This post was written by Hatchet Staff Writer Madeleine Morgenstern.
The Student Association senate passed a resolution Tuesday in support of attaining the 100,000 hours of community service that first lady Michelle Obama promised would bring her to campus for Commencement this year.
While the Student Service Act does not specifically reference Obama or commencement, much of the senate’s discussion involved the first lady’s pledge.
Sen. Dan Sadlosky, ESIA-U, one of the bill’s sponsors, said the resolution is meant only to express support for community service. He added that he wants to encourage student organizations to credit their service hours toward the 100,000-hour goal.
“I hope that it will strengthen the commitment that the Student Association and student body has to doing more community service,” Sadlosky said.
Debate stalled over a clause that urges the University to hold “reoccurring University-wide ‘Days of Service’ throughout the year.”
Sen. Logan Dobson, CCAS-U, said encouraging GW to spend more money while already in debt was “a little whacky.”
Sadlosky said he understood these concerns, but said he felt “Days of Service” would help mobilize and coordinate student service efforts throughout the year.
“This does not call for the University to spend money,” Sadlosky said. “Merely to help coordinate or advertise if they would like to at no cost, which I would prefer.”
Sen. Tom Fogarty, SMHS-G, voiced his opposition to having the first lady speak at all.
“I think we can do better than Michelle Obama and I don’t think we should support this,” Fogarty said.
Also on Tuesday, the senate passed a bill that abolished the graduate affairs committee and a bill that struck the Socially Responsible Initiatives Commission from the senate bylaws.
Sen. Jamie Baker (CPS-G), chair of the Rules Committee, introduced the bill that eliminated the Graduate Affairs Committee and shifted its jurisdiction to the Student Life and Academic Affairs committees. He said that Graduate Affairs had become largely irrelevant with regard to legislation, and that there was no reason that graduate issues could not be raised in other committees.
All graduate senators are automatically placed on the graduate affairs committee, which has no quorum requirements to hold meetings. Baker added that nothing bars graduate senators from caucusing together or meeting in sub-committees within their committee assignments to advocate for graduate issues.
Sen. Brian Droker (SMHS-G) spoke up during the debate in support of the Graduate Affairs committee. He argued that as graduate
senators, they are meant to represent graduate students and should have their own committee to do so.
“It can serve its purpose in the future. It was created for a reason, and eliminating it means it’s that much more work to get it
back in,” Droker said.
Baker announced at the beginning of Tuesday’s meeting that Rob Shorette, the Graduate Affairs committee chair, had resigned from the senate on unrelated issues.
The removal of the SRI Commission from the bylaws was the second attempt to do so after the senate rejected a bill earlier this
month that would have removed the SRI but also contained other controversial measures. In a bill of its own, the SRI’s removal passed without opposition.
The SRI was a two-year, $50,000 commission established by former University President Stephen Joel Trachtenberg to sponsor
“socially responsible” events on campus. When the SRI ended this year, President Knapp chose not to renew it.
The senate previously passed a non-binding resolution in April that supported renewing the SRI.
Dobson said he was glad to see the SRI go. “The SRI was a bad org that existed to hand out free money to green
organizations. Nothing it did couldn’t have been handled by the finance committee, or GW Housing, or any of the other groups at GW that give out money for programming,” Dobson said.
