UNM Graduate and Professional Student Association President Texanna Martin said GPSA will work with students this semester to ensure their voices continue to be heard on fee changes, including proposed mandatory online fees and differentials for the School of Engineering, as well as any other issues that may arise.
GPSA will also be participating in UNM budget discussions and will continue to voice the students’ sentiments about the mandatory fees, she said.
“We will continue to serve students as their advocates, so please remember we are your elected representatives, and are here to serve you,” Martin said.
As GPSA prepares for the spring semester she said it is also important to take a moment to review activities from the fall.
This year, GPSA was responsible for chairing for the Student Fee Review Board (SFRB), which faced several difficult decisions, Martin said.
“Decreased enrollment has created a budget deficit this year, and the SFRB worked to balance exercising its fiduciary responsibilities with its primary task of maximizing students’ access to a variety of resources on campus,” she said.
Martin said the SFRB members spent time meeting with applicants for student fees and listening to student input.
“Our engagement with students from around campus resulted in the decision to hold student fees at the same level as in 2015," she said. "However, due to the budget deficit, the students negotiated a 1.5 percent decrease in organizational budgets to help counter the deficit.”
She said last semester GPSA and the Associated Students of UNM (ASUNM) worked together to bring the student voice to decisions regarding facilities on campus and worked with administration to create opportunities for the students to tell their representatives what buildings on campus are important to them.
“We learned that Johnson Center is important to the wellness and success of our student population, and worked to carry that message to the administration, the Board of Regents, and New Mexico’s elected officials,” Martin said. “Through these discussions, it became clear that the much needed renovation of our Physics and Astronomy Building was also a high priority, and would directly impact student success, as well as continued research being conducted by students and faculty working out of this facility.”
She said that the GPSA and ASUNM are also working on acquiring funding to improve access to the Human Osteology lab, which is part of the Maxwell Museum of Anthropology.
“The ultimate goal of this initiative was to ensure that students understood the impacts of these changes, and how it would affect how much they pay in student fees,” she said.
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She said a continuing mission of GPSA has been to actively work towards engaging graduate and professional students and their departments by working with Provost Chaouki Abdallah to provide letters of recommendation for representatives who actively participated in GPSA sponsored organizations.
“We have committees reviewing our Constitution & Bylaws as well as Prorated Benefits (PB Funds), which will be voted on this coming semester and implemented in the 2016-17 academic year,” she said.
Martin said that GPSA is also looking at orientation practices at the University to see if there is a better way for GPSA to alert graduate students to available resources, and ensure that graduate and professional students are aware of all the available tools they need to succeed.
“The GPSA is proud to be able to offer numerous grants and scholarships every semester," she said. "Students have expressed concern about certain aspects of the process, as well as some limitations of the grants.”
This semester the GPSA is working to partner with Academic Affairs to create a better, more transparent process, with an improved electronic submissions platform that will address many of the issues that have been brought to the GPSA’s attention, Martin said.
“We also plan to begin looking into creating a new grant for professional development to help students with certification, testing, etc.,” she said.
Sally Barker, GPSA chief of staff, said that with so many students finishing up at UNM, GPSA would like to remind all advanced degree students that they are members of the UNM Alumni, and to take time to register for a free wallet diploma, as well as the great workshops that they offer to students.
“GPSA has been working with the Alumni association to bring those services to the graduate and professional student population,” she said.
Barker said that GPSA has also become a member of the National Association of Graduate-Professional Students (NAGPS), meaning that every graduate and professional student on campus is a member of the association.
She recommended students to visit the NAGPS website (nagps.org) to learn more about the services the association provides to the UNM graduate and professional student population.
“We at GPSA realize that we are one university, and when working together we can ensure that our voices are heard and that every graduate and professional student at UNM has the resources to best ensure success,” she said.
Sayyed Shah is the assistant news editor at the Daily Lobo. He can be contacted at assistant-news@dailylobo.com or on Twitter @mianfawadshah.
