Hello everyone. I hope you enjoyed your weekend. I want to spend some time this week talking about perceptions of the Senate. People often hear rumors about what the Senate does or does not do. Rensselaer publications often only talk about the Senate when it makes a mistake or tackles a controversial issue. Seldom do they report on the countless hours of hard work to better the quality of life here. I believe that the former is caused partly by older students who have seen past Senates and believe it operates in the same way each year. Perhaps the latter is because it is more interesting to read about controversy or to point out mistakes than it is to take the time to learn about all of the projects that will better quality of life for Rensselaer students. I want to again walk through what the Senate is doing this year.
We have been working very hard to tenaciously communicate with students for two reasons: First, to report on the progress of our projects and what the Institute is doing; second, to get feedback about projects that we are working on, possible new initiatives that we should tackle, and quick things that we can do to make someone’s time here better. Often people say, “How can the Senate do anything if they are constantly waiting for feedback!?” This is simply not the way we are going about it. We established a number of goals in the beginning of the semester—that we wished to accomplish by the end of the semester. I will describe these in a few moments. As we continue our communication initiatives, we are also continuing progress on all of these goals. Again, we are communicating progress as well as getting feedback from students.
We are trying our best to communicate in several ways. In addition to visiting each greek house on campus, we visit each lower and upper class dorm on campus on the first Wednesday of every month. We are also adding the Union to our list. Zack and I meet regularly with athletic teams and the Senate will be meeting with the top ten biggest clubs. We are having public discussion forums about different topics including Public Safety, physical facilities, and the Student Life Performance Plan. I have also asked the Independent Council to help us in reaching more independent students.
To organize all of this feedback, we have created the Action Response Committee which organizes the data and formulates recommendations to the Senate. The report is distributed each month for non-greek storming and once per semester for greek storming. We are building an interface on our website that will allow students to see what people had to say and what the Senate is doing to respond. In the mean time, anyone is welcome to stop by my office and see a copy.
While we are working constantly to communicate, we are working in parallel to accomplish the goals established at the beginning of the semester. We are well under way in working with faculty and members of the administration to write a recommendation to the President to drastically improve the advising system. We spent some time initially gathering data about how students feel about their advisors and what they would like to see to improve the system, but we are now moving on to formulating a plan.
We are continuing our customer service initiatives. This means that physical facilities will be taking new measures to ensure that you are getting the best service possible. As an example, when you need something to be fixed, you will soon be able to use a friendly web-interface that will allow you to get an estimated time before someone can get to you and allow you to evaluate how well you were satisfied. We are working to standardize TA grading. In other words, we would like to eliminate the random grading that often occurs in large classes where TAs have different grading styles and students are penalized as a result by asking professors to provide systematic point systems for tests and homework assignments. These are just a few of the projects the Senate has undertaken.
As Grand Marshal, one of the most difficult challenges I’ve faced is trying to figure out how to show students what this organization is capable of and how they can use it effectively. I’m asking that instead of listening to the same people talk about what the Senate doesn’t do, take the time to learn about it yourself. You can always talk with me about anything. Just stop by my office on the third floor of the Union or send me an e-mail.
Before I go to bed I’d like to quickly mention the Rensselaer Alumni Association Community Service Award. The award is used to honor a Rensselaer student who is very actively involved with community service and philanthropic activities in the local community. I’m looking to nominate someone for the award and would be very interested in hearing from you if you know of someone who deserves it.
Thanks everyone, good night and enjoy the rest of your week.
