On Tuesday Evening the Student Association held its weekly meeting of the Senate. The meeting was called to order making it the seventh meeting of the Spring semester. Quorum to begin the meeting was met and following the approval of the meeting minutes and agenda, the meeting proceeded.

The first and only guest to the Senate for the evening was a new campus organization Strong and Healthy. This new organization is committed to teaching students aboudy body confidence as well as the importance of living a healthy lifestyle. On April 22nd in the Marano Campus Center at 6pm, Strong and Healthy will be joining another organization on campus, Pencils of Promise, to host an exercise circuit event. The goal of this event is to encourage students to formulate daily workout habits and routines. Students will be given the chance to participate in various events such as, push-up contests, dance competitions and more. Strong and Healthy requested funds from the Senate to help promote the new club and ensure the event’s success. The funds would help contribute to tee shirts, water bottles, healthy snacks, backdrop for pictures and prizes for the event. Two senators offered to help write the bill and proposal which will be voted on at a later date.

In light of there being no public comment for the evening, the meeting moved on to executive reports. Student Association Vice President Shelby Gallaro, was the first to deliver her report. Gallaro shared with senators that Laura Kelly, organizer for SUNY Oswego’s homecoming, was looking for three to four senators, who would like to become a part of the student homecoming committee. Any senator, freshman through juniors, are eligible to participate and if interested, they were encouraged to email Gallaro.

SA President Emily Nassir, was the next to deliver her executive report. Nassir revealed that plans for the new SA website are well underway and she is currently looking into the photography portion of the webiste, which would feature all senators’ pictures, that way students are aware of who their campus representatives are. Nassir also shared with senators that the discount app is currently up and running. Students can download the collegediscounts app to their phones and then search SUNY Oswego to see all the discounts offered at the various businesses the school has partnered with to provide this service. In an earlier meeting this semester, Nassir shared a project she was working on with auxiliary services, but little information could be revealed at that time. Nassir revealed updates on this new project at Tuesday evening’s meeting. She will be working with auxiliary services to bring students’ food favorites from the dining halls, to the small markets like Lake Effect Cafe and Ontario Bagel Company located on campus. This new plan is generated toward students who commute or don’t have a meal plan, that way they don’t have to pay for a full meal at the dining hall, they can just pick up their favorite foods at one of the stores on campus. To progress the planning process, Nassir plans to generate a survey, which will then be placed on all of the class pages on Facebook. Students will be encouraged to list their favorite foods from the dining halls, that they wish to be sold in the various markets on campus. Nassir plans to keep the Senate updated on this new project as progress is made.

Matthew Peters SA Director of Finance, delivered his executive report following Nassir. Peters revealed the plans to dive into the new organization budgets for next year, next week. The senators will be reviewing the budgets within the next few weeks and in the final weeks of the semester, organizations will be given the chance to attend the weekly SA meetings to dispute the budget if they disagree with the budget given to their organization. To finish off his executive report, Peters stated that OzFest is moving along and hopefully all preparations will be finished and finalized by next week.

Generally, there are only three executive reports at each meeting, however, SA Director of Legislation, spoke to the Senate about “Rational Tuition 2020”. Under the trustees and government body of SUNY, tuition can be raised for students at a specific amount allocated by the Rational Tuition Bill passed five years ago. The goal of this bill was to allow students to be able to predict the amount of tuition they will be required to pay during their undergraduate schooling period. Currently, five years later, SUNY SA is pushing to renew the bill to avoid the unpredictability of increased tuition costs. Failing to renew the bill would result in the government having control over tuition costs which could result in an increase in tuition at any time.

The meeting moved swiftly onto hall council reports seeing as the SA committees were unable to meet this week. Mackin shared that their laker life event “Mash Safari” will be taking place this Friday at 8pm. The event will include snacks and beverages as well as live animals including a kangaroo, snakes, alligators and more. Funnelle Hall announced that they will be holding their “pie your RA day” on pie day. Students can pay a small fee to throw pie in their RA’s face and all money raised will go back to their hall council.

Organization reports were next on the agenda. Senators revealed the Oswegonian, the campus newspaper, is looking to put together a Business Sales Team. Their job will included going to local businesses to encourage them to purchase as space in the paper. Any senator or student interested, are encouraged to contact the Oswegonian.

There we no special orders for the evening, there was however one general order on the agenda. The Adrenaline Hip-Hop Team on campus is a new organization who requested funds from the Senate, to help the team with promotions. The funds requested are to help with flyers, markers, posters and paints, all to be used to help with club promotions. The proposed bill and budget was passed by general consent, and the fundy will allow the Adrenaline Hip-Hop dance team to get their name out to students on campus.

The meeting came to a close following the general orders for the evening. The Student Association meets every Tuesday at 6pm, in Lanigan 106. All meetings are open to the public and students are encouraged to attend to express any opinions or concerns they may have.

On Monday, SUNY Oswego students were subjected to some unusual surprise when a “preacher man” took over their quad and said what some students claimed were “offensive remarks and beliefs”.

Jim Deferrio, a middle aged man, was seen holding a sign preaching on the SUNY Oswego quad a variety of different ultra-religious phrases other remarks unpopular on a liberal public campus.

Students grouped around Deferrio and gave their input before he was asked to leave by University Police, but soon was allowed to come back on campus as it is considered a public university.

Many students expressed their displeasure to the man and on various sources of social media, calling the man “homophobic” and claiming that his messages were “hateful”.

According to several different sources, Deferrio has been known to go to different colleges and university preaching a similar message.

Whatever his message may have been, he certainly raised a stir on the quad and on the SUNY Campus.

Originally Reported By Chelsey Moore

By Fan Shi

OSWEGO, N.Y.– SUNY Oswego Public Justice Professor Jaclyn Schildkraut, recognized expert on the topic of mass shootings, gave the presentation “We Need To Talk About School Safety” on Nov 7.

“There is not a full law that we can necessary to use to stop it, but what we can do is to guard ourselves and protect our community safer,” Schildkraut said.

Some people have different views on how to guard themselves during this situation.

“I know a couple of my friends back home were shot and killed because of gun violence. Even when I go out, I still carry a pocket knife with me,” Rebecca Velez said.

Student Gianna Perri believes guns can protect her safety. There is still someone like Meghan Harrington who has a mixed opinion on guns.

“I understand why people would like to have guns. I understand people feel safer. But I don’t feel super comfortable around guns,” Schildkraut said, “There are numbers of things that has to be considered when determining whether to allow for concealed carrying in certain places. For instance, if the law enforcement comes in and citizens are engaged with the shooter, law enforcement will not goanna know who the shooter really is.”

Not all license types allow unrestricted concealed carrying. The license must specify whether it is issued to carry on the person or possess on the premises. Not all of these laws apply to the New York city. In New York City, all firearms need to be registered and there is stricter limitation to carry firearms.

For more information on gun laws, visit https://www.nraila.org/gun-laws/.