Union Council Meeting 11/20/08

Brittany Wiegand presented a brief overview of information regarding the Student Activity Center (SAC), which will open spring semester. SAC is a part of the new University Square complex at 333 East Campus Mall (Lucky Apartments is above it), with the purpose of providing student organizations meeting spaces. The Student Activity Center Governing Board (SACGB) is the ASM committee that oversees the spaces, which is chaired by Lauren Vollrath. They have finished allocating offices for registered student organizations.

Brittany also gave out information about the current draft of the new ASM Constitution, which can be found online at asmconstitution.wordpress.com. Feedback can be submitted to the blog.

Each of the four departments of the Union (Admin and Marketing, Facilities, Food, Social Education) gave a brief report on efforts currently being used to increase its sustainability. They will report back again in the spring to show what new efforts have been taken; any suggestions are welcome, and it was agreed that it would be a good idea to get experts in the area to give feedback and suggestions.

The one action item of the meeting was concerning extended hours for both of the Unions during finals week. It was voted to keep them open until 3am on Dec 14 (Sun night/Mon morn) through Dec 17 (Wed night/Thurs morn) (as opposed to 12 midnight, the normal closing time). This was concurrent with WUD's recommendation, but different than the Facilities subcommittee's recommendation of leaving them open for 24 hours Sunday through Thursday.

Union Design Committee 11/17/2008

The Union Design Committee met Monday November 17th to discuss the Info Commons/Technology Lounge, Food Service and Operations, the Percent for Art Program, the Rec. Center and the Student Meetings rooms.

Ideas for the Info Commons and Technology lounge included a potential lap top bar with plenty of outlets as well as available printing and individual work stations throughout the entire building. This was the opening discussion regarding technology in the building; there will be more discussions to follow as the project progresses.

Food Service in the new South Campus Union will include a traditional coffeehouse and wine bar, a market, and individual food kiosks. The coffee house will serve snacks and pastries, the market will have “grab and go” type foods, while the food kiosks will serve three distinctly different cuisines. A chef’s table will be incorporated into the kiosk area to function as a culinary training station.

The Percent for Art Program decided that an integrated piece of art should be incorporated into the new building rather than a statue or a stand-alone piece. At their next meeting on December 12th, the committee intends to select the final artist from the three finalists that were chosen at an earlier date.

Currently the recreational center in the basement of the new South Campus Union is set to have seven billiards tables; discussion arose as to whether or not some of these should be replaced with other games to add variety. One of the original stairwells was removed, opening up approximated 250 square feet of additional space. A television lounge was also added.

Student meeting room discussions focused on the ideas of permanent versus divisible walls, and whether there should be larger spaces for meeting rooms or smaller and midsized meeting rooms.

Please let me know if you have any questions, comments, or concerns regarding the information presented.

The next Union Design Meeting is going to be on Monday December 8th at 5:30 p.m., TITU.

-Stephanie

Space and Remodeling Committee

Space and Remodeling Committee our first meeting of the year. We were informed about how the UW ranked near the bottom compared to its peers in usage of classrooms. UW uses an average classroom for about 27 out of the 40 available hours. To give you an idea of other schools, Purdue ranks at the top using their classrooms at an average about 45 out of the 50 hours. A presentation was give about energy conservation. Some key points for students were, the money used to pay for updating buildings will come from the 20 million dollars the state provides or other sources not from segregated fees. In the long run the money put into updating the building will save the university more money. There was an idea purposed about having a class about how to save energy which would be mandatory for every student to take before they graduate. Finally the goal of meeting 20 percent energy reduction by 2010 is expected to be reached. 

Segregated Fees and Building(s)

Here's the link to current segregated fees

Other Info:
All tuition and fees

Policies

Some info from ASM about seg fees and the students who have a say in how they are spent.


What is capitol building?

Campus Master Plan all the info you can handle about building on campus. The long term plan for what the UW will look like (physically) in the future.

University Assessment Committee

The University Assessment Committee met this morning.

We discussed the purpose of the committee and a possible re-visioning of the committee. The big concern of the committee is the bleak budget future. There is fear that assessment will go by the wayside or will be used as a weapon against programs.

What this means for students: There is going to be some sort of trade-off among ACCESS-COST-QUALITY because of the poor economy/budget. Decisions about what we value should be made using data and be meaningful, not arbitrary.

Memorial Library Committee Meeting 11/17/08

Hi all,

Memorial Library Committee had its first meeting yesterday (11/17/08) and below is a summary of the meeting. Please let me know if you have any questions or concerns. Thank you!

Memorial Lib Committee Meeting- 11/17/08

1) Appoint new faculty chair: Professor Richard Knowles, English Dept.

2) Review Committee Functions
a. Please see our website for a full description: http://memorial.library.wisc.edu/about/index.html

3) Updates
a. L&S to declare 2009-2010 the year of Humanities
b. Google digitization of documents
i. Print articles are now more widely available on MADCAT due to Google digitizing library print materials
ii. These digital articles will also be found at hathitrust.com
1. This is a University institution article-sharing database, more about preservation and academics than Google Books.

4) Faculty/Student Concerns
a. Food in the Library, causes too much garbage
b. Cell phones are disrupting, need more signs prohibiting these
c. Signage in general, need better signs to direct students as to where computers, printing labs, etc. are located

5) Greater access to print collections for faculty
a. Delivery of print materials to faculty offices
b. This is a pilot program with just Memorial Library and a few offices
c. If it goes well, may implement campus wide

6) Special Collections/Exhibits
a. Special Collections, 9th Floor, Campus Humor Exhibit until 12/26
i. Humor articles/journals from a number of campuses over the past 40 years
b. US National Holocaust Exhibit, First Floor

As always, please let me know if any of you have any concerns that you would like to see addressed at our next meeting. Thanks!

Jessica

Upcoming Memorial Library Committee Meeting

Hi All,

We are having our first Memorial Library Committee meeting on Monday and I just wanted to get any opinions or comments that any of you may have or have heard regarding the Memorial Library and student concerns. Let me know if you have any suggests or issues with the Library. We will be addressing some student concerns at the meeting so I thought I would open up discussion with all of you! It would be greatly appreciated. :) Thanks!

Jessica