AS Review - February 23, 2015 by ASWWU

Vol. 30 #16 2. 23.15

2 • as.wwu.edu/asreview

“Noodle,” an exhibit by Camila Frey-Booth and Daniel Morris, was on display in Western’s B Gallery. Photo by Trevor Grimm // AS Review

MAKING YOUR LIFE BETTER, ONE PAGE AT A TIME Viking Union 411 516 High St. Bellingham, WA 98225 Phone: 360.650.6126 Fax: 360.650.6507 Email: as.review@wwu.edu as.wwu.edu/asreview @TheASReview facebook.com/theasreview © 2015. Published most Mondays during the school year by the Associated Students of Western Washington University. The AS Review is an alternative weekly that provides coverage of student interests such as the AS government, activities and student life. The Review seeks to enhance the student experience by shedding light on underrepresented issues, inclusive coverage, informing readers and promoting dialogue.

IN THIS ISSUE NEWS

STUDENT LIFE

4 A movie about rock 7 Is it a plane? Is it climbing? Get reel! The Outdoor Center presents Reel Rock 9: “Valley Uprising”

6 Women’s Center puts on annual event Four nights of true stories and experiences

Superman? No it’s a bird! Read about common winter birds you might see around Bellingham

10 Getting

#Lobbylicious down in Olympia Read AS Legislative Liaison Heather Heffelmire’s sixth update

FEATURES 9 It don’t mean a

thing if you ain’t got a swing Wester’s Swing Kids, a swing dance club, creates friendly spaces for students to dance

11 Students:

committed to committees Join a committee to get involved on campus

We welcome reader submissions, including news articles, literary pieces, photography, artwork or anything else physically printable. Email submissions to as.review@wwu.edu. We welcome letters to the editor. Please limit your letter to 300 words, include your name, phone number and year in school, if you’re a student. Send them to as.review@wwu.edu. Published letters may have minor edits made to their length or grammar.

Abigail Ramos Kelly Mason Trevor Grimm Ian Sanquist Nontawat Thammawan Marina Price Alex Bartick Spencer Newsad Designer Keghouhi Bedoyan Adviser Jeff Bates

Editor in Chief Assistant Editor Lead Photographer Writers

“Noodle,” an exhibit by Camila Frey-Booth and Daniel Morris, was on display in Western’s B Gallery. Photo by Trevor Grimm // AS Review

2. 23. 2015 • 3

EVENTS

Free Yoga!

Every Monday & Thursday // 4:15 - 5:30 p.m. // Mondays VU 562 & Thursdays in VU MPR // Free Join the Outdoor Center every Monday and Thursday during winter quarter for free yoga! All yoga levels are welcomed. Bring your own mat and enjoy the relaxation.

Queer Exper ience Info Session Feb. 24 & 25 // 6 p.m. // VU 462 A/B // Free Interested in being a part of the Queer Experience? Learn more about the Queer Resource Center’s annual event at the info sessions. Much like Vagina Memoirs, the Queer Experience offers a chance for marginalized identites to share their voices in a safe space.

B re tt H a r r i s w / E m m a L e e Toyo d a Feb. 25 // 7 p.m. // UGCH // Free Enjoy free music at the Underground Coffeehouse as a part of the

Wednesday Night Concert Series. This week’s performers include singer/songwriter Brett Harris and indie/folk artist Emma Lee Toyoda.

AS Outdoor Center presents Reel Rock 9 Feb. 26 // 6:30 p.m. // Fraser 101 // $5 w/ Western ID & $7 general Join the Outdoor Center in its showing of Reel Rock 9’s “Valley Uprising.” The film highlights Yosemite’s rock climbing revolution. For more information about this event, check out p. 4

Vagina Memoirs Feb. 25 & 26 // 7 p.m. // VU MPR // Free Feb. 27 & 29 // 7 p.m. // PAC 155 Concert Hall // Free Need a night of empowerment? The AS Women’s Center hosts its annual Vagina Memoirs, a night dedicated to giving voice to marginalized and oppressed gender identities. To learn more, turn to p. 6

The None of the Above Club hosts Pizza and Politics on Friday, Feb. 27. Poster by Enkhbayar Munkh-Erdene

LETTER TO THE EDITOR: Autonomous Students United to Reduce Tuition

The annual cost of attending higher education in Washington state has more than doubled in the last ten years, and is likely to keep rising. Autonomous Students United to Reduce Tuition [ASURT] is a new effort on campus to fight tuition hikes and decrease student debt. High tuition rates put a clear burden on parents and students who are already struggling to pay the bills. While Western prides itself on diversity, an increase in tuition will price many working class students, especially students of color, out of educational opportunities. Students who cannot afford tuition will amass skyrocketing debt. The current cumulative total of student loan debt in the United States is a staggering $1.2 trillion, a crippling burden to countless students and a drag on the national economy. Despite this, the state legislature has proposed 15 percent cuts to higher education. These cuts will produce even higher tuition rates, fewer programs and larger class sizes, meaning students will be paying more for a worse education. If you want to join the fight against higher tuition, you can find ASURT on Facebook and Twitter, or attend weekly meetings at 4 p.m. on Fridays in Miller Hall 135. You can make a difference. Thank you, ASURT We welcome letters to the editor. Please limit your letter to 300 words, include your name, phone number and year in school, if you’re a student. Send them to as.review@wwu.edu. Published letters may have minor edits made to their length or grammar.

4 • as.wwu.edu/asreview

A movie about rock climbing? Get reel! By Ian Sanquist Poster By Jamie Jones The AS Outdoor Center is hosting Reel Rock 9, featuring the hotly anticipated “Valley Uprising,” a full-length documentary about the history of rock climbing in Yosemite National Park. Reel Rock, now in its ninth year, has brought new and exciting films about rock climbing to audiences worldwide with each festival and is coming to Western on Thursday, Feb. 26. The screening will be held in Fraser Hall 101. Doors open at 6:30 p.m. and tickets are $5 for students and $7 for the general public. “Climbing is something that can take over your life if you let it,” local rock climber and psychology major Hannah Kepner said. Kepner said the Reel Rock Film Festival is an exciting opportunity for members of the climbing community to get together and watch films highlighting unique chapters in the history of climbing. “You just go and get psyched, and you’re like, ‘Oh let’s watch movies about climbing and then make plans to go climbing,’” Kepner said Though the film has specific appeal for climbers, anyone who is interested in physical fitness, should be able to find something to enjoy in “Valley Uprising.” The film depicts a group of climbers who have abandoned typical employment in the pursuit of their extreme lifestyle, living without regard for hygiene or the accepted structures of society, embodying a “dirtbag” climber ideal where all else is secondary to rock climbing. “The true dirtbag climber regime began [in Yosemite] basically and it was on a whole other level then than what people are doing today,” AS Outdoor Center Assistant Excursions Coordinator Peter Dykes said. In one scene, climbers retrieve hundreds of bales of high-grade marijuana from a cargo plane crashed into a frozen lake. “Valley Uprising” tells the story of the Yosemite climbers through archival footage, photographs and interviews. “It’s a cool comparison to see where climbing was and where it is now, and it was a lot more rebel back then,” AS Outdoor Center Excursions Coordinator Brian Bates said. “Rock climbing isn’t something just rebels do now. It’s very developed.” Reel Rock’s sponsors include The North Face, which reported $2 billion in revenue in 2013 according to an annual financial statement from its parent company, VF Corporation, and Clif Bar, which reported $508 million in revenue in 2013, according to the San Francisco Business Times. If you’re new to rock climbing, the best way to get excited about it is to watch some really cool history on it and see some really cool climbers doing some pretty crazy things,” Bates said. “You might not be doing exactly what you see in ‘Valley Uprising,’”

Dykes said, “but it’ll be a fun exciting look back on the history of [the sport].” Climbers and would-be climbers looking for something to get them excited about hitting the rocks need look no further than the Reel Rock film festival. Tickets are currently on sale at the PAC box office and will also be available at the door. “It’s really cool watching people get rad,” Kepner said. “Sometimes I’ll see something and be like, ‘Oh yeah, I wanna go climbing’...but I always wanna go climbing.”

2. 23. 2015 • 5

Dancing with the sculptures New Viking Union Gallery exhibit, “Organic Geometric: The Body/Mind,” combines sculptures and dancing By Marina Price Poster by Zach Becker March 12 will see dance and sculpture unite at the closing reception for “Organic Geometric: The Body/ Mind” in the Viking Union Gallery. Dancer and sculptor Francie Allen is working with six students from Western’s Fine Arts department and six students from the Dance department to create a performance that brings geometric shapes and organic dance together. “My work expresses the joy of being physically embodied - the miracle of actually being alive in a body,” said Organic Geometric Artist Francie Allen. Allen had to undergo surgery in late January for a torn rotator cuff, so much of the work was left up to the students to complete. “We were all assigned a shape or geometric form and a color to make a sculpture someone could dance with,” Sculptor Jake Fetterman said. The sculptures are made of strong paper, which allows the dancers to lift and move the pieces while they perform around them. Fetterman said that most of the pieces were

designed to be able to maintain their shape while the dancers manipulated them through the performance. The student involvement is predominantly volunteer-based, although some students are using it to complete independent study credits for their respective art studies. “These students are so incredibly bright, creative and accomplished,” said Allen. “They took care of all aspects of the process.”

“My work expresses the joy of being physically embodied the miracle of actually being alive in a body.” -- FRANCIE ALLEN Bonnie Smerdon is a student of the Fine Arts department, but has recently become involved in the dance department as well. She is one of the six dancers preforming in this installation. “It’s interesting because I’m also an artist, but now I’m on the dance side of it. I’m work-

ing with someone else’s art form. It’s interesting to work with something so large and so delicate,” Smerdon said. Dancers are each going to interpret their own movements to one of the pieces, and then teach their fellow dancers their movements at rehearsals, she said. Rehearsals are going to take place while the sculptures are on display in the VU Gallery from Feb. 23 to March 11, which spectators are welcome to come watch if they happen upon the gallery at the right time. The geometric shapes and performance are going to be loosely derived from the Chakras, which in yogic and tantric traditions within Buddhism and Hinduism, are the seven energy centers of the body. They begin at the top of the head and trail down to the tailbone. Francie Allen’s work can be found all over Bellingham, with permanent pieces located in the Bellingham Airport, other public transportation centers, theatres and businesses. “Organic Geometric: The Body/Mind” will be on display for free in the Viking Union Gallery from Feb. 23 to March 13. The closing reception and performance will be on March 12 from 6-8 p.m.

6 • as.wwu.edu/asreview

Women’s Center puts on annual event By Spencer Newsad Poster By Jamie Jones The Associated Students Women’s Center will present its annual performance of the Vagina Memoirs Feb. 25-26 in the Viking Union multipurpose room and Feb. 27-28 in the Performing Arts Center Concert Hall at 7 p.m. Vagina Memoirs is a collection of spoken memoirs written by Western students and members of the Bellingham community with marginalized gender identities. The production features a nine-member cast, led by AS Vagina Memoirs Coordinator Sara Richards. The cast has met every Friday since November to talk about their experiences, work from writing prompts and support one another. “One of the main things we’re looking for is a group of people who can work well together and understand the need for social justice around gender inequality,” Richards said. “We’re also looking for diversity of experiences

and identities … trying to find a group of people whose stories haven’t been heard—who’ve had the most silence around their lives.” Preparation for the performances requires a safe space, which looks different for everyone Richards said. Though the names of the cast are kept private until the performances, two members volunteered to talk about their process: Chelsea Lohr and Kylie Gemmell. Lohr works on campus as the Assistant Coordinator in the Queer Resource Center. She is a Recreation major, and this is her first year as a cast member. “I had just transferred to Western when I saw the Memoirs last year,” Lohr said. “The only person I knew on-campus was Laura Del Villar, the 2013-2014 cast coordinator, and they had to really talk me into going.” Gemmell is studying creative writing, American cultural studies and sociology in order to complete her Fairhaven concentration entitled, “Power of Voice: Understanding Intersecting Identities through Narratives.” “In the fall during open calls I was work-

A NIGHT OF TRUE STORIES

ing on designing my concentration,” Gemmell said. “And the focus of my concentration is concerned with voices being heard and stories being passed on, especially those from marginalized communities. Stories get lost, and there’s a lot of information that we don’t talk about.” Already hundreds of Facebook users have joined the Facebook event page for this year’s performances. “In terms of spreading awareness, we get a lot of support from people who have already been to the memoirs and who understand what a great experience this is and how important it is that these things be talked about,” Richards said. While students and members of the Western and Bellingham communities may attend next week, Richards said that part of the agreement that the audience makes with the cast and her as a coordinator is that they don’t share specific details about specific cast members’ memoirs. The performances are free and open to the public. For disAbility accommodations please call (360) 650-6114 or email as.wc.memoirs@ wwu.edu.

For disability accommodations please call (xxx) xxx – xxxx Western is an equal opportunity institution Theft of this banner is a violation of University policy and will result in notifying University Police and the Dean of Students Office.

AND EXPERIENCES.

2. 23. 2015 • 7

Is it a plane? Is it Superman? No, it’s a bird! By Marina Price Illustrations by Amelia Barlow Birdwatching is a winter activity in Bellingham that is often overlooked. If you’re in need of a reason to spend some quality time outdoors, grab a pair of binoculars and a camera and head out to Larabee State Park off of Chuckanut Drive, Lake Padden in the Samish Neighborhood or even Western’s Arboretum for some bird-spotting. Here are some common Bellingham winter birds you might see on your trip.

Red-Necked Grebe

The red-necked grebe spends its winter along the Washington coast. They have large, straight, sharp bills and, contrary to their name, have gray necks and cheeks in the winter. Catch these water birds anywhere along Chuckanut Bay eating fish, crustaceans and sometimes even amphibians. Oddly enough, this bird often ingests its own feathers, the function of which is unknown.

American Dipper

The american dipper is North America’s only aquatic songbird. Short, stocky and grey, this little bird can be found bopping up and down near the falls in Whatcom Falls Park. These birds search for habitats far from floods and predators, which makes Whatcom Falls Park a great nest site. American dippers have extra oxygen-carrying capacity, in order to survive in icy waters during Bellingham’s winters. They feed on aquatic insects and their larvae.

Long-Tailed Duck

Commonly found in Bellingham Bay, the males of this black and white bird have long protruding tail feathers and sometimes a pink band near the tip of their bill to attract females. These ducks can dive up to 200 feet underwater to forage for food, one of the deepest duck dives in the world. Of all the diving ducks, the long-tailed duck spends the longest time submerged underwater than time afloat.

Pileated Woodpeckers

Lake Padden, Larabee State Park, the Lummi Reservation and Western’s very own Arboretum are all great places to find pileated woodpeckers. One of the biggest forest birds on the continent, they have a flaming red crest on their heads, with white streaks cascading down their black bodies. These woodpeckers drill small, rectangular holes into rotten wood to collect insects. You can often hear the tapping occur without seeing the bird.

Bald Eagle

These beautiful birds can be found the easiest during the winter when they are feeding on the spawning salmon in the rivers. Larabee State Park and Lake Padden are prime viewing locations for these birds, although they can be spotted soaring all over Bellingham, even over Western’s campus. Bald eagles often harass ospreys or other fishing birds, causing them to drop their catches, so the bald eagle can snatch them up. Another distinctive feature is their large nests, which can be found high up in trees or even at the top of telephone polls. The largest nest ever recorded was 20 feet long, and used for more than 30 years until the tree it was nested in blew over.

8 • as.wwu.edu/asreview

Six things you didn’t know ATUS could do for you By Alex Bartick Illustrations by Keghouhi Bedoyan

Breakdown of the Student Technology Fee

Each quarter both full and part time students are required to pay the Student Technology Fee. This fee is used to fund Academic Technology and User Services, which provides a multitude of educational services for students to utilize, including the Student Technology Center. If you want to enrich your experience at Western a great way to do so is to make use of all the free services ATUS has to offer. This list offers a breakdown of some of these wonderful services. Equipment Rentals A part of the Student Technology Fee we pay each quarter goes towards buying audio, video and photography equipment for students to check out. The equipment is for educational purposes and free to checkout. Available are multiple types of microphones, digital video cameras, digital cameras, lighting kits and much more.

Software One of the more popular services the Student Technology Center has to offer is their walk up application support service. Located in Haggard Hall across from the circulation desk, students can come to the STC from 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Thursday and get help with different computer applications that are on the school computers. The STC has a list of the student employees who are experts with particular types of software. “If you’re asked to make a webpage and you’ve never done anything with webpages before we have a webpage expert,” ATUS Coordinator David Hamiter said. Students can book an hour one-on-one sessions with STC

$14 computer lab renewal and replacement $6 Microsoft Student Advantage $4 for the Student Technology Center $4 for wireless network renewal and replacement $3 for Tech Initiatives [previously Student Technology Fee proposals] $2 for a print quota with 50 prints per quarter

student employees to get help with projects that require them to use unfamiliar computer applications. Workshops Each quarter the STC holds around 70 workshops on how to use different types of computer software. The workshops are taught by one of the STC student staff, are 90-minutes long and are free for students. They offer workshops on Adobe Dreamweaver, InDesign, Final Cut Pro, Prezi and many more. A list of available workshops and times can be found on the STC website.

Room Rentals and the Dub Rack The STC also offers a video booth, an audio booth and a presentation practice room to rent. The video booth and audio booth are equipped with all the necessary tools for making a video or recording your voice. The presentation practice room has the capabilities for you to record yourself giving a presentation and then watch it on video. Another piece of equipment the STC has for student use is a dub-rack. This equipment allows you to turn your old VHS into DVDs.

You can copy all of your old home videos onto DVDs and give them to your parents as a present. If you want to make copies of the DVD, the STC also has a DVD burner. Scanners, printers and phone locker The STC is equipped with all the scanning and printing equipment you could ever need. In addition to regular sized scanners and printers, they also have large formats of each. The large format printing can print in color and goes up to 30 inches by 40 inches.

ATUS Help Desk The ATUS Help Desk located in Haggard Hall 123 provides professional computer, and account support for students. The help desk offers assistance with software related problems, issues with connecting to Westerns wireless servers and much more. The ATUS Help Desk has students who can help you install virus software and recover data from your computer if your hard drive crashes. All these services are free to students.

2. 23. 2015 • 9

It don’t mean a thing, if you ain’t got that swing By Nontawat Thammawan Western Swing Kids, a social swing dance club, dedicated to creating free and friendly spaces for students to dance and to offering dancing lessons to beginning and intermediate dancers. The club is meeting weekly Wednesday at 7 p.m. in the Viking Union Multipurpose Room. Swing Kids was first started in 1995 by Western student Collin Topolski, who is still an active member of the club today, and currently has more than 100 people regularly attend the weekly meeting. “What I love most about the club is that it’s an incubator for greatness: amazing dancers, friendships, and memories have come out of this club,” Western Swing Kids President Johnna Gurgel said. “The weekly club teaches you the dance and introduces you to people you could very well see for the rest of your life.” At the club meeting, members teach one hour of basic individual and group lessons, focusing on six and eight-count swing dance moves and later hold a social dance where music is played and everybody just dances freely. Swing Kids specifically teaches East Coast Swing or six-count, Lindy-Hop or eight-count and Balboa with a mix in between Swedish and California styles. Besides the weekly meeting, the club also offers quarterly and monthly workshops for students who are trying to improve. The monthly workshop is a four-hour long session with focus on eight-count dance, and it’s held on one of the Saturday of every month, depending on the schedule. The quarterly workshops happen during the middle or the end of a weekend within a quarter, often featuring national or international swing dance instructors brought to campus and sometimes a live band on offcampus venues.

Swing Kids meets weekly on Wednesday nights to practice in the Viking Union. Photo by Trevor Grimm // AS Review

On Saturday, March 7 Swing Kids will be having its quarterly workshop with Zac and Christina Sluys, Matt Lam and Angie Weddell from Vancouver, B.C. teaching intermediate swing dance and beginning Balboa. It’s going to be an all-day event with classes from 10 a.m. – 3 p.m. and an evening dance from 6–9 p.m. at Carver Gym. The cost for the workshop is $10 for Western students and $12 general. Swing Kids Vice President Devon Hamblett said she has been involved with the club for more than three years, and her experience has been nothing but rewarding. Hamblett is from Seattle and was a member of a huge swing dance team in the area. Later, she had to leave the team to study at Western and was worried that the group wouldn’t be as big as before. However, she said she was surprised not only by the size of Swing Kids, but also the

friendliness of the people in the club. “It’s a really casual club. I think my favorite thing about the club is how nice and welcoming people are,” Hamblett said. “People are especially nervous when it comes to dancing with a partner, but everyone is so nice at Swing Kids that there is really no pressure at all.” Beginners are more than welcome to join Swing Kids as one of the primary purposes of the club is building new professional dancers to later contribute in the community. Experience is not required, so if students are interested in learning swing dance and making new friends, check out the club weekly meeting Wednesday at 7 p.m. in VU MPR. “If you don’t know the first thing about dancing, we’ll get you dancing!” Hamblett said.

10 • as.wwu.edu/asreview

Getting #Lobbylicious down in Olympia AS Legislative Liaison Heather Heffelmire sends her sixth update from Olympia, Wash. Part Six: Bills, Bills, Bills and the worst experience ever!

Hello Western Friends! As the title of this update reads, my past week was all about bills. Testifying on bills, seeing bills going through executive session, tracking bills and having meetings about particular bills. At this point of the session, all the bills have been drafted, so now the work of deciding which bills go on and become laws begins. The life of a bill is extremely perilous. I’ve learned that at almost every corner a bill can be shut down and stopped. Bills start in a committee and if the committee doesn’t hear that particular bill it dies, if a committee hears a bill, but doesn’t vote it out of committee, it dies. If a bill is voted out of its original committee, it’s sent to either the Appropriations Committee - if it deals with money - or the Rules Committee - if it deals with policy - where again it might get shut down and die. If a bill goes through all that and finally gets to a vote of all the legislators in the house or the senate it may have a chance of becoming law, but might get a no-vote and die… I know the process is very complicated and often hard to keep track of. Our democracy is supposed to be open and accessible, but very few people have this knowledge and I think our state could do more to make this process more transparent to folks who aren’t familiar with it. As my title also reads, I experienced my most negative experience to date last Thursday, Feb. 12. You know those times when your resilience is really tested and you ask yourself “Why am I even here?” Well, it was one of the experiences. I was testifying to the Senate Higher Education Committee in opposition to Senate Bill 5547, a bill that would mandate a 2.5 GPA for students to receive the State Need Grant and would negatively impact the most vulnerable students in our state. During my testimony, I was shut down, silenced and oppressed by some of the members on that committee. It was all very public and very embarrassing. I’m grateful I didn’t start crying in the middle of it. This experience made me feel insignificant and made something that I’ve found to be empowering - giving testimony - something I now kind of fear. However, thanks to the support of my friends, family, co-workers and all of you, I made it through this experience and testified again for the first time today! I know I can learn and grow from this experience and use it to forward my work in the future, but I am still affected by it and have gotten a little emotional while reflecting on it. I would like to send a shout out to my mom who talked to me after it happened and built me back up after being so shut down!

I don’t want to end on a negative note, so I’ll share that on Friday I decided to wear my “Hands Up Don’t Shoot” shirt that my sista in the struggle, Andrea Tompkins, bought for me as a birthday gift to the capital. After the shooting in Pasco, Chapel Hill and my experience on Thursday I really needed to push back against the powers that be and I felt like I could do this through my choice of outfit. For those of you who are unfamiliar, “Hands Up Don’t Shoot” became a rallying cry for protestors after Mike Brown was murdered and is synonymous with the #Blacklivesmatter movement. It felt good to wear this shirt and gave me much needed lift after a long week. That’s it for now, until next week! STAY #LOBBYLICIOUS Y’ALL! Contact Heather: Email at heatherheffelmire@yahoo.com Or visit the Representation and Engagement Programs: Viking Union 435

AS Legislative Liasion spends winter quarter in Olympia, Wash. lobbying for student issues. Illustration by Keghouhi Bedoyan

2. 23. 2015 • 11

Students: committed to committees! By Alex Bartick Illustration by Keghouhi Bedoyan The Associated Students and Western are committed to making sure students have a voice in decisions made around campus. To ensure that students are able to achieve this goal there are about 150 seats for students to serve on both AS and Western committees. Currently there are about 45 different AS and Western committees ranging from AS Alternative Transportation Fee Committee to the Student Publications Council. AS committees are usually chaired by one of the AS Board of Directors, and by students who have applied to be on the committee. The committees vote on decisions that are implemented into the school and usually affect the whole student body, Representation and Engagement Programs Committee Coordinator Griffin Crisp said. Crisp believes that it’s important for students to be involved with committees because it is a way for them to make institutional changes that will benefit students on campus. For instance committees, can change dates on the academic calendar. Without a student voice, dates may be changed around in a way that negatively affects students, said Crisp. “I think it’s incredibly important [to join committees] because it’s a really easy way to get involved with some really big decisions”, AS Communications Director Josie Ellison said. In addition to making changes to the academic calendar, committees also decide on what classes are going to be offered each quarter, how much student fees should cost and what they should cover. Having sat on multiple committees both this year and last year, Ellison said they think it is important for student voices to be heard, especially on the decisions that are behind

the scenes but affect students’ everyday. “It is a good way to keep the University and AS accountable to the students we represent,” said Ellison. AS Vice President for Governmental Affairs Sarah Kohout said if student committee spots go unfilled, student voices and opinions are not present when important decisions are being made. As the chair of the Legislative Affairs Council, Kohout is currently working to draft the ASWWU Federal Agenda. Students will use this agenda for the Federal Lobby Trip this April. This year is Ellison’s second year serving on the Student Technology Fee Committee. Part of the Student Tech Fee we pay each quarter goes towards the funding of student and faculty proposals to increase technology on campus. “The year before last we purchased drones for the Geology Department to do Geological Surveying”, Ellison said. “This year we’re look-

ing at a proposal that would put a 3D printer that students can use somewhere on campus.” One of the committees students can join is the Student Publications Council. The council acts as the policy-making board of the publications on campus. They help make decisions on names of the publications, how frequently they should be released and the method of publication. This is Ellison’s favorite committee they serve on because it decides which tech proposals will receive money. The Alternative Transportation Fee Committee conducts the operations and finances of the Western Student Transportation program. They look over and evaluate the program, student input and recommend additions or changes to the fee. If you’re interested in joining a committee you can visit the committees website to find out which chair positions are available.

12 • as.wwu.edu/asreview