If you haven’t visited Pioneer Web to vote on student initiatives yet today, you have until midnight.
This week’s SGA Awareness Week included an ice cream social before Tuesday’s usual Joint Board meeting, an open forum on Wednesday evening, and chips and dip in the SGA offices throughout the afternoon on Thursday. Senators and Cabinet members also hung out outside the dining halls during dinners.
In just three days of talking to students at dinner, SGA President Mark Henry, ’05 recorded 64 comments, from students wanting a safer campus to the return of fountain soda in the Forum.
The ice cream social was a hit, too, said Henry. “We had about six or seven students—who as far as I know had never been to Joint Board—come for the ice cream and end up staying, so that was encouraging.”
—Ben King
Because Grinnell administration changed its smoking policy to make Grinnell College a smoke free campus, there was the guarantee that a smoking lounge would be established for North Campus and South Campus. Due to the lack of sufficient support from many students for a smoking lounge on North Campus, the Student Government Association should decide the location of the second smoking lounge on Grinnell College campus with a committee consisting of one student from each dorm on Grinnell College campus.
Background: Since the suicides that occurred in the spring of 2003, Grinnell College created a Mental Health Task Force in the fall of 2003 to examine the status of emotional and mental health on campus and the resources available to students. One of the primary recommendations from the Mental Health Task Force is the implementation of buffer days before exams. In addition to the suggestions from the Mental Health Task Force, many of Grinnell College’s peer institutions of higher learning already have at least one day or an entire week as a reading period prior to exams, including Carleton College, Wesleyan University, Duke University, Smith College, Harvard College, Amherst College, Yale University, Williams College, Swarthmore College and Bowdoin College among others.
Statement of the Initiative: Given the intensity of the last week of classes, the recommendation of buffer days by the Mental Health Task Force, and their implementation at peer institutions of higher learning, we, as the Grinnell College student body, propose the implementation of one or two buffer days between the end of classes and the final examination period.
Plan of Action: We propose that a group of students, faculty, staff, administrators and the registrar convene to determine the best way to schedule buffer days as part of the Grinnell College academic calendar.
Whereas the Coca-Cola corporation is a known international and domestic human and labor rights violator and has been charged with numerous irresponsible business practices; and
Whereas Grinnell College has an exclusive pouring rights contract with the Coca-Cola Corporation; and
Whereas Grinnell College prides itself on its long history of conscious consumerism including the eschewal of apartheid investments, sweatshop apparel and old-growth wood paper products; and
Whereas in 2001 SGA passed a resolution demanding consideration of student input in decisions regarding the college’s corporate contracts, and promoting ethical standards of consumerism;
Whereas 528 members of the Grinnell student body have signed a petition boycotting Coke products and disapproving of the actions of the Coca-Cola corporation;
We resolve that Grinnell College Dining Services should provide students with viable beverage alternatives to Coca Cola products and work towards ending their contract with the Coca-Cola Company.
Background: Grinnell College has twice made a commitment to addressing issues of institutional sustainability by employing two temporary Environmental Coordinators. It should now make that commitment permanent. In the past three years, Grinnell College has hired two separate environmental coordinators that served one-year terms. Both these employees have been recently graduated students. Brian Turner (Class of ’02) served from 2002-2003 and Dave Theriault (Class of ’04) is currently employed for the 2004-2005 year.
The temporary environmental coordinators have added much to the campus. They have contributed research on issues as varied as institutional composting and green building, audits of campus consumption, acted as liaisons to various stakeholders on campus and provided a central office for environmental concerns.
Yet, a temporary employee’s impact is inherently limited. The College would benefit by having the consistency of a long-term, full-time employee. Similarly, the College would gain more from an Environmental Coordinator by hiring a person with professional training and experience in the area of institutional sustainability.
President Osgood has indicated to members of the Campus Advisory Committee on Environmental Concerns (EcoCampus) that he is in support of establishing a permanent Environmental Coordinator position. This initiative is intended to give student encouragement to the administration to create that position.
Statement of the Initiative: The Grinnell College administration should make the temporary position of Environmental Coordinator a permanent, full-time position. The position should be established with a competitive salary that will attract professionals who can address the environmental issues of an institution such as Grinnell.
Plan of Action: The Student Government Association will send a letter certifying the results of this initiative to President Osgood and Nord Brue, Chair of the Board of Trustees.
The Student Government Association along with the Campus Advisory Committee on Environmental Concerns (EcoCampus) will work with President Osgood and other members of the administration to submit the necessary budget requests and other information needed to create a full-time position for an Environmental Coordinator.
Statement: The College should consider providing photographic facilities and resources as a priority, and the College should commit to creating or finding a space for a traditional, black and white film processing darkroom.
Background: In past years, a black and white film darkroom was available to students through the Craft Workshop, facilitated by the Office of Student Affairs and maintained by students. The Craft Workshop, formerly housed in the basement of Darby, was displaced when the building was demolished and was not relocated due to space limitations. There were plans to include a darkroom in the new campus center, but due to budget cuts that is no longer a possibility. The College has no formal curricular photography classes, and although there are possibilities for incorporating digital photography courses into the Art Department, traditional black and white photography is still neglected. The one darkroom that does exist, in the publications building, has extremely limited space (one enlarger) and is of substandard quality. This darkroom is also restricted to S&B and the yearbook staffers due to legitimate security concerns about the publications building. Thus, the campus entirely lacks adequate black and white film processing and printing facilities open to all students. Beginning next semester, the Craft Workshop will operate a digital photography class, but the absence of a darkroom is still a problem. Digital photography and film photography are different artistic processes, each with their benefits and disadvantages, and both should be considered desired by the students. Many students come to Grinnell with background of darkroom photography and desire to continue that interest here, even if in an independent capacity. Not having a darkroom on campus is a concern felt by current Grinnell students, and will continue to be an issue, as students coming to Grinnell will expect a school of our caliber to have a quality film processing and printing facility.
Plan of Action: There has been a valiant effort in Student Affairs to keep the Photography Craft Workshop, as well as the Ceramics Craft Workshop, functioning. We appreciate these efforts and recognize that space reductions limit everyone. However, the main goal of this initiative is to illustrate the interest students have in photography in general, and especially black and white photography. We would like to express concern that traditional film photography not be de-emphasized and abandoned in the wake of digital photography. Every attempt should be made to utilize the Craft Workshop equipment now in storage, or find a way to make the publications’ darkroom fully functional and usable, without infringing on the newspaper or the yearbook. For the long term, we ask the College to reserve a space for a darkroom in the future and make a commitment to establishing a high quality facility.
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