Commencement

President David Munson and provost and senior vice president for Academic Affairs, Ellen Granberg, announced that they are working towards an in-person commencement for the Class of 2020 and 2021. They plan to craft an event that follows New York State regulations. The finalized plans will come into focus in the coming weeks for the May celebration.

Announcements

Shine DeHarder announced that Student Government (SG) is beginning a bi-weekly online debrief that will be available on their social media. These will include important announcements and cool updates from Senators from the past two weeks. The debriefs will also likely contain information about PawPrints and policy changes.

Griffin Warntz, College of Engineering Technology senator, is working towards starting an Institute for Electronics and Electrical Engineers (IEEE) chapter on campus. If you are interested in electronics or electrical engineering and think you might benefit from an IEEE chapter, please email sgcet@rit.edu or sgkgcoe@rit.edu for more information.

New Charge

The only new charge this week is to Designate Parking Spaces in D Lot For Tiger Testing. This charge asks that RIT consider the students that commute each week for Tiger Testing and set aside some parking places for these students. The author would like to see spaces with a longer acceptable parking time to relieve students from stressing about their car while getting tested. SG charged the petition to the Facilities, Parking and Transportation (FPAT) Committee.

Old Charges

The Cleaning The Laundry Rooms - Smells of Sewage and Mildew charge was given a response. This charge was for the unhygienic conditions of the laundry rooms on campus. In response, the FPAT committee chair, Angeline Hamele, parlayed that "Facilities Management Services (FMS) will be putting more focus on quickly responding to FMS work orders and ensuring these are completed within a reasonable timeframe."

The Remove the BLM Flag was also given a response. The charge advocated that RIT take into account the ever-evolving social context of the symbols that RIT chooses to endorse. In response, Alex Kruger, committee chair of Student Affairs, highlighted the statement from Sandy Johnson, senior vice president of Student Affairs and Dr. Keith Jenkins, Vice President and Associate Provost for Diversity and Inclusion.

They stated, “The decision to display the Black Lives Matter flag, as well as, the other three flags, was simple — RIT believes that Black Lives Matter and we recognize that they are very much endangered and threatened by systemic and routine patterns of racism, police brutality and anti-Black resistance. The ubiquitous phrase ‘Black Lives Matter’ is NOT representative of any specific organization or group, but rather a social movement with the goal to ensure that people who identify as Black aren’t denied the basic rights, protections and respect they deserve."