By Lisa Kaczke
A new committee will be added to the Council for University Programs (CUP) to act as liaison between CUP and other student groups, the organization’s executive board members announced at an Aug. 2 meeting.
Students had raised concerns after CUP decided not to fill the culture and diversity chair last spring, afraid CUP would no longer have a focus on holding culturally diverse events on campus.
Fifteen students representing various cultural student organizations gathered to hear CUP’s plan for the new “collaboration committee,” which will be added to CUP’s five existing committees – lectures, concerts, Springfest, showcases and homecoming. E-board members listened to students’ suggestions made at the July 19 meeting and incorporated those ideas into the committee, said Amanda Zoglio, CUP president.
The goal of the collaboration committee will be to act as a liaison between CUP and other student groups to create events for the university community. They will work as the central body responsible for talking to student organizations about events, said Chris Burns, CUP’s vice president of marketing. When a student group has an idea for an event, the collaboration committee will hear and then present the idea to the e-board. The committee chair will be elected through CUP’s standard election process at a later date.
The committee will help decide which events should receive support from CUP and which of the five committees will help the student organization hold the event.
“We, as an e-board, decide what events are going to work and what’s not going to work,” said Caitlin Lowell, chair of CUP’s lecture committee.
The collaboration committee will not have any money to spend, as CUP’s budget for the upcoming year is already split between the five existing committees.
Because diversity is at the forefront of the executive board’s minds, each of the five committees will be incorporating diversity into all of their events throughout the year, Zoglio said.
Roodly Dorleans, vice president of Haitian Student Unity, said he was concerned about CUP’s commitment to diversity. After making the executive board stand up, he said, “Promise us you’re not lying to us.”
Jonathan Santos Silva, the culture and diversity chair two years ago, said at the meeting that he didn’t understand why CUP needs a collaboration committee.
“It didn’t seem like CUP had a problem with collaboration. CUP has a problem with culture and diversity. Why flip it around?” said Santos Silva, an alumnus.
Nadine Yaver, former president of the Latin American Student Organization (LASO), called CUP’s plan for the new committee “vague,” and that there was no system of accountability.
She was concerned that, although the current executive board is dedicated to diversity, future CUP members may not be, and with the deletion of the culture and diversity chair, there is no system in place to ensure that diversity will be included in events sponsored by CUP in the future.
Without the culture and diversity chair, Yaver said the burden is going to fall on student groups to guarantee events on campus will include diversity.
“You can’t just rely on LASO and other groups to bring it to you,” said Yaver, a senior criminal justice major, during the meeting.
The level of responsibility to Northeastern’s community is greater for CUP than for smaller organizations, Yaver said, because their budget is so large.
“CUP hasn’t lived up to its mission statement. You’ve just moved the names around and the money around,” Yaver said to the e-board.
Burns offered an explanation for why CUP cannot bring back the culture and diversity chair this year, citing a “budget limitation,” as there was no money allocated to it by the previous CUP e-board.
“We are not the CUP that decided to cut the money,” Burns said.
CUP will also begin holding “roll-out” and “wrap-up” meetings, said Scott Hultman, chair of the Springfest committee. The meetings will be conducted like their general board meetings, but will be heavily advertised to Northeastern’s community. The roll-out meeting will be held at the beginning of each semester to show what is being planned by CUP for the upcoming semester and to receive suggestions for the events. The wrap-up meeting will be held at the end of each semester to receive feedback on the events.
CUP members asked students to wait until CUP has implemented the new committee and meetings before deciding whether or not their solution was working.
“We can talk and talk, but we need to see it in action,” Burns said.
