GAPSA discusses budget increase, elections

The Graduate and Professional Student Assembly met in Houston Hall Wednesday night to discuss its plans for the remainder of the semester and to accept nominations for new officers. GAPSA Chairperson and second-year Wharton graduate student Victor Prince began the meeting by reviewing GAPSA's accomplishments of the 1995-96 academic year. Prince recounted the board's goals, mentioning the substantial rise in graduate student social activities, an increased awareness of GAPSA and consistent attendance level at general meetings. First Vice Chairperson Surya Ghosh, a Physics doctoral student, announced a tentative five percent budget increase for the upcoming year. This would double GAPSA's special projects budget, allowing for more graduate student activities, Ghosh said. He also expressed concern about whether the General Fee graduate students pay was being spent appropriately. Ghosh went on to explain that three percent of the Student Activities portion of the General Fee is allocated to GAPSA. The remaining 97 percent is distributed evenly among the 12 graduate schools. Ghosh asked individual school representatives to investigate whether their school's portion of the fund is going specifically toward student activities, and not being used for other purposes. GAPSA also passed a resolution requesting that Pennsylvania Governor Tom Ridge establish a statewide Graduate Student Appreciation Week in April. The resolution will be forwarded to the governor for approval. Ghosh also presented two letters that will be circulated to the deans of each graduate school. The first letter, which was written by the Graduate Cafe/Pub Committee, addressed space issues and decisions reached by the committee. The second letter encouraged all deans to schedule their orientation events so as not to conflict with the University-wide orientation, in light of the poor turnout at last year's general graduate student orientation. Other business on GAPSA's agenda included granting funding to the continued planning of upcoming social events, as well as to three graduate student groups who came to the meeting in order to request co-sponsorship for their events. Nominations for the seven positions on the GAPSA board were accepted toward the end of the meeting. Nominations will also be taken via electronic mail, Prince said. Prince encouraged the 24 people in attendance and other interested graduate students to run for office, adding that he nominated himself last year.