Audits, space bacteria and enrollment: Student Senate hears from Student Trustees
On Wednesday, April 10, the Ohio University Student Senate held its first meeting after its recent election. Those who were elected into new positions within the Senate will be sworn into office at the last meeting of this academic year on April 24.
This week’s meeting began with an update presentation from Ohio U’s Student Trustees, Garrett Meek and Mia Citino. Meek and Citino gave a total of four updates regarding information about when upcoming audits will occur, academic and student success and resources and facilities.
Citino started with the first audit update explaining the internal compliance projects plan. A timeline was presented to the Senate displaying upcoming dates for this specific audit.
“We will be getting an update, we being the board, in June for a lot of these different plans,” Citino said. “We’ll bring that to you at your next senate meeting when we present, which will probably be August sometime.”
An update regarding the external audit plan, which is powered by an accounting and consulting company called Crowe, was also conveyed by Citino.
“They just presented their plan to us, which will be wrapped up around October,” Citino said. “Their goal really is to look through all the different financial statements and make sure that they comply with standards of accounting that are generally accepted in the United States. So they review plans from Ohio University, the Ohio University Foundation, WOUB, and numerous other entities around the university. But we’ll have that update for you in October.”
Meek followed with information regarding academic and student success. Recently, Dr. Sarah Wyatt and some of her students competed in a competition to send something to space by writing research proposals and competing with other students.
“Basically they’re gonna be sending something to space, and they’re saying it is going to be some kind of bacteria to see how it grows in space,” Meek said. “It was really cool to hear because this is the first time anyone has done any research on this so no matter what the results are it’s going to be beneficial.”
An enrollment update was also given by Meek in which he reported that spring enrollment sits at a total of 27,308 students which is up 4.3% in comparison to last spring semester. Additionally, the fall-to-spring return rate for students was 94.2%.
Finally, Citino gave a brief update that pertained to resources and facilities. She briefly explained that the housing projects and housing master plan from Ohio U needed an extension of budgets. The housing plan from Ohio U aims to have community spaces for students to work and study together allowing students to get to know each other better. The university also wants to offer more single-use restrooms and rooms to be inclusive to all students.
“They’re planning on starting this in May 2024 and finishing in the fall of 2026,” Citino said.
In other Student Senate news, two resolutions passed.
Resolution 2324-138 was a resolution that awarded Fire Chief Robert Rymer the Student Senate Bobcat Medal award for his service to the Athens and Ohio University community. The resolution passed unanimously.
Resolution 2324-139 was a resolution that “cleaned up” some of the academic affairs rules and procedures as Commissioner Dylan Demonte said. Minor language regarding titles within the section and required meetings were either edited or deleted. The resolution passed unanimously.
