer, Diane Feinstein (latter already scheduled)
Representatives: Anna Eshoo, Zoe Lofgren (Chair of the Subcommittee on Immigration), Jackie Speier, Mike Honda (Democratic Senior Whip), Lynn Wollsey, Barbara Lee, Nancy Pelosi (Speaker of the House).

Many democratic and republic members of the Committee on Education and Labor they’re looking for. George Miller (Chair) is in UC Davis’ district.

Moderate Democrats they’re seeking out:
Adam Schiff, Loretta Sanchez (Gubernatorial candidate?), Jane Harman, Pete Stark, Joe Baca, Jim Costa.

Additional preparation:
– Met with John Pearson to get additional info from I-center. Goals from them are as follows:
Maintain H1-B exempt status for the university.
Continue to improve user friendliness of electronic data keeping.
Minimum work permission for F2 visas (dependent visas – can’t earn money at a job, or volunteer for a job that someone would ordinarily be paid to do).
Prescreening for students going home for break, so they have a better chance to get back from breaks in time.
Figure out if international students can accept public dependent healthcare (Concerns that they can get onto plans like Health Families, but that may count as taking “social welfare” which then might lead to later visa problems.)

– Input from GSC?
Nanna wonders about priorities. They generally start with immigration and visa issues, because some of those are very particular to graduate students, which means that other people are not addressing them as much. Probably after that would be dependent healthcare. In general, they look up what the person they’ll be meeting with does ahead of time and customize the presentation to that.

For Mary, important thing would be science and technology, because funding for that affects funding now and for getting a job later.

Up soon too: NAGPS Western Regional Conference, at UC Davis, April 4-6, 2009. Purpose is to interact with other grad student leaders on a range of topics pertaining to graduate education. There’s a call for topics right now. Would like a few people to go from here, and we can just drive up.
Mary, Nanna and Simone would be interested in being involved with this. We’ll also talk more about this at the retreat.

11) 8:23 New Business (Polina)

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i. Andrew is doing survey on Grad student dining in Munger, will send out link to us in the next week that we should send out.

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GSC meeting 2009-02-18

Wednesday, February 18th, 2009

Proceedings of the February 18th 2009 GSC meeting

Agenda

1) 5:45 FOOD (thanks Shane!)

2) 6:00 Welcome with introductions and Announcements (George)
i. Please be aware that all meetings are audio recorded and will be made available on the GSC website.
ii. Approve minutes from the last meeting (2/11/09)
iii. Winter retreat will be in San Francisco on Saturday, February 28th. If you are interested in going, please raise your hand or email Polina (polina@stanford) by 2/20 at the latest.

3) 6:05 Funding (Addy)
i. Pakistanis at Stanford
ii. GSB International Development Club

4) 6:15 Senate Report (Justin and Ryan)

5) 6:20 ASSU Update (Jonny and Fagan)

6) 6:25 Fiscally Responsible Campaign Spending Bill (Ryan)

7) 6:55 Programming (Justin and Adam S.)

8) 7:00 Special Fees Process (Lan)

9) 7:15 Funding Request for DC Lobbying (Ryan)

10) 7:30 Discussion of GSC Winter Retreat Agenda (George)

11) 7:50 New Business (George)

Attendance

Voting members present:
At large 1: Aleksandra Korolova
At large 2: Adam Beberg
At large 3: Nanna Notthoff
At large 4: Ryan Peacock
At large 5: Mary Van der Hoven
Business: Rick Thielke
Earth Sciences: Justin Brown
Education: Shane Moise
Engineering 1: Polina Segalova
Humanities: George Bloom
Medicine: Maria Spletter
Social Sciences: Hanna Muenke

Voting members not present:
Engineering 2: Addy Satija
Law: Andrew Park
Natural Sciences: Fen Zhao

Other people present: David Gobaud, Vardaan Chawa, Daniel Bui, Kyle Anderson, Adam Sciambi, Simone Manganelli, Shelley Gao, Varun Sivaram, Chari Raxwaxke, Lan Wei, Donna Winston, Ping Li, A. Danowitz, Fagan Harris, Jonny Dorsey

Minutes

1) 5:45 FOOD (thanks Shane!)

2) 6:01 Welcome with introductions and Announcements (George)

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i. Please be aware that all meetings are audio recorded and will be made available on the GSC website.
ii. Approved minutes from the last meeting (2/11/09) by consensus.
iii. Winter retreat will be in San Francisco on Saturday, February 28th. If you are interested in going, please raise your hand or email Polina (polina@stanford) by 2/20 at the latest. She’ll send out another email soon asking who’s coming and who wants to stay over at the hotel Saturday night.

3) 6:04 Funding (Lan)

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i. GSB International Development Club – having a one day conference, requesting $6556. Asking for food, programming expenses (including money for AV technician, rental and clean-up), and general marketing. 60-40 Grad/Undergrad split for group membership. The conference is called ‘Food for Thought’ and they will be discussing issues of food security, etc. Money recommended for marketing is just for flyers – the banners and t-shirts requested were cut. Recommended $4572. Giving $4572 passes by consensus.
ii. Pakistanis at Stanford – Speaker event with Shuja Nawaz, a political and strategic analyst. Will be held in Cubberly, so much of the money is for space rental. Recommended $1000. Also have money from other sources. Giving $1000 passes by consensus.

4) 6:10 Senate Report (Ryan)

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The Undergrad Senate discussed the caps bill, which we’ll talk about later in our agenda. Also had a presentation by student groups associated with the community centers showing their support for keeping them running as they are. Also, Matt McLaughlin was officially approved as Financial Manager for 09-10, which we did last week.

5) 6:12 ASSU Update (Jonny and Fagan)

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Having bystander campaign this week to promote students not just being bystanders if they see something that should be addressed. Lila, co-chair for health and wellness has been working on that. There’s a program online that people can take, and Fagan has sent a link for it to us, encourages us to send it to others.

The Wellness room is opening on February 25th, and Execs worked with Chris Griffith to hire two staff, who will coordinate student volunteers. The room is centrally located in Old Union, meant to be a resource for students to address mental health needs. Will have programs about skills that people can use to stay happy. Think that Vaden has a stigma associated with it that may prevent people from seeking help, and that the Wellness Room may lead more people to get at least some information about mental health resources.

Execs sent a draft of the Service Group Bill and the Public Financing Bill that they hope we will be able to vote on next week. Some grad students worked on this as well.

Apologized for short notice on the meeting this morning about Caps bill, it was mostly geared towards Undergrads who had concerns following their Senate meeting yesterday.

6) 6:18 Programming (Justin and Adam S.)

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Will be using SSE for ticket sales for the formal, which will mean that tickets can be purchased at the ASSU office or online. Will sell tickets through event day, and run busses to formal from Tressider so that people can get last minute tickets there, and this won’t have to be done at the formal itself. People could not get on the bus without a ticket.

Still working on finding a band for the formal, but do have catering set-up. Fagan says that he has band suggestions, will get in touch with Justin.

Side note on GCC Ops – things are going well in the GCC. The building has been used three times as much since we modified the room reservation rules, and there is much more variety in the programming occuring. No concerns about the pub came up at this GCC Ops meeting, perhaps helped by the fact that they have more student bartenders.

Updates from GSPB: They have Grad Night with live music this week and next week at the GCC. Next Friday they’re having a Mafia event. The GSPB meets Tuesdays at noon at Old Union, and anyone who has ideas for programs is welcome to join them there.

7) 6:21 Fiscally Responsible Campaign Spending Bill (Ryan)

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Fiscally Responsible Campaign Spending Bill

Ryan worked with some Undergrad Senators, Briana, and Polina to craft this bill.

Some Undergrads are concerned about things that we don’t think are the case, such as whether a caps bill goes against the ASSU Constitution rules on free speech. Other concerns are ones that we potentially do want to think more about, such as how enforcement of the cap would work, and what potential punishment would be (for example, whether it should be disqualification or loss of fair campaign label). Undergrads also concerned about whether we can get this done in time for this year and iron out the necessary kinks in time.

Reminder that this is meant to augment a public financing scheme, not replace it, so we should consider this bill on its own.

Some concern that we need to make sure the Bill and monitoring of spending is set up in such a way that it encourages people to work within the limits imposed, rather than trying to subvert them.

George asks whether it’s okay for Elections Commissioner to officially support the Bill. Adam B. thinks so.

Adam B. reminds us that the Elections Commissioner was created as an independent body to oversee the elections of GSC and Senate and Execs, and as such, it would be their role to come up with a fair overseeing.

Fagan thinks the Undergrads have the perception that the Elections Commission is not impartial, don’t think Undergrads would want to give them such a large responsibility for overseeing caps and making decisions about punishment resulting from any problems. This would be a big increase in responsibility for the Elections Commission, thinks they would need to be bigger in order to meet this role.

Nanna thinks that if the Elections Commission isn’t considered impartial, this impacts lots of other things already, and that should be dealt with separately. Fagan thinks that the Exec race is seen as higher status than the others, which is why Undergrads may not want to give Elections Commission too much influence on that race in particular.

Nanna also doesn’t think enforcement would need to be that big a deal, for example, if people had to get flyers and such through SSE, then we’d have full record of their order and cost. Fagan thinks that we need to work through details of logistics like that before implementing this Bill.

Polina asks about how candidates would approach a cap, whether they’d embrace it, or try to subvert it. Fagan gives the example of how last year when the rules gave a limit for Undergrad fliers, he and Jonny instead put lots of fliers in Grad residents, which wasn’t specifically outlawed, so some evidence that students may well do what they can to advertise themselves, even through loopholes.

Andrew wonders about the phrasing of part A in the proposed changes, about how much money can be spent and questions whether other people could spend the money for the candidate. It does say the limit is what “may be spent to campaign for a candidate or slate” so it does mean by anyone on behalf of the candidate as well as what the candidates spend on themselves. In that case, Andrew wonders whether it could be possible that someone spend money on a candidate uninvited. which would then be counted against the candidate. Also concerned about gifts not easily monetized, such as gift of website design.

Ryan specifically left bill somewhat open for now. Wants to run this in an elections cycle and see how it goes, then fix problems later if any come up. It would be tough to list out every possibility that someone could do and specifically ban it, prefer to have people buy into the general principle and make their own appropriate decisions.

Adam B. is concerned that the Undergrads think that the rules for a cap and the enforcement thereof need to be complicated, and that simple rules wouldn’t work. Fagan thinks it’s a vocal minority who is preventing this in the Senate right now, and it’s not that everyone is against the idea of caps. Many others do want to see it through, though they may want some more operalization of the rules and enforcement, which Fagan agrees would be appropriate.

Justin encourages us to just focus on our own opinion of the Bill, and not to worry about the senate. It needs a 2/3 majority to pass, so it’s okay if there are some dissenters.

George felt like previous discussion suggested that candidates would welcome a reason to spend less money, but Fagan thinks that people are concerned about the worst-case scenarios of people looking for any loophole they can in order to win the election.

Shelley thinks that the Senate has some valid concerns, and they want to see this implemented in a long -term successful way, but don’t think it’s there yet. They’re definitely concerned about the timeline of implementing the bill, as we are already into elections, with this being the first week of petitions.

Nanna thinks that maybe having a shorter notice of the new policy would be good, as there would less time for students to try and get around it.

There are objections to consensus to we move to a roll call vote.
10 for, 1 opposed, 1 abstaining. The Fiscally Responsible Campaign Spending Bill passes the GSC, but the Senate would need to pass it too.

Update on Public Financing Bill – latest proposal would subsidize slates up to $750, and lets them spend up to $750 more of their own. Primary mechanism of enforcement would be to operate through reimbursements. Candidates would submit budget ahead of time, then turn in receipts after elections. Elections Commission would then go through the receipts and give reimbursement. Any campaign or budget violations would mean that the candidate would not get their reimbursement. Would like to implement this Public Financing Bill for this elections season, so trying to move quickly on this.

Need to solidify funding source, but think that it will come from the Exec budget of the year that the candidates are running for, at least at some point. For pilot, think money should come from GSC and Senate. Suggesting this because of the way the budget years work (July to June), and thought it’d be hard to pull money from 09-10 budget to use this year for elections. Adam B. and Nanna think that should work, though Matt McLaughlin had told Execs that it wouldn’t, so they’ll work it out.

Regardless of source of money, Adam B. concerned about Public Financing idea, especially given concerns about joke slates. Fagan thinks that it’s important to include everyone, and that even the joke slates are not always as silly as they appear. Thinks the barrier to entry of getting many signatures (including both Grads and Undergrads) would be enough to help.

Fagan think it’s a multi-faceted approach to funding, that we should consider this along with the caps, so that the financial barrier to entry is lower.

Ryan reminds us that there is an overall limit that will be spent on slates asking for public financing, so if more slates qualify, the money each receives would be reduced. Reminder that many slates do gamble on their campaign costs with the hope that they’ll be able to pay it back with their later salary, so we’re just taking that gamble out of the equation, even though the source of paying is ultimately the same.

George concerned that presenting both bills together might reduce support for either, with the possibility that negative feelings about one would impact the vote on the other. Fagan thinks that the Undergrads seem more in support of this public financing bill than the caps bill (somewhat opposite of the GSC), and thinks that they can be presented with similar timing.

8) 6:58 Special Fees Process (Lan)

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Polina gives a shout out to Undergrad Appropriations committee; there was a good budget meeting on Sunday for which they were well prepared.

Intended applicants for special fees: groups with a broad mission and impact on Stanford, with extraordinarily large budgets (greater than $8000). The request must be voted on by the Stanford community. Accepting special fee money means they are ineligible for discretionary funds (including the VSO Funding money). Any unused money from the requests goes into a reserve.

This year there are 8 applications for joint special fee groups, with 7 returning groups, and 1 new group. There are no grad only groups.

Steps that joint special fee groups need to take: create a budget at banking.stanford.edu, indicate intent to be a joint special fee group, attend funding interview, then petition if necessary. After that, the application is placed on the ballot for voting.

Need to petition if they want to request more money then the committee approved (need 15% of student body to sign petition), if they are a new group (10% of student body signatures), or if they are a returning group with a budget increase of more than 10% (10% of student body signatures).

As part of the recommendation for each group’s budget, amount of reserves are taken into account. If a group has requested an increase in budget compared to the previous year, and they have 20% of their total request in reserves, money from reserves should fund the increased request. If after that transfer (or initially if there was no request for an increase in budget) high reserve amounts still remain, then groups are asked to fund 9% of their total request from reserves.

Legal Counseling was asked to pay 9% of their request from reserves. Pacific Free Clinic was asked to pay some from reserves, but not the full 9% because they have specific plans for part of their reserve.

Mary asks why Club Sports requested budget is lower this year. Lan thinks it’s because of changes in active groups in the umbrella organization.

Groups applying for joint special fee must have a membership of at least 35% grad students, which is at least some indication in interest to grad students overall. Also, if these groups are not sufficiently reaching the grad population, then students voting won’t know about them and therefore might be less likely to vote to give them money. In order to be approved for funding, each group needs to get 15% total of both the Grad and Undergrad populations to vote yes, and 50% of voters from each student body voting yes. This may be a challenge on the Grad side this year, since there’s no other major issue (such as the Go-Pass) facing students.

9) 7:06 Funding Request for DC Lobbying (Ryan)

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NAGPS is having Legislative Action Days coming up. Ryan and Fen went in September, thought it was a successful trip. Asking for money for plane tickets, will get boarding from NAGPS. Ryan thinks that going to DC and lobbying members of Congress is a successful advocacy strategy for us, and feels that it is particularly important with a new administration.

Asking for $550, to have a buffer, but thinks it may be less. Nanna gives us information on current spending. Total advocacy budget is $3500, spend $1443.59 on NAGPS Legislative Action Days in September 2008, gave money to Diversity Action Committee, leaving $1442.87 in that account. For General Discretionary, have $4690 allocated, spent $2052 on NAGPS (recent conference and $500 yearly dues), and then some money other things, leaving $2614.88 in the account currently. Total NAGPS spending is then $4494.87 out of the two accounts. Nanna thinks this is already a lot of money, especially for something that we don’t see obvious outcomes helping students.

Objections to consensus, so moving a roll call vote.

7 for, 2 opposed, 1 abstaining. Giving $500 from Advocacy Discretionary passes.

10) 7:11 Discussion of GSC Winter Retreat Agenda (George)

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Will be an all-day meeting, Saturday February 28th, getting to San Francisco around 11am, stopping for lunch at some point, then work until 5pm.

Suggestions for discussion:
– get website right
– talk about how programming is funded.
– make long term plan for advocating University budget cuts.
– elections enforcement and policies
– discussion about department groups losing department money and coming to us instead.
– cheerleading session for member recruitment

11) 7:15 New Business (George)

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i. Justin – Stanford Public Safety folk could do investigation into our missing instruments if we would like them too. Would just need to provide them receipts.

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GSC meeting 2009-02-11

Wednesday, February 11th, 2009

Proceedings of the February 11th, 2009 GSC meeting.

Agenda

1) 5:45 FOOD (thanks Shane!)

2) 6:00 Welcome with introductions and Announcements (Polina)
i. Please be aware that all meetings are audio recorded and will be
made available on the GSC website.
ii. Approve minutes from the last meeting (2/4/09).
iii. Winter retreat will be in San Francisco on Saturday, February 28th. More info coming soon.

3) 6:05 Funding (Addy)
i. Russian Student Association
ii. Stanford Management Operations Research Engineering Students

4) 6:15 Senate Report (Justin and Ryan)

5) 6:20 ASSU Update (Jonny and Fagan)

6) 6:25 Programming (Justin and Adam S.)

7) 6:30 I-Center Updates (John Pearson)

8) 7:00 Musical Instruments Update (Noa and Mary)

9) 7:10 Improving Programming Expenses Process (Justin)

10) 7:20 Bill to Re-appoint Matt McLaughlin as ASSU Financial Manager
for 2009-2010 (Nanna)

11) 7:35 University Advocacy (Polina and George)

12) 7:55 New Business (Polina)

Attendance

Voting members present:
At large 1: Aleksandra Korolova
At large 2: Adam Beberg
At large 3: Nanna Notthoff
At large 4: Ryan Peacock
At large 5: Mary Van der Hoven
Earth Sciences: Justin Brown
Education: Shane Moise
Engineering 1: Polina Segalova
Engineering 2: Addy Satija
Humanities: George Bloom
Law: Andrew Park
Natural Sciences: Fen Zhao
Social Sciences: Hanna Muenke

Voting members not present:
Business: Rick Thielke
Medicine: Maria Spletter

Other people present: Ping Li, Donna Winston, David Gobaud, Simone Manganelli, Lawrence Chow, Noa Lincoln, Adam Sciambi, Fagan Harris, Jonny Dorsey, Matt McLaughlin, Alex Teichman, Dan Chawia, Alexander Nezlobin

Minutes

1) 5:45 FOOD (thanks Shane!)

2) 6:04 Welcome with introductions and Announcements (Polina)

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i. Please be aware that all meetings are audio recorded and will be made available on the GSC website.
ii. Approve minutes from the last meeting (2/4/09) with the following change:
Specify that the current housing rates (cheaper for the apartments with unconverted living rooms) will remain in place only through the end of the current contract for those who move back into their newly converted apartments.
iii. Winter retreat will be in San Francisco on Saturday, February 28th, which Justin is planning. More info coming soon. We’ll leave here Saturday morning, meet during the day, then go out to dinner, and stay overnight in a hotel there. A show of hands suggests that many people will be able to attend.

3) 6:09 Funding (Addy)

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i. Russian Student Association. Have about 90 members, mostly graduate students. Planning three upcoming events that they’re requesting money for. First is a concert by an Eastern European Band. Other two commemorate important Russian National holidays. Requesting $1700 for all three events. $250 for honorarium (matched from other sources), $1300 for event food lowered to $1240 due to cap, $150 for programming expeses. Recommended $1640. Giving $1640 passes by consensus.

ii. Stanford Management Operations Research Engineering Students (SMORES). Have five student seminars planned, with students from various research groups presenting. Generally lunch events, and plan to have one every two weeks or so. Total recommended is $1200, because of food cap. The upcoming one this Friday was advertised on Grad Events. They did ask department for food money, but were declined. They are a new group, so no precedent for getting department funding. They did apply for and get SPICE funding from VPGE, but that didn’t cover enough. Giving $1200 passes by consensus.

4) 6:15 Senate Report (Ryan)

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Discussed NomCom and some other issues that aren’t directly pertinent to this body. Other items they discussed will come up later in this meeting probably.

5) 6:17 ASSU Update (Jonny and Fagan)

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Jonny thanks those who came to State of Association speech he gave.

They have some upcoming confirmation bills that we’ll see soon. Had some projects that were not being addressed, so appointing some new czars, including Free Speech Czar (understanding what student rights on free speech are), Fun Czar (addressing balance of regulations for safety and fun for party planning), and Community Czar (thinking about services we could be providing to the broader community, like tutoring staff’s kids, providing information about affording housing, etc). The czars are officially appointment for just the current term, though the next Execs could follow the precedent.

Also next week putting two new members of Constitutional Council up for confirmation. Holding an open session next week so that we can ask the candidates some questions ahead of time if we want.

Soon will also have a bill to create an ASSU Service Division that will work on projects that serve the students, such as the ASSU Green Store, Wellness Room, and Airport Shuttle. These have been delegated to the Execs, which is not ideal given their yearly turnover, so would prefer to have a more permanent solution in place. Adam B. asks about SSE and why these projects won’t go through them. Matt McLaughlin reports that the goal of the SSE is only to work on projects that directly improve the financial stability of the ASSU, and these new projects do not fit that core mission. These projects sort of fell to the Execs because of that, but it doesn’t necessarily fit the core mission of the Execs either, which is why it makes sense to have this separate group. The money will mostly come out of the budget the Execs would have used for those projects. Having office hours on Monday to talk about this.

Having a Campaign finance meeting on Friday at 2pm. Open to anyone who wants to work on this issue.

Lastly, having a Townhall on Friday at 6pm to talk about budget stuff. Grads are encouraged to attend. They’re at the point of needing to cut money from specific projects, which we’ve already gone through on the Grad side, so could perhaps offer some guidance.

6) 6:28 Programming (Justin and Adam S.)

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Looking into rentals for the Formal, probably a bit under budget for now. Still trying to figure out band situation, and how much money to put towards that, and how to balance cost and quality. Generally have DJ playing in the first half and a band in the second half.

7) 6:30 I-Center (Bechtel International Center) Updates (John Pearson)

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John is the director of the Bechtel International Center. They are the University’s immigration center as well, so work with all International students, post-docs, visiting scholars, families, etc. Currently have 2726 Grad International Students, which is about 33% of student body, which has been fairly consistent. The Undergrad percentage is lower (about 6%) but has increased in the last few years. Stanford is 21st in total enrollment of international students, but 1st in percentage of student body, since many of the other schools with high numbers are larger schools.

Along with the immigration advising, Bechtel does a lot of programming for international students and their families. They have some events focused on bringing in members of the local community, have many English classes each week, have some spouses holding classes for foreign languages, and they match spouses up with community members, among other activities.

One of the big challenges has been an increase in regulations for International Students, which has increased since 1986, which meant that Bechtel was spending a lot of their effort working on compliance with the regulations. Had more recently had an increased budget for programming, though that’s currently ending.

When John first started 20-30 years ago, they saw themselves as primarily advisers, and spent 1-on-1 time talking with students about schooling in general. However, many new regulations since 2001 have kept them busier. The Federal Government requires reports on student activities, including registration, moving, etc, which is 36,000 events each year to monitor, though many do not require follow-up. They generally do their best to work with student to address any concerns before official reporting. Stanford also sometimes needs to monitor students up to 29 months after they graduate, depending on their visa situation, which includes regular updates checking in on address and employment status. This has been a challenge sometimes since students don’t always keep in touch like they should after they leave Stanford.

One thing they’re proud of is a mandatory information session that they hold in the fall, which students must attend before they’re allowed to register for classes. Part of this is that they need to verify to the government that the student has arrived on campus, and is also a good opportunity to make sure students have all the information they need about maintaining their status.

Ultimately, students are responsible for maintaining their status, but Bechtel and Stanford do their best to help them do so, with quick responses from advisers to address any concerns. About 98% of International Students have relatively smooth sailing while here, but the other 2% are more difficult.

Concerned about implications of current legislation for foreign students after they graduate as well. For example, banks receiving bailouts have a provision that they can’t hire H1s, and legislation for students being fast-tracked for green cards has fallen by the wayside. The RealID Act being considered would be very difficult for students as well, in that it’s tied to the length of the visa. Students from China, for example, only have a 1-year visa, so they’d have to reapply for a driver’s license each year. There may also be an increased requirement to keep track of student spouses who apply for work, which Bechtel does not currently need to do.

Have seen an increase in the last few months about visa delays, leading to problems for some students trying to return to campus after winter break at home. Students from Iran have been advised not to go home, because they have to go through clearance again each time, which can take 2-3 months, potentially leading to missed classes.

Another issue is insurance for dependents. Bechtel reaches out to students prior to their arrival, letting them know that it may be tough to get care here, so things should be done back at home if at all possible.

There are rules against Bechtel advising on visa issues (for example, students wanting to apply for a green card), so they bring in lawyers periodically to address these issues.

International students trying to get a job in the US after graduation also face challenges there, given a limited number of H1 visas, for which one needs to apply on April 1st to receive by the following October. The application requires proof of graduation by that time, but our winter quarter conferral is April 2nd, which students really can’t afford to wait for. Bechtel is working with the registrar to see if there’s anything that can be gotten earlier that could be included in student’s applications about impending graduation.

Bechtel also helps students who seek off-campus employment, and processed about 1000 authorizations for this last year.

There are many restrictions about what international students can do while on-campus. F1 students can only work 20 hours a week on-campus, which an RA-ship already fills. Unauthorized employment is very bad, so take this requirement seriously.

Run a lot of interference with local service centers, Immigration Office, DMV, etc, to get students through those processes.

Don’t know yet what budget cuts might be, but hope that advising funds will remain as is. They will adjust programming levels as necessary.

Have 15 total staff to cover the various advising and programming needs of International students and families. They also administer some foreign awards.

Polina reports that in our original letter to the Provost and others specifying which programs we thought highly benefited Graduate students we did encourage that the I-Center budget stay as intact as possible.

Fen asks about proportion of international students in STEM fields (who can get a work authorization extension). There are 1510 students in Engineering, with 3385 total in those fields. For the extension to work though, employers need to use a particular e-verify system, which most employers don’t have in place yet.

John has done advocacy for the International students in government, did testify to Congress, and do have some Stanford connections there working on immigration.

Ryan asks about increase in cost to deal with post 2001 regulations. $400,000 is John’s estimate, based on needed increase in staff hours. The SEVIS system, which is used for tracking International students each quarter (in terms of enrollment, address, etc) and reporting any changes to government, has been an expense, including the need for IT help to get student data organized in a way that staff can gather and batch necessary student info. Did have to do some information reporting previously, so not all is new expense, but there has been an increase. There’s a new update to the tracking system coming next year which is said to be paperless, which Stanford then also has to adjust to. This is an unfunded mandate from the government that Stanford has to meet.

Aleksandra has had a very positive experience in working with I-Center to follow the regulations, getting advising, etc. Finds them much more responsive than other departments.

8) 7:04 Musical Instruments Update (Noa and Mary)

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Went through receipts of expenditures on the instruments, and based on those, it looks like $5200 was spent. Noa has been going through current equipment to see how it matches. Seems some things that were on receipts are no longer there, and some parts have been switched.

Things that are missing or switched include:
- base guitar head/amplifier has been switched for different model which is cheaper
- 2 PA speakers are missing.
- A base guitar has also been switched out for a cheaper model.
- An acoustic guitar and case cannot be found.
- A Beringer keyboard and guitar amp is also gone.
- Missing a bass effects pedal.

What we do have:
Guerilla base amp (not on original inventory).
Rouge base
Randal amplifier
Les Paul Gibson guitar (though not as in good condition as it should be).
Drum set (which has been set-up and assembled and is in good condition).
Strings and cables and guitar picks seem to be there.

Noa thinks there are people who would like the equipment, including him, hence the motivation to get things organized.

Polina asks for any recommendations that would make the set more appealing. Noa thinks getting more strings, picks, drum sticks, etc, would help, and that those are the types of things that might need to be replaced each quarter. Cable supplies okay for now. Some more cases for the instruments are probably needed. An effects pedal might be something to get, though most bands might have this.

Mary is handling general equipment check-out right now, but have not added musical instruments to the official offerings. The goal is to move to a new system by spring, so perhaps have Noa come back closer to the spring when we’re ready to post things, and have him include lists of “must haves” and “nice to have” so that we can really get the collection ready for use.

Nanna suggests that Noa work through Grad Challenge set-up to make a proposal for how to get this equipment up and running.

Or $5200 original receipts, about $3600 seems to be missing, and current value if we were to sell it off might only be $800.

A band could function with what we have, but quality is lower than might be nice.

Part of the problem is that no one is really sure what equipment originally arrived and in what condition it was in at the time, because the person organizing the purchase had already left campus, and others did not have the necessary expertise to know equipment quality.

Reason to suspect that the receipts may not be entirely accurate, because there were some problems with that. Because of high cost of instruments, Nanna advance-paid, but then the purchaser did not turn in all the necessary paperwork. This was a challenge with the GSC accounts over the summer, and they were temporarily frozen to try to deal with this. Couldn’t resolve the situation, especially with the purchaser gone, so the only step taken in the end was the end any advance paid purchases.

Donna wonders, given the problem in getting back final receipts, if maybe the receipts that we have reflect what the purchaser initially intended to buy, but then didn’t actually end up buying it.

Noa concerned about the fact that the bass equipment in particular was listed as very high quality on the receipts, as compared to the rest of the equipment, and wonders if the purchaser or others might have later swapped out the higher quality pieces supposedly ordered with less expensive ones.

Seems there might be a possibility to pursue legal action to figure out what happened with this equipment or money. Polina will follow up with the purchaser.

9) 7:22 Improving Programming Expenses Process (Justin)
Tabled until next week.

10) 7:22 Bill to Re-appoint Matt McLaughlin as ASSU Financial Manager for 2009-2010 (Nanna)

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Matt is currently Financial Manager, completing his first term this summer. They can reapply for second year under certain circumstances. The search committee reviewed Matt’s application, decided to recommend him for a second year.

Next year will be tough with budget cuts, Matt looking forward to the challenge.

Ryan likes how personally Matt takes the money troubles, an indication of how seriously he takes the job.

Approving Matt McLaughlin as the ASSU Financial Manager for 2009-2010 passes by consensus.

11) 7:24 University Advocacy (Polina and George)

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Last Friday, some GSC members sought some clarification about what was going on with the budget.

Chairs had originally sent letter to President and others highlighting programs they thought were highly valuable. President responded that what he really needed was suggestions for programs that could be cut. Spent awhile searching out actual budget numbers for some programs that are in place for Grad students, and then we had a post-GSC meeting conversation about the budgets for various programs and what recommendations we would make for cuts. Chairs then took those suggestions to write a new letter about programs that could be cut. Had a meeting with the Provost, and a separate meeting with the VPGE about those ideas.

The VPGE reported that there are $29 million worth of Graduate Fellowships currently. Have cut back on things that had been proposed but not yet implement, and took some cuts in other places, but will not reduce those fellowships.

Had originally also scheduled a meeting with the President, but arrived at the conclusion that they already had all the necessary information about budgets and programs from the other sources, and thus canceled that meeting.

Will send another email to the Provost and others detailing some of the cuts that we suggest, based on our own meeting and discussions with the Provost and VPGE. A draft of this email went around last week, but haven’t sent that out yet.

There will likely be more budget cuts next year, don’t know what percentage yet. Probably want to start some of the ground work visits to offices rather sooner than later to make sure we have as much information about existing programs and budgets.

Polina and George were very pleased in the meetings they had with administrators to see how committed the University is to graduate student issues, but we need to work with them so they know what we value.

Would like our buy-in for the current email proposing some cuts to specific programs, and also our help to meet with other offices.

Ryan still concerned about the stated GSPB budget, since there seems to be some slush funds that we’re not sure where it goes. In the books, there’s $75,000 listed total for the GSPB budget, of which what we think of as the GSPB saw about $25,000. Other money probably went to GLO and NGSO, but we’re not completely sure. Provost thinks in large scale amounts, so not his concern to deal with money on this level, so did not try to figure out further details from him when they met. Ryan would like to see money in the budget specifically going to actual GSPB, not that gets filtered through others. Also need to figure out GSPB/GLO relationship, and how money works between them, but that’s another conversation. In short, one problem is that reimbursement for GSPB from GLO goes through University channels, which can take months. There is a P-card that the GLO office can lend to GSPB, but not an efficient system given the number of students planning events.

Adam B. reminds us that advocacy needs to continue to be a focus of the GSC, especially given what will likely be an upcoming tough couple years. We have a good relationship with the Administration, better than some other schools, and we need to maintain this.

Generally nodding approval for sending the email proposing some budget cuts to programs affecting Graduate students to the Provost and others.

12) 7:40 New Business (Polina)

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i. Some interest in tour of Munger. Polina will follow up with Housing to make that happen.

ii. We’ve been having University Administrators coming in to talk to us at GSC meetings, but don’t currently have anyone new on our list to invite. Ryan recommends a Government affairs person, and will send info to Polina. Thinks that would be helpful in preparation for NAGPS Legislative Action Days. Also suggestion to have some meetings with scheduled time to talk about big issues facing us, rather than scheduling a visitor. Mary suggests inviting the school Deans. Simone asks about possibility of the Constitutional Council coming and talking to us, given some recent questions about policies and procedure. Polina has asked, they suggested that if we really want good advice, that we would have to submit a case, rather than have an information discussion at a GSC meeting.

iii. Andrew has been taking a class, through that has the opportunity to take on Dining issues on-campus. Ran a focus group about dining. Will be doing survey about perceived needs and wants of students, would like our help in sending that out once he has it.

iv. Valentine’s Party on Friday the 13th in GCC. Doubled the beer order from the Stoplight Party, so need some people to come to drink it! Starts at 8pm. There will be a DJ.

v. Ryan wants our opinion on caps for elections, possibly a strict cap of $1500.
- Fen thinks it would be really hard to mandate and check up on this, thinks stating a cap that cannot be enforced would be problematic.
- Mary thinks it would be good to try, work on the details later.
- Etosha looked up caps at other schools, some in $1500 range, some lower.
- Andrew doesn’t think enforceability should prevent us from instituting something that we believe in.
- If it’s really unenforceable, Simone doesn’t think we should pass it, but would want to put effort into finding ways that it could be enforced.
- George thinks amount is a bit high, given that if you take out big expenses like t-shirts and big expensive banners, that’s a lot of money to spend on other outreach methods.
- Fen says that when elections had procedures whereby students could get a “fair campaign” label in the past, almost no one followed it. Ryan thinks in this case people would be disqualified if they were found to be cheating, not giving them a choice.
- Ryan is all for running this elections with caps and seeing what happens, closing loopholes for any problems that come up. Fen thinks there would just be too many challenges to address in a timely fashion during the campaigning time.
- Adam B. thinks there are enough ways to potentially enforce, thinks campaigns were fine a few years ago with the lesser amount of money they spent.
- George asks about the role of money in the campaign, whether it’s part of the fun culture. David doesn’t think so, would personally welcome caps as a candidate.
- Nanna also approves.
- Seems to be general thumbs up for pursuing this.

vi. Campaign finance meeting is on Friday, email Briana with any questions.

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GSC meeting 2009-02-04

Wednesday, February 4th, 2009

Proceedings of the February 4th, 2009 GSC meeting

Agenda

1) 5:45 FOOD (thanks Shane!)

2) 6:00 Welcome with introductions and Announcements (George)
i. Please be aware that all meetings are audio recorded and will be made available on the GSC website.
ii. Approve minutes from the last meeting (1/28/08).
iii. Send any updates for the February Grad Announce to Polina by Wednesday 2/4 at 11:59pm.

3) 6:05 Funding (Addy)
i. Stanford Cycling Club Loan
ii. Special Fees Process Timeline

4) 6:15 Senate Report (Justin and Ryan)

5) 6:20 Programming (Justin and Adam S.)

6) 6:25 ASSU Update (Jonny and Fagan)

7) 6:30 IT Services (Bill Clebsch)

8) 6:50 Update on Budget Meetings with Administration (Polina and George)

9) 7:00 GHAC Update (Nanna)

10) 7:10 Publicity Update (Ivette)

11) 7:20 Elections Goals (Etosha and Briana)

12) 7:35 Elections Commission Public Financing Bill and Timeline (Etosha and Briana)

13) 7:50 Re-allocation of Funds for Valentine’s Day Party (Nanna)

14) 7:55 New Business (George)

Attendance

Voting members present:
At large 1: Aleksandra Korolova
At large 2: Adam Beberg
At large 3: Nanna Notthoff
At large 4: Ryan Peacock
At large 5: Mary Van der Hoven
Earth Sciences: Justin Brown
Education: Shane Moise
Engineering 1: Polina Segalova
Engineering 2: Addy Satija
Humanities: George Bloom
Law: Andrew Park
Natural Sciences: Fen Zhao
Medicine: Maria Spletter
Social Sciences: Hanna Muenke

Voting members not present:
Business: Rick Thielke

Other people present: Shelley Gao, Rae Brownsberger, Ping Li, Simone Manganelli, Ivette Estay, Adam Sciambi, Donna Winston, Andrew Danowitz, Jonny Dorsey, Fagan Harris David Gobaud

Minutes

1) 5:45 FOOD (thanks Shane!)

2) 6:02 Welcome with introductions and Announcements (Polina)

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i. Please be aware that all meetings are audio recorded and will be made available on the GSC website.
ii. Approved minutes from the last meeting (1/28/08) by consensus.
iii. Send any updates for the February Grad Announce to Polina by Wednesday 2/4 at 11:59pm.

3) 6:05 Funding (Addy)

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i. Stanford Cycling Club Loan – Stanford Club Sports is umbrella group for the Cycling Club. The Cycling Club wants to borrow $26,000 from Club Sports reserves, so Club Sports is asking for approval for that. The cycling club buys bikes at reduced cost from a sponsor, and this is the second of a two-year-deal with them. They sell bikes at the end of the year and use that to pay back the loan, which they did successfully this year. Approving loan transfer of $26,000 from Club Sports reserve to Cycling Club passes by consensus.
ii. Special Fee process has started. First meeting will be Feb 7th with mostly Undergrad Groups. Next meeting will be with primarily joint groups on February 15th, 8:30-5pm.
Special Fees are groups that work on a large budget that are funded directly by student fees. Legal Counsel is one example of a joint Special Fee, which gets money from both Grads and Undergrads. We’ll see budgets for any Grad and joint Special Fee Groups soon.

4) 6:10 Senate Report (Shelley)

2009_02_02_3_UGrad Senate##

Had a discussion on Campaign Finance with Execs and Elections Commissioners. Not really any more time for the Elections Commission to work out details of the program in time to put them in place for this year’s election, so took a straw poll vote on the pilot program as was presented to the GSC last week, was evenly split on support. Some senators are starting a working-group to address this issue to see if they can come up with an agreeable Bill in time, and would like our support. Etosha asked about the possibility of support for caps on spending (which some GSC members had expressed interest in), but that’s another can of worms that will likely not be addressed in time for this year.

Keep in mind that the pilot program would be funded by us, while future years would not be, so we should consider them separately if something does come up for a vote. Ryan reminds us that Undergrad Senate takes a week longer for votes, because Bills must be introduced a week prior to voting on them.

5) 6:13 Programming (Justin and Adam S.)

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Catering run by the pub group will cater the formal, and are giving a good deal. The catering will serve beer and wine, and liquor will be bought and served separately. Will pay catering $9000 for beer and wine and food.

Have quotes from bus and entertainment companies as well, OSA appreciating the organization and steps so far.

Need to talk to Matt McLaughlin about SSE ticket service, would like to consider that to reduce the per-ticket fees that they’ve paid in the past with other options.

Other Programming note is that we had a good Stoplight party last week in the GCC.

Side note from GCC Operations meeting– the office downstairs is no longer Stanford Housing, but a separate security company, who deals with lock-outs, late check-ins, etc. They do not handle room reservations in the GCC. All they handle is access to the sound system for the first floor, so if we want to use that for events in the first-floor, we need to get in touch with them ahead of time to make sure someone will be around.

The online link for reserving rooms does go to the new correct place, rather than that office.

6) 6:16 ASSU Update (Jonny and Fagan)

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Jonny giving a State of the Association at 6pm this Friday, will have burritos. Would like to see us there.

Budget moving forward. More info on elections coming up later.

7) 6:17 Update on Budget Meetings with Administration (Polina and George)

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Polina and George met with the Provost last week, along with Execs and Shelley, to give them our thoughts on the budget process. They also met with the VPGE later in the day, after which they realized they had talked to sufficient people to gather necessary information, so canceled a planned meeting with President. There’s a letter handout of what they sent to the President, Provost, VPGE and VPSA with current suggestions about cuts that could be made to some programs. Also on the handout is the original letter sent with some programs that they find very worthwhile. In their discussion about funds for Thanksgiving, there was some push between people who wanted to cut it completely, and others who didn’t think it should be cut at all. Provost encouraged them not to cut it too much. The Provost also will be funding the Easter Egg Roll out of his own pocket this year. He’s very committed to making sure those programs continue.

Still some confusion about the original amount for the GSPB, recorded as $75,000, though the GSPB itself has never really gotten the full amount for (the $75,000) because it’s gone to other things. We think for next year, other sources of money will fund things like NGSO, so even if the $75,000 is cut, GSPB will still get their normal budget. Concern that the suggested 53% cut from the overall amount suggests that we don’t value the GSPB as much as other things, but in conversations, that should be clear that it is not the case, and that actual money to the GSPB itself should not decrease.

Another suggestion from the letter are to reduce NGSO funds by $31,000 (52%) to $30,000, by eliminating some of the food focused events of the week while still maintaining goals of providing new students with information and also opportunities for them to meet other new students. The third suggestion is to decrease the budget of Thanksgiving Dinner by $15,000 (33%), which would still allow the spirit of the event.

8) 6:26 IT Services (Bill Clebsch)

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IT services is responsible for on-campus computing, telecommunications, networking, etc. Bill gives a handout about their call from the University, and what their specific plans are to make that happen.

Nanna asks about separation between the Residential and the Campus networks, given that students who register as on-campus residents then can’t get help about the connection from department IT services, because those people don’t have access to that system. Separation is somewhat historical, in terms of how some things were originally installed, but also thinks it works out to have RCCs, who probably keep more similar schedules to other grad students than IT services and thus more able to help when we need them. Overall IT services still handle the actual network and such. Part of the problem is that the ResComp registration is somewhat set in its ways and tough to change quickly, but they’re working on it. Ryan points out that off-campus people have the similar problem in that if they’re registered with their department, but then visit a friend on-campus, they can’t use the residential internet.

Simone asks about wireless service on-campus, because he has had problems in places like Rains, Tressider and Bytes. IT doesn’t get separate money from the University for wireless access, because it’s seen as a “fringe benefit,” so they’ve been doing what they can to install wireless within their existing budget. Problem about connectivity has gotten worse, potentially because of all the IPhones on the campus. They’ve been adding some access to the quad, and have a contract with a distributed antenna company, which will increase cell coverage, especially for ATT, but also help for Verizon. This should happen this summer. Will put wireless systems up on the towers as well, which should help with service outdoors. Working on N-protocol, which would mean each channel would get more bandwidth. Rains is tough for wireless given its layout, but might get better in the next two years.

Working on a new research computing facility data center, trying to build it up at SLAC. It would be greener than other facilities, enough to help a long way towards the cost of those green processes. Data centers are important to get at the right capacity, because too small fills up fast, and large ones are a huge use of energy despite being underused. Want to build a modular system to help meet the correct need.

Addy asks about RCC criteria and training. This is ResComp’s deal, not Bill’s domain.

Andrew asks about support for Vista 64 bit, has had trouble with getting the Stanford registration software through. RCCs can do this manually, but that’s not a good long-term solution, because 64-bit will probably get more popular.

Fen asks about access to the new computing facility. It would be Stanford only, would be controlled by Dean’s ultimately, working with faculty. Transport time for huge datasets to current cloud computing systems is large, which is another benefit for having a facility on campus to use instead.

Aleksandra asks about point 10 on the plan, which is about the communications fee. The idea is that everything will ultimately be on one network, with all phone, voice, internet, coming in one form, so it might make more sense to have a single fee, rather than multiple. The last time they worked on fees for students, they communicated with the ASSU, so would do that again.

Mary asks about the Earth Sciences computer cluster. Theirs is externally funded, separate from the University. It’s probably out of space soon though, and the Clark center has had the same problem, so even departments who have some resources would likely benefit from the large scale computing project as well. Bill has been talking with those schools to see what works well for them and incorporating ideas into the new project.

Maria wonders about security of email addresses, concerned about the fact that her email address has been used to send out spam. Did not find ITs response very helpful, which was essentially that she just shouldn’t worry about it. In November, they did have a large-scale success in shutting down a spam server, so the spam went way down, but the spammers do ultimately get this up again; it’s always an ongoing project to try to stay one step ahead of the spammers. Overall, Stanford does seem to be doing better than other schools, but never going to be perfect.

Andrew asks about the reasoning behind the new antivirus software. Bill thinks the new product is a bit more advanced, offering a broader scale of services, and is also less expensive. Have a three-year-contract with them, would again re-evaluate all options when it’s time to renew.

George asks about potential for using GMail as a host for email. Faculty and staff are not interested in using anything with an off-campus service, due to the potential for sensitive information being sent around. We can’t be certain how data is stored off-campus, and Google for example, is more susceptible to subpoenas. Also, the medical community really needs secure transmission, with Zimbra (current system) does allow. It’s possible to do something different for students, who may not care as much about security. Using Gmail as a host instead of Stanford might allow SuNet email for life, which could be a nice benefit, but Alumni Affairs and Registrar have some concerns that would need to be addressed first.

9) 6:53 GHAC Update (Nanna)

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At the recent meeting, they talked about converted Couple’s housing 1-bedrooms, where the original living room is used as a second bedroom. Would like to put a full lockable door for that living room space. Working on converting Blackwelder completely, and also two floors of Quillen. Plan is to move out two floors completely into other EV housing, install the doors on those floors, then move people from another floor into those newly converted spaces temporarily for two-weeks while they install the doors on the new floor, then move back to their original space, which would now have the completely separate room.

220 people live in Blackwelder. The benefit would be that students would get to move back to the two-locked door place and keep their old rate through the end of the current contract year, even though those rooms would otherwise be more expensive than unconverted rooms. Some apartments will be kept in their current state, without doors separating the living room, to allow flexibility in space such that couples could move back in, depending on demand. Students were informed about this likelihood when they first moved into Blackwelder.

Ryan thinks the University should reimburse two-weeks rent or something for the inconvenience. Nanna thinks it’s unlikely to happen. Donna reports that when they did this a few years ago in a different section, students who were relocated were guaranteed on-campus housing for the following year (not just if they resign where-ever they get put for spring quarter).

Fen would like us to consider this as a broader issue, given that there is a lot of potential moving around upcoming, given Munger and other renovation plans.

There will be movers to help move stuff, apartments cleaned and such, to try and reduce the hassle on the students.

Munger is essentially on track, but the one building with the Great Hall may not be completely done by Fall. The top floor may not be done, which misses out on a few apartments. This is because they need it to stay open in order to build the Great Hall, and the permits for this have been delayed. The students living there now seem to be happy, and Andy Hernandez is working with them to address concerns, and to provide programming. They’ve found some problems with these “try-out residents” that they are now addressing, like insufficient capacity for electrical circuits, and that the building is so well sound-proofed that people don’t hear knocks on the doors, so they’re installing door bells. Also some concerns about pathways between buildings. There’s a special hot-line for Munger residents to let builders know of any problem areas. In terms of programming, have had a ski trip, and cooking classes (because they moved from Crothers, which doesn’t have kitchens). Crothers CAs moved over as well.

Gender neutral housing will be extended as regular program. Currently available in Rains and Schwab, and will probably be in Munger as well. Right now there are 16 graduate students taking advantage of this, seems to be more demand among Undergrads. It’s somewhat complicated with random assignment, and the need to keep equal numbers available for males and females, but Housing is working to make it possible.

Rates for next year, including for Munger, will probably be approved next week, when Trustees are here, but it’s not confirmed right now, and the discussions were confidential, so Nanna can’t give us an update yet.

Mary asks about DoorKing system, which is not in place in Munger yet, so people have to come down to let people in. Nanna thinks DoorKing will be set up there at some point.

Another problem with housing is that a lot of EV houses have radiant heat, which they’re trying to update because some pipes are leaking. Have a 10- to 12-year-plan to fix this. Doing 3 buildings at a time to try to limit disruptions to students (many families in those types of houses), but also can’t afford to reduce capacity by much. Also making some other changes like adding more insulated windows.

Will have more options for couples next year, including two-bedroom options if both members are students. As of now, they’ve assigned single students from waitlist, still working on families. Housing on-campus is currently very full.

10) 7:09 Publicity Update (Ivette)

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Next project is elections. Will try to visit a lot of upcoming Grad events to tell people about the GSC, hopefully get them interested in running for a position. Plan to hit up some department happy hours.

Would like to get some new publicity items. Thinking about party beads with GSC logo on medallion. Would cost about 0.90 each if ordered in quantities of 500, so $450. 1000 items would cost $750 total. Think they have about $1000 to spend on these items.

Reminder that all elected members can spend $100 each on GSC promotion, though Nanna reminds us that only $1000 total can be spend among all of us.

Adam B. likes that some of the other things we’ve done are more reuseable, like the grocery bags we gave out in the fall, doesn’t think that the beads would match that.

Shane wonders if we could make it an access thing, that if bringing them back to another event would get you something. Fen thinks it might work well as a party favor for the formal or something, rather than just distributing it randomly.

Fen wonders whether we could do reuseable cups. Donna says this didn’t work very well when they tried it in the past, because people didn’t realize they could keep the cup. Mary suggests having a benefit for keeping the cup and bringing it back, like a shorter line at parties to get a new drink.

Ivette also looked into shot glasses, but personally doesn’t think that people would be good at keeping track of them, can couldn’t find good options for getting those engraved.

We’re not really reaching a conclusion with our discussion. Ivette will look into other options at various price points and present them at a future meeting.

Ivette did look into LED things like lights and buttons, haven’t found ones that can be printed well.

11) 7:22 Elections Goals (Etosha and Briana)

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Missing the audio of the very first bit due to changing batteries on voice recorder.

Etosha’s goal is to have at least two people per position. Some ideas to make this happen:

– Coffee with the candidates. Encouragement for current GSC members to invite someone they think would be good for the GSC to have coffee and talk about it. Would be reimbursed $10 gift card, if you turn in receipt, the name of the potential candidate, and their permission to get contacted with elections updates and encouragements to run.

Addy suggests making sure Elections Commission use a Stanford address to send out information, not a Gmail address.

Overall, the anticipated budget for coffee with the candidates is about $300. There are also some bonus options if you take more people to coffee, or reach across to other schools.

Plan to be at happy hours with flyers, working with publicity committee to make this happen. Polina would like the flyer sent out via email as well so that we could give it to candidates we take to coffee.

Second goal is to increase grad voter numbers by 10%. The last few years have accomplished that, although we may be hitting a wall, with 25% voting in last year’s election.

Will send two emails to departmental Student Services reps and ask them to forward it to all students. One will be ahead of time, and one will be sent day-of to remind people to vote. Will also use Flicks ads, Grad Announce, Grad Events, and Facebook.

Straw poll suggests about 9 people think it’s good to advertise the amount of money we control as a teaser for getting interest, but 3 don’t think that’s a great idea to list that detail.

Specific plans for grad students:
Meet, greet, and eat brunch with the candidates. Plan is Sunday, April 5th, Ryan concerned that it’s the same time as the NAGPS Western regional conference. Suggestion to move it to noon, rather than 10am. Adam B. concerned about off-campus students coming for this, but can’t please everyone.

Will have Rock the Vote again, with student groups performing. Will be on a Wednesday April 8th 8-10pm. Would like to introduce the candidates at this event.

Now moving on to timeline. Have ‘Elections Commission Bill 02’ with the proposed dates that they would like us to approve.

Highlights:
2/4-2/25 Coffee with the candidates
2/11 and 2/25 Intro sessions after GSC meetings
3/2 Grad candidates declaration of intent due
3/9 Candidate Handbook statements due (submit online)
Campaign week will like have Grad Student Brunch on 4/5, Exec debate on 4/7, Rock the Vote 4/8.
Voting 4/9 and 4/10, tentative Vote and Dine one of those evenings depending on budget.
Results party 4/11

13 for, 0 opposed, 1 abstaining. Timeline passes.

Now for an update on Campaign Finance:

Still a lot to be ironed out in order to make a pilot work this year. Jonny and Fagan and some Undergrad Senators would like to work on this, inviting GSC people to work along as well.

Ryan would like to bring the discussion back to caps. Asks about Constitutional Council. They’re currently trying to fill some spaces on it, have some law students who should be on it soon. Ryan is not convinced by the arguments that caps shouldn’t be okay, would like to hear from Constitutional Council what they think. Suggestion to separate the issues of caps and public financing on bills, because we could approve one and not the other.

Mary concerned about the article that showed up in the Daily on two accounts, first that it implies the issue is dead in the water, which it may not be completely, and also that it implied that the GSC was also there and part of the discussion (which we were not, because it was an article about the Undergrad Senate meeting). Also, the Undergrad Senate did not take an official vote, just took a brief poll to see where people stood.

Etosha was at the meeting, thinks that the biggest concern from the Undergrad Senate was about the caps and the opt-in part of the system and whether it would work, with less concern about the actual amount of the money.

Justin asks what Etosha thinks is possible with these bills. Based on the Undergrad Senate, Etosha thinks there may be more support for caps than we had assumed, though still an issue that would need work and compromise before it would pass.

Fen wonders how we would enforce caps, in the pragmatic sense of checking how much candidates have actually spent. Jonny and Fagan agree that it would be hard, and we may not have much in the way of law or actual consequences for those who don’t follow caps. Honor code probably doesn’t help much in this case. If we wanted it to apply, University would need to be involved. Otherwise, we could probably just disqualify them from the race.

The issues of caps and public financing are somewhat related, in that we don’t want people taking public financing and then spending a lot of their own money in addition to that.

Even with caps, might be helpful to have public financing available, because of the initial goal of reducing the barrier to entrance. Ryan and Polina and Andrew volunteer to work on this. They will present some bills (three probably) soon.

12) 8:00 Re-allocation of Funds for Valentine’s Day Party (Nanna)

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Valentine’s Party is often done by the EV CAs, have $3500 allocated for them for this event in the budget. However, the EV CAs don’t want to do it this year, and GSPB would like to take it over, so just need to approve the GSPB using the money for the party instead. Planning to spend $2500 for beer, $500 for security, and $500 for a DJ. Shifting $3500 from EV CAs to GSPB passes by consensus.

13) 8:03 New Business (George)

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i. Good Stoplight party. They ran out of beer at 11:30pm, they ran out of wrist bands so at least 700 people were there, and people came dressed up in appropriate colors. All sorts of people came, including couples and singles. Equipment was all returned, no disasters.
ii. Mary points out that the website really needs to be a fixed, that this should be a way that new people can learn about us and what we do, and why they should want to join us. The website is the first place she had looked to learn more before becoming more involved, and was disappointed at the time about information available. The current website is very out of date, including the events that are advertised, and the people listed as members. They’ve tried to find another webmaster, but have not managed to get one yet.

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