GSC BoD Meeting
Thursday, March 1, 2001
Directors present:
Alex Backer, Jeff Bergthorson, Catherine Cornu, Diego Dugatkin, Michael Fleming, Bob Gingrich, Will Green, Benedict Hebert, Anil Hirani, Michael Johnson, Fok-Yan Leung, Timothy Lesko, Chunhui Mo, Jose Mumbru, Athanasios Nenes, Nick Pornsinsiriak, Steve Pracko, Hui Wu
Directors absent:
Magali Billen, Tanja Bosak, Marco Casari, Serena Guarnaschelli, James Harrington, Ying Huang, Tobias Kippenberg, Melvin Leok, Adrian Lew, Cecily Ryan, Claude Seywert
Guests:
Martha-Helene Stapleton, Chip Sumner, Janis Schonauer
Chair Alex Backer presiding.
I. PRELIMINARY BUSINESS
a. Introduction of guests and new directors
Martha-Helene Stapleton, ASCIT President; Chip Sumner, from CHCC; and Janis Schonauer, from Ombuds Office.
b. Additions to the agenda
None.
II. APPROVAL OF MINUTES
The minutes of February 2001 were approved.
III. ACTION ITEMS
The annual report has traditionally looked like a financial report. Given that one of the comments from the last survey was that students were happy about the BoD getting back to them for feedback, Alex proposed to complement the report with a summary of the activities and initiatives carried out by the board during the fiscal year. The motion was passed with only one abstention (Catherine).
The attendance of BoD members to the Quick-funding meetings has been low. Since most of the request are straightforward and do not need much discussion, one way to get more involvement is to have an electronic meeting rather than a face-to-face one. For those cases that cannot be solved by means of the electronic quick-funding, a face-to-face meeting will be called. For that contingency, a quick-funding committee will attend the meeting. This committee will be formed by 5 directors and renewed every month by taking the next 5 members from the list of directors from the web. It is the responsibility of the members of the committee to find a substitute if they cannot attend the meeting. A vote was made and the initiative passed with one abstention (Jose).
Alex presented the results of the survey. There has been a good response regarding the Health Insurance issue. A lot of people would be interested in affordable insurance for dependents. The results have been sent to the President and to Student Affairs. No answers have been received yet. Diego and Chunhui have collected data from other schools. Although there are big differences in the benefits, Caltech's plan seems to be on the high side. Another result from the survey indicates the interest for a job-shadowing program.
IV. ONGOING ACTION ITEMS
Tim said that 20 companies have been contacted. So far two companies, Raytheon and Hughes, have shown interest. Thomas Lott, from Career Center, suggested that we should target first those companies that came to Career Day. The companies will be grouped by geographical area and topic so 2 or 3 companies can be visited on the same day.
Thanos said that the preparation would be finalized within this week. It will most likely take place the second weekend of April. The budget is $400 ($200 for bus and $200 for others). Each participant will pay $15.
Although it would be valuable for prospective students to have access to the results of the lab reviews, they will be initially IP-restricted to Caltech. The committee that has elaborated the survey has decided that the lab review could be implemented as a questionnaire to be filled out by the student as part of the exit interview. Alumni will also be asked to fill out these questionnaires. Shanti Rao has agreed to set up the software to keep the statistics of the results. A lab review editor will be needed to input the answers of the questionnaire into the system. This will be a paid position. The editor would receive $150/year to update the webpage, and there is a $250 bonus for the first year only to create the environment for the database. The question of how many questionnaires from people of one given lab are needed before the results are published on the web. There was some agreement that a minimum of three would be necessary. The budget for the editor was voted and passed with only one abstention (Catherine).
V. ANNOUNCEMENTS
Chip had a meeting with Linda regarding the issue of the cleaning of apartment during holidays. A compromise has been reached so no apartment should get skipped twice in a row. In extreme cases, the resident should talk to Linda. Steve said that during the last month, there were two fires in one week. Both were the result of residents leaving an open flame unattended in the apartment (a stove in one instance, a candle in the other). In at least one of these, none of the smoke detectors in the apartment went off. After the last term party, and because the recroom was not cleaned up soon after the event, a new policy has been establish. For small parties, the recroom must be cleaned right after the event. For large parties, if the recroom is to be cleaned up at a later time, this needs to be discussed with Linda in advance. The ski-trip is scheduled on March 19.