Vote in Referendum
 
To the Editor:

This letter is to inform students of the Student Senate referendum. Senate is currently holding a referendum regarding the appointment of students to committees. At present Senate must hold half of the seats open until after Fall elections. Since Fall elections require two weeks of nominations followed by at least five days of open election, these committees often sit unfilled for weeks. This means that committees often meet without adequate student representation or are forced to greatly delay their agenda, a serious problem as well. There has been some confusion regarding the language of the change and the existing language. In order to help clear this up, I’ve included the old wording and the wording which, if approved, would be incorporated into the Senate Constitution.
The old wording is as follows: “Before the end of the spring semester, the Senate will appoint students to the SFC, Judicial Board, Community Board, Mediation Board, Honor Committee, Forum Board and the Student Union Board. No more than half of the student seats on any other regular faculty, administrative, or ad-hoc committee may be filled before the fall election.”
The referendum would change the language to the following: “Before the end of the spring semester, the Senate will appoint students to the SFC, Judicial Board, Community Board, Honor Committee, Forum Board, Student Union Board and EPPC. Also in the spring the Senate shall place as many students on all other committees as are deemed qualified. All other seats will be filled as necessary.”
To pass an amendment to the Senate Constitution half of all students must vote and of those voting, more than half must vote in the affirmative. The referendum will continue until 50 percent of the student body has voted.
If you would like more information about the referendum please e-mail osenate@oberlin.edu.

–Aaron B. Leavy
College senior
Student Senate Liaison