Senate General Body Meeting #12 — Minutes (10/29/24)

112th Johns Hopkins Student Government AssociationSenate Meeting #12October 29, 2024 / 07:00 PM / Hackerman B17MINUTES

11. Call to Order and Attendance (1 min)

a. Excused Absentees: Justin Pokrant, Danial Nabizadeh,

Jacquelyn Slade, Anisha Rasamsettyb. Unexcused Absentees: Jennifer Tang Cabrera

12. Convening Business (15 min)

b. Presentation from Dining- Dining Teami. The Hopkins Dining management team came to themeeting. The representatives were Director of Marketing

Brianna Williams, Director of Dining Operations

Demetrius Heckstall, Executive Director of Operations

Michelle Mooney and Marketing Specialist StephanieSufczynski.ii. They have given several updates.

1. At Hopkins Cafe, they now have non-allergenic

stations and a Poke Bar.

2. At Levering, they have new stations like the Mosaic

and Tossed. They want to hear feedback regardingthem. They’ve also extended their hours.

3. There are two new changes with their third parties

as they’ve started to work with Niecy’s FabulousJuice Bar and Kitschenette.

4. Students can use Nutrislice to check the menu out at

the dining facilities.

5. They asked everyone to fill out the JHU Dining

Options Survey. The deadline is November 3rd andit takes about 10 minutes. They want to hear ourfeedback on how to better their programs. There aregiveaway prizes like Airpods Max, iPad Mini, AppleWatch to people who fill out the survey. The surveyis conducted by an independent consultant and it issolely for internal use. Identities will remainconfidential and won’t be linked to responses.

6. They talked about upcoming events like Farm to

Fork and Halloween with Hopkins Dining.iii. Secretary Buse Koldas asked if the dining team is workingon bringing healthier options and beverages to Leveringand Charles Market.

1. Hopkins Dining team said that they will be working

on this and improving the beverage options.iv. Senior Class Senator Ryan Alezz said that as a healthierbeverage option, press juices could be considered. Heasked about the dietary restrictions at Hopkins Diningand if these are applied to events appropriately, morespecifically if there are adequate and variety foods that arelabeled appropriately for certain groups. He also asked ifthey were on Nutrislice.

1. The team said that this depends on what they are

offering. For a lot of them, they make sure that thereare vegan or vegetarian options, but there isn’t asmuch work in halal as it is not always a top priority.They said that this is great feedback. They furtherexplained that they build themed meal menus intothe system. For pop-ups, they are mostly not inNutrislice.v. WSE Senator Omar Gharib raised a question for studentswithout a dining plan, asking how much it costs.

1. For breakfast, it is around $12 whereas for lunch

and dinner it is around $16.vi. Sophomore Class President Vishnu Dontu said that astudent approached him about food stamps. He said thatthis was a feedback he communicated to dining a whileago and got the response that it is not eligible for hotmeals. He asked if this could be implemented to CharlesMarket.

1. Mooney will look into this.
2. Williams asked if there are any other comparable

institutions that offer this.

3. Dontu is not sure but he will look into it. He also

raised the idea of offering dumplings and sushi withmeal swipes at Charles Market.

4. Koldas added onto what Dontu said, stating that

Brown University offers sushi in exchange for mealswipes.

5. Mooney will see the pricing and determine if this is

doable.

6. Alezz added that The Pennsylvania State University

has food stamps.vii. President of the Senate Nasreen Naqvi said that since theCharles Market staff is elderly, there are some employeeswho get paranoid when students purchase flu medicine orcough while paying as there is no protective sheet. Naqviasked if that could be reinstated.

1. Mooney will look into this.

viii. WSE Senator Ivan Alexander Kroumov said that peoplecame up to him about vegetarian options. He said that thetables sometimes give wrong information where the menudoesn’t match the meal. Such as the vegetarian optionseen in the table is not offered and rather substituted witha nonvegetarian protein option.

1. Williams said that there are certain times when the

food runs out, so that could be a reason.

2. Heckstall said that there could be a variety of

factors. When there’s a menu change, the time ittakes to change the display depends. He asked thestudents to notify a manager if they ever see thissituation happening.ix. Freshman Class Senator Kevin Xu asked to havevegetarian options that are offered everyday. For example,he mentioned a friend of his who really likes the tofusteak, but that they can’t find it sometimes. He waswondering if the team would consider having permanentvegetarian protein options like tofu steaks.

1. Williams said that they have menu rotations, so tofu

steak comes out twice a week. They will considermaking it permanent.

2. Heckstall said that tofu is at the salad bar, meaning

they can always get it.

3. Mooney said that she can ask the chefs or people

with blue collars, who are managers.x. Xu was also curious to hear if the dining team found asolution to the stains on the coffee mugs as one monthinto the semester, he was witnessing a lot of stains on thedishes yet now that is not the case. He was wondering ifthere were any systematic changes they made.

1. Heckstall said that they heard the students, so they

changed it. He explained that there are alsodisposables on the way out of the dining hall, whichcan be used by the students if they would like.

xi. Civic Engagement and Service Senator Prisha Agrawalasked about vegetarian options. At Hopkins Cafe andNolan’s on the 33rd, she believes that the vegetarianoptions are very limited, mostly just beans, salads andrice. She asked if dining has any plans to implementvegetarian tacos and pizzas, or similar ideas.

1. Heckstall said that they are building their menus

and they are looking forward to adding morevegetarian options. For example, Americanbreakfast changed to international breakfast. Hesaid that every feedback counts and that they areinterested in developing their menus even further.xii. Agrawal followed up by saying vegetarian options oftenrun out by the time it’s meal swipe time in LeveringKitchens and asked if the dining team is working onresolving this issue.

1. Heckstall said that they call it production numbers.

They anticipate how many people will eat a certainmeal option and once they see what the students areeating, they either increase or decrease theproduction.xiii. Religious and Spiritual Life Senator Zachary Bahar saidthat the markup to dining dollars from regular moneydoes not make it sensible to purchase them as it is higherthan tax. He asked if there's logic behind this.

1. This led to a discussion between the dining team

and Bahar, which was continued outside of themeeting.

2. Sophomore Class Senator Jazzlyn Fernandez

touched upon two different topics. She asked about

the app called Transact Mobile Ordering App, wherestudents pay using dining dollars. She didn’t knowthis was a thing and believes that it’s very useful asstudents can order beforehand and then pick uptheir order. She asked if this could be advertisedfurther. She also asked if swipes could be used inLevering during lunch as this is now the case fordinner.

3. Williams thinks that this is a great point. She said

that the app was not made a priority but they had aplan to run a promotion around the app byorganizing giveaways. They will get the word out.For payment, she said that J-Cash must be workingin the app.

4. Fernandez then asked about the labeling of food in

different stations. For example, for lamb gyro, staffsays its lamb but the label indicates it could be amixture of other types of meats. She asked if thereare any plans to fix this.

5. Sophomore Class Senator Arihant Singh said this is

very common during late night, which impactspeople with religious dietary restrictions, especiallywhen there are shortages or spontaneous gaps. Hesaid that it should be emphasized what type of meatit exactly is.

6. Mooney said that it was not their intention to not

have the correct option on display or have ashortage, especially when allergens are in question.She thanked SGA for the feedback and said thatshe’ll talk to the team.

13. Amendment and Approval of the Agenda (1 min)

a. Agenda was approved.

14. Public Input (3 min)
15. Reports (5 min)

a. Cabinet Reports (4 min)i. The Trunk o Treat tabling was announced and peoplewere asked to volunteer for shifts.

ii. Programming Chair Tim Huang said that President StoneMeng, although he couldn’t have been present today atthe GBM, wants to announce to the SGA that theexecutive board will meet with President Daniels nextMonday. A form will be sent to Teams, so it should befilled out with questions to be asked to him.iii. Huang announced that they will be working on the classformals. He added that programming council membershaven’t been coming to the programming meetings. Heasked everyone to urge the programming members toattend the meetings regularly. Now, there is one personinterested in programming, so more people should beencouraged to apply.iv. Li said that class formals are very important as Class of2026 still remembers their Freshman Formal.Establishing traditions is significant, which is why weshould foster class communities. Huang would appreciatethis.v. Huang said that they will get feedback from classesthemselves. He added that people who sign up for theTrunk or Treat tabling will be given attendance incentives.vi. Treasurer Brandon Benjamin echoed Huang on theprogramming council announcements. SGA has 16,503USD in its discretionary budget. Since our total budget is24,000 USD, we want to spend 12,000 USD everysemester. He asked everyone to be mindful of this.vii. Secretary Buse Koldas reminded that Class CouncilPresidents must take an active role in filling out thevacancies.viii. Naqvi said that we will have the US elections next week.She has been working on follow up meetings after theforum. She is making sure no one’s voice remainsunheard. She encourages everyone to watch the elections.There won’t be a meeting next week, which is why theagenda is packed. Now is the time to come forward withyour initiatives, especially since the SGA Advisor CharlesNorman is here.

b. Advisor Report (2 min)

i. Remarks from Jessica

1. SGA Advisor Jessica Snell said that there will be a

follow up email on the MSE construction resolution.Another update is that in a meeting with IT, theywill draft a survey for Homewood students’ WiFiaccess. She’ll send out a draft email to us, we’llcheck the survey and then they will send it to thestudent body. They want to make our experiencemore enjoyable on campus.

16. Non-Legislative Business (25 min)

g. Senate Vacancy Elections- President Nasreen Naqvii. All members of the public left the meeting as there willnow be an internal SGA election.

ii. Activism & Advocacy Senator

1. Krishna Kumar is a member of class of 2028. He

talked about the concerns during the war in Gaza,wants to see the behind the scenes of SGA, and caresabout the students’ perspectives and opinions.

2. Arham Alam was a pro-choice organizer. He mainly

talked about their reproductive justice advocacyjourney. He wants to represent the students.

3. Sara Mishra wrote to local politicians, worked in

anti-xenophobic and anti-racist groups, uncleardorms and high tuition are the things she wants todevelop initiatives on.

4. Mishra was elected.

iii. Disability Senator:

1. Raven McCoy is passionate about the position and

wants to improve the experience of disabledstudents.

2. Seungmyoung Lee wants to hear diverse voices and

discuss the intersection of student life, knowledgeand disability rights. DEI can’t be achieved withoutongoing effort, according to her.

3. Carissa Shuxteau understands the challenges

disabled people go through. She wants to improvestudent accessibility, consider the needs of allstudents, and change university policies ifnecessary.

4. Dubravko Rodriguez is the chair of student

engagements at Peabody. He wants to bring hisdedication, understand unique challenges, developprograms and policies that enhance accessibility.a. Since Rodriguez is a Peabody student, he wasremoved.

5. Krish Kulkarni’s dad was diagnosed with a

congenital hip condition and his sister was left withpost-surgical seizures after her surgery. He spenttime taking care of them, so he wants to become asenator and advocate for the rights of people who gothrough scenarios similar to theirs.

6. Johnalys Ferrer thinks that there isn’t a strong

sense of disability services on campus. She believesthat the recent constructions affected pathways andthere is no accessible feedback mechanism. Shewants to amplify everybody’s voices.

7. Ferrer was elected.

iv. Junior Class Senator:

1. Sitina Mesfin criticized the library construction and

dining.

2. Zaynab Mirza is passionate and was the president of

the SGA of Northern Virginia Community College.She went to conferences to build leadership goals.She had previous initiatives in other SGAs, such asstudent discounts, on-campus daycare system, andsuccessful implementation of a community garden.

3. Ali Asghar Kassamali values feedback, cares about

community education in Baltimore city, and wantsto collaborate and find sustainable solutions.

4. Peter Jackson wants to advocate for students, and

he is a transfer student from UMD.

5. Junior Class Council endorses Mirza as the things

she mentioned in the application aligns with thecouncil’s goals.

6. Mirza and Jackson were elected.

h. Senior Class Programming Council Approval- Chair Tim Huangi. Members were approved.

i. Junior Class Updates- President Oluwakemi Abioduni. Voting registration event went well and 200 people attended.International inclusion efforts faced challenges. Some wereunfamiliar with how voting works in their home countries, andthey had limited participation. Vice President of the SenateSrigouri Oruganty assisted 15 students with out of stateregistration. She helped students register and providedinformation on voting.ii. Only three senators from SGA showed up to support the event.This lack of presence is concerning and SGA should take amore active role, prioritize civic duty and lead by example.iii. 88% of respondents agreed that the worst time to find parkingon campus is 11 am - 2 pm. People who are living off campus,especially upperclassmen, missed classes and work. They werelate no matter how early they left.

iv. Media Senator Tyler Turner talked to Brittani Brown. Thereare no current or future options for parking. Expensiveparking permits are another challenge.v. Junior Class President Oluwakemi Abiodun said that theadministration doesn’t know how much of an issue it is. NineEast 33rd has a parking deck behind their building and it’sempty during the day, which could be utilized for the future.We can tell President Daniels about this.vi. Future initiatives are included in the slides. Class presidentswill include this information in their emails to their class.

j. Wellbeing Day Feedback- Vice President Srigouri Orugantyi. One of the biggest events SGA put together is WellbeingDay. There was yoga on Decker Garden, hammocks, andplant giveaways. Will Kirk took a bunch of photos.ii. Engagement was high, hammocks were full, peopledropped by to see the movie, and there were long lines forplant giveaways.iii. There were several events. The fact that it was on 9/11caused some concerns but people were positive about it.There were Sidechat posts on hammocks, clubs used thehammocks as promotional materials, and people weretalking about it.iv. SGA’s support could’ve been higher. There could havebeen more reposts and sharing with organizations. Not alot of people knew about the details. The organization feltoverwhelming to Oruganty and there was confusion onduties. There were unexpected outlet complications andthey needed more time to set up and training from DMC.

k. Campus Surveillance Discussion- President Nasreen Naqvi and

Senator Yashas Mallikarjuni. The discussion was tabled to a later meeting.l. Initiatives (3 mins each)

i. Senator Tyler Turner

1. Turner presented the Blue Jay Crew, which is

supported by Rachelle Hernandez and Brown. Theidea is to create a group of students to expand BlueJay Tuesday to be an everyday thing. This includesgiving more tools, leaving them at class, andexciting people.

ii. Senator Daarian Rouhani

1. Fencing entrapped the chairs and tables in front of

MSE. KSAS Senator Daarian Rouhani wants tomove these out. Send Rouhani a message, so that wecan have a meeting with Dean Long and talk to herabout this, and buy more tables and chairs ifnecessary.

2. Li said that we can talk to Cecilia Etzel.
3. Hispanic/Latinx Caucus Chair Cynthia Sanchez

Hidalgo thinks that we should ask for morefurniture.

4. There will be increased seating at the MSE Patio.
5. Rouhani will address concerns about Foundational

Abilities.iii. Sophomore Class Senator Tarini Basireddy is working ona survey to get freshmen’s opinions about thefoundational abilities.

17. First Reading

d. SARU Funding Bill- Vice President Srigouri Orugantyi. London Lloyd is a member of JHU Gender and SexualAssault Resource Unit.ii. All information is in the bill.iii. This will be reviewed by the Finance Committee and will bevoted on after that.iv. Motion to refer this to the Finance Committee was passed.v. For questions, message Oruganty.

e. Affirmative Action Resolution- Senator Nayshawn and SenatorCynthiai. DEI training is optional now, which is something theparticipants of the forum were not happy about. Staff saidthat more students took the initiative to take the trainingwhen it’s not mandatory. Hidalgo wants to make itmandatory for everyone and not only for students. Hidalgointroduced the DEI tag on SIS.ii. Koldas suggested giving two options: either take a coursewith the DEI tag or complete a workshop.iii. CDI is being rebranded as Community and Belonging. Staffweren’t even aware. They were trying to recruit for the newvice provost. New name change was included in the jobdescription, so this is how they found out. There was nofeedback from the staff.iv. Suggestion from Meng was to change the conclusionparagraph and set a deadline. Hidalgo asked what would bea good deadline.v. Freshman Class Senator Kevin Xu thinks that the DEI tag isa good idea, but with the FA requirements, he thinks that itmight put too much burden on the students. He thinks thatmaking it mandatory might overwhelm the students. Xusuggested focusing on FA first and making them lessdemanding. Basireddy and Xu have been working on the FAsituation and creating a survey for the freshmen. Once therequirements are more manageable, then DEI can beworked on.vi. Hidalgo doesn’t think this would be adding an extrarequirement as these already count.vii. Xu said that if we don’t make it mandatory, it would workwell, like adding a DEI tag so students can see. He suggestedthat maybe we could make it double count with some FAs.viii. Huang thinks that if we send this, we will be blasted by theuniversity administrators. He suggested to change some ofthe wordings.ix. Snell doesn’t think it’s too harsh.x. Hidalgo said that five members of staff and administratorsread this and no one said that it’s harsh.xi. Abiodun thinks that the executive board played nice enoughso this should be okay.xii. Basireddy asked if we will send out the survey first, to whichHidalgo said yes.xiii. Naqvi said that after the president is elected next week, wecan add something relevant to that in the resolution, too.xiv. Sophomore Class Senator Omotara Tiamiyu asked about thedeadline. She asked to be more specific and narrow it down:meeting or written documentation or statement? What dowe expect?xv. Hidalgo will change that sentence to transparency.xvi. Tiamiyu said to specifically show that we want a publicstatement to hold them accountable.xvii. Rouhani asked what the main benefit we’re hoping to seewith the DEI tag is.xviii. Hidalgo thinks that people who don’t work in DEI don’t taketime to learn about DEI, although it’s important.xix. WSE Senator Moses Frumkin said that the faculty is nothappy with the tag situation and they mostly regard it as apush from the administration. He raised the question: Whogets to have control on how the classes are taught?xx. Hidalgo said that if we get a tangible feedback from thefaculty about this, then we can definitely share that.xxi. Performing and Visual Arts Senator Deryck Yin asked whatare some examples of courses that you’d double count asDEI.xxii. Hidalgo said that the number she has given in the resolutioncan be changed. Even independent study can count as aDEI.xxiii. Special Interest and Hobby Senator Adithyan Neelamanasaid that people are voicing valid concerns about the DEItags. He questioned to what extent this is doable. He talkedto academic advisors who said that students have noflexibility based on their electives (especially those in STEMdegrees). He asked why we’re not asking for a return to theDEI training. Just in general, in the spirit of this resolution,one of the issues is that Hopkins doesn’t do legacy admits.Within that logic, how can we use examples of universitieswho do legacy admits as those who preserved theiradmissions rate?xxiv. Black Caucus Chair Nayshawn Ferebee doesn’t think this isabout the legacy admits. Their practices were the mainelement as to how they achieved these rates.xxv. Neelamana said that admissions pushed out a vagueexplanation as to what they’re planning to do. Why are wenot including those in the resolution?xxvi. Hidalgo reiterated that there was an increase when trainingwasn’t mandatory. She added that we shouldn’t be in asituation where we need to ask for transparency. They arenot transparent even when they promise to be transparent.The diversity road map was updated back in Spring 2022,which Hidalgo thinks is too long to leave somethingunupdated for.xxvii. Senior Class Senator Ryan Alezz said that the purpose ofthis was affirmative action. A lot of the things here are veryauxiliary. Some are not even related to the decision. Heresponded to Frumkin saying students pay for the tuition,so they should be able to ask for it. We don’t have clearfeedback from the students. He asked to make it moreconcise and focus on affirmative action. Diversity shouldstay, but all these other DEI stuff could be separateinitiatives. He said that the main purpose is affirmativeaction, so let’s focus on that. We are adding stuff that wedon’t know for sure are even wanted by the student body.xxviii. Ferebee asked about the status on the executive branchapology. Press release and apology will be in TheNews-Letter print and released with the next newspaperissue.xxix. This resolution is not being voted on today.

f. Lighting of the Quads Tabling- Chair Tim Huangi. For LOTQ, there will be a general merch giveaway. Feel freeto add merch ideas to the document. Price is lower than theone in the bill because we have a student discount.ii. Neelamana asked whether we get reimbursed if we don’tspend the whole amount.iii. Huang clarified that any money not spent will stay in thebudget.iv. Alezz asked for clarification on the custom merch.v. Huang said that Connie Weng resigned, so Huang is incharge of everything. It’s a little late to do custom merch.We have more money this year, so he doesn’t want to limit.vi. Koldas said that The News-Letter has a great graphicdesigner, so Huang will talk to Koldas.vii. Motion to refer this to Finance Committee was passed.

18. Second Reading

a. November Tabling - Chair Tim Huangi. Hot cocoa part will be changed as working with vendorsand catering doesn’t work too well.ii. The bill was passed.

b. Leadership Workshop 2 - Chair Tim Huangi. Since the attendance was low for the first workshop, thistime we’ll do more marketing and now allocations are out,so this time we expect more attendance.ii. The bill was passed.

19. Prospective Legislation & Announcements (5 min)
20. Adjournment (Estimated 9:00 PM)

a. Motion to adjourn passed.Time-length and adjournment estimates are provided for the benefit ofguests at Senate meetings. However, SGA meetings are always slated toextend until 9:00 PM and SGA members are expected to remain in theSenate chamber until official adjournment by motion, whether before orafter the adjournment estimate.