The senate of the Associated Students of the University of Nevada eliminated a Title IX Liaison position from one of their committees, mandated a new comprehensive student survey and passed a resolution urging the Board of Regents to double the amount students pay to support tutoring at the university in three bills discussed Oct. 2.
The senate also saw presentations that discussed the results of yet another comprehensive survey and introduced a new outdoor adventure and leadership minor.
Food, housing insecurity and campus racism stand out in new survey
Every two years, the Center for Student Engagement, which houses ASUN, conducts a comprehensive civic engagement survey in collaboration with the Office of Student Persistence Research. This year, the survey rounded up jarring results, with student respondents struggling to pay for housing and less likely than in 2022 to be registered to vote.
The survey also asked students to assess the “campus engagement climate” and their own sense of belonging.
Black and Indigenous students stood out as the only two ethnic groups in the survey to report a negative overall feeling on related questions. Sandra Rodriguez, director of CSE, invited senators to ask themselves why.
“When we talk about why we’re losing Black students, why they aren’t graduating, this helps explain, then, our retention and graduation issues,” Rodriguez said. “This isn’t about GPA, this isn’t about how they’re doing in their courses: they do equally well in their courses as other students. This is about the impact that our campus culture has on whether they feel like they belong.”
Rodriguez also pointed out that when the survey was taken in the Spring 2024 term, fewer students had said they were registered to vote than at the same time in 2022.
“My heart broke when I saw it go down seven, eight points,” Rodriguez said of the survey’s result, which also showed only 76% of undergraduate students planning to vote in the upcoming election.
The survey was taken before Kamala Harris, the current democratic candidate for president, became the nominee.
Rodriguez and Jennifer Loman, the director of student persistence research, later discussed the cost-of-living crisis in relation to students.
Food insecurity was striking, with 23% of respondents identifying themselves as “very” food insecure, and another 22% identifying themselves as “medium” food insecure.
“Think about this the next time you walk into your large classrooms,” Rodriguez told senators. “Almost one in five of those students come from food insecure homes.”
Some 25% of student respondents said they were housing insecure. Over a third of respondents, 37%, also said they were struggling to pay for housing.
Rafting on a field trip? It’s more likely than you think
Andy Rost, a professor recently employed at the university by way of the UNR at Lake Tahoe campus, visited the senate to discuss a new minor coming to the university.
The outdoor adventure & leadership minor, which is expected to offer its first classes this May, gives students the opportunity to take coursework centered around leading recreation opportunities outdoors.
Coursework, however, comes with hefty additional course fees. Liesel Kemmelmeier, ASUN’s vice president and a member of a committee that reviews new course fees, said she approved the fees only on the condition that there be a scholarship created to cover them for low-income students interested in the program.
Extra Title IX liaison position axed in new bill
Two senators on two committees were previously tasked with communicating with UNR’s Center for Civil Rights & Equal Access — previously known as the Title IX office.
Madison Kitch, senator for the Honors College, fills the position for the Committee on Safety, Sustainability and Wellness. Kitch, with Joel Martin, a senator for the College of Liberal Arts, sponsored the bill to remove a similar position from the Committee on Inclusion, Diversity, Equity and Accessibility (IDEA), leaving her the only senator tasked with the job for a committee.
“I think that adding two confuses it more for an office that has backed-up issues,” Kitch said. “Simply because the director came in four months before the biggest case of the year.”
That case being a sexual assault scandal in the College of Engineering, prompting a campus protest last fall.
Abigail Castro, senator for the School of Social work and chair of the IDEA Committee, and Emma Doty, a senator for the College of Science, opposed the bill.
Doty, who previously sponsored a bill to remove a duplicate Veterans Affairs liaison position from one of its committees, told other senators that this matter is different.
“I’ve never once heard a student complaining about Veteran Services,” Doty said. “For all of those (criticisms) and for what our constituents have told us…when on Oct. 18 we had a line out the door of constituents telling us what was wrong with Title IX, I really believe we need as much oversight as possible on Title IX.”
The piece, “S. B. 92 – A Bill to Remove the Title IX Liaison Position From the Committee on IDEA,” passed, with only Doty and Castro opposing.
Never enough surveys? (Or spellcheck)
Martin, with Dillon Moss, ASUN’s director of government affairs, sponsored a bill to require Moss’ department to conduct a comprehensive survey every two years. The extra survey would cover the “off years” where the CSE’s comprehensive student survey wasn’t conducted.
The piece, “S. B. 92- An Act to Mandate the Department of Government Affairs to Conduct An Biannual [typo in original title] Comprehensive Student Survey,” passed, with only Rafay Jamil, a senator for the College of Engineering, opposing.
Yes to $25 more for tutoring
The senate voted to show its support for a new proposal that would double the amount students pay for the Academic Success Fee to support the university’s three tutoring centers.
The resolution, “S. B. 92 – A Resolution In Support of the Academic Success Fee Increase” had a majority of senators listed as co-sponsors.
Directors of the centers came to the senate Sept. 11 to stress how badly they needed the money –– and ASUN’s approval to go to the Board of Regents to ask for it in December.
“Genuinely, if you’re against this, you’re against your constituents,” Martin, who emphasized his past opposition of student fees, said.
Leaf Acklin, a senator for the College of Liberal Arts, said he opposed the resolution even though he knew it would go to the Board of Regents anyway.
“I believe the university can have different ways and different means,” to fund its programs besides student fees, Acklin explained.
The resolution passed, with only Acklin and Tucker Goodspeed, a senator for the College of Business, opposing. Vera Vaz, a senator for the College of Science, and Travis Terry, a senator for the College of Liberal Arts, abstained. Four more were not present for the vote.
Peregrine Hart can be reached via email at peregrineh@unr.edu or on Instagram @pintofperegrine.
