Attendance: Emma, Yehyun, Victoria, Thea, Claire, Grant, Oliver, Kabir, Scott
Agenda: StuCo Exec Board Agenda 24/25
- Call to order (1:00-1:02)
- Roll Call (1:02-1:05)
- Adoption of Agenda (1:05-1:06)
- Approval of Minutes (1:06-1:07)
- Community Comments (1:07-1:17)
- Old Business (1:17-1:27)
- New Business 1 (1:27-1:42): Scott Wojciechowski
- Updates on community housing funding
- New Business 2 (1:42-1:57):
- Adjournment (1:57-2:00)
Call to Order
Yehyun: I call this meeting to order at 1:03pm.
Emma: More than half of Exec board is in attendance. Quorum has been met.
Yehyun: 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
Emma: We have no community comment today.
New Business:
Yehyun: Today we invite Scott from ResLife. A couple goals for today include relaying concerns from the discussion we had with community and affinity group members from two meetings ago, and to open up the floor to clarify and inform us about ResLife’s relationship with these processes. One of the big topics that was brought forth was about funding and how there were changes to how those funds can be used. Also some groups had cutting of funding.
I know one house, Lit House, told us that they had a cut of funding which made it difficult for them to connect with the community as they have large events. Can you share with us more about how these funding decisions are made and what the conversations are like with these groups.
Scott: Thank you for having me. This March will be my third year at Haverford College. It is different because I came in the Spring after all the community houses were rostered. It’s a weird window of effecting change and hearing what those concerns may be. As I read the minutes from the prior exec board and hearing in some cases for the first time, the issues or pinch points. I thought there was an opportunity there. I think that where we are from a funding perspective, I noticed that there is some disparity from what would be our affinity spaces and interest space houses. When I first got here, it was still billed as special interest housing. In those conversations, one of the major things we wanted to talk about from a semantic interest was being Black or LatinX was not a special interest but an identity. We moved away from a special interest idea and split into identity based and affinity based spaces. There was some disparity between some of our established houses like BCC and the newly formed LCC. We looked at the prominence of the space and also what communities they were serving. In the past we looked at what had been an ear marked from StuCo, I gave things from the RESE budget. The BCC has been around for a while, they have a lot of things that they have gathered over time. The newer house like the LCC was still trying to figure things out. What was complemented for house improvement fund was to figure out what would be a standard item in the houses. It was never intended for cleaning supplies. There is a departure in what the expectation for that was and how it was interesting, and what students feel entitled to while living in those spaces. We set this in a way that over the course of the last two and a half years, RESE’s budget line has stayed static, but there have been differences in what we do. The student wage increase has changed budgeting. We also had a major expansion of some of the programs in our office, like Customs. Those are the competing priorities we have. We still want to recognize the allocation from StuCo, but we have morphed into what are the dollars from StuCo, it is still $1000, but we no longer have the home improvement fund. We have seen things achieve their goal in bringing spaces up to par with each other. With that said, we want to be conscious of what we have. Each affinity space has a $1000 budget. This reduces the dollars per program for the identity based houses. We keep a rotating budget fund for the groups that are showing robust programs that serve the purpose of a community house, we can reallocate or share some of the money. Sharing that funding for those houses as they are in a community space, but they are still governed by the purchasing guidelines. I apologize for the long preamble. That is the framework in what has changed. What I want to share with students in these spaces, we don’t know what we don’t know. My policy is you can ask for anything once nicely. When Lit House asked for things, Amy Miller, the RSA in charge of that space, made that happen. That is not to say we are always going to say yes, we have a finite amount of money. There are a significant number of houses that have a large part of the budget untouched and who have not communicated with RESE after multiple attempts reaching out to them.
Yehyun: Thank you. Could we focus first on affinity housing, and then move into community housing. For affinity housing, this is where StuCo allocates $1000 for each house. You described what the $300 for housing items were supposed to be used for. There were concerns talking about how to create community and fill its mission as an identity based house. Affinity houses often have low income chesick scholars, therefore, not being able to use $300 to buy cleaning supplies have been creating conflict and tensions in the living spaces. For those kinds of concerns, what do you see happening?
Scott: The community houses are not the only spaces for low income students. How, in the sense of there are systems set to support those students who have expressed a need, are we, through the community house program, setting a disparate distribution, an unfair advantage because if you live in a house you get access to this, but if you live in an apartment with other FGLI students you don’t get that. From an institutional perspective I think about how those additional needs are supported, like the NEST, Chesick office, Reuse store.The goal is not to create 6 different NESTs but to think about how we consolidate or centralize those resources.
Victoria: My understanding is that a lot of houses are required to host events. In many instances they will host them at the actual house. For affinity housing, a major concern with losing funding for cleaning supplies is when they bring in a large volume of students. It doesn’t make sense that cleaning products have to come out of their own pockets when it’s a requirement to host events to live in the house and then they have to pay out of pocket to clean up after those events.
Scott: With the exception of PANA, the other spaces have housekeeping staff assigned to them. Because PANA is an open floor plan it’s a little different, but everywhere else has housekeeping staff assigned there. If we provide supplies, what about the labor, are we not compensating the labor. I would say this about any group, there is a need incumbent in that. When folks reserve a party space, they are expected to clean that up. One of the things we want to talk about is how we can offset that and work with facilities to think about how we can predict needs. I also want to be protective of our housekeeping staff and make sure these things fall under their responsibilities. It’s not their job to clean up after a rager, for example. As a result of the conversations we have been having, one of things we will launch is a set agreement of the responsibility delegation of what students are responsible for, RESE, the college and facilities. I want you to know that while this may be stressful, that is a way we want to show that we are listening. We are hoping to diagnose the actual problem and find solutions for it.
Victoria: I had heard for some affinity houses, there was a role where there would be a head of the house, and students stepped into it, and didn’t learn until into the semester that they would not have that role and be compensated.
Scott: We had nearly complete turnover in the ResLife staff. Things we had proposed for heads of houses, we were not in the place to launch that. There was a gap between those areas, I will take full ownership in communicating what was expressed in the interview process to what we are. This is something that will be built in now. The application is now open to formalize that relationship and make right on what was intended and projected last spring.
Kabir: You stated that sometimes when communicating with affinity houses about unused funds, there was a lack of response. Is there anything that StuCo can do to help facilitate these conversations?
Scott: That’s what the intention of the house leader role is. If everyone is responsible for this then no one is. That is not to bash the houses, but if there is not a clear point person then communication can be hard. One thing we can do a better job is that unused funds at the end of a term, can that go back into the pool of dollars that can actually be used? At the end of the day if StuCo money is not being spent it should be rolled back into the larger budget. We should keep a tighter grasp on this budget. The last thing I want to do, I don’t want to buy stuff to buy stuff. I want to think about the custody of items. I want to think about the sustainability of what we are purchasing. The dollar amounts that what groups think they need, does that jive with larger sustainability. My question is how do we work together, and have continued communication lines, and what structures can alleviate that burden from you all. How can we have systems that hold that accountability?
Grant: A lot of groups expressed problems with obtaining funding for events or not having enough funding for events. How would they resolve the conflict of not having enough money to put on well attended events.
Scott: That is something where you want to work with Amy. Lit House reached out about an event and we were able to reallocate money for them. It depends on how much requests cost, but we are willing to support the houses. Lit House is the only group that has spent or exceeded that initial allocation. We are able to support from existing money. Lit House has done a really good job being consistent in the work they have done.
Yehyun: As you stated, Lit House is a community house that has had three years of consistent events. One of the leaders of Lit House told us they have a baseline of what they are expecting to spend. When they came back this academic year, they were really shocked by $100, because they had started planning for events during the summer with the expectation of getting in the $400 range. If students know how much they are usually paid, why weren’t they given the usual straight up?
Scott: Originally it was $700 from StuCo with $300 from ResLife. I will share this, Lit House does a really good job of putting up their calendar of events within the first week of the semester–other groups do not do this as quickly or forget. We were delayed on that communication. Two events happened from Lit House before we engaged with them, that’s our bad. When they realized they were out of money, they were able to work with Amy to find that extra funding. I wish other houses had a similar process. We will make it work, but I don’t want to do it with lack of intention or clarity. With the thoughtful work that Lit House has put in, we are going to do everything we can to support them.
Victoria: I really like how that sounds. I think it is unfortunate that the other groups don’t have that relationship that was fostered. Something I was thinking about with expectations for funding with affinity and community, there is definitely some money there period. It sounds like that money can go to community or affinity. My question is our budgeting process, you only go through it with the expectation of spending some dollar amount. Is there a system that can be implemented where groups aren’t told you only get this much, but your starting line is this much? If you want more, you can go through a budgeting process.
Scott: Or submit a budget from the beginning. Then it is not an outright allocation. The structure we brought in over three years. How do we follow StuCo lead that StuCo money should follow StuCo processes.
Yehyun: Looking at community houses, Nerd House brought up a concern.
Thea: Last year the StuCo treasurer’s folded Nerd Houses’s historical funding into the general StuCo budget. Someone in Nerd House felt blindsided that they lost the status, but the Co-Treasurers from last year had them give up the funding.
Scott: They are in that same block, and we are supporting them. They function as a highly productive space. Nerd House has been communicative with Amy. The amount of things we have bought over the last decade to furnish and support them. The attics full of supplies is where I want to do the shift. What already exists and how do we store that and make it available.
Yehyun: They went from knowing how much they get to not knowing what is out there. I think that lack of a clear number is giving them a little anxiety and trouble in creating events since they don’t know how much funding they can get.
Scott: There is a financial budget process called zero based budgeting. Don’t get hung up on I’m going to spend all this money. When we do it in a shared pool, Lit House and Nerd House provide lists of events. Then that is a way in a larger budgetary process to be more thoughtful. It’s not saying we are constraining folks, but it’s helping to limit spending a full budget just to spend it. That philosophical shift is something we can be more intentional with and better allocated with our into the Spring and remainder of the academic year.
Oliver: When does RESE finalize budget changes for the coming year? Some of the miscommunication has stemmed from students doing their planning at one time and RESE does it at another.
Scott: We are subject to opening another fiscal year. We assume a flat budget and what that looks like. When the new fiscal year starts and budgets are loaded in the new fiscal year we can plan however we want. However there has been an operational budget cut in RESE this year. Our office covers all early arrival meals for freshmen–like ISSO, Horizons, etc. So we are responsible for all the Customs people and students, which stacks up to $80,000. So we don’t know until that hits, where we are and what guarantees we can make to the houses. The choice is based on when we receive the final hit.
Oliver: The fiscal year turnover is at the end of June?
Scott: Yes. We also think about how students aren’t here. We don’t want students to be responsible unnecessarily. There are groups that are already planning in the Spring. Is that good practice we’d like to see? Yes. But that is not always true for students, but I’d love to see greater standardization.
Kabir: To clarify the difference in approach between identity and affinity based housing, StuCo provides funds for the identity based housing. How does RESE play into this?
Scott: We got the allocation of $6000 for the community house program. The predominance is routed for affinity based houses. With the interest based houses, most of the houses are stand-alone structures, we are working with PANA to move out of 50, and if we stay, how do we make it more hospitable. Whereas, with the other open floor plans, we try to offer the interest based incentive, predominantly to sophomores, where 11 to 13 students can live together. That’s our chance to program those spaces with folks who know each other as opposed to it going to pockets of “randos” who now have to live in a floor plan that is not the most conducive to living with 11 other “randos.” We don’t want to make it burdensome but the support that the identity based houses have is a little different than the interest based houses. Where we’re working with REEO and GRASE to support the LCC, PANA, and Q-House. We want those spaces to be an extension of a center or a community based group. We have been making some physical strides towards opening up these community spaces, like LCC and BCC. It gets tricky in older houses. Differentiating residential from community. The house could potentially ask for general card access. If the LCC wanted to use their downstairs as a community space, they could share the names of students to get unlimited access to that space. Same goes for all the other houses. That might be lost in communications yes, but that can be articulated in a standard agreement. There should be no misunderstandings after a conversation about what we expect from each other.
Victoria: We brought in affinity and community group leaders. Could you schedule a similar meeting? There is a lot of programming and restructuring you want to do. Is there any way that within that process those students can also be brought in?
Scott: For sure. It is an open invitation. One pride I have for my office is our visibility and accessibility to students. I want that to be known for every student on campus. If you email us, you will get a response. That’s the one piece, if I want to share a larger context, it may have been based on the availability of folks who came, as I read the name of people who came, it wasn’t always the names of folks we have been in contact with. That is the other question, how does a message mutate when we are talking to different people? I will share that there are a number of houses that maintain regular contact with our office. For example, with PANA, QHouse and Lit House. We have a lot of contact with LCC via the ALAS board but not necessarily the residents. That’s the way of, as we introduce layers of communication, we start to lose the signal. This is an open invitation to anyone reading these minutes, email hc-reslife or go to Stokes 022 on the ground floor. We have snacks. You will always be greeted with a smile and a listening ear. We can’t guarantee you will get what you want, but you will be heard. My time in high school and college I spent selling shoes. My experience in retail has been formative with students. I think of the idea of SWAT, “sell what is available today”. What are the needs and what the promises we have made, and in the dynamic system where folks were locked into places they were assigned, we will look at what is available today. Our focus is students, and as long as we keep those lines of communication open, we are going to do our damndest to make it happen.
Victoria: It would be beneficial to StuCo to understand how budgeting reallocation occurs in RESE to continue supporting students in these houses.
Scott: Absolutely.
Yehyun: I want to stress how important communication is. There is dialogue going on but I think the biggest hurdles are when the academic year ends, planning is happening at two different times. How do we make sure that when students finish their projection of what the next academic year will look like, they are informed by ResLife. During the summer when RESE is finalized with their budget, notifying ahead of time. Saying we understand we are giving $100, we know it’s not enough, please talk to us. That concrete communication makes sure that relationship is sustained and that students are not blindsided. At the end of the day, if they ask nicely once, we will see what we can do. If they feel like they have been blindsided, it is hard to ask. That is the biggest takeaway I would like to see our community housing team work on.
Kabir: Do you have drop in hours?
Scott: I don’t. My schedule changes via “crisis du jour”. If folks are able to send me availability, the best way is through hc-reslife. I try to be present on campus as much as I can. I have toyed with doing drop in at the DC. I love me some beef stroganoff. There are students that have a comfort with that, I want to extend the opportunity to students I haven’t met yet.
Claire: I have heard from some students that they are unsure how to create or apply for community housing.
Scott: That will all be shared in the spring when we kick off. My goal is that in January or early February we are going to send a massive email about housing, including establishing community housing. Our general priority processes are students with ADA related housing accommodations and RSL/RCA placement. We also have our religious consideration, which is done by the Office of Religious and Spiritual Life. With interest based communities looking at open floor plans, that will be done before spring break. Expect that email in late January and early February.
Yehyun: One final thing, one group was expecting new furniture?
Scott: I don’t know where that came from. The only thing that may have been. Is that we are working with facilities that when the open floor plans are renovated they get new furniture. Maybe because the upstairs was being renovated they thought the downstairs would get it? What are the best ways, when we think about communicating out, ResLife is known for sending long emails, what other ways that would be for a general audience for us to provide information. I know the ResLife co-heads have info sessions for the general audience.
Emma: Tabling at the DC. That will be good to catch underclassmen who may not know much about community housing.
Victoria: The stall seat journal. Every housing dorm has an RCA or RSL, they can communicate information.
Claire: Sometimes the font is really small in the emails from RESE. I feel like people may miss some information. That may be more of an IITS problem.
Scott: That is something I will check with IITS or if it is a google setting or what is causing it. We are writing communications in a word or google doc and then copy and pasting, is there something that is getting loose.
Grant: The emails you send out are very helpful from ResLife. As much as it is a lot, it is needed.
Scott: We try and put it all in one place, so that is definitely helpful.
Oliver: For some stuff, like general information about the community housing process, there can be more on the Haverford website. So if you google it you can find information.
Yehyun: Collaborating with established community things. I know people go to Wawa with Wendy, so an event like that may be good. Even having more of an affinity group gathering. I know for fly in squirrels they have those gatherings, maybe having that during the academic year as well would allow other students to engage with community housing.
Scott: I think that is a great idea. For the Chesick launch program we talked about what housing would look like for the spring. In years past I have been invited to speak to students through MSA to accommodate religious housing considerations,
Claire: If you want to share things with StuCo, we can post on the instagram.
Scott: Or the Weekly Consensus!
Emma: Or the StuCo Newsletter!
Scott: The new display board, in the Stokes entry way, how do we get information on there. If you look at the communications sent in March of 2022 compared to today, we have come a long way. This has been based on feedback that we have gotten and looking at repeated questions we get.Just as we ask for you all to be critical thinkers, we also want to be responsive to your needs and requests.
Victoria: I adjourn this meeting.
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