SG holds first meeting, approves funding for collaborative space

Boston University’s Student Government kicked off the year with an informational Senate meeting Monday night to train new members on standard Senate procedures and review changes for the upcoming semester.

SG President SaraAnn Kurkul opened the meeting by discussing the critical role SG has in representing BU students during her president’s address.

“We are all here together for a reason,” Kurkul said. “The student body put their faith and trust in you to serve an advocate for them to the best of our ability.”

The College of Communication senior emphasized the value of community among all members of SG “in order to build a strong sense of community on campus.”

During the training portion of the meeting, Senate Chair Octavio Vidal spoke of the importance of attendance, specifically the mental presence of senators.

“I know a lot of these meetings are long and can be boring, but [senators] are here to be senators,” Vidal said during his address. “If [senators] don’t know what [they’re] voting on and [they’re] just voting for whatever, they’re doing a disservice to [their] contingency,” he added, referencing Senate’s poor attendance record over the past few years.

Vidal said the purpose of this first meeting was primarily to provide an overview for new members.

“[I] really want to get into the huge Senate portion of advocacy and changing amendments and fulfilling funding requests,” the Sargent College of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences senior said after the meeting.

In addition to training, Senate passed its first funding proposal from the BUILDS, a space located in the Math and Computer Sciences building for students to construct innovative projects in collaboration with their peers.

The proposal, which passed unanimously, allocated $116.84 for new equipment, as well additional tax expenses from SG’s $30,000 budget for the semester, according to Kurkul.

Max Mesirow, a CAS junior who presented on behalf of the organization at the meeting, said BUILDS can increase opportunities for students to practice creativity.

“We’ve been trying to get funding for this for a while. I didn’t even know student government could do this until recently,” Mesirow said after the meeting. “It’s going to increase the number of opportunities for students to build projects, and it’s going to allow them to create new things.”

Eva Jungreis, SG vice president of internal affairs, said she is looking forward to introducing new initiatives focused on student groups this year.  

“I hope to increase it over what’s been done in the past, so I think that there’s a good opportunity to do that this year,” Jungreis said.

After the meeting, senators shared their thoughts on the proposal that passed along with their hopes for the semester.

Zhaohan Yin, a freshman at-large senator, said he voted to approve the funding proposal because it has potential to improve student life at a grassroots level rather than administrative policy.

“I feel like proposals like these, they’re not very grand, but they actually provide an actual service for the students,” Yin said.

ENG senator and freshman Aditya Jain said he hopes SG will allocate a bigger portion of its funds to student groups this year.

“With funding, there’s a really good opportunity to do something for the entire college. I think that that’d be a good policy this year,” Jain said.

Senator Andrew Chiao, a junior in the College of Arts and Sciences, spoke about initiatives he plans to raise for motions in the coming semester, specifically introducing gender-neutral bathrooms throughout campus.

“It could be the first step into making more campuswide changes, not just CAS adding gender-neutral bathrooms, but the whole campus really coming together and adding those,” Chiao said.

Shaun Robinson and Lillian Ilsley-Greene contributed to the reporting of this article.