USC’s student senate passed several pieces of legislation, including recommendations to re-evaluate first-year student parking and add compost bins to all dining halls on campus to increase sustainability.
Re-evaluating parking for first-year students
The senate passed a recommendation to expand the surface lots on and nearby campus and re-evaluate whether first-year students should be able to park on campus. This recommendation was sponsored by the student life committee.
Jacob Sheridan, chairman of the student life committee, said the purpose of this legislation is to recommend the university to create enough surface lot space to allow first-year students to use over garage space.
“The majority of (freshmen) are using (garages) as storage parking,” Sheridan said. “If we can put that storage parking onto surface lots rather than in garages, which are in very high demand for commuter students, I believe that that's what's best for this university.”
One of the areas that the recommendation suggests university administration look into developing for surface lots is the Capital City Stadium in Olympia.
According to the recommendation, the stadium has been largely abandoned for multiple years, and the city of Columbia has already addressed interest in redeveloping that area.
Adding compost bins to university dining halls
The senate passed a recommendation to enhance university sustainability practices by adding compost bins to all university dining halls. This recommendation was sponsored by Sens. Moorea Modica and Nicole Delorenzo.
Modica said, the only two dining halls on campus that have their own composting machines are Garnet Station and the Pavilion. She said she met with the sustainability and composting services' leadership on campus about composting.
“They're looking to add more composting because at all the other dining halls, it's mostly from preparing the food and not actually scraping it, so there's a lot of food waste going to the garbage pails,” Modica said.
Other Southeastern Conference schools have composting bins in all of their dining halls, and the Darla Moore School of Business has incorporated composting bins into its facilities, the recommendation said.
Creating joint academic review
The senate passed a recommendation to create a joint academic policy review process conducted by university administration and student body representatives. This recommendation was sponsored by Chairperson of the Academics Committee Lenyx Coviak.
According to the recommendation, students have various concerns regarding academics, but there is a lack of clarity in where to address those concerns.
There are multiple bodies in the university, such as administration and Student Government, who share the same goal in representing academic needs, but there is a lack of formalized communication between them, the recommendation said.
The recommendation suggests the faculty senate, Office of the Provost and Student Government work to create a formal policy and set of procedures for these various bodies to communicate with each other.
“A lot of us are utilizing informal modes of communication with these different faculty members, provost, that kind of thing,” Coviak said. “(The legislation is) just to make sure that those relationships are a codified requirement of all of our roles, so that way, nothing can fall by the wayside.”
Other legislation
The senate passed a bill to simplify chapter two of the Student Government codes, regarding the student senate. This bill was sponsored by Chairwoman of the Judiciary Committee Kiki D’Apolito.
A recommendation sponsored by Sen. Jasmine Whatley and Chairwoman of the Health and Safety Committee Emma Cumby to replace the missing hooks in the Russell House bathroom stalls was passed.
“We like hooks in our bathroom, we don't want to just put things on the ground, and so we just think that this reaffirms it,” Cumby said. “(Student Government) likes sanitation, and this really reaffirms sanitation.”
The senate failed to pass a recommendation from Sen. Lester Lewis. This recommendation was in regards to adding charging stations on campus for electric scooters and e-bikes.
Several senators said they liked the idea behind the recommendation but just felt, in its current state, it was infeasible and needed to be more developed.
The senate passed four resolutions to commend the work of the current executive members of Student Government: President Courtney Tkacs, Vice President Jordan Richardson, Treasurer Ashley Reynolds and Speaker of the Senate Maura Hamilton.
This was the final meeting of the 117th USC student senate.