Wednesday, May 13, 2009
www.therecorderonline.net
Volume 105 No. 27
Making Student New Class Scheduling Voices Heard Blocks on the Table New Senator McKeown
Looks Forward to 2009-10 AShLEy FOy
McKeown doesn’t shy away when asked about budget cuts and club funding and wishes to bring Beyond the tough talk and the about more activity for clubs. valiant, yet vague proposals in his He stands for utilizing the budcampaign video, the new SGA sena- get to fund clubs equally and tor Brian McKeown ‘10 is ready to get transparently. down to business. “Right now I believe there is While some of the problems are unfair funding. The way they do it annual, such as parking, budget cuts now is that a lot of clubs do get fundand threats to regular club funding ing and a lot do not get funding,” he present new difficulties and said. “… Something I suggested at a McKeown will focus on these issues meeting was that the finance comto face the 2009-2010 Senate. mittee should write up a report on The exuberant history and po- why they fund certain clubs and not litical science double-major was en- others.” couraged to get involved with the McKeown also spoke about SGA after observing passive student how it is necessary for the SGA to behavior. help the clubs with their fundraising, “Students have rights. They and not let them rely on small-time don’t speak out, though they have events such as bake sales. Instead he opinions,” McKeown said. “I talk out advocates for a fundraising for the students. I fight for the stu- committee. dents. There needs to be more of an McKeown also spoke about the outcry from free shutthe tle service students.” at CCSU, He is which is fully devotvital to ed to maksome stuing his work dents help the though it SGA beis not very come a betpopular. Brian McKeown used YouTube ter working McKeown to help win his Senate seat. system and said that to he said it’s the most exciting part of keep it running, it costs around his new position. $45,000 per year to drive students McKeown said he looks for- from the campus to downtown New ward to creating a “campus unity” Britain and Westfarms Mall. He is in and awareness of the fact that the favor of expanding the service and SGA exists to voice the students’ ensuring that it stays available to opinions and concerns. Other than students. that, he is also excited to bring stuHis goals also include expanddent senators closer together and for ing and improving the parking situahis work as co-chair of the promo- tion at CCSU, a perennial problem. tions committee. McKeown said that a few ideas have An issue McKeown presses was been discussed, one of which is to althe lack of school pride on campus. low students to park in certain areas For the students who wear CCSU ap- depending on when or where they parel and branding on campus, have classes. they’re rivaled by the near equal After acknowledging the diffiamount of CCSU students who wear culties associated with this idea, he gear from other universities. said he is trying to figure out ways to “We have an issue where we make it work. McKeown also menneed to be more proud of going to tioned the possibility of asking a state CCSU,” he said. “We need more rec- legislator to give CCSU money to ognition of campus unity.” help the parking situation, as has The new senator also calls for a been done in the past for other greater presence by the SGA and get- schools. ting the name out there for students. Ultimately, the new senator ar“One of the main issues [at gued that students should receive the hand] is the recognition of the SGA education they need. on campus. There should be more in“If they’re paying the school teraction with students,” he said. system, they should get the education “The nice thing about the SGA is that they deserve and are paying for and they can go to the administration not what administrators want,” he without any backlashes or getting said. “It is becoming more like a comfired. Students can work through the pany than an education system.” SGA.” Special to The Recorder
Dr. Joseph Paige presented the plan to the Faculty Senate on Monday. STORy By MATT KiERNAN
The Faculty Senate met on Monday to discuss plans for a hybrid block schedule that would ease existing scheduling conflicts. “The main thrust is to use classroom space efficiently,” said professor and chairman of the English department Dr. Gilbert Gigliotti. Freeing time slots that would normally have overlapped each other would now make hundreds of classrooms have availability for use, something that has become a major problem when the university needs to schedule times for rooms. In the new time block schedule class times will be altered to separate certain class times and with spaces in between so students will have time to walk to their next class. One of the worries that faculty have is that students won’t have time to walk to their next class because of the decrease in time from 15 minutes to 10 minutes. “Our aim was to have this ready for spring 2010 but apparently that’s not the case,” said Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs Dr. Joseph Paige. Having the new time schedule ready by spring of next year is a possibility but more than likely not going to happen until the fall semester of 2010. With the time given between classes narrowed to ten minutes students could have a problem finding time for outside classroom ac-
PHOTOS By EDwARD GAuG / ThE RECORDER
Plans could be implemented as early as Fall 2010
Registrar Susan Petrosino was part of the development team for new schedule plans.
tivities. The time spent talking with friends or asking questions to their professor will be limited since students will have to concentrate on spending their time walking to their next class. Safety and inconvenience is another issue because the new schedule would move some classes from ending at 9:30 p.m. to 10 p.m. causing some students to get out later. Darkness and the lack of people on campus at such late hours can be dangerous for students walking to their cars. “We have gotten numerous complaints from teachers education and students who work,” said Paige in regards to the current schedule. For many students in the School of Education who have three-hour classes two times per week at night, it can cause problemsas they try to schedule themselves to get their general education classes. “This is something that I asked them to do and what I think they’ve done is extraordinary,” said Provost Carl Lovitt. The proposal to create a new schedule was received mostly by positive reviews from faculty at the senate meeting and some of the faculty thanked Dr. Paige and Susan Petrosino of Registrar for their work on creating the schedule. Another problem that could arise from the new time block is See New Class Page 2
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