The Student Assembly is looking to spend 12 percent of its budget for the year on a project which would collect student input for the next president of the College to read upon arriving at Dartmouth.
The Assembly will be distributing a series of questions in a Wednesday publication that will take the place of last term's Tick Talk.
The committee in charge of the project hopes to earmark $4,000 to promote and organize the collection of students' opinions on the future of the College.
The Assembly will then present a report based on student responses to the College's future president, dean and student body, said Janelle Ruley '00, co-chair of the Assembly's "Visions of Dartmouth Project" ad hoc committee.
The committee is not yet sure how it will present the responses, but one possibility is that the final report will include each student's response and a summary of students' answers.
"[We hope] the students take this opportunity to give their input on where they want the College to go. [We] certainly hope they will talk about what it is they like and dislike," Ruley said.
The Assembly is hoping student responses will help guide the College's new president and will "initiate dialog between students and the administration," said Josh Green '00, the ad hoc committee's other co-chair.
"Students care," he said. "They want to be involved in the decision making process and in the long-term future of the College."
Assembly member Jorge Miranda '01 said students' responses may help a new president realize his changes will have to satisfy Dartmouth's student body.
"It's not going to be a clean slate," he said. "There are issues students want dealt with."
Green said Wednesday's publication will be the start of a massive distribution campaign.
He said the Assembly will put questionnaires on tables in Thayer and will deliver questionnaires to either students' Hinman boxes or their dorm rooms.
"Everybody gets the chance to answer [the questions]," Green said.
Although the Assembly has not yet voted on how much money will be dedicated to the project, the Visions Committee is asking for up to $4,000 -- about 12 percent of the Assembly's budget at the beginning of this year, according to Dave Gacioch '00, the Assembly's vice president of student life.
The money will be used to create posters, distribute questions and to advertise, among other functions, Ruley said.
But the effort to obtain student responses is just one of the Assembly's plans this term.
The Assembly's student life committee will spend most of the next three weeks responding to the alcohol policy recommendation of the College Committee on Alcohol and Other Drugs, Gacioch said.
The Assembly will present its response to Dean of the College Lee Pelton by Feb. 2, Eilertsen said.
The committee will also work towards a more student-friendly DarTalk system and opening a student parking lot near the Channing Cox river apartments, Gacioch said.
Assembly members will spend 12 hours in diversity training this Winter term, an education "meant to be a starting point for addressing the issues of race and ethnicity on campus," Eilertsen said.
He said the Assembly will "invite students to talk about issues of race and diversity over a community dinner" as a follow up to the Martin Luther King Day celebration.
Eilertsen also said the Assembly will attempt to find a replacement for Webster Hall, one of the College's few medium-sized social spaces. Webster Hall is currently undergoing renovations to be converted to the Rauner Special Collections Library.
"It's outrageous that there are no plans to replace Webster," Eilertsen said.
One of the Assembly's goals last term -- to acquire computers for clusters far away from Kiewit -- has nearly been accomplished.
The computers are in the Student Assembly office and the Assembly is awaiting the Office of Residential Life's construction of the rooms the computers will be placed in, Gacioch said.
The academic affairs committee plans to improve the pre-major advising system for sophomores and to try to expand Non-Recording Option in the economics, studio art and art history departments, said Anne Kanyusik '98, Assembly vice president of academic affairs.
Another goal is the creation of quality preparation courses for the MCAT and LSAT with more reasonable fees than the Kaplan programs, Kanyusik said.
The committee is also continuing to work toward one of the goals it set during Fall term -- the creation of an ethnic studies department.
But this is not the only course change being sought by the committee. It is also investigating whether the creation of a Korean Studies department would be possible, Kanyusik said.
Last term, the Assembly passed a unanimous resolution supporting the creation of a Korean Studies department, which was voted down by the Humanities Division Council at their meeting last month.
