Graduate Student Assembly
Regular General Meeting

4:15-adjournment; Monday, December 1, 2003
Texas Union, UNB 3.116

MINUTES

1. Call to Order. The meeting was called to order at 4:18 by Marian Barber (Co-Chair).

2. Verification of Attendance.

Executive Committee Members Present: Marian Barber (Co-Chair), Don Drumtra (Co-Chair), Joyce Banks (Secretary), Dan Gilman (Treasurer), Ginger Gossman (Publicity Coordinator), Erik Malmberg (Electronic Resources Coordinator), Melissa Midkiff (Special Events Coordinator).

Certified Representatives Present: Peter Haney (Anthropology), Maria Baroco (School of Information), Jane Ries (Mathematics Education), Rob Deemer (Music—Composition), Larry Oubre (Music—Performance), Paul Mathews (Neuroscience), Robyn Honig (Psychology), Ruby J. Jones (Slavic Languages), Marcus Hilliard (GLBTGrad), Erin Boade (TSEU), Jenny Peterson (GSEC)

Uncertified Representatives Present: Don Zinman (Government), Ken Ward (LLILAS), Taran Johnston (Spanish and Portuguese), Rachel Mitchell (Music Theory), Lori Stuntz (Economics), Sylvia Gale (English)

Alternate Representatives Present: Eva Noyola (Astronomy), Makiko Iné (Linguistics).

Ex-Officio Members Present: Victoria Rodriguez (Vice Provost and Dean of Graduate Studies, GSA Faculty Advisor), Rusty Ince (Senate of College Councils Chair).

University Committee Representatives Present: Melanie Ulrich (University Library Committee), Sarah Ponchitera (Student Library Advisory Committee)

Guests Present: Jennifer Lee (General Libraries), Patty Drumtra

3. Adoption of Minutes of Last Meeting: November 3, 2003. Several amendments to the minutes were offered. Dr. Victoria Rodriguez should not be listed as an Officer but as Ex-Officio in the verification of attendance. Rusty Ince should be noted as Chair, not president of the Senate of College Councils. The minutes passed unanimously as amended.

4. Reports of Guests. None were offered.

5. Reports of Ex-officio Members

a. Vice Provost and Dean of Graduate Studies Victoria Rodriguez. Dr. Rodriguez had two significant items to report on. First, a new Admissions Policy using race and ethnicity as part of the criteria has been submitted to the Regents. For graduate students, they have also included financial support as part of the proposal. It has been submitted so that it can be reviewed, published, and hopefully be implemented in time for fall 2005 admits. This was necessary since a statute requires them to publish any policy for a year before it can be enacted. Second, and more importantly for graduate students, the Benefits Committee is ready to make their recommendation to President Faulkner and the UBC (University Budget Committee). Until this report has been formally presented she is not at liberty to elaborate on any details of their recommendations. Dr. Rodriguez also wished everyone well wrapping up their semesters and then opened the floor for questions or comments.
Marian Barber (Co-Chair) asked if they were still planning a public forum with graduate students on the issue of Benefits. Dr. Rodriguez noted that yes; they were still hoping to be able to do this once the recommendations had become public. Pete Haney (Anthropology) asked: What is the timeline for adopting a policy? They are making the presentation tomorrow (December 2, 2003). After the presentation, she imagines that implementation will be very fast since departments and faculty members have been very eager to know what they can include in their offers of admission. Don Drumtra (Co-Chair) asked Dr. Rodriguez if she had any comments to share about the Tuition Committee. Dr. Rodriguez noted that the committee’s recommendations were tweaked by Dr. Faulkner—the most significant change was increasing financial aid from 30% to 50% before submitting it to the Regents. The recommendations are now in a 60 day comment period for the fall increase, but in general it has been well received and the Regents have approved the increases. Erik Malmberg (Electronic Resources Coordinator) noted that several people have voiced their concerns that their spring tuition bills had not reflected an increase in the waiver for TAs and AIs to cover the increase in tuition. Dr. Rodriguez noted that there had been some glitches in the timing of the tuition bills and the committee’s recommendations being implemented but students could expect these to be rectified since the University is committed to covering the increase for these employees.

b. Rusty Ince (Senate of College Councils). Rusty noted that he sits on both the Enrollment Committee and the Racial Respect and Fairness Task Forces. Both will be releasing their reports the first week in the spring semester.

6. Reports of Officers (Please read posted reports online in advance of the meeting)

a. Co-chairs. Posted on-line via Blackboard.
b. Secretary. No report this month.
c. Treasurer. No report this month.
d. Special Events Coordinator. No report this month.
e. Public Relations Coordinator. Posted on-line via Blackboard.
f. Electronic Resources Coordinator. Erik Malmberg noted that he attended the NAGPS in November and will present on it shortly. He also announced that he had worked with Dan Gilman (Treasurer) to submit a request for a one-time purchase to the University Fee Committee for a new photocopier for the GSA office. Our current photocopier is very old and can’t do many standard functions. If the request is approved he would like to look into letting representatives of GSO’s use the machine as Student Government offers use of its machine to student groups.

7. Reports of University Committee Representatives Committee reports have been posted online at the GSA website. No additional reports were offered. Erik asked is anyone had feedback regarding the report submitted by the Commission of 125? Several members noted that they have heard that the reports were not well written. Marian (Co-Chair) offered to speak to Dr. Rodriguez about where the Commission of 125’s report stands.

8. Reports of Ad Hoc Committees. None were offered.

9. Unfinished Business

a. Approve Resolution Concerning the Protection of Students' Civil Rights in the Wake of Passage of the USA PATRIOT Act. This resolution was postponed at the November meeting. The Assembly voted unanimously to consider passing it at this meeting.

The motion passed with one nay vote.

b. Resolution Supporting President Faulkner's Commitment to Diversity in Admissions. Erik Malmberg noted that since he had received no feedback concerning this resolution he moved to withdraw the resolution from consideration. Seeing no objection to this, the resolution was withdrawn.

c. Report on NAGPS Conference (Erik Malmberg). Erik reported that from Nov 5-9th he traveled to Washington D.C. to attend the National Association of Graduate and Professional Students Conference. He joined representatives from more than 100 schools. He was able to meet a representative from Texas Tech and others in UTAustin’s region. One major activity Erik was able to participate in was Lobby Day. The primary issue upon which they wanted to educated representatives was on the taxability of graduate student fellowships. Erik met with Lloyd Doggett and they discussed redistricting. Erik also met with the University’s new representative (due to recent redistricting) but noted that although he seemed interested in higher education issues, he seemed more concerned with undergraduate student issues than graduate student issues. Erik felt that our GSA needs to take more action in tracking issues at the State and National level that can affect graduate students--like the issue of fellowship taxability. Erik discussed the success stories and problems of other campus’ graduate student governments. He noted that many representatives from other schools noted that they had conflicts between their undergraduate and graduate student government, particularly when it came to funding. He noted that the good relationships that currently exist at UT Austin between undergraduate and graduate governments were not set in stone. Therefore, there is much that we can and should do to formalize our place in the infrastructure. He also discussed budgets with representatives at other schools. In almost all cases, the fees paid by graduate students went directly back to the GSA, not into a pool to be distributed to all students. What kinds of things did other graduate student organizations do with this money? Most worked with their graduate school deans and administrators to help run orientation. Therefore, graduate students would be familiar with their graduate student organizations from their very first day on campus. Also, instead of funding individual organizations’ events, they often gave out funding as travel grants for graduate students to go to professional conferences. They also held cross-disciplinary symposiums and poster presentations. Finally, Erik noted that the idea of our fall Welcome to TX BBQ was well received and will probably be instituted at other universities in the future.

d. Resolution Commemorating the Thirty-Fifth Anniversary of the Graduate Student Assembly. This resolution is still in the process of being researched and written. If anyone has any information concerning the history of GSA please contact Erik Malmberg or Ginger Gossman. The resolution was postponed to the next general meeting.

e. Creation of an ad hoc committee to review and update the GSA Constitution and Bylaws. Don Drumtra (Co-Chair) noted that the issue of revising the GSA Constitution and bylaws first came up in a July excom meeting. This fall, a resolution that amended the bylaws was passed so that members of SG and Senate could become ex-officio and to use current job titles following the reorganization of OGS. There are a few additional issues that we want to be addressed by a review and revision. These include: making the GSA an officially sanctioned body with the Administration much the way SG is now and streamlining policies and procedures in one document.

The motion to create this ad hoc committee passed unanimously.

10. New Business

a. Certification of Membership. Joyce Banks (Secretary) noted that in order to answer calls for quorum and solidify membership it was time to certify those members who had completed paperwork. Graduate student members of SG and Senate and GSA’s sponsored University committee members are automatically members according to the GSA constitution. After certification had been completed only members would be eligible to vote. Any new members could present paperwork between meetings and become certified to vote at the next meeting.

The Motion to certify passed unanimously.

b. Calls for creation of AdHoc Committees. Don and Marian (Co-Chairs) recently met with a number of representatives who were concerned with the lack of AdHoc committees to conduct the business of the GSA and address issues as they came up. Marian noted that for various reasons, AdHoc committees had fallen by the wayside for a number of reasons, but they would like to reinvigorate this means of doing business. Two AdHoc committees currently exist, Finance and Special Events, but involvement in them has been mixed. Marian discussed a number of other issues that representatives had wanted to create committees for. They are: TA, AI, GRA, and GA Rights and Responsibilities, Financial Aid for Graduate Students, International Student Issues, Masters Student Issues, State Legislative Issues, and Alternative Employment Opportunities for Graduate Students. She suggested that it might be most productive if these committees met midway between GSA general meetings. One representative urged that the committees be opened to involvement with graduate students outside of the GSA.

A motion to create these Adhoc committees passed unanimously.

c. Call for the creation of a resolution that requires placement of Graduate Students on all University Faculty and Administrative Search Committees. Joyce Banks (Secretary) noted that several years ago a proposal to include students on all University faculty search committees was brought forward. After heated debate, that motion failed. However, Joyce felt there would be more support for a proposal that specified that the student be a graduate student. Marian Barber (Co-Chair) noted that in History, where graduate students already serve on search committees, there is an issue with whether the student is selected by faculty or elected by students. Joyce asked for representatives interested in this issue to contact her to work on researching and writing a resolution.

d. Discuss the issue of Graduate Assistantships on campus. Erik Malmberg (Electronic Resources Coordinator) pointed out that those departments without a significant number of undergraduates cannot hire their graduate students as TAs and AIs. Instead, they employ a large number of Graduate Assistants. This is problematic since the pay for GAs is lower and they work longer hours. Erik sees a need to increase the visibility of GAs so they are no longer considered glorified work-study students and would like to see more committees address their issues and potentially increase the number of positions that are available.

e. GSA funding to GSOs. A representative questioned what is happening with this process since the deadline from last year was quickly approaching. Dan Gilman (Treasurer) said that we don’t have the money yet since the Fees Committee has not made any decisions regarding our budget or these funds. Last year the timing of the release of these funds created major problems for the GSA and those organizations that had been awarded them since the money often came too late to be useful. The newest road block is that members of the Fee Committee asked Dan for documentation that would make concrete how the funds that were distributed were beneficial to the organizations that had received them. It was decided that Ginger Gossman would create a petition representatives could sign that pointed out the need for timely release of the funds in order for them to be useful to the GSA and the organizations that are interested in competing for them.

11. Announcement

a. The next General Meeting of the GSA will be February 2, 2004, 4:15 to adjournment, location TBA.
b. Don Drumtra announced that he will send an email detailing further committee vacancies. No one has volunteered yet for the Shuttle Bus Committee (Taran Johnson then volunteered to serve on this committee).
c. Please send Melissa Midkiff any feedback you have, both positive and negative, on Special Events.

12. The meeting adjourned at 5:30 p.m.