On Tuesday night, the Student Government Association (SGA) convened to discuss a host of subjects including the design and installment of a new University mobile app as well as the pending approval of five new student groups.
Through the Appointments and Evaluations Committee (A&E), the three groups that proposed a fortnight ago were approved. These include Music Dynasty and Homewood Chamber Seminars — both performing arts groups — as well as the Global Friendship Club, a cultural group.
Furthermore, Mahzi Malcolm, chair of the committee, announced that two new groups have applied for SGA recognition: Bikemore and the JHU Robotics Club.
“Bikemore is a bike advocacy and social group. They want to meet with ‘the common biker’ and increase the number of students that bike by trying to make the University aware of any problems that could deter people from biking,” Malcolm said.
The Hopkins Robotics Club, which aims to appeal to students interested in innovation and engineering, wishes to create a robot to enter in a competition at Brown University.
The SGA decided to table the decisions on these two groups until next week. Since the Bikemore organization already has several existing locations in Baltimore, the SGA plans to wait until more information can be provided on how the on-campus group will interact with the established city chapters. The decision for the Hopkins Robotics Club was suspended until next week in order to determine whether it will be categorized as an academic club or a special interest and hobby.
At last week’s meeting, Junior Class Senator Parth Patel organized buses to transport Homewood students to and from Fell’s Point on the eve of Halloween. The buses will run from 10 p.m. until 1 a.m. and will be available to make an unlimited number of trips. The SGA unanimously approved this transportation initiative.
The Chair of the Security, Sustainability and Development Committee (SSD), Rodolfo Finnochi, announced that the local Barnes & Noble has agreed to donate 500 Hopkins-themed mugs to the committee that the SSD is planning to sell for $2 to $5 each. Proceeds will go towards sustainability initiatives on campus.
“We’re developing a new grant that will allow student groups to have more sustainability [upon application and approval],” Finnochi said.
The Student Services Committee focused on adding practical resources to campus libraries this week.
“We’re working on getting more things to be rentable from the libraries like umbrellas and ponchos,” Committee Chair and Senior Class President Sean Glass said. Alex Koren, sophomore class president, proposed adding android and windows chargers to this list.
As announced last week, Executive Secretary Kyra Toomre is spearheading the commission of a large bronze statue of a blue jay to be positioned outside the O’Connor Recreation Center in order to promote school spirit.
“The idea is that freshman can take pictures with the statue during Convocation the way they do at other schools or rub the statue for good luck,” Toomre said.
At this time, Koren announced the plan to design a new mobile app that will consolidate all Hopkins resources for students. He noted that the app is already in its first stages of development.
Koren hopes that, with the help of the Technology Committee and Student Services, they can create an app that integrates the functions of Blackboard and Microsoft Outlook in a user-friendly way.
“This application was designed for Johns Hopkins students by Johns Hopkins students. We’re actually going to have a sort of feed [in the app] where we’ll have announcements for events like games or [safety issues such as] the fire in Charles Commons,” Koren said. “There will also be a class feed where each teacher will be able to post homework assignments. There will be a page with the JHU map and all the bus services on it. ISIS will be on it too so you can sign up for classes via mobile.”
Koren will be addressing any changes that need to be made to the preliminary design in the coming month before continuing on to the later development stages.
