Allegheny Student Government began its general assembly this week by swearing in first-year senators.

ASG came to order at 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Sept. 21, in room 301/302 of the Henderson Campus Center. The assembly introduced the new first-year senators. Senators Zachary Gallagher, ’25, Abigail Estrada-Hernandez, ’25, and Ray Colabawalla, ’25, were sworn in before beginning cabinet reports.

Chief of Staff Genesis Pena, ’22, talked about information shared to her by Dean for Institutional Diversity Kristin Dukes about the Gator Day workshop centered around diversity and inclusion.

“There is going to be talk about diversity and inclusion and how that works on campus, so that is something I know a lot of students will benefit from,” Pena said. “It is an outside company that’s coming to do this workshop, so that’s something that we can take advantage of. We can give some feedback and see if it’s something we want to continue to see on campus.”

Parliamentarian Rachel Harris, ’23, explained the purpose of the ASG luncheon on Monday Oct. 4 from 12:45 p.m. to 2 p.m. in room 301/302 of the campus center.

“Essentially the event is going to be us spreading some information and resource pamphlets, we’re going to answer any questions from the ASG side of things and the Title IX side of things,” Harris said.

Director of Finance Lucas Biniewski, ’23, reported the budget spending for the week and shared some of the current financial discussions.

“Last week we discussed a couple of very pressing topics,” Biniewski said. “We talked about summer housing and research and how there might be a potential shift in how we will price and bill summer housing. I have approved $200 on the general fund for transportation for the Outing Club, $2,833 for E-sports because they want to have some new equipment, then $150 for the ASA Shazam event on Thursday (Sept. 23).”

Director of Student Affairs Elizabeth Graham, ’22, announced projects she is working on.

“We are working on some ways to try and get more student communication about when the WiFi drops out because essentially the problem is that the school needs exact data on where and when it’s dropping out,” Graham said. “Additionally, we are having conversations about the possibility of another printer being on campus.”

Graham also shared the possibility of bringing back networking events to have more career exploration opportunities on campus.

“I reached out to (Director of Career Education) Jim Fitch about career education on campus and bringing back an event to do essentially a career fair that they got a lot of people involved in,” Graham said.

In terms of campus safety and parking, Graham shared efforts being made to address student concerns about safety and parking.

“Public Safety is currently working on a nightwatch to address the lighting issues on campus that we are going to help them out with,” Graham said. “We are also setting up a parking committee to address parking issues on campus.”

Community Relations Director Kyrie Doniz, ’23, informed ASG of her current work with having more students involved with local businesses.

“I am still figuring out when the next Second Saturday event is,” Doniz said. “Second Saturday is just when all the local businesses go out on Chestnut Street and block it off, like a farmers market. Then I want to reach out to Andy Walker to see where the student discount is. On top of that, I want to go into businesses and gauge where they’re at in terms of whether or not they have the student discount.”

President Noah Tart, ’22, on behalf of Director of Sustainability and Environmental Affairs Andi Reiser, ’23, announced plans for furthering sustainability on campus.

“We are going to start to revive the water bottle with refill stations, we had already purchased a couple of water bottle refill stations,” Tart said.

Director of Organizational Development Crystal Hernandez, ’23, updated the status of the “Comp Buddy” idea she had spoken about in previous meetings. Hernandez said that the project is making progress and will begin soon.

President of the Class of 2023 Olivia Brophy reported her goals to have more students interact with ASG to gain more insight about what the students want.

“We are focused on the student voices in as many ways as we can and we are going to be asking for student input on Instagram,” Brophy said.

President of the Class of 2024 Kristen Cadham shared some initiatives being made to improve student experience.

“We want to email people about getting them a fund set up for future pandemics,” Cadham said. “We are also looking at getting more meal plan options for students or at least making them more flexible.”

The assembly adjourned at 8:06 p.m.