From the Editors:
Each week, The Bi-College News will be publishing the Students’ Council meeting minutes released in the Students’ Council Newsletter. These meeting minutes come directly to the inboxes of all Haverford students; in the interests of making the minutes and the activities of the College’s student government as accessible and transparent as possible, they are likewise published here, where the Bryn Mawr community, along with Bi-Co faculty, staff, alumni, and others can see the Council‘s discourse. The Haverford Clerk has been publishing these minutes in a series since 2019; head to their website to read past releases.
Executive Board Meeting 09/26
Friday, September 26th, 2025; 4:15 – 5:15 p.m., – GEST 101
Members Present: Ben Fligelman, Sarah Weill-Jones, Oliver Wilson, Grant DeVries, Ben Perez-Flesler, Sophia Goss, Victoria Haber, Caroline Yao
Members Absent: N/A
Guests: Will Murdoch, Ben Mansfield, Max Johnson, Paeton Smith-Hiebert, Shaina Maitra, Zoe Hartmann, Clara Morton, Liv Davis, Caitlin Chatterton, Daria Colbath
Next Meeting: Friday, September 26th, 4:15 – 5:15 p.m., – GEST 102
“The Paul DesJardins memorial non-load-bearing pillar is getting in my way.” – Ben Fligelman
- Call to order
- Roll Call
- Adoption of Agenda
- Fords Form
- Old Business:
- Updates from Grant regarding club sports meeting
- Next steps for club and varsity sports dynamics
- Updates from Tori and Caroline’s meeting with Amy Miller RE community housing
- Any relevant updates from CSCAR?
- Updates from Grant regarding club sports meeting
- New Business 1: Addressing student concerns with safety on campus
- PEER EDUCATORS Guest at current plans and next steps RE: student safety
- Concerns with loopholes in party host training requirements
- Discussion of Officer of Athletics’ information RE how sports’ teams tackle required host trainings
- Exec board next steps (at time of writing no updates information wise have been provided to Students’ Council or the general student body)
- New Business 2: Plenary theme voting discourse
- Do we reopen the vote for another week to require quorum?
- Is it legally permissible to use branding in Plenary (ie. rainforest cafe or IKEA themes)
- New Business 3: RUBBER DUCKY DAY NOVEMBER 14th
- Adjournment
Call to Order
Ben Flig: I call this meeting to order at 1:05pm.
Victoria: More than half of Executive Board is in attendance. Quorum has been met.
Ben Flig: I move to adopt the agenda. I also move to approve the minutes. Any concerns? The agenda is adopted and the minutes are approved.
Community Comment
Victoria: Guests, please say your names for the minutes.
Zoe Hartmann: I am the Treasurer Librarian.
Max Johnson: I’m a part of the Bi-Co News.
Will Murdoch: I’m with Men’s Ultimate Frisbee.
Ben Mansfield: I’m with Intramural Futsal League
Paeton Smith-Hiebert & Shaina Maitra: We’re the Peer Health Educators.
Clara Morton: I’m a Sneetch Captain.
Liv Davis: I’m also a Sneetch Captain.
Caitlin Chatterton: I’m a co-head of the Women’s Soccer Club.
Daria Colbath: I’m one of the captains of the Crew Team.
Fords Form
Victoria: We have two comments from the Fords Form.
“I’ve been reading the meeting minutes, and saw that there is a $400,000 rollover budget, and that StuCo can suggest how to use it. To that end: a lot of us are having trouble fitting in afternoon/evening activities while still having time to eat during the DC’s limited hours. It would help boost student engagement in activities, and help us eat more regular meals, if there was a grab-and-go option in the DC for extended hours (maybe from 6am to DC opening, and from 7:30-11pm). Because a lot of student workers and full-time staff can’t stay that long, and it wouldn’t be fair to them, the budget can be used to staff a grab-and-go (ready-made sandwiches, salads, etc) that counts as a meal swipe during these off hours to make sure students can eat! It can just be a fridge/cooler in the DC entrance area to keep things clean, with one worker. Thanks!”
Sophia: We’ve talked about it being a capital expense, if it’s a staffing expense, that raises concerts about the sustainability of the expense — because they are finite, not infinite, and wouldn’t last forever. It’s not a continual source, but I think it’s a good idea.
Zoe: If we were to fund that, that’d give the DC an out to not fix any institutional issues. It’d put a bandaid on the problem instead of finding a long term solution, and in five or six years we’d be out of food again.
Ben Flig: We will send the student a longer response in conjunction with our Co-Treasurers.
Sarah: Thank you for the feedback and submitting to the form.
Victoria: The second is as follows:
“As a woman I find it really concerning that Quaker Bouncers are not required at parties whist because the hosts have a bad relationship with the organization. When I am intoxicated and I can’t find my friend in the crowd I want to have a person I can turn to for help who is clearly identifiable. I don’t/ can’t always call campus safety and it’s not the same. I also find it concerning that people not in our community can go to these parties and not be taken record of.”
Sarah: We’ll give a response and follow up to this Fords Form with an email.
Ben Flig: The Quaker Bouncers do not have the staff to be required at every party right now. That’s something to keep in mind when talking about requirements for Quaker Bouncers.
Sarah: Their concerns are completely valid and these are conversations we are actively having to tackle this.
Ben Flig: If you look at New Business 1, the Peer Educators will be here to talk about that today!
Old Business: Club sports
Ben Flig: It’s time to talk about club and varsity sports.
Grant: For some context, we have heard a number of concerns from heads of club sports on this campus, on how to maintain a club environment with varsity sports that isn’t detrimental and actually keeps club sports competitive spaces too. In the past, these concerns have been growing and ongoing for at least three years and appear to be getting worse. Anecdotally, in submissions to the Co-Treasurers, a number of the concerns are related to varsity athletics, in that they aren’t being supportive of club sports and allowing club sports to have a space to practice.
*Grant interrupts his train of thought to actively kick Oliver out of the room to let students enter the space.*
To address this, we have some ideas. First, to meet with the interest groups on campus that are concerned about this issue. We met with Tyler who is in charge of club sports this past Monday, and some of the Co-Heads today, and also some Co-Heads have emailed me. Depending on where this conversation goes and the conversation with the Head of Athletics, we will either make a list of concerns and address them peacefully or we might end up writing a Plenary Resolution some time in the next couple of weeks. We have a number of club sports today who are here and we can hear from each of the heads of the clubs and what issues they’re facing, how we can address these issues, and continue to support them/you all.
Just to start off the conversation, here’s something that men’s club soccer captain Krish Gupta has shared with me for the minutes:
“For me, I think the main concern is only getting Swan field once per semester, even when there are schedule[d] openings. ’88 and Featherbed aren’t very playable for games, and has [resulted in us] consistently mostly having away games (with costs associated with that). In addition, I’d raise the question of why we can’t use varsity trainers when the school isn’t able to secure trainers through NovaCare- this resulted in the unnecessary cancellation of one of our games.
As for field availability for practices, totally understand not getting priority and Athletics has been helpful in communication about that. In addition, [I] wanted to communicate that Tyler has been super helpful and I think both of these issues are a matter of school policy he can’t control.”
Ben Flig: Thank you. From our wonderful club sports heads who are here, let’s hear from you all. Let us know your relationships with teams, spaces, and so on.
Will: I think we have had similar issues to what Grant described from club soccer. When it’s nice out, we tend to use Merion Field, by the duck pond, and the conditions are not the best. We have reached out to see if we can reserve any other fields but have been turned down despite what seems to be varsity teams using the spaces consistently. We’ve seen open spaces, asked about them, and been told that the conditions of the fields aren’t ‘good enough’ for us to reserve them. This is also the case in the winter. I understand we don’t get priority to reserve the field house but it’s often hard to find times other than 7am where it’s freezing cold on Swan Field, or 11pm at night, which isn’t feasible. Therefore it’s tough for us to meet.
Ben Flig: Thank you.
Ben M: Futsal’s relationship with athletics is mostly (from my perspective as I see Grant send emails) is that it’s massively annoying, in the sense that, a lot of the time, we get the gym reserved but the issue is that practices always run over. Futsal is one of the biggest clubs on campus and we have to run a tight schedule. We can’t really do that if all varsity practices run over into our time slot by 15 to 20 mins. As a result of that, we also then have to leave early at night because the GIAC closes. It’s not fun or feasible that way. There was a debacle about dark sole shoes too. Because futsal is a sport that we wear shoes for, skid marks happen, but because we were not a varsity team, we got heat from athletics. Ultimately, we were forced to clean those up for more than an hour scrubbing the floors. I’m not opposed to doing this if the varsity teams also had to do this. But they don’t–they have a floor cleaner. I think that it just wasn’t kind to be on the receiving end of stigma, when we’re not completely sure, since multiple clubs and sports use the GIAC space. That’s not exactly fair. Scrubbing marks with tennis balls is not what goes through your mind when you join a club sport. It’s unpleasant and annoying having to do extra things that I know other varsity teams don’t have to worry about. I know for a fact that varsity sports are not cleaning those up.
Caroline: Badminton also got the same emails. It wasn’t really a question that varsity sports maybe did not receive these same communications or attitudes.
Ben Flig: Sneetches?
Clara: For the most part, Haverford’s been great to us and Tyler’s been a good resource to make sure we’re accessible to the Bi-Co. The main troubles include field space and injury prevention. We aren’t a varsity sport, and we practice a lot on poorer fields. We had a lot of meniscus, ACLs, rolled ankles, etc. Easy things and really bad things to deal with. There’s a big barrier to having just a quick check up on that, and they end up going to emergency care for that, because we’re not allowed to go to trainers. It becomes expensive, and that’s not equitable.
Sarah: Do varsity athletes have access to this care?
Clara: Yes. I understand why regarding the liability. But, we are an activity too that requires physical exertion and has a high risk of physical injury, given how big of a team we are, especially.
Liv: We had 40 people who have been consistently coming so that is a lot of people and field space would be really important to have.
Victoria: I think part of the reason, in order to do varsity, there’s a lot of health checkups and ability to get care, and is that something intramural club sports go through?
*head shakes*
Clara: We’ve had to sign liability forms at BMC but nothing regarding health and getting trainers involved. We’ve had some people who haven’t been able to come back due to concussions.
Not anything that certifies healthwise. I just know it becomes a cost barrier. They haven’t been able to streamline that healthcare process. One much more logistic and accessible issue is that the way that field space is reserved in the field house over the winter, is really convoluted, and requires us to constantly stalk our emails on Monday morning to reserve a space after the varsity sports get their pick. As students, we end up having to split up time to where all of us on our emails.
Liv: And then sometimes, we still end up receiving bad time slots; for example, doing practice from 10pm-12am which is rough.
Clara: In the fall, we have secured practice times but not in the spring. That’s one of the immediately solvable issues is the way field space is presented to us.
Ben Flig: I appreciate that thanks.
Caitlin: For women’s club soccer, we usually have the same field, but during varsity games Swan or Walton, we can’t practice, and we have to switch to Featherbed which causes problems. We haven’t gotten contacted by athletics about games. Once, we found out the day of, 20 mins before practice, that we had to switch fields. The lack of communication is difficult. We have gotten some reservations switched, but initially were not contacted. Similar to futsal problems, sometimes we’ve had to wait for varsity to finish practice and then we can’t start yet. Sometimes we have to ask people to leave the space because they’re going into our reservation time. Additionally, you have to get keycard access to the bottom of the GIAC, and even after that, my keycard would not work for half the days I needed it, so I had to wait for a varsity athlete to let me in. Just not having access is an issue. It’d be very helpful for our team to see trainers, and have that access. Not having to wait outside.
Daria: For, crew we have access to the boathouse off campus. Our land practices are in the Swan Multipurpose Room, and we have problems with varsity sports overriding our bookings. It hasn’t been an issue lately but it has in the past. We’ll show up and our booking is completely removed. This season we’ve been able to work with that though. Echoing what everyone else is saying about physical therapy and trainers. People can get injured easily without proper training and we don’t have anyone at Haverford who can help us. People are training, and we don’t want them to get injured and that’s only been on the Captains so far, and that’s taxing on the club heads. It’s difficult because we’re trying to participate in the sport as well. If we had the same access it’d help since many students have to get care off campus.
Sarah: Thank you all so much for coming.
Ben Flig: Does anyone on council have any questions?
Grant: Thanks everyone for coming, I really appreciate you all for coming. Well follow up with the Athletics Department and then let you all know. Depending on that meeting, this may be a Plenary Resolution so you can all help and speak in favor. We’ll do our best to address these problems. We’ve been affected by this issue for a while so it’s finally time for us to do something about it. We appreciate you all coming to address your issues.
Again, thank you.
Liv: Thank you for making our club sports as accessible as possible. Shout out to the Co-Treasurers too.
*claps*
Old Business: Community Housing
Victoria: I met with Amy Miller. She will be here next week.
Old Business: CSCAR
Ben PF: We’ll meet again on Sunday. We’re writing things. We have plans for feedback. It’s good, we have a wonderful group!
New Business 1: Addressing student concerns with safety on campus
Sarah: We’ll be talking about the students’ concerns for safety on campus. This section might pertain to the second Fords Form. We find this to be very important. We have two Peer Educators here, the heads of the program, and we would like to know what’s going on regarding the concerns. What is going on with PHE and the next steps regarding student safety?
Pae: I had sent an email to the Co-Presidents and Co-Secretaries with a general overview about our office, who’s in it, what we’re up to right now. We previously had a director Carrie Carr who has departed from her role. That has left us in a position where we are supervised by Scott Wojciechowski in Student Life and Cassie Scanlon who is the Divisional Case Manager. They are kind of our current staff supervisors.
We have two senior Peer Educators, who help more with the day to day managerial aspects. We have six peer educators not including us, total, one abroad. We oversee the party host training which is a 90 minute training regarding risk reduction, bystander intervention, and sexual violence intervention. Our other biggest training is the bystander training–Brining in the Bystander.. Additionally our office designed the consent curriculum for the class of 2029.
We manage the party host process. In line with previous years, there’s a grace period between the start of the semester and fall break to host parties. Once fall break happens you have to be party host trained. Before that, you can host without being trained. There is a collection of people trained last year who could recertify by taking a test. To be recertified you must pass with an 80%. Those who do not pass can take the test again. We have previously been functioning on the assumption that if they did not complete the recertification, they would also have to retake it (if they didn’t complete it within the time frame we sent out). We’re still working on that with Scott. We have to have two co-facilitators, so it might be a challenge to coordinate schedules, but we are trying to offer as many training sessions as possible.
Shaina: We offered one last week and one on Tuesday. The most recent training had about 25 people. At this point, we probably have 70-80 students on campus who are trained.
Pae: About 55 went through recertification and an additional 6-8 from last week and 20-25 as of this past Tuesday. We have another one scheduled for next Friday.
In terms of next steps, we’re looking to make adjustments to party host training, based on feedback. We are updating for clarity and pulling in feedback from the first years consent program centering the sexual violence, bystander intervention, alcohol and other drug safety.
Shaina: The training right now addresses baseline concerns with party hosting. Especially because it’s a 90 minute training, usually we wrap up a little early, but now we want to take those minutes to dive deeper into pressing matters.
Sarah: Pae and I spoke about the concerns of the requirements and people signing up as a party host. Campus Safety has told party hosts that they want them to book in advance, so that they can know when the parties are all happening. This ends up with one student signing up for all parties, preventing others from getting the training or even from using spaces. What is the best way to tackle this?
Pae: Our previous director had suspicions of that being the case, and we are also trying to think of ways to combat that. I feel as though there have been a few different ideas like placing some sort of restriction on how many parties one can host in a semester, and/or doing a continued check in for repeat party hosts to make sure they are remembering the training. I think that there’s also specific improvements for areas that are tied to residential buildings. There should be encouragement, regardless of whether students are holding the parties, to undergo the training or engage with the topics in a more intentional way, keeping in mind with anti-violence prevention being embedded in community care. We want to ensure that everyone there has the tools and info they need to be an effective and active bystander.
Shaina: While we do hope to address these concerns, the training is available to anyone. As a broader community we have to be interested in attending these. So while we have specific interests, and do outreach, we do make these trainings open to everyone. Everyone should understand how important this is.
Sarah: We’ll talk further about StuCo having one scheduled.
Pae: We’ll connect on that. Getting trained in party host training is important, and we also have one in bystander training, that is longer and a little more intensive but also very important. It’s called Bringing in the Bystander. That is a training from University of New Hampshire that Customs leaders and athletes have gone under. If StuCo would be interested in that, we can also schedule that.
Sarah: It’ll be tough to get us all together.
Victoria: We can do it during a general meeting.
Sarah: Yes that’ll be good. That’s one of the ways that the Executive Board can support you right now. Anything else we can help with?
Pae: We’re continuing to advertise any time we have trainings. We’ve done this through the Weekly Consensus and on our instagram. I don’t know if there’s anything beyond the current moment, but I do think it’s important that Students’ Council is taking the step to get trained. We appreciate the engagement and opportunity to come in and speak and address any concerns. So just continue keeping that line of communication. If you need more from us like clarification, know that we are here to address any questions you have.
Shaina: What are some thoughts or concerns you’ve had in mind?
Sarah: One of our main things is connecting with you guys with JSAAPP and also Quaker Bouncers. This can be continued with them. You’re all working towards a common goal and bringing you into the same room is key.
Victoria: How many conversations have you had with Campus Safety?
Ben Flig: We just had the Campus Safety Advisory Committee meeting. If we want to have more convos with them, I’m sure they’ll be receptive. Campus Safety is generally ready to help.
Pae: I also met with Anna Moronski the Bi-College Associate Director for Investigations in Campus Safety after that meeting. We talked about general student safety concerns and accountability. Also I’m typically there as a representative for the Survivor’s Collective and one of our other Peer Educators will also be going to that meeting.
If any students can’t make the sessions we advertise, like a group of friends that want to get trained together, they are encouraged to reach out to us and we can work around scheduling conflicts. We have also recently started our office hours, and we are also developing a public facing calendar so that people can easily sign up there. We’re trying to be more visible and accessible.
If anyone has any questions, stopping by our office hours, emailing, or messaging us on Instagram is a good way to get in contact. Email: [email protected] Instagram: @hcwellbeing.
New Business 2: Plenary theme voting discourse
Ben Flig: I know that we talked about this last weekend, and that there were concerns that we shouldn’t vote on the theme, but now I think that StuCo should vote on it. I hope we agree on IKEA because that’s what students wanted, but we’ll see.
Victoria: Consensus or vote?
Ben Flig: I would prefer consensus, but it might not be the best efficient option.
Sarah: I’d prefer that as well.
Ben Flig: We can have a serious talk about this, but in matters of taste there can be no dispute.
Sarah: We also don’t have any copyright issues there. Ben did some research.
Ben Flig: If IKEA sued us they’d have to sue for damages and there’s no DAMAGE they can sue us for! If anything we can go to IKEA and have them SPONSOR us!! If we were serious about engaging with the corporation that is.
Sarah: Are we going to wait for gen bod to vote?
Ben Flig: Seems like it!
New Business 3: RUBBER DUCKY DAY NOVEMBER 14th
Sarah: Rubber Ducky Day is Nov 14. I’ve been working with the illustrious treasurers to make a fun event for November. I really like duckies so I want the community to have access to this joy. Will this happen for sure? I don’t know. But we are brainstorming fun events. Hopefully one on Nov 14th. It’s an ongoing logical conversation.
Grant: A final announcement, the DAC is meeting Sunday! I have a variety of things that people have been telling me that are on the list. All of those concerns will be added to the list. We’re trying to schedule as best as possible to have Tom come.
Ben Flig: I adjourn this meeting at 5:10pm.
General Body Meeting 09/28
Sunday, September 28th, 2025; 2:00 – 3:00 p.m., – GEST 101
Members Present: Ben Fligelman, Sarah Weill-Jones, Oliver Wilson, Grant DeVries, Sophia Goss, Victoria Haber, Caroline Yao, Coco Liu, Elena Vol, Isabela Azumatan Aceituno, Vivian Ross, Conner McWhan, Hettie Van Dyke, Zora Kuehne, Isaac Kemokai, Julie Edelstein, Esme Dorsey, Ian Trask, Zoe Hartmann, Chris O’Conner, Abigail Trapp, Leo Ni, Michael Pyo
Members Absent: Ben Perez-Flesler, Jack Weinstein, Jackson Cannon, Ben Fitzgerald, Anjali Agarwal, Pratyusha Katiyar, Hannah Mattison, Jonathan Lee, Sofie Quirk
Guests: N/A
Next Meeting: Sunday, October 5th; 2:00 – 3:00 p.m., – GEST 101
“Conner, if you want to talk to me about Quaker voting practices, we’ll talk later.” – Benjamin Fligelman
- Call to order
- Roll Call
- Ford’s Form
- Old Business:
- Updates from Dining Center Committee RE: Coop Hours
- Updates RE: last week’s campus safety email
- Updates on outreach from JSAAPPs with QB
- Next steps within the power of StuCo for student safety
- Ways to change party host training so that more students obligated to complete it
- Updates RE: plenary theme from Exec Board meeting
- New Business 1: Retreat Replacement
- What did we like or dislike about dinner at Dean McKnights?
- What should the next dinner focus on and what changes should be made?
- What did we like or dislike about dinner at Dean McKnights?
- New Business 2: Bryn Mawr SGA Budget Crisis
- What we’re doing to fix it and how we’re going to help.
- New Business 3: How do we better involve Affinity Groups with Students’ Council?
- Should there be a meeting separate from Gen Bod once a month to get updates from affinity groups? Or an alternative? What is the best way to keep in contact?
- New Business 4: RUBBER DUCKY DAY NOVEMBER 14th
- Adjournment.
Call to Order
Ben Flig: I call this meeting to order at 2:06pm. We had some responses to the Fords Form read out at the Exec Board. We’ll share them in minutes rather than go over them extensively for the sake of time. Co-Presidents and Co-Treasurers will send responses to those that requested them.
Victoria: The Fords Form submissions are as follows:
“I’ve been reading the meeting minutes, and saw that there is a $400,000 rollover budget, and that StuCo can suggest how to use it. To that end: a lot of us are having trouble fitting in afternoon/evening activities while still having time to eat during the DC’s limited hours. It would help boost student engagement in activities, and help us eat more regular meals, if there was a grab-and-go option in the DC for extended hours (maybe from 6am to DC opening, and from 7:30-11pm). Because a lot of student workers and full-time staff can’t stay that long, and it wouldn’t be fair to them, the budget can be used to staff a grab-and-go (ready-made sandwiches, salads, etc) that counts as a meal swipe during these off hours to make sure students can eat! It can just be a fridge/cooler in the DC entrance area to keep things clean, with one worker. Thanks!”
“As a woman I find it really concerning that Quaker Bouncers are not required at parties whist because the hosts have a bad relationship with the organization. When I am intoxicated and I can’t find my friend in the crowd I want to have a person I can turn to for help who is clearly identifiable. I don’t/ can’t always call campus safety and it’s not the same. I also find it concerning that people not in our community can go to these parties and not be taken record of.”
Old Business
Sarah: Are there updates from the Dining Advisory Committee (DAC)?
Grant: We met for the first time. We met as a committee and with Thomas Mitchell, Director of Dining Services. The main topic was The Coop and its hours. He brought up many reasons why the hours were changed, we won’t go over those. We will be working to fix those hours to make The Coop open hopefully until or past 7pm. We’ll be meeting with Scott Wojciechowski and Dean McKnight which is what Tom advised us to do to figure out why the hours were changed in more detail, as he says it was a decision ultimately from upper administration. We’ll address that as soon as we can.
Sarah: Thank you. Ben and I reached out to JSAAPP. Any updates overall?
Isabela: Jackson and I met with Scott Wojciechowski and have decided to update the alcohol policy. There is some outdated information and rules that aren’t necessary anymore. For example the alcohol policy says we do training during Customs which is not true anymore due to it being in the online orientation. On the Quaker Bouncers side, I haven’t met with the other Co-Head so we haven’t discussed much but we will be at Executive Board Oct. 3rd to dive into these topics.
Sarah: Thank you. We’re trying to get ongoing convos with you guys, the Quaker Bouncers and with the Peer Educators to talk about ongoing educational efforts regarding student safety. We have talked to the Peer Educators from the Health and Wellbeing Office about the next steps for Students’ Council regarding student safety. We decided we’ll be holding a training for all gen bod to have in place of a regular meeting in the next few weeks. We believe this will set a good standard for our community if we take the steps to make (party) spaces safer. We’ll let you know when that happens. JSAAPP let us know if you have any updates and how your ongoing conversations go. If you aren’t able to come all the time to gen bod please make this a priority.
We’re also talking to Peer Educators regarding changing the party host training to meet the goals of them and Campus Safety. The office has been under strain due to leadership transitions. We want to find ways to alleviate the pressure Peer Educators are experiencing, but also to encourage students to take the training rather than have one student do that for an entire group. Maybe we will require that everyone in specific residential spaces take it or limit the amount of parties a certain student can book.
Plenary Theme
Ben Flig: Last week we had some discourse! I want to come back with a few thoughts. Last week, Esme brought up the possibility of there being copyright issues with companies. I looked into this and the basic problem I found is that if we got sued we would have to be sued for damages. There’s no damage if we hosted Plenary with any of these themes. So legally we’re fine…we might even be able to get sponsored! With that in mind for this meeting, I’d like for us to determine what the theme for plenary will be this fall. If we remember, the top themes were IKEA, Rainforest Cafe, and “gone fishing.” Let’s have more discussion.
Victoria: IKEA is cool if that’s what people wanted.
Ian: I am a fan of the IKEA theme pushing the notion regarding constructing the Honor Code.
Grant: I’m not gonna vote for or against it. Theming plenary after a company is not something I would want to do as Students’ Council. For one of the most important plenaries I think we should do something a bit more serious. Caroline did mention a theme as “building something new” which has helped me reconcile with the general concept. While it’s not my favorite theme, and while few people voted, it’s not that big of a deal.
Zora: Of the five themes we presented, three were corporation based, so if there’s a problem with IKEA, there might be an equal problem with the others presented.
Zora lost their voice and Victoria finds it very funny and relatable
Ben Flig: Rest your vocal chords!
Sarah: Anyone else? Because we are hoping to reach consensus on this.
Conner: I’m curious, over IKEA what would you want?
Grant: There are other options like “building something new” or “gone fishing” or the concept of “rainforest.” But like I said if everyone wants IKEA it’s not an issue.
Victoria: Instead of having the theme being IKEA, it can be rebuilding something new/constructing the honor code, then we can have stickers and merch taking inspiration from different companies. It can also leave room for us to incorporate things like Bob the Builder. The easy compromise would be that the general theme would be rebuilding.
Sophia: I think having a functionally construction theme feels a little thematically weak in my opinion. I want a Skog sticker also, so… I feel like there’s less of a reason if it’s just a construction theme.
Conner: I like the idea that Victoria had, the theme of rebuilding. We’d still be able to make Skog stickers. I think it’s a good compromise.
Ben Flig: Informally, how do we feel about an IKEA theme? Hands? I just want to get a read on the room. For the building theme? For those who chose IKEA, can we reach consensus with the majority that chose the construction/rebuilding theme?
Zora: I would say construction doesn’t feel like a theme. A construction themed plenary feels like a strange idea.
Julie: Aside from the shirts, all of the merch will mostly be from student body input.
It doesn’t matter what we think if we pick one or another, we’ll get input. If we say “construction,” it’s up to interpretation if IKEA falls into it. Saying a theme won’t be conducive to input when we’re not in charge of that is fine. We’ll get input.
Victoria: Also to clarify, I meant “rebuilding the Honor Code” is the theme, not “construction” per say.
Ian: IKEA has more of an iconic relevance in this day and age rather than general construction or rebuilding. Many people are familiar with the different IKEA creatures. The form that people voted on included at least one hundred of the most engaged members of the community, who came together to decide that they wanted IKEA. I still think it’s a bit upsetting that the three people who didn’t want IKEA can override that.
Sophia: Ben PF wants to say through text that construction or rebuilding of the Honor Code theme feels too literal and he’s not in favor.
Ben Flig: That’s time. We need to decide now. Do we have consensus? For those who read this, for those of you who may find this silly, it means a lot for the ways that Student Council works and Haverford works, that all voices are heard and included, even things that seem trivial or small.
Sarah: If you’d like to stand outside of consensus that’s okay, no one will judge you.
Grant and Michael stand outside.
Ben Flig: With that in mind, do we have consensus on a Plenary theme? The overarching aesthetic of Plenary will be IKEA based, and the central theme will be ‘rebuilding the Honor Code.’
Victoria: IKEA: Rebuilding the Honor Code!
Sarah: Okay, that’s the plenary theme.
The Retreat
Ben Flig: Thoughts about Friday?
Chris: I liked the dinner because it was pretty convenient versus staying overnight. Dean McKnight’s house is much closer, versus going away for the weekend. I’m able to do something off campus that’s still nearby. I liked the dinner because of the convenience and it still was fun to gather together ‘off campus.’
Ben Flig: We’ll have more of these. What would we want those to focus on? What issues should we discuss, what admin do we want there?
Sarah: What would be most useful to you in your role?
Victoria: Maybe having Scott would be nice as well, in addition to having Dean McKnight and Jodi.
*Victoria wants CAVA the next time.*
Victoria: Would we keep having them at Dean McKnight’s House?
Sarah: Potentially yes. I was thinking of even Wendy’s house for one of these but I don’t know if she’d be open to that. Maybe just one! But overall convenience is important since I work other non-campus jobs outside of Students’ Council. The ability to be near my non-campus jobs and having the retreat close by to campus, was very valuable.
Bryn Mawr SGA Budget Crisis
Ben Flig: Let’s move on.
Sophia: Last Sunday, Bryn Mawr Self-Government Association (SGA) had their Budgeting Town Hall Meetings–mandatory by their Constitution. So after they make decisions they bring it to RepCo and they can make contestations, which is like the appeals system we have at Haverford. RepCo makes up the representatives of each student organization, like each club head. It’s a body of 30-50 members at least. Ben PF and I were there and they presented their budgeting decisions. Because of the surplus they accumulated since COVID-19 and the excessive over-spending the past few years through that fund, they have to cut a lot of funding for their clubs this year. This resulted in 48 out of the 104 clubs that requested funding not receiving any. That’s a lot of clubs that would cease all activity, some of which were Bi-Co. The options they presented were that you could vote and every club could get $10 out of the $500 dedicated to contestations or you could contest up to $20. Ben and I talked and decided we’d offer $3,000 out of our surplus money in order to cover the cost of Bi-Co clubs, to ease any tension on clubs and SGA, thus increasing contestations from originally $500 to now $3,500.
They’ll make purchase requests with us. We wanted to do this as a sign of good faith and our commitment to the community, but also in part because it’ll benefit Haverford students. There’s a lot of clubs that aren’t officially Bi-Co that take Haverford students as well. We hope they would be willing to do it for us if we were in a similar situation and they had the resources. I want to emphasize this won’t impact any of the funding we have dedicated for Haverford students since it comes from the capital surplus, not from the Student Activities Fund (SAF).
Elena: This is just for this semester?
Sophia: Yes.
Elena: So I’m assuming their financial situation won’t be solved. Will we be stepping in next semester?
Sophia: No, one of the biggest differences is that Bryn Mawr covers their traditions through their student activity fund including providing freshmen with their class lanterns. We have Haverfest but it’s far less expensive; their traditions have historically cost $110,000. They’re pulling that from their Student Activities Fund.That’s something that they’re working on, I believe as a plenary resolution to move that responsibility to administration. Ideally, that will free up $80,000-$110,000 each semester to go towards clubs. We’re approaching it as a one-time in crisis solution for them for now.
Ben Flig: For those curious, here is the Bryn Mawr Constitution so you can read about RepCo.
Sarah: Any other questions?
Zora: Could we suggest that Bryn Mawr cut funding from larger clubs to benefit Bi-Co clubs?
Sophia: They’ve slashed all of the funding that they can to the point that clubs are functional to the minimal amount. For example, the amount that they are paying fencing is the pre-contracted amount that their instructor has to be paid. There are situations like that. They also cut their concert budget by $16,000. The traditions budget cannot be cut anymore than it already has been so there’s really no where else they could cut from. It could be a suggestion we can make to them, but I really don’t think it’s feasible in any sense of the word. I want to communicate how dire their situation is. It’s really bad.
Oliver: Does the SGA budget come from the SAF? What has been the status to increase to that in their intuition in the past decade?
Sophia: That’s information that I don’t have on hand. My understanding is that they’ve raised it less than we’ve raised it overall. Currently, the fee is about $90 less than ours. That has a big impact on how much revenue they bring in. One thing they covered at the meeting we went to was a firm desire to not raise their SAF in part because of any pressure on low income students.
Oliver: Is it not covered by financial aid for them? Increases in SAF don’t impact financial aid packages here, so I wonder if that’s true there.
Sophia: That was not the understanding that was communicated to us, so I’m not sure. We can look into that. My understanding is that it wouldn’t be raised by the full amount if you’re on aid, but for students on partial aid, their costs would increase.
Ben Flig: The last thing I want to say on this issue, is that this is a good thing that we are doing. This is a really good thing. Over the last couple of decades the Bi-Co has grown apart and it’s really important that we work to strengthen our ties with SGA and Bryn Mawr in general. The Bi-Co is one of the greatest assets we can offer to students. It’s two colleges for the price of one. I’m really glad that we’re making this decision and I think this will be our benefit in years to come that can’t be measured just financially.
Conner: Sophia, can you go over again how the money is distributed and how you’re making decisions over which clubs get money at Bryn Mawr?
Sophia: So we’re not writing them a blank check. We are reading their purchase requests through our system. They have line items like we do that they submit to their treasurers, and they will send those to us. We will go through each request in line with our policies at Haverford, such as covering $15/student for catered dinners, and generally not approving snacks. I don’t anticipate there being policy conflicts. If there are, they’ll have to follow our policies.
Conner: How are you thinking of the timeline over the course of the semester? To make sure you don’t run out of money by the end of the semester? If you’re getting an influx of budget requests you may want to save a certain amount of money at Bryn Mawr. How are you gauging that?
Sophia: In terms of running out of money we’re fine. Tracking how much is coming in, we have those line items up front, it’s been approved by the treasurers, and it’s reapproved by us. We would mark that in a separate sheet and send that to Tina Coyne, Administrative Assistant in Student Life. She’ll check on the back end. Once the money is allocated, we don’t think about when it’s coming out of the system.
Conner: So these are requests we’re approving right now?
Sophia: Yes.
New Business 3: How do we better involve Affinity Groups with Students’ Council?
Sarah: We are trying to figure out better ways to have affinity groups to be involved.
Grant: We do have the Officer of Multiculturalism.
Vivian: Jonathan is out of town. He does have thoughts about this. The timing of this discussion might not be great right now.
Caroline: I’m an AGC co-head. We will be having monthly AGC meetings, which is how it’s usually run. We’re happy to talk about having additional joint meetings with Students’ Council.
Tori: We should consider including community houses, BCC, LCC, PANA, in that too.
Caroline: Agreed, I’ll tell Jonathan.
Grant: Can we also reach out to SAC in athletics? What is the difference that we only reach out to affinity groups?
Ben Flig: In the long term, I would like to have more groups on campus, athletics, affinity groups, etc, to be more involved in Students’ Council. One of the interesting things about Bryn Mawr SGA constitution is RepCo. Every head of affinity group, large club, governance committees, has a seat. They take part in Bryn Mawr’s Students’ Council equivalent. That’s something we might want to explore down the line. The reason that I wanted to bring up affinity groups is because they represent voices on our campus who are typically more marginalized and less represented in the larger campus. Since Jonathan isn’t here we can’t talk about this fully. We’ll discuss more next week. Does anyone else have anything else to say?
New Business 4: RUBBER DUCKY DAY NOVEMBER 14th
Sarah: Put November 14th on your calendars as a big day for Haverford! We are looking to implement rubber ducky day with the Co-Treasures to incorporate a fun day, where you and your friends can search for rubber duckies and have snacks by the Duck Pond. We have a beautiful pond so why not have a rubber ducky themed event? We don’t have a lot of traditions or opportunities for community building either. As Co-Presidents one of our goals this year is to make more fun events for students.
Tori: I think this would be nice because the skate house was just renovated too.
Coco: I was wondering, since you intend this to be a tradition, how much have you talked to the student body about their feelings on this? How well the student body will take a tradition is a concern of mine since many of us including you guys will graduate.
Sarah: The way that I think of it is how Pinwheel Day started. A random student put pinwheels out on the lawn and now it’s a thing. I do understand what you’re saying on how the student body is going to react, so we’re still working with Co-Treasurers to make sure that it’s not too costly and can be repeated annually. It will be done on a small scale though to see how students engage. We want to set up longevity and have materials that can be reused. Once we graduate though, the next Students’ Council can do whatever they want. I think it’s still worth a shot, and either way it can just be a way to engage in community
*Caroline says, if you have comments about traditions, put it in the Fords Form!*
Sophia: In terms of the Fords Form about Dean McKnight dinner, we’re aware of potential concerns. We are reworking our snack policy to see how it plays into this event and larger budgeting policies. We are concerned and thinking about club equity in funding.
Sarah: Everything we fund for this would be in line with the policies we have.
Zora: Between this and the anticipated Honor Code birthday, how many new traditions are we trying to integrate?
Sarah: Just these two. We aren’t trying to overwhelm the student body. We can just eat cupcakes at the DC for the birthday.
Victoria: I would prefer there was something bigger in addition to that, since I recall us having previous conversations related to a bell or something.
Sarah: That’s something important to keep in mind. We’ll chat with the Co-Treasurers and Student Life to stay in policy.
Sophia: If you’re talking about the bell, that would be a one-time purchase from the capital surplus which is doable. We would have to talk about a potential source for a consistently-held birthday. If it’s a tradition, it’s not wise to take out of the capital surplus, so we’ll keep talking about that.
Sarah: Either way, come to Rubber Ducky Day on November 14th! I adjourn this meeting at 2:55pm.
Some more fun from your Students’ Council General Body Meeting:
“Anyone wanna throw a tomato at me?” – Benjamin Fligelman, “If you insist!” – Victoria Haber
Budgeting Meeting 09/26
Friday, September 26, 2025; 8:00 – 10:00 p.m., – GEST 102
Members Present: Ben Fligelman, Sarah Weill-Jones, Oliver Wilson, Grant DeVries, Ben Perez-Flesler, Sophia Goss, Victoria Haber, Caroline Yao
Members Absent: N/A
Guests: Zoe Hartmann
Next Meeting: Friday, October 3, 2025; 4:15 – 5:15 p.m., – GEST 102
“A new bombshell enters the budgeting committee!” – Ben Fligelman
- Call to order
- Roll Call
- Adoption of Agenda
- Old Business
- Bryn Mawr SGA Budgeting Crisis
- Extraordinary & Historical Budget Requests
- Bi-Co Chabad
- Bi-Co Lame Ducks Ice Hockey
- Bi-Co Sneetch Ultimate Frisbee
- Big Donkey Ultimate Frisbee (BDU)
- Federation United Concert Series (FUCS)
- Fords Against Boredom (FAB)
- HaverCode
- Haverford Badminton Club
- Haverford Climbing Club
- Haverford College Rugby Club
- Haverford College Crew Team
- Haverford Mock Trial (HMT)
- Haverford Quantum Computing Club
- Muslim Student Association (MSA)
- Quaker Bouncers (QBs)
- South Asian Society (SAS)
- Special Events Committee for Students (SECS)
Call to Order
Sophia: I call this meeting to order at 8:14pm.
Victoria: More than half of Exec board is in attendance. Quorum has been met.
Sophia: I move to adopt the agenda. I also move to approve the minutes. Any concerns? The agenda is adopted and the minutes are approved.
Community Comment
Victoria: Guests please say your names for the minutes.
Zoe: I’m the Students’ Council Treasurer Librarian.
Old Business
Sophia: We attended Bryn Mawr’s Budgeting Meeting last weekend, and it was definitely challenging for them, they had to fully deny funding for a lot of orgs which could cause some to disappear completely. We will talk more about this in General Body Meeting, but we offered $3,000 dollars out of our surplus to cover the costs of Bi-College clubs so as to free up more for their contestations. We wanted to take the pressure off of SGA in a really contentious situation, and did it in the spirit of bi-college unity.
Note: “contestations” is the term that Bryn Mawr SGA uses for what Haverford calls “appeals” during rolling budgeting. As a reference point, we normally aim to save around $30,000 for appeals and rolling budgeting each semester. This semester, Bryn Mawr was only able to allocate $500 to that, even after making extreme cuts to everything, leaving 48 out of 104 clubs with $0 before appeals.
Ben PF: It’s a step to us all working together more, their clubs are in a really desperate situation this semester..It’s not really bailing them out – $3k is not going to save them or make them dependent on us, but it’ll lighten the load. They’ve invited us to help review their budget going forward so we can give them advice on how to reach financial stability and help them leverage more institutional support, which we’ve had a lot more of. We really look forward to working more with them, the students in these positions this year are good people and trying as hard as they can to fix the mistakes of their predecessors. That benefits all of us. Trust is the first step, even if it might be hard initially, it’s the only way.
Ben PF: It’s good for us to help here; we have the ability and it’s within our values and scope. It’s a huge impact for them and the cost for Haverford students is negligible or arguably even negative. If anyone has any questions or wants to discuss/hear more, please reach out to us!
Extraordinary Budget Requests
Bi-Co Chabad
Grant: How much money do you think we should approve?
Sophia: For context, they’re getting $6000 from BMC. It might make sense to cut them down to $4,000-$5,000 from us, especially given our per head policy on dinners.
Ben PF: Because they don’t give us very much information, the only part of their budget that is relevant is how much each portion of food costs for the individuals.
Ben Flig: Okay, so $15 per person.
Ben PF: Yup. This is the standard we typically use for catering as well.
Grant: It’s $15 per each person, then what about their larger events that aren’t dinners?
Ben PF: If they’re not dinners, then it’s $10 per person for food; we started doing this this semester.
Sophia: It seems like their estimated attendance is 30 per dinner, so that would be 450 for each weekly dinner.
Grant: But does that add up to $1,300?
Ben PF: I’m not sure yet what they received from Bryn Mawr. It will probably end up that their total funding (us+BMC) will be more than $6,000 but less than $12,000.
Grant: So how much are we approving?
Ben PF: Around $9,000 to $10,000 total between BMC+us. Once again we’ll do $15 per person for dinners and $10 per person for other events, still have to do the math on the final number, but it’ll be in our budget report next week.
Oliver: I move to approve the budget for discussed changes.
Victoria: I second.
Consensus is achieved!
Bi-Co Lame Ducks Ice Hockey
Grant: How much have we historically approved?
Ben PF: It’s gone up due to an increase in attendance, and unexpected pricing changes at the rink they use.
Sarah: I think we have to cut events that are during finals week.
Sophia: Yup, we’ll be doing that.
Grant: I move to approve the budget with the following changes.
Sophia: I second.
Consensus is achieved! (with Caroline standing outside)
Bi-Co Sneetch Ultimate Frisbee
Zoe: What should we do about the dinner?
Ben PF: What Mock Trial does with food for away games is pay for a portion for the students who need it and they have to cover their own costs beyond that. I think we’ll do something similar.
Sophia: We need to establish a per diem for that.
Ben PF: We’ll probably approve about 250 of that. Like Sophia said, in the future we’ll work with these teams to develop a standard policy/rate that we can apply. I think everything else looks good.
Grant: I move to approve the budget with the changes discussed, with the intention of establishing a per diem.
Oliver: I second.
Consensus is achieved!
Big Donkey Ultimate Frisbee
Ben PF: This budget is similar. The food bags are from last year. It’s from the dining center. They have to give food anyway since it’s a part of their registration fees, we’re just fronting the cost and they’ll earn back more by the end anyways.
Oliver: This is something we also benefit from since they give us the money back.
Ben Flig: I appreciate how some clubs are self funding.
Sarah: I make a motion to approve this budget.
Ben Flig: I second the motion.
Consensus is achieved!
Federation United Concert Series (FUCS)
Grant: What do they do? Also, what does that $13,000 pay for?
Ben Flig: They bring local music to campus to perform.
Grant: Wait, you mean like…bands???
Grant has an eye opening experience learning about FUCS
Sophia: This is similar to historical budgeting in the sense that they don’t have the line up made yet, but this is usually what they receive.
Oliver: I might be wrong but their historical budgeting might have been $12,000 last year.
Ben PF: I need to check. No, their funding has been $13,000 for the last few years.
Oliver: Thanks for checking.
Victoria: I make a motion to approve their budget.
Sophia: I second the motion.
Consensus is achieved! (with Sarah standing outside)
Fords Against Boredom
Ben PF: FAB also has a historical budget that is consistent with last year’s. What do we think?
Grant: Should we give them more?
Oliver: They don’t usually spend all of their money, so I advise against this.
Grant: I see.
Victoria: I make a motion to approve this budget.
Ben Flig: I second.
Consensus is achieved!
HaverCode
Ben PF: This is a new entry to the budgeting committee!
*Exciting!*
Grant: Can we read their club objectives?
Ben PF: Yes.
Sophia: They made their budget pretty affordable for travel so I’m not opposed to that.
Victoria: Agreed. For the Society of Women Engineers conference, does the registration confirm they do get to go?
Ben PF: It looks like it.
Sophia: I think we can push everything except the transportation (for hackathons) to the KINSC.
Oliver: As conferences go, this is pretty affordable so I think that would work.
Grant: Would you want to give them a fallback option in case the KINSC doesn’t approve their funding proposal?
Ben PF: It’s not what we’re set up to do. I trust the KINSC to make their decision; I don’t think we have the capacity to fund this kind of thing.
Sophia: If they want to circle back with us, we can talk about it with them.
Ben PF: They can always appeal with additional justification, like any group that has a regular budgeting request denied or deduced,or apply to rolling budgeting.
Grant: I move to approve the budget with the following changes.
Oliver: I second the motion.
Consensus is achieved!
Haverford Badminton Club
Grant: This is also new!
*Exciting!!!!*
Sarah: Why are the shuttlecocks so expensive?
Sophia: I researched this. They are generally very expensive. These are pretty much the cheapest they can get while still maintaining decent enough quality to play matches.
Ben PF: It is also one of the more popular sports too.
Sophia: Let’s talk about their Eastern Collegiate Tournament.
Grant: This makes sense to me regarding how we fund other club sports and club tournaments.
Ben PF: Agreed, although the hotels are pretty expensive.
Grant: I have a question around trainer hours. For inter-club scrimmages, they should have trainers, but should that come from us?
Ben PF: We approved trainers for others, it’s a safety issue and required by the college.
Oliver: Yes, for games, but this is a scrimmage. It looks like they’re hosting other student teams, so I think this is fine.
Sarah: I move to approve this budget.
Grant: I second.
Bing bang walla walla bing bang consensus is achieved! (Victoria begrudgingly writes this)
Haverford Climbing Club
Ben PF: What I would like to know is the frequency at which they go climbing in the past and use those day passes. This seems like a significant increase over last semester and they haven’t given any reason why.
Victoria: This is a lot of money.
Ben PF: I think we will have to cut some of it.
Sarah: How many trips have they done historically per week?
Oliver: I wouldn’t cut the amount they go each week? I think where there’s some flexibility is how many people go each time. I’m not sure what their average weekly attendance is.
Ben PF: We clarified with them that the amount of passes they use is what we pay for, so they are likely to not use everything we approve, but they might also be able to carry over into future budgeting periods.
Oliver: That means we could approve and they spend what they spend, or reject some of it and if they need more they can ask through rolling.
Grant: Let’s approve what they did last year.
Ben PF: It’s changed a little from last year. They’re asking for 11 more weeks.
Sarah: I think we should cut some weeks.
Victoria: I agree, at this point about 11 weeks are left in the semester which includes fall break, Thanksgiving break, and finals week. That’s three weeks to cut.
Oliver: Is this also for backpay for Early Budgeting though?
Ben PF: We are trying to find that out.
Sophia: They are running it through fall break I think.
Victoria: If it’s through fall break and after, we can still cut two weeks right?
Ben PF: I think they may spend it, since they will pay upfront for a certain number of passes. They already budgeted for 5 weeks in early budgeting so 11 more doesn’t make a lot of sense.
Ben Flig: Yes, I imagine that the passes that don’t get used will be deadstocked.
Ben PF: So based on cutting 2 weeks’ worth of trips we would approve $5,240 for the passes, and $810 for transportation. They can move these around how they want, but we’re reducing the overall number by 2/11ths.
Ben Flig: You’re doing some wizardry here, Ben!
Sophia: …Yup, the calculator app!
Saraah: I move to approve the adjusted budget.
Victoria: I second.
Consensus is achieved!
Haverford College Rugby Club
Grant: I think we can cut the jerseys, just because they are a little newer.
Sophia: They are starting tackle this year, and I know the jerseys are important to make the sport safer
Ben PF: I don’t think we should cut the jersey shorts, because it’s sport-specific and they need that.
Grant: The jerseys make sense. I’m curious how many people there are, but otherwise I’m good for this.
Sophia: I talked to one of the members; they have 10-12 returning members and a lot of interest from first years.
Zoe: When was this?
Sophia: About a week ago.
Victoria: If the concern is about numbers, I’d approve jerseys for returning members, but not yet for the new members, so that they can confirm the numbers.
Sophia: I think I looked at the website though, and it would be around the same if we bought 12 versus 25, where the pricing in bulk then changes.
Ben PF: If we go through and check how buying in bulk changes, it’s not that much of a difference and I think we can absorb it. We only save about $18 with the bulk pricing at 25 jerseys, so we would save way more by just not buying that many. What about 15 for now, and they can appeal or wait for later if they really need more?
Grant: I think rejecting some and waiting for rolling makes sense. For the trainer, they don’t have games.
Ben PF: They need that for safety though, and talked to Tyler about it. We think the trainer is the most important.
Grant: But that’s only four hours?
Sophia: They need it to start doing tackle, but it’s a slow launch. I think they only expect that training to be 4 hours.
Victoria: Are we only approving a certain amount of uniforms then?
Sophia: Yes, just the 15 jersey and jersey shorts.
Caroline: I move to approve the budget with the proposed changes.
Sarah: I second.
Consensus is #achieved!
Haverford College Crew Team
Victoria: We have been very generous with crew.
Ben PF: Sophia and I talked about it a lot, how we can get them on a more sustainable model than our budget. But this request came in a lot lower than we were expecting historically.
Sarah: What’s the paint for?
Sophia: I think there are standards relating to the paint for uniformity and safety that they have to adhere to in competition/meets, so this might be a necessary cost.
Ben Flig: I think it’s for the oars.
Grant: They did remove a coach.
Ben Flig: My understanding of the megaphone is the coxswain. But I’m curious why they need such an expensive one.
Ben PF: It’s from the crew company that makes crew-specific items, it needs to be waterproof and they say it’s necessary to have for safety/communication which makes sense.
Sophia: What are they currently using?
Ben PF: That’s a good question, they have to be using something.
Sarah: Is there a process for club sports to become a varsity sport?
Ben PF: Probably not. Their costs would go up significantly and the college would have to deal with that, they would probably never go for it and they would lose out on a lot of the positive aspects of being a club sport.
Oliver: There was a tentative promise from them that they’d start self-funding as well. You could set up something where they are held responsible for that.
Sophia: That’s smart but if they stay at this amount, it’s probably feasible. We’ll see. If this is the number they’ll stay at, that’s fine, but I think they are still discussing needing a new boat amongst other things.
Sarah: Either way they are still far below.
Oliver: I do think they have consistent pull for people to come to Haverford because there is a crew team, and some alumni also care.
Sarah: If the paints are not necessary, we should cut that. But, everything else is fine.
Ben Flig: But, they are representing Haverford, and we want them to look uniform and publicly facing?
Victoria: If we’re doing good with budgeting, we should be fine to approve that.
Grant: I move to approve the budget, pending changes after our visit tomorrow to the boathouse.
Sarah: I second.
Consensus is achieved!
Haverford Mock Trial
Grant: This is a bit much to me.
Ben PF: Yes, I think they’re asking for more invitationals than we can really justify to attend. They want to move their Black Squirrel Invitational which they normally host at a courthouse in Philly to Haverford instead. This is on the weekend of Plenary, and there is not enough turnaround time for the size of this event for Student Engagement to be able to approve it according to our policies. They would have needed to start planning and request permission much earlier than today. I also don’t think we want to fund/support an event that would take 40+ people away from plenary unless it’s absolutely critical, which at the end of the day this isn’t. Do we all agree? If we gave them funding to do it off campus we would not be making money on the event like we have in years past. It’s really unfortunate but I don’t think there’s any option possible here that is good unless they can reschedule it.
Sophia: For reference we approved UMBC in early budgeting. They also very helpfully ranked the tournaments by priority, so we can look at the lower priority tournaments to cut from.
Grant: I think some of these costs are higher than before as well.
Caroline: I think it’s important to mention they have achieved a lot, jumped in ranking, and created three new teams, but I’m hearing that you also funded things for them over the summer.
Ben PF: Yes. With the cuts, we have come down to approximately $13,800 from over $30,000 requested in regular budgeting, while still approving 7 out of 11 requested invitationals. We will also reject food for the Villanova and UPenn tournaments since those are not overnight tournaments. This is in addition to about 8,000 in early and summer budgeting, including the very prestigious tournament in LA previously mentioned, and we’re expanding them to a third team this year.
Grant: I move to approve the budget as edited.
Victoria: I second.
Consensus is achieved! (with Ben Flig standing outside)
Haverford Quantum Computing Club
Oliver: What is the software?
Ben PF: It’s software that only one company creates and provides. They’re also getting a major discount from it since the CEO is an alum, and it includes a package with a lot of logistical support and staffing for the hackathon.
Sophia: It’s huge for the college that this is happening.
Victoria: I move to approve the budget with the exception of the guest speakers.
Sarah: I second.
Consensus is achieved!
Muslim Student Association (MSA)
Grant: I think everything looks good.
Sarah: I move to approve the budget.
Grant: I second.
Consensus is achieved!
Quaker Bouncers
Oliver: I wish we could increase their funding. I move to approve the historical budget.
Sarah: I second.
Consensus is achieved!
South Asian Society (SAS)
Caroline: This is barely over $5k.
Grant: I move to approve the budget.
Sophia: I second.
Consensus is achieved!
Special Events Committee for Students (SECS)
Ben PF: They received some money in early budgeting, so we’ll subtract that out, keeping to their semester total of 25k
Grant: I move to approve the budget with the changes.
Caroline: I second.
Consensus is achieved!
Fall Plenary
Sarah: I move to approve the budget.
Sophia: I second.
Consensus is achieved!
Community Housing
Sarah: I move to approve the budget.
Sophia: I second.
Consensus is achieved!
BLAST
Ben PF: This is to round out their $12k, and they’re going to get a lot more items soon too.
Grant: I move to approve the budget.
Sarah: I second.
Consensus is achieved.
Sophia: I adjourn this meeting at 9:32pm.
