Essential Reading

Here are some interesting reports from Student Assembly and other student groups from the past several years:

Committee on Standards Student Task Force, October 2006
Student Governance Review Task Force, May 2007
Club Sports at Dartmouth, Spring 2006
Minority Professor Recruitment and Retention, Winter 2007
Student Budget Advisory Committee Quarterly Report, Winter 2006

And some older reports:
The Soul of Dartmouth: the Academic Direction of Dartmouth College, 2000-2001
Student and Faculty Relations, 2000-2001
The State of Student Involvement, 2000-2001
Undergraduate Teaching Initiative, 2001-2002

Stumbling in Public

I made the front cover photo of The Dartmouth today... in a moose costume. The good news is that the moose looks great, the bad news is that for the inexperienced mascot (me) getting up and down those Haldeman classroom stairs took quite an effort. The moose mascot is brand new and made its debut during freshmen orientation. As a point of clarification, Student Assembly, of which I'm an officer, does not want Dartmouth to be "the Moose." Instead, we want to remain the "Big Green" while using the moose as a mascot. It's just like North Carolina - they are the "Tar Heels" but they use a ram as their mascot. Also, like every Dartmouth student I know, I love Keggy and he's definitely here to stay. Instead, the moose is meant to serve as a much more politically correct sidekick. Because Keggy is, well, a keg, his potential to represent Dartmouth officially is non-existent. The Moose has the potential of being a visual symbol that can fill an absence created by the end of the Indian mascot. After all, what exactly is "Big Green" supposed to look like?

The article also discusses Student Assembly's proposed new constitution. Perhaps the most significant change is the proposed increase of presidential and executive discretionary spending limits from $300 and $500, respectively, to $500 and $1000. The money can also be used for programming purposes under the new constitution while previously it was only allowed for "administrative expenditures." Normally, a project gets funded by passing legislation in SA's General Assembly, which contains all Assembly members.

So why is this increase important? To some, it might seem like an unwarranted power-grab. But it is definitely necessary. Getting legislation passed is extremely time consuming and often takes 3 or 4 weeks. In a 10 week term, that's a long time. It slows down the ability of the Assembly to get projects done, particularly if many things are going on at once. For example, I'm the chair of the Academic Affairs committee, along with Corey Chu '08, and we currently have 27 projects in the works. If we needed to pass legislation for even half of them, our efficacy would be slashed. Typically, there's only enough time to debate two pieces of legislation per General Assembly. That leaves 18 open slots per term (given that we won't meet during finals), which means that each of SA's four committees will only have four or five opportunities to propose legislation each term. But that assumes that our need for passing legislation is evenly divided throughout the term, which is never the case. So basically, everything gets bogged down in an endless back flow of legislation.

Students want their leaders to get things done, not to endlessly debate small amounts of money in public. Student Assembly has an annual budget of $70,000, so $500 or $1000 is not a very significant amount, given that the General Assembly meets only about 25 times each year. Empowering the Assembly's executive board to make these allocations would ensure that we can move quickly and efficiently on small projects, and spend the needed time in General Assembly to discuss legislation that is important, not secondary not-controversial programs. I just want to get my projects done. Let me do my job.

Loyal Opposition?

On the Student Assemblog, SA's quasi-official blog, Nathan Bruschi '10 shares his plan to create a devil's advocate in the Assembly, where somebody would be designated to argue against legislation. Bruschi's proposal was drafted after a conversation with Travis Green, the incoming student body president. I like that Bruschi and Green are thinking outside the box, but I don't think it's a good idea. Student Assembly isn't a debaters' club. I like when bills are debated on the floor – it's important to give them scrutiny – but opposition should be real, not some act. A combative Assembly is not just "drama," it's good for democracy – creating a marketplace of ideas. But fake opposition is fake opposition; it rings false and is insincere. Not every piece of legislation needs to be debated. Sometimes it's just important to get things done.

Revolution?

Today the Student Governance Task Force released their report to campus. I thought their findings were more or less on target, but I wish that they were more radical in their aims. Some of the suggestions are similar to my campaign proposals during my run last week for VP, most notably the call for a "Governance Council". Here are some thoughts:

- I like the "Governance Council" idea, but I wish that it had some true authority over member organizations. In particular, I think that my proposal for flexible Student Activity Fee distribution (i.e. distribute some of the money as the year goes on) was quite strong, and would have increased the efficacy of student government.

- I support the proposal to consolidate SA committees. The Student Life, Student Organizations, and Alumni Affairs committees are definitely weaklings compared to Academic Affairs and Student Services. I've served on most of them and there is definitely a difference in workload.

- The proposal to eliminate the Communications Committee really confuses me. One of the biggest complaints about Student Assembly in this election season was its lack of communication with campus. I really think that the committee can be much more than simply making posters, instead looking for ways to truly connect SA with the rest of Dartmouth. Kapil Kale was the head of the Communications Committee before serving on this Task Force; in his absence the committee has been basically abolished. I know that Kapil was really enthusiastic about the committee when the year started, and its surprising that he leaves so pessimistic about its potential.

- As far as I understand, COSO is chaired by Eric Ramsey, the Associate Director of Collis. If the Governance Council is implemented as proposed, then an adminstrator would be leading the financial wing of the overall student government every spring, which strikes me as strange.

- It's really too bad that the task force didn't propose completely overhauling the structure of student goverment organizations. Most students have no faith in the system. Why not try something new, something very different? I do believe that this proposed changes will be beneficial, but they won't fix any of the fundamental problems. Despite the risks of anarchy, I wholeheartedly believe that Shpeen-led revolution would have been far more effective.

Also, check out a DartWire blog posting from Laura Little and Adi Sivaraman, two of the task force members.

Student Governance Task Force

Tomorrow, the Student Governance Task Force is presenting their findings to the Student Assembly.

Possible outcomes:
a) Apocalypse
b) Many things will change
c) Some things will change
d) Nothing will change

In all seriousness, the structure of student government at Dartmouth really does need major reform. But I fear that instituting change will be very difficult, not because of a lack of desire on the part of Dartmouth's student leaders, but because no one has the authority to compel overarching reform - not Student Assembly, not the UFC, not even the adminstration.