December 2023 General Body Meeting 

Dec. 4th, 2023, 6:00-7:30 PM 
Newcomb South Meeting Room

1. Call to Order and Remarks (Max Schnidman, 1 minute)

a. Max recently met with China and Phil Trella at OGPA (Office of Grad & Postdoctoral Affairs. Updates below

2. Old Business (9 Minutes)

a. Housing Updates (Max Schnidman, 4 minutes)

i. Neither China nor Phil aware that this was happening, China suggested escalationt to Phil’s level and Max brought our recommendations to him: timeline of housing stock, priority for grad students, university can work with local apts to act as guarantor. Phil will meet with Res Life to discuss these recommendations with ResLife. Overall: looks like University will work with us and work with landlords to recognize grad student offer letters as proof of income. Phil also wanted to bring emergency fund to everyone’s attention: available to grads for any purpose, including rent related things.

b. Curriculum Update (Max Schnidman, 2 minutes)

i. GradEd discussing w/ China: understanding curricula across programs to investigate overlap, redundancies, opportunity for consolidation. Planning to meet with the Dean next semester, more areas for collaborations. Dean China is also considering departmental visits. Had one with Art History which she thought went positively. Max suggested many more.

ii. Action items: GradEd will meet with DGS, send out survey, help faculty be more open to grads enrolling in other depts.

iii. Q: This came up for Previous GradEd committee. Survey has already been done, but the main takeaway was: we need more money. In other words, not sure we need another survey. We have the data, we could just go through with this.

1. Max will follow up about this

c. Security Posture Update (Max Schnidman, 1 minute)

i. Last meeting: discussed possible changes, as well as proposals from north grounds about more locks, more uni. Personal. Kylor spoke with Phil Trella; Phil wants to focus energy on swipe access. Many reasons w

hy we can’t have additional personel. Funding & doesn’t actually make everyone safe.

ii. Attorney General: trial has concluded for suspect. Investigation of UVA seems completed, report is not being publicized

d. Food Truck Update (Max Schnidman, 2 minutes)

i. Answers from UVA dine:

1. Gruhbub is connected to student meal plans, which is why it’s all grubhub now

2. Grubhub location inaccuracy: food track operators are responsible for updating that.

3. Privacy concerns about credit card info: reach out to grubhub security if you are concerned. Students with meal plans don’t need to input credit card info. BUT you can also load cash directly onto your student ID and then pay that way.

4. What's up with the check-in process? Basically a non-asnwer.

5. Are food trucks paying any fees to grubhub? Another non-answer. Payment structure is private and set up with individual contracts.

6. Working on putting together a student advisory board, we will try to make sure there is a grad student on the commmittee.

7. Q: could we ask the food truck people what they think of this? Could we ask the undergrads what they think? Undergrad council rep: they haven’t discussed this at all, but Karl might ask.

8. Q: to not get the fees as a student you have to sign up through the campus one and add your email in, it’s a pain to do.

9. Rep reports hearing murmers that undergrads don’t like this either.

10. We would be most successful advocating for change if we are working with undergrad council

11. Q: would it also be worth bringing to staff senate? They can’t be thrilled about it either

3. Council Business (20 Minutes)

a. Potential vacation days policy for lab science students (Ian Winchester, 10 minutes)

i. Recurring problem in chem dept that students don’t have a definite policy in terms of vacation days. Extremely important for int’l students who have to travel, especially when it takes days to get to where they are headed. Initially, minimum amount of days, but then it was changed to “up to” a certain amount of days. Super important for lab concentrations who work yearround, have to be in lab during summer, no real policies that give them the freedom to even come to PI’s and feel comfortable asking for appropriate amount of time off. Proposal: advocate for a university policy that says, for the laboratory setting, there should be an allocated amount of days for vacation. Would not only help for grad students, but also PI’s understand what their responsibility is for students.

ii. Q: would this be for lab science specifically or anyone who hold the position of research assistant?

iii. Terms of employment is also an issue with in the union.

iv. We should see if any other departments have policies?

v. By show of hands which depts have a clearly mandated leave policy: wow, apparently none of them 🙁 .

vi. Protected holidays: apparently, none 🙁

vii. Idea from Max: staff holidays have aprotected window would that work?

1. Not ideal, because

2. “up to” 22 days, including holidays

viii. Any student who has a fixed work commitments as opposed to felxible work commitments should be entitled to a certain amount of leave when they want to take it

ix. Q: whether or not something is remote is also an issue of terms of employment

x. Q: what kind of pay structure does this work fall under? A: it depends on the student whether or not they have a fellowship, stipend, etc. But even stipended studnets are obligated to be in lab for a fixed amount of hours.

xi. Some history of this policy in the chem dept.: was supposed to be a guideline where you started a discussion with your PI. However, it has turned into a policy that is being used against some students, especially international students. Studnets are expected to work weends and sacrifice their mental health to save up vacation days.

xii. Q: what happens if you’re sick? No sick leave either. Basically your advisor

xiii. Would get more support from other departments if you demand a min. # of holidays per year, make clear that remote work and federal int’l holidays don’t count as your time off.

xiv. Are you trying to have this written in our contracts? Yes. IF it’s per-dept, don’t know if they would be more receptive or not.

xv. A lot of the extreme end of this is the chem. Dept, would be great to have some examples from depts. Would help the chem dept advocate for more leave.

xvi. Note from chem. Dept: it doesn’t always go great when people even think of asking for leave. Having something in the contract would make this process easier and more protected.

xvii. Conclusion: clearly delineated leave policy and remote work policy. As far as long-term solutions: a policy for “grad students whose work requires them to be on-grounds.” i.e. govt cluster, labs, etc. Not at the dept level necessarily, but the university level might be a more sound option. Goal: to balance flexibility. Tyisha Hawthorn is doing a policy review next semester to see what gaps exist. This is a clear gap that we can bring to Tyisha’s attention as the policy review. Max will bring this to Tyisha.

xviii. Laura Galloway is a dean specifically for lab sciences that we can work with on this.

xix. One possible resrouces in terms of legislation: PROV-028

xx. This could be part of a larger trend of us beign seen more as employees than as studnets

xxi. Don’t we have a union? https://ucwva.org/ note we are a right to work state

xxii. We do have a union. We are employees. We are also students. It is a right to work state. It is federal law that we cannot actually work more than 20 hours per week in the school year.

b. Livable Cville Zoning Coalition Letter (Mo Van de Sompel, 10 min)

i. Opportunity to help solve housing crisis in cville. Ongoing plan to rezone city for about 7 years, finally going to city council and ity council is predictably trying to chip away at it. Trying to decrease density and provide less housing overall. Response: large mvmt, mostly organized by Livable Cville, based around housing coalition letter. Urging them to keep the plan as-is. Already been signed onto by a ton of organizations, undergrad council, Fifeville nbhd association, UVA Democrats, Charlottesville DSA, proposes that Grad Council add our names to the list.

ii. Is this separate from a conversation about a housing project on Ivy? Yes. That meeting is happening as we speak. Zoning meeting is happening tomorrow. So that’s why we’d love to a vote tonight!

iii. Motion passes. Max will inform Livable Cville tonight! 😊

iv. Link to city council meeting: both Tyler and Mo are going, if anyone else wants to meet up! https://www.charlottesville.gov/Calendar.aspx?EID=2491&month=12&year=2023&day=3&calType=0

4. Committee Business (20 minutes)

a. Finance Committee (Tyler Barnes, 10 minutes)- budget updated. Started with $25k, about $15k left to allocate. Thinking about actual finance committee allocations, started with $4k, allocated about $1.1k. If we approve the five requests today, we will have about $1500 left for the spring semester. Several of the five requests actually bleed into the spring semester. All that is to say we are doing really well.

i. Funding requests:

1. Classics Grad Colloquium: taking place in March, speakers, accepting papers across many disciplines and institutions, would like a broad scholarly community to participate. Already have support from French, Art, Envi Sci. Asking for $300 for food. Several meals going on at the colloquium. Passes.

2. STEM Communications Practice Series: a total of 4 events, dedicated to all grads from all sorts of depts, want to improve STEM communication skills, Chem, Physics, Engineering, Comp Sci. Expecting about 50 grads to participate, about 35 of which should be GSAS. Asking for $300 for coffee and bagels, spread out over the 4 meetings. Passes.

3. First Intermural registration reimbursement request: $15.00, student played 5v5 indoor soccer. Passes

4. Manuel for a graduate student lunch: American studies, Spanish, Italian, Portugues, English, many grads coming together for a seminar. Asking for $350, $300 for take it away lunch, $50 for printing flyers for the event. Passes.

5. Winter Social for Grad [?] Fellowship: there are about 15 grads in this, requesting $380 for food and drinks. Comes out to about $25 per head, our funding policy suggests no more than $12 a head which is very low. We tend to violate it all the time, but not usually at the level of $25.

a. Q: where does the $380 come from? $300 for food, $80 for drinks, but they don’t have specifics on where they are going to get that.

b. Rep feels that $25 per person seems too large for a $15 person event. Suggests going back to them with $15 or $16 per person. Especially for such a closed event. Particulr to recipients of a certain fellowship

c. Rep is concerned this does not set good precedent if we are going to go that far over.

d. Finance committee's recommendation: bump it down to $300, the discrepancy between depts. Comes out to about $20 per head, not a ridiculous amount of money. Motion to fund them for only $300 passes.

6. Events have become larger and more interdisciplinary, working on the discrepancy between “dept” and “organization” in the language of the current policy. History: used to be $10, updated to $12 last spring, thinking of ways to further adjust it.

b. Social (2-3 minutes)

i. Thinking of a Valentine’s Day event. Structure: cookie decorating, watch a Rom Com, would love some kind of friendship matchmaking situation, friend speed dating. Hasn’t planned yet, but we have time.

ii. Finance committee will need to see a request before the Feb. Meeting.

iii. Prom event is still in the works, mid-april. GPC is putting on a “semi-formal” in March.

iv. Max does not know what a semi-formal is

c. Education (2-3 minutes)

i. Update from Ian: Diversity in Research conference initiative, and Bridge Program initiative.

1. China sees good evidence that B2D is a good program, acknoweldges that it’s a benefit not only to the fellows but to entire departments. Building a way to continue the program in a new light. They don’t want to continue as it was before, a lot of rearrangement going on with ideas in terms of how to make it more successful not only for students but also for the dept. Interesting fact: costs $2 million dollars to fund from year to year. Looking for funding through college foundation through a generalized felxible fund. No specific funding request for the bridge program, it is being wrapped into this other “generalized flexible fund.” In general, Simran and Ian gave their own opinions of the Bridge Program. China encouraged them to talk to Deans Keisha and Crista about lack of funding.

2. Diversity in Research Conference: China gave them some ideas and goals. Meeting with the Diversity Retreat Keynote Speaker, Ian got a lot of good pointers. Talked about making it with Darden, Med, Law, etc, not just GSAS. Wanted to have about 50 participants for the first total attendance, limits us to how many people we have to accommodate and have more focused discussions. Want to include an application process, including research statement, general interest statement. Talked about different formats. Would also like to have monetary prizes (for posters? Not sure) Suggested they talk to Jasmine Crenshaw for financial support from the university.

3. Q: with regard to the bridge program, where did the $2 million come from? A designated grant, strategic initiative fund. (another example: dissertation completion fellowships)

4. Q: how many departments are presently participating in the bridge program? As funding has dwindled, the number of participating depts has gone down.

5. Q: Jemima’s experience with college foundation: when college foundation si allocating the money, typically Dean Acampora picks a topic. Right now the topic is “Graduate Student Funding.” Right now, they have zero funding for anything else grad-related. That’s probably how the bridge program went under. If they put it under a flexible budget, it will take a lot longer than if it is explicitly allocated. Jemima recommends going directly to the College Foundation and saying “hey I would like to showcase this program to fund.” (Jemima or Kylor can give the contacts here).

6. Bridge Program being deprioritized could be a result of Dean Acampora trying to beeline us to competitive funding.

7. Jemima recommends having bridge students come and speak and stay how wonderful the program was, or to have whoever the director was to come and speak. They are really just trying to fund stipends right now, and then they will start up with whatever projects Dean Acampora does, sure she wants to be known for something else during her tenure here.

8. Dean Acampora decides what the college foundation raises money for.

d. Research (2-3 minutes)

i. 65 research grant applications, disbursed the 11 winning grants. Had a successful workshop with PhD plus folks, plugged Huskey there. Make sure to forward Huskey application link to your departments if you haven’t already. Another reminder will circulate in January, deadline is late January.

ii. Date for Huskey: March 14th. Mark your calendars! Come and bring a friend.

iii. Working on catering quotes for food.

5. For the Good of the Order

a. Call for newsletter submissions (1min)

b. Jemima will send out the call!

c. Policy Review forthcoming (1 minute): they will want to have a grad student on that committee.

d. For the newsletter, if you want to shout out someone for winning an award, Talk of making the stipend issue tracker more widely available. University admin is very impressed with it.

6. Time for Committees to Meet (As Needed)