By Victoria Jimenez
Representatives of the student body held their first official Associated Student Government meeting of 2018, signifying the beginning of potential big policy changes for Colorado State University-Pueblo students.
ASG President Jake Harmon formally welcomed back all ASG board members into their new conference room. “Over $30 million worth of funds were raised by the students for this facility, so I’m very excited to be back in here,” said Harmon. The funds Harmon mentioned were those that went to the renovation of the Occhiato Student Center.
ASG Vice President Daniella Trujillo moved the meeting into a discussion of open positions on the ASG board during the meeting. Parliamentarian Keragan Ettleman was moved to the Director of Internal Affairs for ASG and Senator at-large Demetrius Marrow was moved to Senator of CHASS; the decision was made by vice president Trujillo and backed by every ASG member accordingly.
After brief presentations, new senators were elected to the board. The two seats for Senator at-large were fulfilled during the meeting by two students: Aaron Booker and Dashon King. Both newly appointed senators took their oaths from Chief Justice Zahria Rogers, signifying their official responsibilities as new ASG members.
Senators at-large are those on the ASG board who are not assigned to represent a single school within the university, rather, they represent the entire student body as a whole.
Trujillo followed the induction of the new members with information passed from CSU-Pueblo president Timothy Mottet, regarding the possible idea of incorporating a new extension onto the current Thanksgiving break to create a longer school break for the month of November.
Although the idea is not official, the ASG board discussed potential benefits of an extended holiday break, one being the expel of work burnout between professors and students as the semester closes.
ASG identified more disadvantages to the extension of the break, including the possibility of lowered attendance, rescheduling issues with residence halls and monetary issues for individual students who travel out of state on breaks.
President Harmon highlighted all of the past projects ASG completed just last year and their importance to maintaining high spirits and teamwork internally.
Harmon said with the $140,000 budget ASG received, they were able to replace the pool filter in the recreational center, distribute new wolf scenery around campus, repurpose concrete benches from Belmont, paint the water tower and work on several landscaping projects.
“This year by the numbers: we have gathered more popularity on social media than in any previous ASG,” said Harmon. “We also advertised, collected, constructed and delivered a $3,200 service project to the Houston area after Hurricane Harvey.”
Harmon ended by talking about the community service awards ASG received from the Pueblo Chieftain and the Red Cross for their work in 2017.
Trujillo adjourned the meeting at 6:32 p.m. following final comments from the entire board. Executive ASG members had several goals they wanted to achieve for the new semester.
“I’d say the one thing I would change is our outreach to students,” said Ettleman.
Ettleman said that she wants to complete more projects for the CSU-Pueblo student body before she graduates. “There’s so many people in this new building, but they don’t know what’s going on up here and it’s big policies and stuff for them, so they should have a say in it.”
Trujillo also said she wants to make more connections with the student body. “We’re supposed to be the voice of the students, so I want to actually go out there and see what the students have to say,” said Trujillo in response to her goals for the new semester.
All students are encouraged to attend ASG meetings to discuss problems and solutions to issues at CSU-Pueblo. Meetings are now held every Monday starting at 6 p.m. on the second floor of the OSC.