The Honor Committee held its first meeting for the 185th term Sunday evening, led by Genny Freed, newly-elected Committee chair and third-year College student. Freed opened the meeting by introducing the new Executive Committee and the representative body for the new term. The meeting continued with an outline of the Committee’s goals in the incoming term, including the increase of student and faculty outreach and the development of research on support officer retention rates.
The meeting began with executive reports — an overview from Executive Committee members recapping any case progresses or activities of Committee members — which Freed described as largely transitional between previous and current Committee members.
“The majority of the last week and a half has been spent on transitioning exec and Committee,” Freed said. “I think it’s going to be an incredible year, and I’m very excited to have you all as such a dedicated team with me.”
Freed highlighted the Honor Banquet, which was held Friday to commemorate the conclusion of the 184th term. She also noted a speaker event Wednesday at the Civic Futures Summit at the 14th annual Tom Tom Festival — a multi-day gathering focused on innovation, entrepreneurship and civic engagement — where she will participate as a student speaker.
Following reports from the Executive Committee, Freed transitioned to the subcommittees and reports from working groups for the incoming term. Walter Blessing, chair of the Policies and Procedures Committee and third-year College student, outlined goals within the subcommittee for the incoming term and what he hopes to achieve in his newly-assumed role, emphasizing increased efficiency with action items.
“Some of the goals that I really had [were to be] a little bit more intentional about creating a policy agenda,” Blessing said. “For what the [Policies and Procedures Committee] is about, … [I want to] have specific agendas so that we can make actionable items and adjust language in a little different way than we have.”
Continuing with subcommittee reports, the data and research subcommittee chairs Kayla Kim, Data Science representative and third-year Data Science student and Akila Abeyaratna, Graduate School of Arts & Sciences representative and first-year graduate Arts & Sciences student, highlighted a new project that follows incoming support officers from the beginning to the end of their time on the Committee in order to examine retention rates.
Within the project, interviews would be conducted with an incoming support officer class both at the start of their time on the Committee and at the conclusion of their fourth year at the University. According to Kim, this study seeks to understand why individuals do not stay in Honor until their fourth year at the University.
Another focus of the data and research subcommittee is creating a survey to distribute to the University’s graduate community in order to gather input on graduate students’ awareness of the Committee and how Honor applies to them. Abeyaratna noted that many graduate students are unaware of what the Committee does and said the survey would help inform future Committee outreach and programs for the graduate community.
Following the reports from the data and research subcommittee, the Faculty Advisory Committee chairs shared their vision for building stronger relationships and communication between faculty and the Committee. Maddie Magielnicki, senior investigator counsel support officer and second-year College student and Sahasra Molleti, Batten representative and second-year Batten student, shared their ideas for creating more direct dialogue with faculty members.
“The first idea that we really want to implement is faculty panels and seminars, which would consist of having private conversations with faculty,” Molleti said. “We’d like to really hear from them directly, like what has worked from them in the honor process and changes they would like to see.”
Finalizing the outline of each subcommittee, the Community Relations and Diversity Advisory Committee continued building on their goal from the previous term of including Committee presentations in Engagements classes for first-year College students. Samuel Xiong, chair for the CRDAC subcommittee and third-year Education student, discussed his plans for continuing outreach and building relationships with the student body.
“We want to send people [from the Honor Committee] to do presentations in … Engagement classes covering all first-years,” Xiong said. “I want to continue to establish relationships with student leaders in organizations that represent, especially Honor, underrepresented student groups.”
To conclude the meeting, Freed invited the Committee to share ideas for events or initiatives during the University’s final exam period as well as ways to implement these ideas throughout Grounds.
Eunice Ju, School of Medicine representative and Medicine student elaborated on ways the Committee could better connect with members of the School of Medicine community. To incentivize Medicine students to connect with Honor, Ju proposed a coffee tab at Higher Grounds to foster more direct connections between students and the Committee.
“I think it would be good if people can get to know our faces, [to know] that we’re there for them,” Ju said. “If [the students] want support, they know who to reach out to.”
The Committee concluded the meeting with updates on the vacant vice chair for the graduate community position. Cody Scarce, vice chair for the undergraduate community and third-year College student, explained the VCGC role ahead of elections held in closed session Sunday. He noted that the role works with the VCUC and vice chair for operations to organize and execute Committee-related outreach initiatives. The VCGC also helps the VCUC with training the support officer pool.
Elections for the VCGC role will be held during a closed session meeting after the regular session Sunday. Candidates will give a five-minute speech followed by a Q&A session.
Freed also introduced the newest Engineering representatives who were confirmed Saturday, including second-year Engineering student Jack Copeland and third-year Engineering student Boss Oberlin. Copeland and Oberlin filled the original vacancy following the student-wide elections held Feb. 24-26.
The Committee will meet Sunday for its next weekly meeting. Meetings can be attended in person in Newcomb Hall Room 480 or via Zoom. According to the Committee’s website, individuals should contact the chair to request a Zoom link.
Read More
‘Run with Jim’ returns to Grounds ahead of Ryan’s Valedictory Exercises speech
By Lily Kostro | 1 hours agoThe run was organized by the Fourth-Year Trustees and was the second Run with Jim since his resignation last June.
The Student Technology Council aims for student technology self-governance
By Isabela Delgado | YesterdayWith the use of artificial intelligence on the rise at the University, there are currently no official policies in place at the University to regulate the usage of AI in educational settings or professional environments.
Spanberger’s April 13 deadline passed — here’s an overview of legislation she acted upon
By Grace Little | YesterdayGov. Abigail Spanberger (D) had a deadline of 11:59 p.m. April 13 to act upon the bills that passed the 2026 General Assembly session, which took place from Jan. 14 to March 14.
