The 17th ASSU Undergraduate Senate met for the last time for the 2014-2015 academic term on Tuesday, June 2. During this meeting, one resolution and two bills were voted on.
Bus Rapid Transport Passes
The Senate passed the Resolution In Support of El Camino Bus Rapid Transport Project, which was introduced and discussed last week by students from Students for Sustainable Stanford (SSS).
University Committee Nominees
Representations from the Nominations Committee brought up concerns about the constitutionality of certain actions taken by the University to appoint a student to a position that was not nominated by the designated Nominations Committee for that specific position.
“Technically the constitution says that whoever we nominate and then you guys approve has to be on the committee,” explained Daniela Olivios ’15, Co-Chair of the Nominations Committee.
The position in question was for the Undergraduate Representative for the Board of Trustees: Committee on Alumni and External Affairs.
“The agreement was that there would be a student voice who would be advocating for the student population, so this is very much in [the Senate’s] power for who gets chosen,” said Olivios.
Because there is no precedent for this, there would be some discussion as to how the position would eventually be filled.
A motion to first reconsider the Bill to Confirm University Committee Nominees failed. A following motion was passed to approve an amended version of the Committee Nominees, in which the position in question was left vacant.
TDX: Stanford Bicycle Project
A Funding Bill was passed to support a project initiated by the Theta Delta Chi Fraternity to recycle and refurbish abandoned or donated bikes in order to distribute them to students based on need.
The project had been denied VSO status and was requesting funds for storage and bike repair materials. The project will partner with FLIP to assess the distribution details.
“FLIP is a VSO, too, they don’t have necessarily the same information that the Financial Aid office has, but they have resources that will help them evaluate everyone. They are known to be experts in this field on campus,” said Senator Justice Tention ’18.
Contact Alex Bourdillon at abourdil ‘at’ stanford.edu.