On Nov. 3, the Graduate Student Government held its biweekly general body meeting in ChemSci 102. The body discussed the Three Minute Thesis (3MT) competition and an upcoming GSG town hall. GSG reports also covered active challenges for graduate students, including work hour limits, summer stipend changes, and incident reporting.
The meeting began with the GSG President’s report. GSG President Sam Jensen discussed new five-hour work week limitations. The five-hour work week is not a university policy, but it is being adopted in more units. It was established because of funding capabilities and time that is supposed to be dedicated to research for fully-funded students. Concerns were raised regarding the impact of hour limits on international students because they are, for the most part, only permitted to work on-campus. GSG directs any stipend-supported students with work hour limits struggling with living costs to speak with Dr. Landis if they are a part of the College of Engineering.
GSG reflected on the planning process for the 3MT competition and announced a town hall event to be held on Dec. 1 at 5:15 p.m.. The GSG general body meeting on Dec. 1 is cancelled due to overlap with the town hall. This event was referred to as the “most important GSG event of the semester.” Jensen encouraged the GSG body to attend the town hall, having said, “This type of meeting, this town hall, is one of the better ways to go about changing the things we might want to change. And there will be free food.”
Other topics covered in the meeting included incident reporting. GSG informed attendees that public safety is encouraging reports when students are hit by objects while walking to or from campus. If students are yelled at or called slurs, they are encouraged to report the incident in an effort to compile a list of repeat offenders, but this behavior falls under the First Amendment right, so Public Safety and Title IX can not help.
GSG noted that after the Transportation Services Town Hall, data on bus usage will be collected to define future transportation routes. GSG encouraged students to use the bus routes that they would like to see continued in the future during this data collection time.
For further information on GSG agendas, meeting minutes, and events visit gsg.mtu.edu.
