In a special meeting Wednesday, the Syracuse University Graduate Student Organization passed two resolutions relating to THE General Body.

The resolutions were passed in response to how Chancellor Kent Syverud and the SU administration treated protesters from THE General Body, a coalition of student organizations, during their 18-day sit-in in Crouse-Hinds Hall, which ended on Nov. 20. The first calls for the creation of a new office, while the other calls for the administration to look into its treatment of protesters. The GSO executive board originally vetoed a similar resolution at a Nov. 19 meeting that combined the ideas of the two resolutions passed Wednesday night.

The first resolution calls for the formation of an ombudsperson office that would be created in collaboration with similar efforts currently underway in other university bodies, like the University Senate and Student Association. An ombudsperson is an official who acts as an impartial intermediary.

The ombudsperson’s office would act as a safe space for all students, faculty and staff to come forward with concerns about SU and the administration, said Vicky Wang, a University Senate liaison on this issue.

“This is not the person to solve all of the problems,” Wang said, referring to the ombudsperson. “It’s rather a resource to communicate.”

Ombudsman organizations exist nationally and internationally. Currently, 300 universities have ombudsman offices, Wang said.

The second resolution asks that Syverud investigates and prepares a report, presented to the Board of Trustees, on the administration’s response to THE General Body protesters at Crouse-Hinds.

Specifically this resolution asks the chancellor to investigate the decision to prevent protesters from leaving and re-entering Crouse-Hinds on Nov. 14, the manner in which the administration delivered the student code of conduct to students sitting in the building and prohibiting a faculty member from the College of Law from entering Crouse-Hinds in order to give legal advice to THE General Body protesters.

“In my mind, the intention of this is to say, ‘these are the things that were not handled well, this is how we should have handled things instead, here are the policies and procedures we are putting in place to make sure that if this comes up again, it will not be as poorly handled next time,’” GSO President Patrick Neary said at the meeting.

The resolution also calls for Syverud to hold an open forum where students and faculty can respond to concerns about the administration’s handling of the protesters.

At its Nov. 19 meeting, after listening to concerns from Wang, the executive board ultimately decided to veto the resolutions because the language did not make it clear how the ombudsperson office would function. Also, the language did not align with a similar resolution currently in committee in the University Senate, Wang said in a handout given to all GSO senators at the meeting.

“We didn’t want the administration to drive a wedge between the GSO and the University Senate,” Neary said. “We wanted to make sure we got all of the details right.”

Published on December 4, 2014 at 12:37 am

Contact Rachel: rsandler@syr.edu