At the final Graduate Student Senate meeting of the semester, five resolutions were passed as the new executives and senators were inducted.
Graduate students will not see a lower general fee next year, according to an announcement made by President Carl Edward Smith III at Monday’s Graduate Student Senate meeting.
The decision came after Smith and former Student Senate President Megan Marzec met with Ohio University President Roderick McDavis, who shot down the idea.
The general fee for graduate students was $1,256 during the 2014-15 academic year.
“(McDavis) is going to deny the general fee committee's recommendation ... he is officially opposed to decreasing the general fee for graduate students for next year,” Smith said.
At the March GSS meeting, students expressed the wish to to be able to opt out of a portion of the general fee if they thought they wouldn’t attend OU sporting events.
More than $27.4 million was collected for the student general fee in the 2014-15 academic year, according to a previous Post report. About 34 percent of that total, or about $9.2 million, went to Ohio Athletics.
“We have already passed a resolution for an organized and funded protest at all home football games,” Smith said.
Those protests, which were passed in a March resolution, were said to take place on the condition that graduate students still had to pay the athletics portion of the general fee in the fall.
Five resolutions were also passed at Monday’s meeting including:
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a joint resolution to support the environmental committee fossil fuel divestment proposal
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a resolution to develop different approaches for finals for students who have taken comprehensive exams and defended a thesis or dissertation
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a resolution to standardize voting rules for up and down votes with voice voting
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a budget resolution for International Women’s Day
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the budget resolution to approve ‘Grad Fest’ reimbursement
Also at Monday’s meeting the executives and senators for the 2015-16 academic year were inducted.
President Smith was sworn in for a second presidential term.
Maggie Clark was inducted as the college senator for the Voinovich School of Leadership and Public Affairs; she previously served as the vice president of Legislative Affairs.
Liudmila Pestun was sworn in as the vice president of Administration; she previously served as a representative for the International Development Studies Program.
Sarah Kaplan and Shaneil Taylor were inducted as vice president for communications and senator for International Studies, respectively.
Rose Troyer, the vice president of Legislative Affairs elect, was not in attendance.
Chelsea Foster, who previously served as the governmental affairs commissioner, was also named Chief of Staff for the organization.
Hashim Pashtun, outgoing vice president of finance and administration, felt that the last meeting was beneficial.
“I’m happy that we made sure that we’ve spent most of our budget for this year, which was a big challenge ... we had some awesome projects and achievements,” Pashtun said. “So it was effective and I’m looking forward for the new executives to do a better job,”
@megankhenry
