As the University Board of Visitors prepares to hold its second meeting of the semester later this week, students on Grounds are pushing for a more effective method of highlighting student concerns directly to Board members.
Student group U.Va. Students United has expressed discontent over communication between students and the Board. In October, they published an open letter to the Board in The Cavalier Daily, calling for a public comment period during Board meetings.
“Student engagement in issues directly affecting them is essential to the tradition of student self-governance, a founding tenet of the University,” the letter read. “We are among many students who fully intend to utilize this platform to give input on critical issues, including student debt and the diversity of the student body.”
Fourth-year College student Meg Gould, the student member of the Board, is in part responsible for bringing student concerns to the Board. She held “office hours” at Open Grounds on the Corner Friday and circulated an informal questionnaire to give University students an opportunity to discuss their concerns with the Board and the University in general.
Gould said there are several avenues through which students can raise issues with the Board, though she emphasized there is a difference between administrative concerns and concerns that should be directed to the Board.
“There’s the actual student report at every Board meeting,” Gould said. “And then there are also channels like calling them or emailing. I try to send the Board an email every week with a lot of things going on around Grounds and different issues that certain groups are promoting [and] making more aware.”
Gould said her role is not only to listen to students’ concerns, but also to facilitate interactions between Board members and University students. She held a flash seminar last week with Rector George Martin called "An Idea Exchange: Ask the Rector, the Rector Asks You." The event was co-sponsored with the Minority Rights Coalition and Student Council Legislative Affairs.
“[The flash seminar] was a time for more of this direct interaction with a member of the Board, so any student could bring up an idea, and so [public comment] was brought up, and he answered directly to them,” Gould said.
Fourth-year College student Greg Lewis, a member of U.Va. Students United, said U.Va. Students United received responses on the issue of public comment from Gould and Helen Dragas, former Rector of the Board of Visitors. Lewis said Gould and Dragas both independently support the idea of a public comment period.
“We’re part of a university community that really prides itself on ideals of democracy and self governance,” Lewis said. “There’s no formal avenue for constituents at the University to really provide input and share ideas with the Board.”
Lewis said U.Va. Students United has made many efforts to communicate with the University community about the Board.
“We started a petition that’s been circulating to get feedback from students,” Lewis said. “We’ve been reaching out to other parts of the community to really get support and get people on board with this. The public comment period is something that a lot of students express support for.”
Gould said providing a channel for a students to directly address a Board member is often the most productive way to address an issue. Despite how busy Board members are, she said, they make a strong effort to stay connected to University issues.
“They’ve been quick in many instances with responding to me,” Gould said. “Every time I’ve brought up meeting with other students, they’re very quick to say that they want to, and they’re also initiating that themselves.”
Lewis said the addition of the public comment period is a critical first step in addressing other concerns.
“We have exploding student debt, increases in tuition every year, declining communities of color at the University, low wages for workers,” Lewis said. “The University’s future is a really critical and time-sensitive issue that we are addressing and want to provide input to the Board for, and so I think the first step to do that is to have a formal avenue of communication, and that would be the public comment period.”
Read More
Students have federal internship offers rescinded due to hiring freeze
By Nina Broderick | 15 hours agoUntil July 15, no presently vacant federal civilian positions may be filled, and no new positions may be created.
Man dies from self-inflicted gunshot wounds at the Rotunda
By Ford McCracken | 20 hours agoThe investigation is ongoing, and additional details are not available at this time.
Virginia primary elections feature contested race for Democratic Lt. Gov. candidate
By Nicolas Biernacki | YesterdayEligible voters can find more information about early voting by consulting the City Department of Voter Registration & Elections website or the County Department of Elections website.
