Advisory Committee to the Office of the Dean of Students (ODOS) Update
The committee, consisting of faculty from various departments and Dean Lori Berquam, met on 4 Nov 2010 from 3:30 to 5PM at Bascom. This is the first meeting which all of the four 2010-2011 student representatives (Kallman, Kuo, Tanck, and Wang) attended. Below are some key points from the meeting:
1. The Lifelong Connections Committee was introduced. The purpose of the committee is to relate current UW-Madison students to alumni and vice versa, with the aim to educate both students and alumni the importance of giving back to the university. Some means that can allow alumni to contribute to UW-Madison include internship opportunities, career development sessions, donations, presentations on personal experiences at UW-Madison to high school students, and other.
2. Feedback on Show Your Face video: the video has reached 10K hits and will be shown during football games. Dean Berquam is interested in relating the message from the video onto a classroom or community setting. An example is from the Department of Educational Psychology, where students read ”Freak Show” by James St. James.
3. Halloween Review: Police did not use pepper spray, but the majority of the arrests on State Street involved current UW-Madison students. Cultural sensitivity of costumes was discussed as well.
The crucial part from this meeting relates to student requests for a Fall break. Some other universities have a Fall break, and the reason for UW-Madison not to have one is due to the state statute, which affects the beginning date of the academic semester. In the past, the late beginning compared to other universities was due to tourism and students working at Wisconsin Dells. Nowadays, most students do not work in Wisconsin Dells and the university is opened starting from mid- to late-August with training for house fellows, staff, marching band members, and more. If the semester can begin earlier, the possibility for having a Fall break will be greater.
With the above summary, a discussion among all members in ASM Shared Governance is requested. Members and students will need to decide whether they would lobby with members of the State Capitol to begin school earlier. Students will also need to propose possible dates for the Fall break. Some ideas include the middle of October before Halloween or during the entire week of Thanksgiving. Please note that nothing is set in stone, and more research needs to be done.
The next meeting will be on 3 Feb, 2011. Please contact me and/or other student representatives on this committee if you have any questions/concerns and if you have feedback for any of the presented points. Your thoughts are appreciated.
Respectfully submitted,
Joseph Kuo
