By Melissa Werthmann, News Staff
During Monday’s Student Government Association (SGA) meeting, members heard from two guest speakers and cleared proposed referenda to appear on this year’s voting block.
Faculty Senate Agenda Committee Chair Lou Kruger spoke first and said he hopes to improve the freshman year experience and the response rate to TRACE surveys, which give students an opportunity to evaluate class efficiency and professor performance. Kruger also plans to increase continuity within the committee.
“One of the things I’m going to strive for is that there is a good transition between our senate agenda committee and the next senate agenda committee,” he said.
SGA members also heard from Associate Director of Admissions Kurt Heissenbuttel. Heissenbuttel spoke about space issues on campus and Northeastern’s growing number of applicants.
Regarding overcrowding, Heissenbuttel said, “We deal with very finite numbers. We pay very close attention to yield date and yield trends,” referencing the data that charts how many accepted students chose to attend a particular school.
He said it was another record-breaking year for the university with an impressive applicant pool, and stressed the importance of maintaining “the diversity of our community.”
He said his office is committed to keeping the number of enrolled students to 2,800 each year and that “Northeastern is becoming a very popular place.”
SGA members then evaluated the referenda proposed for this year’s voting ballot on fairness, wording, feasibility and adherence to university policy. Six referenda received enough student votes to be considered and SGA voted to approve all of them to appear on the ballot. This included referenda to increase the number of recycling bins on campus and add the opt-out renewable energy fee to the “I Am Here” registration. The fee is currently an opt-in choice on the tuition e-bill.
Referenda to equalize marijuana and alcohol penalties and freeze tuition will appear on the ballot as well. SGA cleared a modified guest policy referendum for voting, which would allow students living in apartment-style residence halls to sign in more guests and a new guest sign-in policy, which aims to upgrade the current paper and pen method to something more secure and efficient.
