Hillsdale College students will elect their Student Federation representatives and vote on eight proposed amendments to the federation’s constitution next week.
From Nov. 14-16 in the Grewcock Student Union, students can elect federation officers, two representatives for their class year, and three at-large delegates. Two-thirds of the student body is needed for each of the amendments to pass.
Student Fed representatives said proposed amendment eight seeks to increase access to the federation by diversifying the ways students can access information in response to Thursday’s Collegian editorial that called for students to vote no on the amendment to increase transparency.
Proposed amendment eight would eliminate a clause in Student Fed’s constitution requiring it to post meeting minutes on its website, which doesn’t exist. Instead, the constitution would mandate the minutes become available to students when they ask.
“It allows Student Fed to be flexible in the medium in which to be transparent,” Student Fed Rep. sophomore Thomas Ryskamp said. “Instead of a website, we can use social media, online storage places.”
Student Fed is working with information technology services to make its materials accessible through other online resources, Student Fed Rep. sophomore Kolbe Conger said.
“When the constitution was amended to include the mandate for a website, it was 2006,” he said. “MySpace was bigger than Facebook. There was no Google Drive, no iPhone, no Android. No one had any idea of the cloud. So to them, it was a binary choice between a website and printing it in The Collegian.”
Creating and maintaining a website would cost hundreds of dollars a year, Conger said. By not specifying a website, Student Fed can use easier and cheaper methods to give student access to meeting minutes, he said.
“We’re talking about getting a ‘my site’ on the MyHillsdale website,” Conger said. “We’re working with the Student Activities Board to have email blasters and links to Dropbox or cloud files…A website is on the table, but we want to make sure all the options are on the table not just one.”
Student Fed Rep. sophomore Ross Hatley, who also serves as the rules committee chairman, said a website isn’t the best or most efficient way to bring transparency to the organization.
“We believe that it’s important to vote for amendment eight to allow the Student Fed a free hand to pursue the maximum transparency possible without restrictions and regulations,” Hatley said.