The Graduate Student Council (GSC) discussed funding, equipment management and future event planning in their meeting Wednesday at the Graduate Community Center.
The meeting kicked off with a discussion over four different events needing funding. Nandita Garud, a third-year graduate student in genetics, represented the Cross Disciplinary Healthcare Innovation Partnership at Stanford and asked for funding for the “health care happy hour” event planned in August.
“This [event] is a new idea that we’re having,” Garud said. “It’s something less formal.”
A $300 food budget was recommended for the event, which was projected to bring in 80 people. The vote, however, failed to pass with four in favor of funding the event, one abstaining and two voting members asking to table the issue until the next meeting so they could better understand the “scope of the event.”
The remaining funding measures, $75 for the Stanford Brewing Club’s beer judging class, $280 for the Russian Student Association’s dinner event and $200 for a cultural festival in August organized by Bengalis at Stanford, all passed unanimously with little discussion.
The meeting continued onto the topic of equipment and an equipment master.
Justin Brown, a fifth-year geophysics graduate student, introduced the issue.
“The old equipment master — he’s done,” Brown said. “Who’s going to be responsible for the equipment?”
The issue came to a quick conclusion when Addy Satija, GSC housing co-chair, announced that there was an equipment master ready to take over in the fall and an interim equipment master in the summer.
The last matter for the council was the July 4 barbeque. GSC co-Chair Marine Denolle started the conversation by praising the job done by the Graduate Student Council.
“I think it went very well,” Denolle said. “It was very intense because it was actually hard to define what was supposed to be done.”
Due to a problem with leftover buns and a few complications with the barbecue, the council proposed another barbecue event for Bastille Day, a French national holiday on July 14.
The bigger issue was about better planning the next event. Due to a few complaints that all the members of the Graduate Student Council should contribute to organize a better barbecue, Cathy Jan, a second-year graduate student in electrical engineering, asked to plan shifts for the next meeting.
“If we have all these tasks to do, it’s great that all of you showed up,” Jan said. “Showing up for an hour isn’t going to cut it.”
The next meeting of the Graduate Student Council will be in two weeks.