The weekly student senate meeting saw the approval of a new registered student organization and a discussion on the transparency and allocation of student fees on Wednesday.
The student senate heard from turn the page journaling at EIU RSO member Lizzie Tomko.
“The purpose of our club is to introduce, educate, explain and assist on how journaling can be helpful for reflection tools and outlets,” Tomko said.
Journaling can include both writing and visual aspects to it.
Meetings are held on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, though it is only required for students to attend one meeting every two weeks, Tomko said.
The RSO was approved with ten in favor with no opposing votes and one abstention.
The meeting saw a speech by Senior Diversity and Inclusion Officer John Blue about the EIU climate survey.
“The results of the climate survey will be used to assist the belonging access and equity council to write the diversity strategic plan,” Blue said.
The survey will be open until Nov. 5. Students, faculty and staff who take the survey can choose to be included in a drawing for EIU merchandise.
A key point of discussion and questioning for the members of the student senate came from the student fees committee report from speaker of the senate Madison Veatch.
“An overview of the committee task force is how fees should appear on the bill,” Veatch said.
There were three questions posed by Veatch on what to do about fees.
The first question was on whether student fees should be listed individually or as one lump sum, which is what is currently in place.
“Within the student activity fee, there is all those fees but on your bill, you are only seeing one fee,” Veatch said.
The second question which caused the main point of discussion was should the athletic fee be moved from the grant in aid fee.
“78% of that fee goes to athletics,” Veatch said. “Should athletics be moved from [grant and aid] to intercollegiate athletics?”
The third question was whether there should be flat rates of fees or fees based around credit hours.
“I think that all athletic fees should be consolidated. I think the one under the GIA shouldn’t be there,” student senator Preston Siewert said.
VPSA Mason Tegeler raised the question to Veatch of changing where the funds go.
“Would moving athletics out of GIA fix the problem of 78% of it going to athletics?” Tegeler said. “If not, then it doesn’t change which bill item is charging you this amount of money.”
In response to Tegeler, Veatch explained moving the fees.
“It would not change the allocation. What it would do was change the transparency,” Veatch said. “It would be one fee, and every athlete would come out of that fee.”
Parliamentarian Megan Fox raised the question on whether there is a breakdown of student fees.
“There seems to be a lack of transparency when it comes to fees,” Fox said. “Is there a way for students to find a breakdown of this?”
“On eiu.edu there is a breakdown of some of the fees, not all of them,” Veatch said in response.
Overall, the discussion led to the senate wanting to have the Office of Financial aid and the Athletic department present fees to gain a better understanding of where funds are going and how the funds are disclosed.
Jason Coulombe can be reached at 581-2812 or at jmcoulombe@eiu.edu.
