An independent student newspaper serving Iowa State since 1890
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02.24.2020 Vol. 220 No. 103
FRIDAY
Travel on a budget Fun, inexpensive spring break trips BY AVERY.STAKER @iowastatedaily.com CAITLIN YAMADA/ IOWA STATE DAILY Graduate and Professional Student Senate meeting in the Sun Room on Dec. 2. The next meeting will be at 6:30 p.m. Monday in the Gallery Room of the Memorial Union.
Iowa State is ensuring every student makes the most of their spring break by offering various trips and activities within their price range. Organizations at Iowa State offer several options for students, like the Pay It Forward (PIF) trip. PIF is a student volunteer organization that participates in service projects around the Ames community throughout the year. “Our organization focuses on making an impact in Ames and around the country while developing servant leaders,” said PIF President Jacob Vos. PIF’s largest event of the year is their annual spring break trip to seven different U.S. cities. Up to 45 student participants travel by charter bus and volunteer in the communities they stop in. Housing is provided by local churches and community centers, with some more unique opportunities popping up each year. “Last year we stayed at the YMCA in the Rockies for the night,” Vos said. This year, PIF is serving in North Platte, Nebraska; Boulder, Colorado; Colorado Springs, Colorado; Grand Junction, Colorado; and Moab, Utah. Their final, two-day stop is Salt Lake City, Utah. Various indoor and outdoor service projects will be completed at each stop, such as helping community shelters, cleaning public buildings, trash pick-ups and building community
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GPSS may declare a climate emergency BY JACOB.SMITH @iowastatedaily.com
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DESIGN BY BROOKLYN WILLIAMS
Iowa State’s chalk rules Permanent policy put in place for chalkings BY SAGE.SMITH @iowastatedaily.com Effective Feb. 17, Iowa State has a permanent ‘Chalking on Campus’ policy that applies to all university students, staff, faculty, affiliates and visitors. The fall 2019 proposed chalking policy and now the permanent policy came after Iowa State’s campus saw ‘chalking wars’ of people writing their opinions, crossing off words and rewriting to change the message, etc. President Wendy Wintersteen told the Daily in early February that the excessive chalking happening around campus had taken
away from Iowa State’s beautiful environment and became a kind of visual graffiti. She said the policy goal is to respect the beautiful campus and that it was a question of aesthetics, how they wanted to be viewed and looked at in terms of “overall beauty.” Ryan Hurley, sophomore in pre-business, is the president of Iowa State’s College Republicans. “I mean, I think the worst aesthetic you can have is being sued,” Hurley said. “[...] It’s not a very good aesthetic to just ban freedom of speech.” The president of Iowa State’s College Democrats is Sehba Faheem, senior in biological systems engineering. She said when the “chalking wars” began, it didn’t seem like anything too out of the ordinary as Iowa State has always had a “fruitful dialogue.” “So at first, it didn’t seem like very much; it was just people chalking things, other people erasing things, and it was honestly kind of interesting to see what everybody was talking about, what they were doing,” Faheem said. “And then it just escalated to a really gross point, and there’s a lot of scary comments that were made on the ground that I was surprised were able to stay for as long as they did.”
Students have varying opinions on the chalking, whether or not it should be allowed and what restrictions should be in place, if any. “To describe it in one word, it was just fun,” Hurley said. “This like back and forth, that’s what politics is about. It’s not just nobody can express these opinions, none of it at all. I think this was a really fun way to express your ideas, messages, things to that effect. Of course, there were some bad eggs that wrote some inappropriate things.” Faheem and Hurley said some inappropriate comments they saw chalked on the ground included “smash the patriarchy” being crossed off and replaced with “smash the hook nose,” swastikas and HH. “That ’s not something that should be allowed in any public space,” Faheem said. “Especially at a public university; this is a university of the state of Iowa, and so they should not be allowing calls to Nazi ideology on the grounds of a public univerisity. That just should not happen.” Students also had varying opinions on how the university chose to handle the chalking and policies put in place, first with the
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The Graduate and Professional Student Senate (GPSS) will be reviewing a joint resolution from Student Government declaring a climate emergency among other bills. The meeting will be at 6:30 p.m. Monday in the Gallery Room of the Memorial Union and open to the public. “On July 20, 2019, University of Iowa Student Government passed legislation at the conference of the Alliance of the Big Ten Schools which led to all of the big ten schools signing on to declare a climate emergency,” according to the document. “The University of Northern Iowa and the University of Iowa have both declared a climate emergency within their respective student governments to portray to their students and university leaders that climate change is a real and immediate threat to the state of Iowa, and, as a university priding itself in science and technology, Iowa State University must show its dedication to responding to changing science and technology by declaring a climate emergency.” The resolution has already been passed by Student Government, which GPSS will now review. Additionally, GPSS will consider a bill to recognize Judy Stand, assistant to the dean of the Graduate College. “The Graduate College has heavily relied on Judy Strand for her knowledge, experience and good sense,” according to the document. “Judy Strand will be retiring from her position on March 6, 2020, after approximately 30 years working for Iowa State University and 10 years in the Graduate College.” Furthermore, GPSS will discuss its budget for the fiscal year 2021 and proposed amendments to the newly revised bylaws and constitution, as well as the adoption of the new bylaws and ratification of the new constitution.