This semester, the Student Government Association (SGA) plans to centralize its efforts on the issues of sexual violence and mental health.
Jack Bartholet, senior and SGA executive president, discussed the shift in focus for the coming semester.
“We spent the majority of the fall semester organizing internally, and then we did some organizational planning over the summer,” Bartholet said. “Then we did advocacy planning during Intersession. So, we’re going to be focused on issue advocacy and actual policy.”
The first event of the semester is a sexual violence panel on Feb. 9 in Shriver Hall. Five administrators will be present at the panel responding to inquiries: Dean of Student Life Terry Martinez; Lee James, executive director of campus safety and security; Paul Pinneau, vice president and interim general counsel; Sara Slaff, interim Title IX coordinator; and Alyse Campbell, who works with the Center for Health Education and Wellness (CHEW), focusing on educational and preventative training.
Bartholet and Charlie Green, junior and SGA executive vice president, discussed how this panel will differ from past panels. Such events had previously been hosted as open forums in Hodson 110 where students were able to ask questions.
“This is the first time that SGA’s not having just an open forum where we’re going to be onstage representing the student body,” Green said. “It forces people to meet their representatives and see which representatives are asking which questions.”
Students will be able to submit questions beforehand by either submitting a question to one of their SGA class representatives or by filling out a form online. There will be an email sent to the student body showing everybody’s class representatives.
This type of forum, where members of SGA ask questions rather than the students, is designed in part to help make the student body feel united with SGA.
“In the past, it’s almost felt a little awkward with SGA almost standing with the administration at open houses and then students stand on the other side,” Bartholet said. “It felt like it was setting up this us-versus-them mentality. This way we’re serving as a conduit for students to be able to access administrators rather than pass-blocking for the administrators or making it an us-versus-them kind of thing.”
Bartholet said that SGA had worked with the Sexual Assault Resource Unit (SARU) last semester, and will reach out to them for the forum.
SGA will also be working closely with the administration to improve mental health on campus. The University will be sharing information with the student body about plans in the near future.
According to Bartholet, the University is taking an holistic approach to improving mental health on campus, looking at elements of student life from scheduling, financial issues, extracurricular activities and the like. This will allow the University to obtain a well-rounded idea of how students experience mental health and the elements that affect it.
SGA will focus on faculty and student interaction and staff appreciation this semester. Junior Class Senator Liam Haviv is currently working on a faculty-student interaction event, and Bartholet is working the University’s Vice President of Human Resources on a staff appreciation week or day.
Most recently, there was a staff appreciation event Monday to thank the staff who were on campus during the blizzard, ensuring that students were provided with necessities.
SGA is working on enacting a club championship funding proposal. Sophomore Class President Anna Du mentioned that Chris Beckman, co-captain of club water polo from fall 2014 through last semester, approached her toward the end of last semester. The team was only a couple games shy of making it to the national tournament. However if the team had been able to attend, it is unlikely they would have been able to go because of a lack of funding.
“He approached me and came up with this idea of establishing some sort of reserved funding pool for club sports teams to be able to draw on if they were ever to be in that situation in the future,” Du said. “They deserve to represent Hopkins.”
Green and Du discussed the benefits of this funding pool, mentioning that it could add to school spirit.
SGA’s Committee on Health and Safety is also working together to add hygiene dispensers for feminine products in bathrooms around campus.
This semester, the Commemoration Ball, which has been held the past two years, will be hosted by the Dean’s office and, according to Bartholet, with heavy help from the SGA. The junior class will likely also get a new senator to fill Charlie Green’s vacancy after she was elected vice president mid-semester.
SGA’s first meeting was cancelled because snow forced the University to remain closed at the beginning of this week.
