GSA Senate Minutes 2/10/12
Present: Jillian Maxey (President), Dan Arroyo (VP), Jon Piron (Financial Director), Caroline Sellmer (GNA),
Cesar Bock (STM), Julie Allen (GSAS), Joe Le (GSSW), Jenna Sattar (OGSL), Emilie Dubois (Schol &Excel
chair-first agenda item), Omar Gonzalez (Grad AHANA Student Assoc), Erin Singer (GPA), Ann Masterman
(GEA), Shawn Savage (GISA)
Missing: Afsheen Namdaran (GMA)
I. BC Talks Event Update: Emilie Dubois is looking for graduate students to give 15 mins presentations -- we
are looking for innovation, brevity, and appeal to the general grad community--and great presentation skills.
Please send recommendations to Emilie (emilie.anne.dubois@gmail.com). She is finalizing the details.
II. Revisioning process update
As a follow up to our conversation in December in which we all discussed the positive aspects of increasing the
GSA's collaborations with OGSL and a revised process for filling the executive board position, Dan, Jon and
Jillian have been meeting with the OGSL in weekly strategy meetings to implement the transition process.
A student from the sociology department had an interaction with Jon Piron regarding the elections and upon
hearing our proposed process contacted Carole Hughes with concerns. His email was forwarded to Jillian and
Jillian and Carole will be meeting with him at 11 am on Thurs Feb 16. Jillian presented the text of the email,
along with Carole's response, to discuss as a group some of the challenges he raises.
We agreed that while he does raise some valid points, he lacks a full understanding of the GSA and the nature
of graduate student life at BC in its full complexity and diversity.
Through our conversation, we came to the conclusion that we are somewhat concerned that the executive
board won't be representative in the traditional sense and in an effort to maintain a vehicle by which students
can have a role in the selection process, we discussed an option that would look something like this:
Interested students will submit a resume, cover letter and a written response to some philosophical question
(this is something I thought of after we met; i.e. in your opinion what are the most pressing issues facing the BC
graduate community at the present moment? SUGGESTIONS WELCOME)
The GSA e board selection committee comprised of the current e board, representatives from the Senate (Ann
Masterman), Denise Fung, Carole Hughes, and the OGSL GAs will review all of the applications for each
position and determine who will be interviewed.
The committee will conduct interviews.
The committee will present the interviewed candidates to the senate and the senate and the committee will
narrow the pool to the top (2?) candidates for each position.
The candidate's basic info, along with their response to the philosophical question will be posted on the GSA
website and sent out to the entire graduate community. Students will be encouraged to share their input on the
candidates with their senators.
Taking this information into account, along with consideration of the candidates qualifications for the position,
the senate and the committee will have a final conversation to recommend who should be selected. We will
have to iron out the details as far as final say in the event that a consensus cannot be reached.
Does this make sense at this point to people? Am I accurately characterizing what we discussed? What might
we need to consider as we move on to the implementation phase?
We have a strategy meeting on Friday at 10am, so if you want to give me some feedback before then, that
would be INCREDIBLY helpful.
III. Cesar and Joe volunteered to serve on a committee looking to replace Blackboard VIsta.