ASUCR held their fourth meeting of the quarter on Wednesday, Oct. 28.
The meeting began with an ex-officio report from Ori Liwanag, fourth-year business major and campaign coordinator for CALPIRG’s New Voters Project. CALPIRG is a UC wide public interest activism group whose mission is to work to protect the environment, provide hunger relief and promote civic engagement. Liwanag gave an update on the efforts that CALPIRG has been focusing on this fall quarter, including civic engagement and voting. Liwanag stated that they recently had their largest fall kickoff ever with 94 participants launching the New Voters Project. He also gave an update regarding the Civic Engagement Coalition he is a part of, a student and faculty led coalition to promote civic engagement across UCR. On Election Day, Nov. 3, multiple departments will be hosting various election and civic engagement events over Zoom and through social media.
The Associated Students Program Board (ASPB) will be conducting an all-day virtual photo booth where students may enter a raffle to win ASPB merchandise, the Civic Engagement Coalition will be hosting their weekly Civics Hour where they will discuss how to stretch one’s involvement beyond the election from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m, campus departments will also host a Q&A session from 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. where students will have the opportunity to ask any last minute questions they have surrounding the election. The California Students Vote Project, which consists of students from CALPIRG, the UC Student Association (UCSA), the Cal State Student Association (CSSA) and the Secretary of State will be hosting an Election Day Vote-A-Thon live stream from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m featuring student speakers, phonebanking, text banking and more. Finally, the UCR School of Public Policy and its dean ambassadors will be hosting an Election Day watch party from 5 p.m. to 12 a.m. via Zoom.
During the meeting, the senate unanimously approved the finance meeting minutes for the week in which the Finance Committee allocated funds to various campus organizations. President Pro Tempore Orlando Cabalo presented SB-F20-006 Stipends, which was authored by ASUCR President Luis Huerta and CHASS Senator Nelson Aguiar. The bill aimed to reallocate money from the ASUCR Historian position, which no longer exists, to the Executive Secretary position. The stipend consists of $990 over a 9 month period. SB-F20-006 passed with a vote of 16-0-0.
During senator reports, CHASS Senator Alyssa Marchan stated that she and the Diversity Council have been working on legislation surrounding nontraditional student issues with a focus on student parents at UCR. She has also been attending phone banking sessions in support of Proposition 16, and has been emailing the CHASS deans about making Election Day a school holiday.
CNAS Senator Abigail Nguyen announced that she has been working on a piece of legislation regarding the addition of inclusivity training in UCR student employees and faculty’s regular work training to support the idea of diversity and inclusion within UCR, she stated. Nguyen also stated that she and other CNAS senators have emailed CNAS Dean Kathryn Uhrich about scheduling a meeting with her to discuss the recent controversy surrounding Associate professor of Chemistry Catharine H. Larsen, after a recent TikTok video went viral of her seemingly being rude to her students.
The senate also welcomed CHASS Senator Sebastian Quinteros, a third year political science major, after the resignation of previous CHASS Senator, Rosemary Le. Quinteros introduced himself and stated that his campus involvement began with CALPIRG during his first year, getting students registered to vote and gathering signatures about environmental efforts. The following year, he joined the ASUCR Lobby Corps committee, where he was able to advocate for UCR and all college students. More recently he became a mentee for the ASUCR senate , and he was encouraged to run for the open senator position. As a CHASS senator, Quinteros’ goals are to secure the ability of his peers to learn and succeed at UCR, to prioritize accountability and transparency within ASUCR and to assist in UCR’s effort of increasing civic engagement on campus.
At the end of the meeting, Executive Vice President Natalie Hernandez announced the resignation of a BCOE Senator and stated that the position had already been filled. This marks the third resignation of the year.
The meeting was adjourned at 7:32 p.m.
