Graduate student organizations applying for event funding from the Graduate and Professional Student Council now have a specific set of guidelines to follow thanks to a motion passed at last night's GPSC meeting.
"We have had affiliated groups funding before, but we never had rigid guidelines," said Kimberly Harris, chair of the Affiliated Groups Funding Committee and a second-year graduate student in chemistry. "This year we wanted to develop specific guidelines to take out the subjectivity."
Under the new regulations, events which classify as charity work, conference fees, speakers or journals will be eligible for funding. GPSC will consider petitions in three time blocks spaced over the academic year, giving priority to on-campus events and those with the most students and departments.
Additionally, groups that receive funding must publicly recognize GPSC for its sponsorship and file reports to GPSC on their use of the funds.
"In the past we have been disappointed with not knowing how our money is being spent," said GPSC president Michael Tino, a third-year graduate student in cell biology. "Now, if groups do not report on how they used the money, they won't get funding in the future."
Tino also said that the distinct number of allocation time periods would allow GPSC to streamline the allocation of funds.
IN OTHER BUSINESS: Dawn Techow, coordinator of volunteer services at the Community Service Center, spoke to the council on graduate student involvement in community service.
"In the past, we have primarily been involved with undergraduate involvement in community service and social justice issues," Techow said. "We are concerned with how [graduate students] could get involved and how we could disseminate information."
Some graduate students expressed concern that community-service opportunities were poorly publicized within the graduate school community and offered suggestions on increasing exposure.
"Graduate students who have an hour to spare don't know the range of activities," said Damon Coletta, a third-year graduate student in political science. "You might want to put together a guide for community agencies and act as a clearinghouse for them."
Other students noted that graduate students' schedules leave them with little leeway to make regular time commitments to community service.
"People might not want to give an hour a week," said Jennifer Terni, a third-year graduate student in romance studies. "One way to harvest graduate students would be to offer them a day [of community service] that was planned once or twice a semester."
GPSC vice president Susan Timberlake, a third-year graduate student in biomedical engineering, suggested that the Community Service Center place a link in the newly developed GPSC home page, located at http://www.duke.edu/gpsc/.
Timberlake also reviewed the annual graduate basketball ticket sale campout held two weekends ago.
"In spite of the fact that there were some rough spots, it went very well," she said. "Considering it is the biggest event of GPSC, we were a little disappointed with the support. If we are going to continue this, we really need more volunteers."
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