SU’s USenate addresses on-campus food insecurity, parking fees

By Anjana Dasam asst. copy editor

University Senate committee members laid out plans to address food insecurity among students at its Wednesday afternoon meeting. This comes after the senate reported a dramatic increase in use of the Syracuse University Hendricks Chapel food pantry on campus and at its South Campus location.

The Student Life Committee reported its findings on food insecurity as one of five presenting committees, including the Committees of Administrative Operations, Computing Services, Curricula and Athletic Policy.

Conversations with people from Hendricks and student representatives revealed an increasing need for volunteers to work the pantry, said Julia Carboni, an associate professor and the chair of the citizenship and civic engagement program at SU’s Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, who presented on behalf of the committee.

Specifically, graduate students are more inclined to need food assistance, said SU English professor Crystal Bartolovich, referencing another report she said was discussed in previous USen meetings.

Carboni said the committee is working on pursuing partnerships with other food pantries at

Cisco and Syracuse Banana, and plans to collaborate on potential solutions with the Food Bank of Central New York.

“We talked about bringing in some of the food banks of Central New York to do a SNAP screening of benefit… for graduate students in particular who may qualify for various forms of food assistance depending on their citizenship status,” Carboni said.

The Student Life Committee will meet next week with Amalia Swan, the chief community impact officer at the Food Bank of Central New York, to connect the CNY Food Bank to the SU Pantry. Other Business:

The Committee on Student Life also addressed parking fees for graduate students who have assistantship status, reporting that graduate students who do not have a current assistantship pay more than students who do. The process for how graduate students are to pay for parking is currently under review by the Administrative Operations and Services to Faculty and Staff Committee.

The Committee on Student Life also plans to meet with Cory Wallack, SU’s associate vice president of student health and wellness, to discuss access to mental health services and reachability of therapists at the Barnes Center at The Arch. adasam@syr.edu

Joshua Russell, an assistant professor of seismology in SU’s Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, said the earthquakes’ magnitude were abnormal given the events’ history in Turkey.

‘There have been five earthquakes greater than a magnitude of six that have happened in that region… Prior to that, there had only been three magnitude six earthquakes in the region over the past 50 years,” Russell said. “This region gets earthquakes quite often, actually, but of this magnitude is definitely unusual.”

Kizil said some SU professors have contacted Turkish students to o er support and academic accommodations.

On Sunday, TSA members worked alongside Turkish residents of the city of Syracuse to pack boxes of supplies to send as aid to Turkey, Kizil said. Ova, whose uncle and cousin live in Kahramanmaraş, expressed her gratitude for the support she has received in the aftermath of the earthquakes.

“It’s helping me a lot because for the fi rst two days, it was too much pain for just one person to shoulder,” Ova said. “But, after we started to work on this together, it’s really helped me feel that I am trying to do something to the best of my abilities.”

Michael Duignan, SU’s senior director for student engagement, highlighted the importance of the immediate mobilization on SU’s campus, which he said was largely orchestrated by students.

“It was really a partnership between o ces, individuals and students who really were like ‘we want to do something in that passion,’” Duignan said. “You saw… some of that distress and pain, (and) you wanted to make sure you did everything in your power within the structures that we have in place to provide them the most support we can.”

TSA will continue with longer-term relief e orts, Ova said, and plans to create a bulletin board in Schine where Turkish students can write notes thanking the SU community for its donations and support.

Celik pointed to the support within the Turkish student community, saying students rallied around each other despite such immediate devastation.

“One of our purposes is that we as human beings know each other, we help each other,” Celik said. “We support each other especially in the case of an emergency or people who are in need. That part of our life makes it meaningful.” dcchiapp@syr.edu

@DominicChiappo2 to foster that conversation,” Dhouadi told the University Senate. from page 3

Alex Scrivner, the co-author of the resolution and a member of both the GSO Senate and SGEU, emphasized that processes like the impeachment should remain internal. She said she’s seen a confl ation of SGEU as a campaign and GSO as a body for advocacy.

“It’s to the benefit of all these bodies, that the GSO’s internal processes (remain) internal processes and there’s not blame pointing to two bodies that could very much collaborate and work together in the future,” Scrivner said.

Kellin Tasber, a university senator and masters student studying biotechnology, said the intention of Friday’s special meeting is to begin the investigation into violations of GSO’s Constitution, or of Robert’s Rules of Order, a general guide to parliamentary procedure.

They said the ensuing process will last two weeks, at which point a hearing based on the fi ndings will take place at an open-door, regular meeting, likely in early March. This period of 10 academic days between appointment and public recommendation is mandated in the GSOC.

In both the English and Spanish programs, students take classes at Chilean universities, including a course Paredes teaches. In the fall Spanish program, students begin the semester in Buenos Aires with a three-week immersion, while in the spring English program, students will now travel to Buenos Aires and Patagonia for shorter trips during the semester, according to the SU Abroad website.

Vianka Calderon, an SU sophomore studying sports management and Spanish, said that while her parents are Chilean and she’s traveled to the country before, she wanted to attend the Santiago program for study abroad to experi- from page 3 ters, particularly with the county budget.

“David has that eye for a budget and he has a really brilliant opportunity to flip the seat and make our county work for everyone,” Lederman said.

Bruen identified participatory budgeting – which enables lawmakers to meet with taxpayers to discuss concerns and work democratically towards budgets that meet their needs – as a measure he’d

Benjamin Tetteh — a university senator and Ph.D. student in mass communications who also spoke at the Wednesday meeting — voiced opposition to the impeachment and made a request that the University Senate send a member to Friday’s meeting to act as a neutral party in the negotiations. He said he had received an email earlier on Wednesday indicating the meeting would be closed-door.

Gretchen Ritter, SU’s vice chancellor, provost and chief academic o cer, said the university administration will not be involved in the impeachment.

“I need to suggest to you that this is an internal matter of self governance for the GSO,” Ritter said at the meeting. “Unless there is a clear violation of something like the student code of conduct, we believe that it is up to you and your colleagues to sort this through.” ence Chile in a new way. But because of her schedule, she could only participate in the English spring semester.

Though GSO won’t provide any updates during the two-week investigation period, Tasber emphasized the unprecedented nature of an external, neutral arbiter. They explained that GSO has its own neutral parties to preside over the a air, including the chair of the Senate and the internal vice president pro tempore, who steps in if the chair is deemed not to be neutral, as well as the parliamentarian.

“I do not want to go to Chile just to speak English and not have any of the classes transfer over for my Spanish minor,” Calderon said. “If you’re going to study abroad in a country whose native language is Spanish, an entire program should be in Spanish.”

Kathryn Everly, a Spanish professor at SU, said she and other faculty in the Spanish Language, Literature and Linguistics department faculty are “disheartened” by the decision.

Instead of immersion in the language, Everly said the new abroad program brings North work to bring to the Rockland County’s legislature, and said he also wants to focus on sustainability.

Cahill a rmed his expectation that Bruen will prioritize transparency and engagement with his constituents through his campaign and policy proposals, while also working to make himself available and accessible to the community.

“Many people don’t even know what the county legislature even does, so I know that David’s going to be pushing for policies to make people more involved in the process, or at least

“I find it very important that due process is had throughout this … and to make sure that everything happens according to the rules we set forth, and be as fair as possible to everyone who is putting forth an opinion in this process,” Tasber said.

Ten academic days after the committee to be appointed on Friday announces its fi nd-

American cultural imperialism to South America. She said it’s not possible to fully understand another country or culture without having at least some knowledge of the native language.

“There’s a real problem at this institution that language is seen as not important, despite all of the rhetoric around internationalization and globalization,” Everly said. “Language is not just conjugating verbs, it’s cultural knowledge.”

Aside from two beginner-level Spanish courses, there aren’t currently any opportunities in the new semester program for students to take courses taught in Spanish, Paredes said. Still, all participating students stay with host families in Santiago, aware of what’s actually going on,” Cahill said.

As of Wednesday, no other candidate has announced a run for the Rockland County District 11 legislature seat. The Rockland County primary elections will be held on June 27, ahead of the general election on Nov. 7.

Bruen said his next steps are to begin reaching out to Rockland County voters to introduce himself, seek official endorsements and plan for fundraising and other campaign events. He said he feels good about ings, the GSOC requires a special meeting for the Senate to consider and vote on the recommendation. The latest date for a vote, through which a two-thirds majority can a ect an impeachment, is March 17. jlseal@syr.edu @JanaLoSeal which Paredes said is one aspect of the program he wants to maintain to ensure some language and cultural exchange. Paredes said he doesn’t want the program to be limited to a bubble-like experience, where despite being abroad, students study the same way they do in the U.S. But or Bee, any sort of program that gives students the opportunity to experience the country for themselves is still worthwhile.

“Ultimately, I respect their decision for making those changes in terms of keeping the program alive, because Chile is a beautiful country, and I want more students at Syracuse to be able to experience it and enjoy it,” Bee said. charri39@syr.edu balancing his time between closing out his undergraduate education at SU and starting his campaign. spwright@syr.edu @stephaniwri_

“I’m going to continue to hone my message, because it’s still early days, and I still have a lot to listen to,” Bruen said. “So I can understand all the issues and all the sides and all the nuances, so I can best be equipped to make the right decisions.”.