Student Senate passed eight resolutions and one bill, including a bill asking Ohio University to increase health insurance subsidies for graduate students from 4 percent to 89 percent.
Multiple graduate students spoke in favor of the bill including doctoral candidate Elliot Long, who brought up other costly ventures the university has taken on, such as the new $2 million basketball scoreboard and a $56 million construction project. Long said passing that bill is about prioritizing graduate students.
Graduate Student Senate also passed the same bill Tuesday at its meeting. OU is far below the average of peer institutions subsidies, according to a report by the Graduate Employee Organization.
“We want to be average,” Ellenore Holbrook, primary sponsor on the bill, said.
That bill passed unanimously.
Four constitutional amendments were passed and five were tabled. The amendments that passed were to amend the ratifications and amendments section, the succession section, the judicial panel section and to create a conduct and ethics section of the Student Senate constitution.
All new business constitutional amendments were tabled after a motion by Courteney Muhl who said Student Senate did not have proper time to consider those new amendments prior to voting. The tabled amendments included adding a bill of rights to the constitution.
A resolution allowing Student Senate to vote electronically did not pass. Because that resolution was denied, there is no chance of passing any of the tabled constitutional amendments. Graduate Student Senate had already passed a similar resolution about voting electronically.
A resolution to revise the senate appropriations chapter in rules and procedures was passed. That resolution allows the Senate Appropriations Commission to change its funding of student organizations from annually to semesterly.
