ASUP reorganizes its committees to better serve the student ?constituents
By Hannah Gray
ASUP passed a resolution to restructure its standing committees on March 23. Due to an inefficiency in the past committee structure, ASUP amended its by-laws to better equip communication between students, senators and administration, according to ASUP Vice President Alison Able.
"I think this change will bring more talking and efficiency," Able said. "We just want more talking."
The resolution was first presented to the senate on March 16. With the new structure, there will be five main standing committees, and within those committees, there will be eleven subcommittees.
The purpose of committees in general is to concentrate on particular issues students have, according to Able. Every week constituency reports are stated from various senators. The constituency reports are then divided among the different committees. Those committees then address areas of concerns and answer questions.
"Committees help network with administrators, which ultimately helps problems to get fixed faster of questions answered faster," said Alyssa Schmidt-Carr, a senator for the College of Arts and Science and ASUP vice president elect.
The main purpose of restructuring the committees was to make them more efficient. Senators were spread too thinly across committees which lessens the effectiveness, according to the resolution.
"We noticed a lot of senators requesting new committees to be made," said Jovelyn Bonilla, a senior class senator and a sponsor of the resolution.
Between last year and this year, ASUP added two new senate standing committees - ASUP Awareness and Sustainability - to the existing nine, according to Able. ASUP also added the Inventory Committee to the Special Committees, which meet less often than the standing committees.
The committee chairs and other senators met with Bonilla to write the resolution. "Because the Oversight Committee meets ahead of time, it was easy to give recommendations to senators," Bonilla said.
The new committees will also increase effective communication between the vice president and the chair of the committees. Currently Able has to schedule in 11 chair members, one from each committee, which can be hard.
"I tried to meet with my chairs at least twice a semester," Able said. "Hopefully with the new structure more meetings can happen. Not only will this help with oversight, but also gives more opportunities to meet with people because there are less people to keep track of."
The chair members for the new consolidated committees - Campus Infrastructure, Campus Affairs, Campus Security and Maintenance, Community Relations, and ASUP Awareness - will play a stronger role in the senate.
"The leadership positions will change - the chair members will become more important," Able said.
One of the proposed committees to add was the Diversity Committee. At the time the Diversity Committee was being proposed, the idea for a restructured committee was being pursued. Because of this, the Diversity Committee was tabled to be voted on after the proposal of the new committee restructure. With the passing of the new committee arrangement, a diversity subcommittee has been added under the ASUP Awareness Committee.
"At first I saw this being a mess," Schmidt-Carr said about the proposal for a committee restructure. "I did realize the other committees needed to be restructured. In the end, we'll see how it works. I think it'll be okay."
One of Schmidt-Carr's goal as the new vice president for the 2009-2010 academic year is to have each senator on two committees.
"I hope this will bring different perspectives to each committee," Schmidt-Carr said.
Schmidt-Carr also has to find six senators to be the committee chairs as the new vice president. "I am confident that I can find six senators to do a good job. Ultimately I think it will build stronger senators," Schmidt-Carr said.
