Student Senate was short and quick this last Thursday, ending after approximately 45 minutes and having only one resolution to vote upon.
Senate endorsed a resolution to install LCD projectors in two rooms in the Olmsted Center, Cowles Library room 201 (The Fishbowl) and in residence hall study rooms. However, they did pass two amendments to the resolution.
The first amendment was to support the presence of projectors in all these locations, not necessarily the installation of them. This change was proposed by Sen. Stephen Slade to address concerns whether or not the residence halls needed to have the projectors installed in the study rooms and if having them available for checkout at the front desk wouldn’t encourage students to use them more. The amendment passed with only Sen. Ethan Gascho voting nay.
The second amendment added the Medbury Honors lounge as an area of priority to receive an LCD projector.
Sen. Breanna Thompson believes Medbury should receive a projector as soon as possible.
“I really think Medbury Honors lounge should be added,” Thompson said. “Not only do groups use it, but we also have speakers come in, and it’s unprofessional to have to put projectors on tables or chairs.”
The second amendment passed unanimously. The resolution to endorse the placing of the projectors also passed unanimously.
The new projectors will be paid for with money out of the Office of Information Technology’s budget.
Dean of Students Sentwali Bakari presented a short administrative report, saying that student life is working on putting together an assessment to see if students are learning from their participation in Drake University’s numerous student organizations.
Sen. Becca Mataloni reported that the Board of Student Communications (BSC) is continuing to establish its own by-laws, rules and regulations. They are also considering changing servers for the online editions of Drake’s student publications.
Sen. Natalie Gadbois reported that the Cline Atrium project is on track to be finished by the start of next semester, but might be cutting it close.
I don’t think it’s necessary to have projectors available in the residence halls.The lobby TVs have HDMI ports and most laptop computers have a HDMI port or if you have an Apple Macintosh laptop computer, you need a Firewire-HDMI adapter. Projector bulbs can be pretty expensive and you need to take care of it. I also feel like it will be used to view movies a lot of time in the classroom which can be a violation of copyright policy.