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Senate General Body Meeting #20 — Minutes (02/18/25)

Minutes / Senate · minutes · 112th session · dated February 18, 2025 · updated March 12, 2025

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112th Johns Hopkins Student Government AssociationSenate Meeting #20February 18, 2025 / 07:20 PM / Hackerman B17AGENDA

  1. Call to Order and Attendance (1 min)

a. Excused Absentees: Justin Pokrant, Sun Moon, JohnalysFerrer, Lucy Landry, Jacquelyn Slade, Brandon, Kemi, Zoe,Sean, Anisha, Nayshawn, Ryann, Kevin, Alex

b. Unexcused Absentees:

  1. Convening Business (40 min)

a. Presentation from Off Campus Living

  1. Amendment and Approval of the Agenda (1 min)
  2. Public Input (3 min)
  3. Reports (5 min)

a. Cabinet Reports (4 min)

i. Speed Dating Tabling:https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Qvz2Vtg0eAS2Wk-13HdvF76Nx6Ic3OK_yMa4ysxH_Ok/edit?usp=sharing

b. Advisor Report (2 min)2

  1. Non-Legislative Business (15 min)

a. Mentorship Survey- Senator Tanisha Taneja & Amy Xu

b. SGA Mental Health event discussion - Chair Tim Huang & Senator

Srigouri Oruganty

  1. First Reading

a. SGA - Alumni Bill- Chair Tim Huangi. Presentationhttps://www.canva.com/design/DAGfgLaqn1Y/fZnyeOh4Fn_DphJHsHPOHQ/view?utm_content=DAGfgLaqn1Y&utm_campaign=designshare&utm_medium=link2&utm_source=uniquelinks&utlId=h9099f673bf

  1. Second Reading
  2. Prospective Legislation & Announcements (5 min)
  3. Adjournment (Estimated 9:00 PM)

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.112th Johns Hopkins Student Government Association

Senate Meeting #20February 18, 2025 / 07:20 PM / Hackerman B17AGENDA

  1. Call to Order and Attendance (1 min)

a. Excused Absentees: Justin Pokrant, Sun Moon, JohnalysFerrer, Lucy Landry, Jacquelyn Slade, Brandon, Kemi, Zoe,Sean, Anisha, Nayshawn, Ryann, Kevin, Alex

b. Unexcused Absentees:

  1. Convening Business (40 min)

b. Presentation from Off Campus Living

i. Robbie Horwitz, Living Coordinatorii. Reached out to us because students and staff are notaware of the Off-Campus Housing office. Not only formoving process but also after move in.iii. When she was 28, she got her first job and realized “youdon’t know what you don’t know.” A lot of issues studentscome to her about are things that they could have resolvedif they were made aware of it beforehand, so they woulddo things differently.iv. Four members in the Off-Campus Office. She showed theflyers - Roommate Finder - that have information on howto find housing, notice scams, and more. It’s the mainforum they send everyone to first.v. After you find the housing, how to manage water/heat notworking, maintenance request, follow up, details, did theysend a text but you opted out of the text? Lots of ins andouts.

vi. Hana Hasan, Directorvii. Jon Walter, Student/Community Liaison - can help out ifyou need to borrow lawn mowers etc

viii. Jelytza Padro, Transition Coordinator - Horwitz’s rolesoverlap with hers. Works with sophomores as theytransition to off-campus. Horwitz works with juniors whoare living off-campus.ix. Community flyers → mostly targeted for sophomoresx. Utilities, financial aid. Organized a workshop, 30 peoplesigned up, no one showed up. Was planning to askquestions like “What do you wish you'd known beforemoving out?”xi. Left all the stuff on the table for us to check out.

xii. Off-Campus Database - offcampushousing.jhu.edu. Askedwhich class everybody is in and whether we’ve ever heardof this website before.xiii. Row houses to flats can be found on this website. Juniorsand seniors → if you live in a row home, at the end of theyear, they do visits where they pick up junk, donations,etc.xiv. Community tree planting, partnering with Tree Baltimoreand other organizations.xv. Community clean up event, the park that’s by the farmers’market.xvi. Horwitz: What does it take to get students to scan a QRcode?xvii. Moses: Information needs to be something that’sadditional to something he can find outside? He feels likehis time is spent better by applying to places and visitingthem rather than going to events.xviii. Horwitz: Had two students come to the office, they askedtheir lease to be checked, so she gave them a print outwith things to look out for in a lease. Students also are notaware of the services they offer, like a lot of people are notaware that after moving in, you have 15 days to schedule awalk through with the property manager. How can sheconnect “you don’t know what you don’t know” to funevents?xix. Tim: Educational ones → what channels have you beengoing through right now?xx. Horwitz: Flyers, Instagram (not sharing as often as she’dlike to because she is a single person office).xxi. Jelytza is connected to RAs, Horwitz is not, which is thechallenge.xxii. Vishnu: Are you able to email juniors and seniorsdirectly?xxiii. Horwitz: Yes. We also have a sophomore newsletter. Willsend an email this week for this month’s events.xxiv. Tyler: Asked about the times of the events, suggested toorganize them in noon instead.xxv. Daar: Believes that morning or noon works better.xxvi. Jenny: Scrolling through the emails she got. Part of theissue, got one email this year. Used to send a monthlynewsletter, so now she only sends things out when she hassomething to send out. Subject-wise → should be moreattention grabbing. “What you need to know beforemoving off campus”, “When should you start looking forhousing?””.xxvii. Jenny: Also do not start with “Off campus housing”.xxviii. Daar: Use emojis.xxix. Jenny: Keep subject lines short.xxx. Danial: Suggested going to the rec center. Personally goesthere often. Upperclassmen are usually there.xxxi. Tarini: QR codes on TVs.xxxii. Horwitz: Used to be one, but then it got removed.xxxiii. Tarini: She has been seeing it.xxxiv. Horwitz: I can reach out to our communications personand ask.xxxv. Arihant: Students tend to ask advice from upperclassmen.Asking people in your design team “Hey, where did youleave?” People mostly look for drop-in, quick advice,rather than an event. They don’t want to spend too muchtime.xxxvi. Buse: Chick fil a event at Nine East seemed prettyeffective because there is incentive to go like free food anda person to ask for advice. Also, use questions in subjectlines, like “do you know what to do if something is brokenin your house?” This would get people to read throughemails.xxxvii. Srigouri: Tabling at the Breezeway is a good way to engagewith people. You’ll get a mix of students but still you’ll beable to show your flyers.xxxviii. Tarini: Sending the flyers to people living off-campus. Askpeople to text you questions and you can respond to themon Instagram. People won’t go out of their way to go toevents but they will shoot you a quick message.xxxix. Horwitz: Stopped using Instagram a while ago. Also, anartist, so she is particular with how things look.xl. Jazzlyn: For her to come to an event, there should beinformation provided along with the activity.xli. Moses: There is already a plethora of information abouthousing in Maryland. For the meetings to be attractive,there needs to be more information than you can getonline, or it needs to be more efficient than what you canget online.xlii. Jordyn: Lives in a rowhome, lived in 9East last year. Itwould have been useful to know there were rakes andshovels available. Emailing all of that to us although it isnot completely relevant at that point would be useful.Question → Curious as to what the office would do if somestudents have issues with landlords.xliii. Horwitz: Can not force anyone to do anything but we canpoint out things that are obviously illegal and give advice.Baltimore 311 → free city service, bulk trash pickup andrecycling, if they attempt to fix it but it keeps gettingbroken, 311 housing inspector comes and gives them 30days to fix it. There are commercial properties they haverelationships with. No stakes, management.xliv. Arihant: Besides events, the Academy has predatorypolicies.xlv. Horwitz: Doesn’t know anything, same Academy policiesnow as school doesn’t manage it yet.xlvi. Arihant: On the website, they give you a price, then theychange the price after. Confused as to why Hopkinsowned housing seems greedy.xlvii. Horwitz: Even those that are not connected to Hopkinscan change everyday. Doesn’t wanna get into this toomuch as she doesn’t have enough information. Nothingchange with the management, doesn’t know if it willchange in the future. Incoming juniors might not be ableto renew their lease.xlviii. Tarini: Some people think these buildings are managed byHopkins. It should be obvious that they are not on thewebsites.xlix. Horwitz: Doesn’t know every building they have arelationship with. Doesn’t like blanket advice.l. Cynthia: They could have a statement specifyingli. Horwitz: You can’t assume things, though. You should doyour research. Once you leave your dorm at Hopkins, it’snot Hopkins anymore.lii. Nas: Thank you! If anyone has any follow up questions,they can reach out after the meeting.

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

a. Move to approve the agenda.b. Cynthia wanted to table Club Columbia Funding Bill.c. ABSA removed as it was rejected in Finance.d. Agenda approved.

  1. Public Input (3 min)

a. 3 simple requests - requesting more money for the APL, wantsSGA to divert most of its funding.

  1. Reports (5 min)

a. Cabinet Reports (4 min)i. Amy: Stone’s announcement- met with Dr. Brown andother university leadership regarding student life.ii. Srigouri referred to Cynthia and Nayshawn.iii. Cynthia: Talked about student experience once they gethere and what we want them to see and feel. Carnival ideaand wellness week. Grow and expand such events more.Think about things that they lacked in their experiencewhen they first got to campus.iv. Tim: Speed dating is a full go. Need a lot more volunteers,go into the document to find the roles. Any amount ofvolunteers is good. Send reminders.v. Buse: How do people know if they are in the event list orwaitlist?vi. Tim: Anyone who registers can come. We are not at fullcapacity yet.vii. Nasreen: Business casual equivalent on March 4th.Admissions (Dean Cho and his team), Mental Health, IT,30 minutes each. Strictly informative session, nolegislative business or anything of the sort. Don’t havecomputers out. Have legitimate questions, don’t catchthem off guard.

b. Advisor Report (2 min)

  1. Non-Legislative Business (15 min)

a. Mentorship Survey- Senator Tanisha Taneja & Amy Xui. Few weeks ago, they talked about starting a mentorshipprogram within SGA, similar to bigs and littles. Createdquestions that would be helpful to send out to mentorsand mentees. Including fun, personality questions too.ii. Jazz: Is this going to the next class of freshmen?iii. Tanisha: Yes and the new senators that enter in Apriliv. Jazz: For freshmen, they may still be finding their footingswith extracurriculars, maybe change it to “whatextracurriculars would you like to be a part of”v. Dar: Add a question like, “What are you most confusedabout”, or “what is the first thing you want to learn about”vi. Tim: Similar to surveying senators on what they areplanning on doing on SGA and what do you want to knowmore about related to that.vii. Buse: For 8g, will the mentor and mentee be matched ifthey choose the same option? I am goal-driven andambitious but I am not sure I would get along withsomeone who is goal-driven and ambitious. Maybeconsider not matching directly.viii. Amy: The personality type may be a stretch, are you goingto put two people with the same personality together?ix. Amy Xu: May help have an understanding of the vibebefore you meet someone.x. Amy: Maybe pair chaotic personalities. Also, includeanother question on “why did you join SGA?”, or “what doyou want to do in SGA?”xi. Arihant: Give the freshmen an option to put the name ofsomebody they want to be their mentor based on who theyalready know, like “if you have a specific mentor inmind…” They may want to build on an existingrelationship.xii. Nasreen: What are the next steps?xiii. Tanisha: Making the changes, finalizing it, and thensending it out when the new people have been inducted.xiv. Amy: Want to be proactive, so they want to push these allas soon as possible.xv. Nas: We might be a little expired as we only have a monthleft. Collaborate with the new members coming in. Oncethey are elected, reach out to them and start pairingpeople right then. Reach out to Luke.

b. SGA for Charity discussion - Chair Tim Huangi. Tim: Mental health event through SGA. Have been talkingto Active Minds. Ideas like sending the silence, an eventon campus where you can say mental health stories.Another idea is on snack packs, trying to expand it beyondgiving basic snacks.ii. Srigouri: Trying to find the best way to engage students.Trying to engage the students who need it the most.iii. Jason: Why is it called SGA for charity?iv. Tim: Forgot to change it, not about charity. Original ideakind of got shifted.v. Jason: Mental health for people in SGA or student body?vi. Tim: Student body.vii. Srigouri: SGA people are welcome to join.viii. Danial: Have a mental health event revolving aroundacademics if you are interested in taking it in that route.ix. Srigouri: We could do bothx. Adi: What form would this take? Would it refer to existingresources? What does it realistically look like?xi. Tim: It’s not about getting people into these services. It’smore about getting out the information about howimportant mental health is. Sending the silence is where acompany brings in backpacks about people with mentalhealth events and it's like an exhibit. The snack pack couldbe bigger than just giving out snacks to students. Srigouritalked about potentially reaching out to counsellors sothey can tell the students who are getting counseling andmake a support group.xii. Srigouri: There can also be education on copingmechanisms.xiii. Tarini: Have you thought about involving other clubs likea Place To Talk?xiv. Tim: Yes, Active Minds and Health and Wellbeingxv. Tyler: Mental health office really wants to come oncampus and talk to students about it. We could do it incollaboration with the other organizations and make it abig event.xvi. Jazz: Their biggest concerns is they don’t know how toreach the students or what kind of event.xvii. Tyler: One day with multiple different stations andmultiple different activities would be good to engage.xviii. Is this coming in the future or is it already going on?xix. Tim: coming in the futurexx. Folks over at health and wellbeing are hosting out of thedarkness walk on April 5th. Promotes awareness onmental health.

  1. First Reading

a. SGA - Alumni Bill - Chair Tim Huangi. Tim: Spring retreat. People wanted it. Annie Koogle. Notmandatory. Fun spring retreat as we are about to expire.In Hampden, BlueBird Cocktail Room. During alumniweekend.ii. Past SGA alumni will be invited to the event. Meet & Greetevent. Free food, mocktails for those in SGA. Fancy meetand greet.iii. Maximum will be 2000 USD. In line with spring retreat.Will probably be less.iv. Jazz: This is the spring retreat?v. Tim: Yes.vi. Amy: Clarification, close to campus, so we can take a BlueJay shuttle.vii. Tim: No alcohol because we would have to get security.viii. Zach: So we can’t go and buy alcohol if we’re older than21?ix. Tim: To my understanding, no, specifically for this event.But I can talk to Annie. A form will be sent out to see howmany people are interested.

  1. Second Reading
  2. Prospective Legislation & Announcements (5 min)
  3. Adjournment (Estimated 9:00 PM)

a. Motion to adjourn the meeting 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.