Annual Report of the Committee on Annual Report - 2019-2020
To: Steering Committee, Academic Senate
From: Chair, Committee on Student Activities
Date: August 8, 2020
Membership/officers
- Kimberly Riegel, Physics (Chair)
- Jennifer Klein, Counseling (Secretary)
- Sasa, Randelle, Nursing
- Sporer, Celia, Social Sciences
- Moran, Wilfredo, Business
- Blick, William, Library
- Susan Wengler (Fall 2019 only)
Liaisons
- Clara Wajngurt, Mathematics and Computer Science, COC Liaison
- Stephen Atkins, English, Steering Committee Designee
- Tikola Russell, Assistant Dean for Student Development/Conduct, President's Liaison
Membership Composition Changes
Wilfredo Moran joined the committee during the middle of the fall 19 semester.
Susan Wengler left the committee after the Fall 2019 semester
William Blick joined the Committee for the Spring 2020 semester
Kimberly Riegel finished her term in spring 2020 semester and was reappointed for the 2020-2023 term
Jennifer Klein finished her term in spring 2020.
Carolyn King was appointed to the committee for the 2020-2023 term
Committee Meeting Dates
Narrative summary of committee work
This year, the committee organized the annual volunteer fair in the fall of 2019 again. 4 organizations attended the event which was combined with the student club fair. In addition, we continued to work closely with the SGA in order to make sure that we were able to continue assisting them to further their agenda. We worked with the Academies, Dean Pullin and the Academy faculty leads in order to better coordinate academy events with the student clubs. This moved to the planning phase. We worked with marketing and Victor Fichera to develop a second student survey to determine the improvements in communication with the students regarding student activities. In addition, the committee worked with marketing to identify some of the issues regarding marketing student events. We determined that additional training was needed to make sure faculty club advisors are aware of the best way to market an event. In event an attempt to better coordinate student activities through a campus wide calendar was suggested.
Much of the work for the student activities committee was put on hold after discussion between the committee members and the steering committee. It was determined the the individuals and departments that we needed help from to achieve our goals were already significantly overburdened by he shift to online learning. In addition, all student activities were suspended when we went virtually.
Assigned Committee work as per Bylaws Charge/Strategic Plan/Middle States Items/ or Actions of the Academic Senate
No specific new charges were given at the beginning of the 2019-2020 academic year other than the charges from the bylaws shown below so the charges given for the 2018-2019 year were continued
- Report to the Academic Senate on policy matters relative to student activities.
- Act as an advisory group to any student group seeking faculty assistance.
- Assist the Director of Student Activities, other administrators, and faculty involved in student activities.
- Participate in the implementation of Article VII, Section B, Part 2, of the Governance Plan which states: “The Faculty and student body shall share equally the responsibility and the power to establish, subject to the approval of the Board, more detailed rules of conduct and regulations in conformity with the general requirements
2018-2019 Charges
- Act on the results of the student survey.
- Update the committee guide, which is dated 2006-2007.
- Work more closely with the Student Government Association.
- Work on improving communication among students, faculty, and staff concerning the various activities on campus.
Committee Responses towards Steering Committee Charges
- Act on the results of the student survey.
- The student survey was completed before the current methods for communicating to students were adopted so the committee thought it would be wise to re-administer the survey to determine if the new methods for communicating to students about events had improved their knowledge. The survey was set to be distributed in March of 2020 and was indefinitely delayed due to Coronavirus.
- Update the committee guide, which is dated 2006-2007.
- This task has been completed and submitted to the steering committee for review.
- Work more closely with the Student Government Association.
- Each semester, a representative of the committee attended the student government meetings to offer assistance from the faculty and academic senate in any way that we could be helpful. This should remain an ongoing activity of the committee.
- Work on improving communication among students, faculty, and staff concerning the various activities on campus.
- The committee worked extensively with the marketing committee and the academies to determine a plan of action for student activities to help facilitate communication between all stakeholders who plan and hold student events. The committee proposed training videos for faculty advisors on how to promote events through the marketing department, coordinated approaches to events with the academies and a campus wide activity planning calendar to help with this effort. Extensive work was completed with the academies to plan coordinated academy days with the clubs. However, due to overburdened IT and marketing departments during the time of the pandemic the committee voted to delay further action on these initiatives until the following semester.
Recommendations for Next Academic Year
This is difficult to say, it is recommended that the committee continue it's work to improve communication and facilitate the planning and marketing of student events however, in light of the online nature of classed in the fall, it is unknown how many student activities will be going on and how they will be held or attended. It is recommended that we continue to put in place the infrastructure to do this as the marketing and IT departments are available to help.
The committee has voted to postpone the Volunteer Fair until Spring 2021 and if classes are in person again the committee will be organizing the fair again.
We would like to distribute the student survey and analyze the resulting data but it does not seem like we would get good data while the students are not on campus.
New Committee Members – newly elected Chair and Secretary
Acknowledgments
Respectfully Submitted,
Kimberly Riegel
