Student Assembly overwhelmingly voted to back a "Statement in Support of Reviewing Yom Kippur Class Scheduling" at Tuesday night's General Assembly meeting after the contested addition of an amendment that encouraged other groups with similar scheduling concerns to step forward.
The Statement, which has sponsored by Adam Halpern-Leistner '10, Adam Shpeen '07 and the Academic Affairs Committee, recommends that Dartmouth consider moving classes that fall on Yom Kippur to x-hours. The legislation is the result of student complaints that, as a result of the day-long reflection and fasting that Yom Kippur entails, attending classes while observing this holiday can be difficult.
"It's a day that you are supposed to kind of repent and reflect, and, because of that, going to classes and observing Yom Kippur inherently conflicts," Halpern-Leistner said.
While professors and administrators are generally responsive to students who miss class as a result of this holiday, proponents of the legislation said that even these excused absences put students at an academic disadvantage.
Some students worried, however, that the creation of legislation that specifically addressed only Yom Kippur might seem biased, and therefore might unintentionally offended some students.
"Saying that [Yom Kippur] is important because students brought it up, that's great," Assembly member Yuki Kondo-Shah '07 said. "I don't think that it's good to be like [the Assembly] as a representative body is saying Yom Kippur is special for X, Y and Z reasons ... that's kind of dangerous."
In order to address these concerns, Kondo-Shah proposed an amendment that encourages other religious and minority groups with issues about religious or ceremonial conflicts to bring their concerns to the attention of the Assembly.
The amendment's supporters argued that Kondo-Shah's amendment effectively clarified the intent of the legislation.
"This [legislation] should not be about singling out Yom Kippur as a unique holiday ... Our job as Student Assembly is to advocate for ... all students, and therefore I think Yuki's amendment makes sense," Student Body President Tim Andreadis '07 said.
Detractors of the amendment, however, worried that its inclusion might cause an influx of demands for days off for religious observances, which could damage the legislation's eventual efficacy before administrative leaders.
"I think the problem with Yuki's amendment that she added is that you almost draw attention to the fact that now you're kind of like opening up the floodgates for any possible organization. I think if you don't put it in there, you won't draw as much attention on the administration's behalf," Assembly member Cory Cunningham '10 said.
Opponents of the amendment also noted that they felt it was not pertinent to the legislation's original intent.
"I think that it's very important that we remove this amendment because [it] doesn't change meaning," Student Assembly Secretary Dave Nachman '09 said. "What [we] should really be considering is what is best for this statement to serve its purpose, which is to provide a strong statement to the administration to support the Committee's goal."
After being voted in and out of the legislation during debate, the amendment was finally included in the passed form of the Statement.
The legislation's sponsors noted that they could not speculate about how responsive the administration was likely to be after reviewing this legislation. Halpern-Leistner did note that he has contacted several members of the administration, and has a meeting to discuss the issue with Acting Dean of the College Dan Nelson on Friday.
Other topics addressed at the meeting included the institution of the Ad Hoc Community Service and Activism Committee as a standing committee and an overview of the Ivy Council's Fall Conference at Princeton.
