Senate
Coordinates Communication
By Oriana
Syed
Student
Senate, it seems, has decided it has a public relations problem.
“Students aren’t sure exactly what it is that Senate
does,” College junior and Senate Communications Coordinator
Jesse Kanson Benanav said. “[They] don’t know how they
can use senate to their benefit.”
Senate feels that the student body perceives them negatively, or,
at best has, an indifferent view. Kanson Benanav further stated
that the same thing applied to many other student groups on campus.
“Obviously every group on this campus has its own agenda for
Oberlin College, but they don’t understand how they could
use Senate as a resource to address the issues they are concerned
with,” he added.
Two senators, sophomores Ary Amerikaner and Dazlynn Pinkston, are
working with senior Joe Greaves, a former senator and current intern
for Associate Dean of Students Bill Stackman, to address this problem.
They plan to arrange ongoing dialogue between the Senate and student
groups through community forums in order to figure out how to be
more responsive to the needs of student organizations.
In the past, lack of communication with administrators was also
a concern of the Senate.
“Senate has had somewhat of a sour relationship with the administration:
anyone who was here last year remembers the attempted ‘impeachment’
of Dean Goldsmith that was undertaken by a coalition of students
with the consent of Student Senate,” Kanson Benanav said.
Though the impeachment was unsuccessful it perhaps opened the eyes
of the administration to a central concern of Oberlin students:
lack of two-way exchange of ideas. One such example of this was
the decision made by the administration last year to eliminate intern
positions without any consultation with the student body.
This year, the administration has been attempting to improve this
relationship.
“We’ve been meeting with President Dye on a semi-regular
basis, and Dean Goldsmith has made it a point to attend Senate meetings
to convey important information to us about issues that arise within
the Administration,” Kanson Benanav said.
Another instance of the administrators new attempts to more readily
communicate with the Senate is seen through Dean Goldsmith’s
attendance of their recent meetings, explaining the decisions made
by the Board of Trustees.
“We’re really trying to engage the administration and
are pleased with the efforts they have made in this realm,”
Kanson Benanav said.
The Senate seeks to ensure that the information they receive in
their active communication with the administration will be successfully
disseminated to the rest of the student body.
“We as senators cannot be an elite group of students with
access to privileged information,” Kanson Benanav stated.
Senate is planning to begin holding monthly forums for the student
body following fall break. Kanson Benanav feels this will be a wonderful
opportunity for the Senate to receive constructive criticism from
students about its group’s functioning.
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