Executive Committee Report - November 7, 2023

The executive committee has issued the following report for the November 7, 2023 Assembly Meeting:

Executive Updates:

• Upcoming Events: Take Your Professor to Lunch, Operation Graduation, Hydration Stations, Halloween Goes Green, iClicker & Calculator Drive (November 1st-8th), Intern Leadership Training (11/11), Subsidized Headshots (11/14-11/17), Renters’ Rights & City Planning Workshop (11/16, 7-9pm, Kuenzel), Sustainability Town Hall (11/15), Chill Out (Winter Wellbeing, 11/30, the Diag)

Programs and Events:

• Operation Graduation Program

  • The Programming team has been working with gown distributors to finalize the details of Operation Graduation distribution, for which we received interest from more than 180 students. Through this program, students have the opportunity to receive free graduation gowns, which will be awarded on a first-come, first-served basis. This year, the Programming team will be distributing gowns in sustainable packages! Barnes and Noble is giving us a 15% discount, and we will be able to cover the costs for 60 Bachelors and 20 Masters gowns! Students have been communicated with and will have until November 30th to pick up their gowns using vouchers. They are also collecting donations for the recycling portion of the program, with boxes located in the Union, Dude, Hatcher, and UgLi starting Wednesday, November 8th.

• Airbus

  • reservations for Thanksgiving break are now open for student sign-ups on the CSG website.

• Renter's Rights and City Planning Workshop - Thursday, November 16th from 7:00-9:00pm

  • CSG will be collaborating with the Urban Planning Student Association on a Renters Rights and City Planning Workshop. This will take place on Thursday, November 16th from 7-9pm in the Kuenzel Room of the Union. At this event, there will be polling exercises to send to the Ann Arbor City Planning Committee and information outreach tabling with the Renters Commission and GEO’s Housing Caucus on renter’s rights.

• Headshot Program - 11/14 - 11/17

  • Chief of Staff Juliette Quenioux and her intern Shane Baum are running a reiteration of the subsidized headshot program. Information and sign-ups will be going up on the ACE, with slots in the third week of November. These will be first come, first serve, and will take place on both Central and North Campuses. This program offers free professional headshots for students in collaboration with Michigan Photography.

• Take Your Professor to Lunch Program

  • Programming Board member Hailey Hartz is running a reiteration of our Take Your Professor to Lunch program, which provides vouchers for free lunch. We were able to cover the cost of 35 groups of up to four students and at least one professor or GSI. Distribution will be ending this week, with a feedback form going out at the end of the week.

• Halloween Goes Green

  • Sustainability Policy Advisor Sayoni Bandyopadhyay is working with LSA SG on “Halloween Goes Green”, a costume recycling program that aims to reduce clothing waste by recirculating Halloween costumes. They are currently collecting donations–there are bins in the CSG and LSA SG offices.

• Land Acknowledgment for Native American Heritage Month

  • Policy Advisor for DEIJ Nneka Obiekwu is planning a land acknowledgment signing activity with the Native American Student Association and MESA for Native American Heritage Month. This will be taking place in the third week of November, tentatively during one of MESA’s Native American Heritage Month events.

• Sustainability Town Hall - Wednesday, November 15th from 5:30-7:30pm

  • Policy Advisor for Sustainability Sayoni Bandyopadhyay is planning a Sustainability Town Hall to connect administrators with students on topics including sustainable finance, facilities, operations, Campus Plan 2050, and carbon neutrality. neutrality. This will be taking place on Wednesday, November 15th from 5:30-7:30 in the Kuenzel contingent on the schedules of administrators.

• Recycling Programs

  • Policy Advisor for Affordability and Accessibility Emily Ryan is running our recycling programs for calculators, test prep books, iClickers, and graduation gowns. A drive for calculators and iClickers is scheduled for November 1st through the 8th. Collection bins will be placed in the CSG office, the Ugli, and various apartment buildings. Outreach has additionally been done to the professional fraternities on campus, specifically for test prep materials for our textbook shelf.

• "Chill Out": winter-themed well-being day - Thursday, November 30th

  • The Programming team is conducting initial outreach for “Chill Out”, a Winter-themed well-being day taking on Thursday, November 30th on the Diag. The goal for this event is to advertise wellness resources and well-being student groups on campus and encourage taking time for self-care as finals come up. Policy Advisor for Mental Health and Wellbeing Aditi Vijendra met with MDining leadership about this event, and Programming has also connected with Zero Waste U-M this week.

• Hydration Stations

  • Chief Programming Officer Terra Lafreniere, alongside Fraternity & Sorority Life (FSL) leadership, is bringing back Hydration Stations! CSG is covering the cost of 100 cases of water bottles to be distributed throughout the Fall football games, and FSL volunteers will be staffing the stations. The programming team is additionally conducting research on sustainable alternatives to water bottles for future iterations of this program.

Policy Team:

• Policy Advisor on DEIJ Nneka Obiekwu is in the initial stages of planning outreach toward student organizations concerning the University’s rollout of their new DEI 2.0 Plan.

• Policy Director Gwen Tatara is working with Beyond the Diag to refresh their off-campus housing guide. BTD is a UM program developed to provide off-campus resources to students.

• Policy Advisor on Mental Health and Wellbeing Aditi Vijendra is working on refreshing the existing CSG resource guide on wellbeing resources.

• Policy Director Gwen Tatara, along with Bipasha and intern Lidia Cappelletti, have met with the Princeton Review and are finalizing details of a partnership. This will enable students to receive subsidized materials, free consultations, and two free events each semester targeted at pre-professional students. Additionally, they have met with Kaplan, UWorld, Blueprints, and Seven Sages to review their offerings and have follow-up meetings scheduled with a few as well. They are working on getting propositions through procurement.

• SMPSEC is working with various organizations on campus to see how CSG can support education about contraceptive use and accessibility, as well as conducting research on the possibility of a vending machine that includes wellness materials.

If you have any questions or would like to meet with the President or Vice President, please contact Chief of Staff to the President Juliette Quenioux (julietq@umich.edu).