USAC recap – Oct. 6

The Undergraduate Students Association Council is the official student government representing the undergraduate student body at UCLA. Council meetings take place every week on Tuesday at 7 p.m. in Kerckhoff 417 and are open to all students. Watch a live stream of the meetings on the USAC Live! YouTube channel.

Agenda

• Alexis Cervantes, a third-year political science and economics student, was unanimously appointed onto the Campus Programs Committee.
• Josh Montoya, second-year business economics student, was not appointed onto the Campus Programs Committee in a 0-13-0 vote.
• Aman Adlakha, a first-year undeclared student, appointed onto the the Campus Programs Committee with a 11-2-0 vote.
• The council unanimously approved an allocation of $1,960 from the Contingency Programming Fund.
• The Academic Affairs commissioner allocated $350 from the Academic Success Referendum Fund.
• The external vice president allocated $500 from funds for student lobbying programs.
• Kevin Casasola, a third-year bioengineering student, gave a special presentation about Filipino culture and history. Casasola added that some Americans discriminated against the first Filipinos who immigrated to the United States. Casasola added that this month is Filipino American History Month.

Officer reports

• President Heather Rosen said she attended a lunch with Assemblymember Patrick O’Donnell to discuss the importance of higher education and said that he was a staunch supporter of the UC.
• Rosen said that she is working with Milan Chatterjee, the president of the Graduate Students Association, to address issues she said that graduate students face, such as the lack of affordable housing. Rosen also added that she would like to collaborate more with GSA.
• Internal Vice President Heather Hourdequin said that the the IVP fellowship program is open. Hourdequin added that submissions for the T-shirt design contest will begin on Oct. 22. Hourdequin said that the student group liaison training with the Student Organizations, Leadership and Engagement (SOLE) is on Wednesday.
• Hourdequin said that she contacted the Bureau of Street Lighting and said that they are working on improving street lighting in Westwood.
• Hourdequin said that Campus Safety Week is fourth week. Hourdequin added that she is working on increasing safety in apartments in Westwood and said that safety should not be a privilege.
• External Vice President Zach Helder said that he has been in contact with assemblymembers and senators to voice his opinion against SB 376, as it would cost the UC $60 million. Helder said that he had a conversation with Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), who shut down the Perkins Loan program.
• General Representative 2 Aaliya Khan said that Mental Illness Awareness Week is this week and that her office is receiving positive feedback. Khan said that she is working with General Representative 1 Danny Siegel to get UCLA to lower the cost of their Halal and Kosher meal plan.
• Academic Affairs Commissioner Trent Kajikawa said that he met with staff from the Institute for Immigration, Globalization and Education to discuss about what he said is discrimination against American Pacific Islanders and how that affects academic success.
• Kajikawa said that he talked to members from the Academic Senate to make sure they fulfill their promise to provide contact information of Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS) on CCLE. Kajikawa said he is partnering up with the Student Wellness Commission to create a symposium that will address mental health.
• Student Wellness Commissioner Marvin Chen said that Tuesday’s Healthcoming was successful and that they received a lot of student traffic. Chen said that he was disappointed that not many councilmembers reached out to him to co-program events for the All of Us campaign.
• Chen added that October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month. Chen said that he will not be attending the next two councilmeetings because he will be going through the CARE certificate training program, which teaches student leaders about violence prevention.
• Chen said that Active Minds has launched a program that will allow students to text mental health questions to a server that will respond with an answer.

Compiled by Nicholas Yu, Bruin senior staff.