This week’s meeting of the University of Rhode Island’s Student Senate was brief with little debate.
During the report of the Campus Affairs Committee, Senator Ryan Menard spoke on the topic of student pay on holidays. Menard expressed that “[The University of Rhode Island] does not pay time and a half [to student employees] working Labor Day” among other holidays. Senator Menard stated that by doing this, the University is essentially “breaking the law.”
Public Safety Liaison John Bagley addressed during the meeting that he is going to be “meeting with public safety and other organizations across campus such as campus police and Emergency Medical Services.”
Under the report of the Cultural Affairs Committee, Chairwoman Jennifer Kohl mentioned that there would be “bystander awareness training for members of senate” and that it is “important that leadership on campus goes to this.”
For the report of the Academic Affairs Committee, Chairman John Morabito discussed the implementation of “Freenters,” a low to no cost printing option on campus again. Morabito was involved in a conference call with the organization, and stated that he would contact the “[Memorial] Union or library for a trial run” of Freenters. This technology would be installed “in addition to the printers now, so that students have an option between using ram account or the freenters.”
External Affairs Committee Chairwoman Sara Straube discussed how she met with officials about “commuter data assessment [of the] average cost of living off campus.”
During general discussion at the end of the meeting, Senator Bagley mentioned that he and Vice President Tristram Howard were working on potentially developing a “Student Senate [for the] Providence campus” of the University.