A total of six resolutions were passed Tuesday at IUSA’s first voting meeting of the semester.
Calvin Sanders, Union Street congressman, along with the Student Relations Committee, sponsored a resolution to amend the IUSA bylaws.
In creating this bill, Sanders used a similar idea from last semester when IUSA worked with the Jewish committee in creating legislation condemning anti-Semitism.
“We can do this again but on a more regular basis and something that’s a little bit more stylistic and formalized,” Sanders said.
This change will allow each standing committee, except the steering committee, to appoint up to three student organization ambassadors to their committee.
These ambassadors will have a non-voting seat but will represent the relevant constituencies of those committees. They will have the ability to share opinions, give input and create legislation.
These ambassadors will be from student organizations already registered with Student Life and Learning and will be nominated by the committee.
This change will create more student involvement in IUSA since only six of the fall’s 25 resolutions directly affected the campus community.
This resolution will make IUSA more inclusive, Sanders said. Committees will not be required to have these ambassadors.
“However, if a committee wants to make active change on campus, bringing in people representing our constituencies would be the best choice,” Sanders said.
Another passed resolution changed two sections of the IUSA election code. Adam Kehoe, chairman of the election commission, presented the resolution to Congress.
A section added to the bill states that anyone who is running for IUSA and wishes to reserve a space on campus must do so through the election commission.
This was something the commission as well as Student Life and Learning worked on together, Kehoe said.
Anyone who wants to reserve space must fill out a form for the election commission that will then make the final decision.
In accordance with Student Life and Learning, an organization can reserve up to three different spaces on campus per day. Kehoe said these will be given out on a first-come-first-serve basis.
The amended section changes the amount of time the commission has to respond to advisory opinions. Instead of three calendar days, it now says three class days.
This is to give the commission a little more time to give an adequate response to the opinions, Kehoe said.
Congress also passed a resolution to extend the period of time students can drop a class without receiving a “W” to two weeks.
Currently, students must drop a class within one week of the start date if they do not want a “W” on their transcript. Many other Big Ten schools have longer periods of time for this, including Purdue University, Michigan State University and the University of Michigan.
This resolution will only affect full-term classes during the fall and spring semesters.
Anne-Therese Ryan, Briscoe congresswoman, sponsored this resolution with the Student Relations Committee, Helen Woeste, Hannah Miller, Meri Dodevska and William Hutchins.
Ryan said her committee talked to Dennis Groth, vice provost for undergraduate education, who thought this bill was a good idea.
“He was really respectful of this bill,” Ryan said.
