CCO Changes

[mitchcieminski]

I'd like to change the following in the CCO section.

Make a list

Add to the description of the Director of Clubs and Organizations that they are responsible for maintaining a publicly-accessible (even outward-facing) list of all Student Groups on campus, both ones that are currently active and ones that are defunct. This list would ideally include contact information for each club as well, although maybe the contact information should only be available to the public upon request. It would aim to be exhaustive, though not be required to be exhaustive. It should also be updated like once a month.

Require that list in the transparency documents

Add The List of All Student Groups to the Transparency Documents Section

Recognize non-clubs and non-orgs as "student groups" for the purposes of listmaking

A new category should be added to the Student Group Classifications: Student Groups not generally funded by CCO. This could have some sub-groups, such as Academic Project Teams, Co-Curriculars, Teaching Teams, Student Government Committees, the Student Government and CORe, and Informal Groups. I would also be OK with adding that any group in this category could request funding from CCO, with the understanding that they will probably be denied excepting circumstances that they are really acting "as a club."

Change the definition of a club.

If we added a third categorization of "Student Groups not generally funded by CCO," then clubs are no longer really the "default." Joe and I created the following definition of a club earlier in the year: "A student-led part of the larger Olin Community with a common goal, interest, mission, or ideology." This would serve as a good start to redefining clubs, but the new definition isn't quite good enough because of some funding kinks.

This particular definition (for both clubs and orgs) is really tricky because we have to exclude "established" teams like Baja or REVO while funding and allowing the creation of new academic teams like Aero or Aquaponics. "Clubs do not financially sustain themselves through soliciting donations" seems like a start toward allowing this, but it might exclude things like SLAC depending on how much money they're raising in a given year. In this definition, a Project Team could decide to not raise any funds anymore and then ask to be funded as a club. Finally, it does weird things for groups like SWE, which I generally say can spend club money on club events and spend their own, donated money on things like conferences. A simple "clubs are not academic in nature" cuts out things like Midnight Math, while "clubs are things like those that are considered clubs today" is too self-referential and circular.

Change the definition of an org

If we have a good definition of a club, you can basically just say that an org is a large or significant club. You change "A student group may petition" to "a club or organization may petition," and say that org status is granted for one-year periods at a time.

Add a bit about club fair

The Director and Assistant Director are the de facto responsible parties for organizing club fairs. This should be made explicit. They should just be responsible for organizing club fair, which must be open to all student groups on the list. CCO should also be able to give all student groups some amount of money (we've usually gone $20) to spend on club fair items or food. This includes both the beginning-of-the-year one and the candidates weekend ones, as well as any that might pop up over the course of the year.

Meetings

At least one meeting should be called at the beginning of every semester to inform club + organization leaders of club spending rules, org budget rules, and train people to spend money. All members of the student government should try to attend, mostly for their convenience.

A meeting should be called toward the end of every year for the purpose of having a general discussion of the state of extracurricular activities at Olin, recognize outstanding clubs or events, and remind student leaders to transition their clubs.

Informal meetings should be held every other week as "CCO office hours" so that CCO officers can learn about club goings-on and help clubs do their things.

Charters

All clubs and organizations should be required to have charters to recognized as clubs or organizations, and not simply "other student groups." What counts as a charter should be defined. It should be the responsibility of CCO officers to maintain a repository of these charters that is accessible to all students and editable by members of the club or organization, so long as those edits are allowed by their charter.

Reform food-related rules

I have no idea what the right way with the food-related rules is, but I know that what we have isn't them

[anushadatar]

Going through each of the individual comments. Note that any of the items dismissed will be discussed during the SG meeting and all of the PRs will be discussed as well - these are just my takes on why I am proposing we either dismiss or create a PR.

Make a List

This has been codified in Article 13 Section 2 under the List of Student Groups. This list includes all the names of all of the clubs

Require that List in the Transparency Documents

This has been codified in Article 13 Section 2 under the List of Student Groups.

Recognize non-clubs and non-orgs as "student groups" for the purposes of listmaking

This has been codified in Article 13 Section 2 under the List of Student Groups, which specifies additional groups under 'branches of SG, administrative committees, and project teams.' Not sure we need to develop more on funding in the transparency documents section.

As for the section on the Student Group Classifications, I will propose a PR to add the three groups to the classifications. I think this is a great way to clarify confusion that happens there.

Change the Definition of Club

I think that the issues with trying to define exactly what a club is remains to be too vague to nicely place in a definition - it might be fine to just say that it is the default case of student group and requires 'less money' from the committee (than an org does>) - will propose a PR to clarify this point.

Change the Definition of the Org

I believe this was updated to reflect this concern.

Club Fair

This is a good thing to add. I will propose a PR to add that the Committee ought to host a club fair open to all student groups as part of its requirements for function. Will likely leave decision-making about allocation for this fair for specific clubs at the discretion of the Director, especially since 20 dollars per club seems potentially excessive in this economy.

Meetings

There was a section added about meetings that I think gives the Director the flexibility to call meetings when necessary but does not create unnecessary overhead, so I'd propose to keep this as-is.

Charters

This one makes sense, and likely ought to go in the Student Group Classifications - will propose a PR that includes this, likely bundled with the additional student group classification items.

Reform food-related rules

This has been acted on since this issue has been proposed.

[anushadatar]

After thinking more about it, it looks like it makes the most sense to propose two PRs - one PR that adds a section of additional responsibilities to the CCO Article which specifies the club fair responsibility and an update regarding additional student groups for the purposes of listmaking and a second PR to cover the charter requirement.

[anushadatar]

Voted to close this issue at the 2/5 meeting