The Cornell Daily Sun (https://cornellsun.com/tag/sa/page/3/)
The Student Assembly is geared up for another election season with three students running for the presidential seat. All three candidates agree on one thing – closing the gap between the assembly and the students it represents.
The Student Assembly recently attempted to loosen those rules by voting to increase the student activity fee — an expense students pay to support on-campus organizations — from $234 to $321 in December 2019.
The resolution lists multiple instances in which S.A. members have reportedly engaged in misconduct, including allegedly using “racist and sexist dog whistle terminology” during presentations and making derogatory comments about other members, such as “behavior resembling sexual harassment.”
Amid student-led protests at Syracuse University over a slew of racist incidents, the Student Assembly passed a statement of support of these students on Thursday. “The Student Assembly calls on leadership at Cornell, at Syracuse, in New York State and on the Federal Government level to acknowledge and investigate these hate crimes and allocate all resources possible to support the communities affected,” the statement read. “We look forward to seeing justice delivered.”
For nearly two weeks, Syracuse has experienced a number of racist incidents that garnered national attention. These incidents included instances of racist graffiti, depictions of swastikas and hate speech directed towards black and Asian students. Tensions heightened when students were reportedly sent a racist, conspiratorial manifesto about white genocide.
The Student Assembly put on hold a resolution on Thursday that would create a new spot for a representative from the Charles H. Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management, with many members citing concerns over reapportioning representation for each of Cornell’s colleges in the S.A.
The Student Assembly approved Thursday increases in byline funding for Cornell University Emergency Medical Services, the International Students Union and the Multicultural Greek and Fraternal Council Thursday, kicking off its funding cycle of 2019. If these increases are approved by the S.A. at the end of the semester, they will go into effect in 2020.
Last semester, we had the opportunity to sit in on a meeting between President Pollack and a group of graduate and professional student leaders. These meetings are regular opportunities for students to communicate issues directly to senior administrators. Topics range anywhere from event management to support for student-parents to diversity and inclusion on campus. At the end of this meeting in particular, as students were packing up and preparing to leave, one of us casually mentioned, “At some point, we should probably talk about OrgSync too.” Everyone paused. The energy in the room changed.
The Undergraduate Student Assembly discussed creating a representative position for students with disabilities, although no official decision was made at the S.A. meeting Thursday afternoon. At the same meeting, the S.A. also passed a resolution calling for the creation of a Student Health Advisory Committee, which aims to establish a committee “in conjunction with the GPSA and Cornell Health to improve quality of care and collaboration at Cornell Health.”
Read the vote counts for all the candidates who participated in the Fall 2018 Student Assembly election.
Sixteen freshmen and four transfer students are competing for four freshman representative positions and one transfer student representative position, respectively.