It was during the last Wednesday, Oct. 14 senate meeting, when theater major Isaac Simons-Araya surprised ASCC by announcing his intent to fill one of the four empty senate seats.
During this Wednesday, Oct. 21 meeting, not only Simons-Araya has been approved by senate but the three other empty seats have also been filled.
Peter Ibrahim, Elena Robles and Ashley Johnson gave a brief one-minute introduction and were then approved all together as the new members of ASCC Senate.
For Robles, the open senate seat was a second opportunity to be a part of senate.
She wanted to be in the senate since the beginning of the semester but due to work she had to give up on the idea. Now she no longer has a work commitment and the open seat gave her the opportunity to fulfill her original intent.
She has also joined the STEAM committee and looks forward to working with fellow senators.
Ibrahim is not a stranger to senate, he heard about the open senate position from friends, “I have two friends in senate who told me about the open seat. I also know [commissioner of IT] Hugo Gonzalez he’s also involved with [ASCC] government.”
For Johnson her patience paid off, she attended the senate meetings since the beginning of the semester and made sure to let Vice President Ivan Oyarzabal of her interest in being a part of senate.
She said, “When I realized I wanted to run [in the senate elections] it was too late, but I continued to attend the meetings since the first one and spoke with Ivan about being a part of senate and he said if a position opened up he or someone in senate would contact me and let me know.”
Johnson is now a part of the appropriations committee and the Falcon student mentor committees.
After being approved by ASCC senate the senators had the right to vote on the legislation items on the meeting’s agenda
First on the list was the legislation: students for a better college library. This legislation has as a resolve to give the library “the necessary resources to address the noise levels that [are] disrupting students who are studying and researching.” This legislation was passed with a 20 to 5 vote.
The second legislation that was acted on was presented by Science, Technology, Engineering, and/or Math (STEAM) committee co-chairs Senators Alex Cervantes and Diana Silveyra.
This legislation has as a resolve to ask the Board of Trustees to fund “an additional 1,430 tutoring hours to be used in Nov. 2015, Dec. 2015 and Spring semester of 2016” and to have “the Board of Trustees fund $22,135.48 in district money to expand tutoring hours for [Science, Technology, Engineering, and/or Math] STEM departments.”
This legislation was discussed during the last senate meeting and after adjusting the dollar amount requested to include fringe costs the legislation was passed with a vote 20 in favor and two senators abstaining from a vote.
A stance of support was also voted on and passed for presenting the Student Senate for California Community Colleges (SSCCC) with legislation to have Scantron vending machines on campus for students.
