At noon on Tuesday, several dozen students gathered in Mother’s for “Pizza with the President,” an event sponsored by the Committee on Student Life of the Student Senate. President Shirley Ann Jackson has agreed to several of these events in hopes of boosting student input to the upper levels of school administration.
Jackson began lunch by chatting with a few student senators, waiting in line for some pizza, and sitting down at a table with several students. Once the questions began, they continued for the two-hour duration of the lunch. They ranged from questions about Jackson’s Super Bowl preference (Eagles) to the reasoning behind the graduate tuition policy.
Over the course of two hours, many comments, questions, complaints, and requests were posed and answered. An engineering student asked if anything could be done about advisors’ poor performance in advising engineers pursuing a degree. Jackson seemed more than happy to offer her personal assistance in resolving the matter.
There was considerably more lengthy discussion on the topic of the graduate tuition policy, which provoked a nearly 15 minute detailed explanation on the goals and aims of the updated policy enacted in recent years. In general, she stated that the new policy seeks to fund as many graduates as possible, but at the same time is designed to give faculty incentive to find research grants and other sources of funding for their research. She commented that “faculty do not seek, or get, anywhere near, or even one quarter of the research grants comparable institutions get…that is our weakness.”
As far as the faculty survey, Jackson did not comment on her particular results, but stated that surveys like it “tend to state dissatisfaction only,” and generally don’t contain anything constructive. For aeronautical engineers present, she spoke briefly about the closing of the wind tunnels for safety reasons and also brought up the planning and construction of newer, more functional replacements that will soon benefit students involved in the program.
One of the questions that had apparently been floating about in the collective consciousness also came to light—the rumored renaming of RPI to Rensselaer University. Jackson twice emphatically stated that there was no plan or even discussion on any level about changing the name of the Institute.
For those fraternity brothers present, Dr. Jackson spoke of the fraternities as “important parts of the RPI community,” though she lamented the lack of fraternity party invites she has received lately. She mentioned RPI’s dual commitment to fix up fraternity houses, as well as steer members clear of serious trouble.
Lastly, in response to many of the questions regarding undergraduate tuition hikes and questions regarding scholarship fund increases to match inflation and tuition changes, Jackson mentioned an effort underway to raise more money for the undergraduate, as well as the graduate, scholarship funds to keep the initial scholarship award amounts or percentages meaningful.
As the lunch came to an end, Jackson epitomized her actions, the well-liked, and the not-so-well liked, by saying, “Whether people hate me or do surveys about me, I still need to do what I think is right.” The next “Pizza with the President” is scheduled for Thursday, March 3 at Mother’s from noon until 2 pm.
