by Joseph J. Garc°a
Daily Lobo columnist
The Student Fee Review Board rules state, "The officials making appointments to the SFRB should use their best efforts to ensure that the SFRB's overall membership reflects the diverse makeup of the University." As GPSA president, I appointed Michelle Touson and Emira Ibrahimpasic as the graduate student representatives. However, Debbie Morris, director of Student Services, put pressure on the director of African-American Student Services to remove Touson because of potential bias. Isaac Padilla was appointed in her place.
Morris' job is to advise officers and members of the SFRB, which allocates $8 million of student fees each year, during meetings and deliberations. She did not hesitate to address issues of bias, but she failed to address the lack of diversity among the undergraduate members of the board. All four members were Anglo-American. Three were in the same academic program. Three were of the same gender. Two were in the same sorority, and all were ASUNM representatives. Diversity, however you define it, was all but nonexistent.
The purpose of a diverse board is to ensure that different opinions and ideas are considered during deliberations. My perspective as a graduate student is different from that of an undergraduate student, just as the perspective of a 22-year-old single mother is different from that of a 20-year-old male student. The single mother might view child care as a pressing concern, and her issues might not be addressed if she does not have a seat at the table. Ethnic minorities could have posed questions and ideas that were not posed during deliberations.
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When ethnic centers presented to the board this year, the undergraduates asked why it was necessary to fund tutoring and mentoring services within the centers when CAPS was available. If students of color were on this board, they could have explained why these services were essential to improve recruitment, retention and graduation rates for students of color. Ironically, the question about the importance of tutoring was not raised in relation to
athletics. When the Athletics Department presented to the SFRB, it asked for an additional $250,000 to increase athletes' access to tutors. Padilla informed the board during deliberations that he was the tutor for the basketball team and that his services were not utilized.
When questions were asked about the background of the members of the board, Brittany Jaeger, ASUNM president, failed to provide all information requested. Louis Jeantete resigned to attend a conference the day of the deliberations. An alternate participated in the deliberations and was therefore the new voting member. When it was obvious diversity was the subject of the inquiry, steps were made to change the voting members. During the final vote, Andrea Roussel and Ashley Fate were not present, and attempts were made to allow Jeantete to vote because he is a student of color. This move would have changed the makeup of the undergraduate representatives and masked the obvious lack of diversity.
Articles in the Daily Lobo and comments made during ASUNM meetings by some senators indicated they believed there was a bias toward ethnic centers. The ethnic centers receive a combined total of $147,000, which is 1.83 percent of the SFRB budget. Athletics received $1.25 million, or 16 percent of the total budget. If in fact a bias exists toward ethnic centers, then the money allocated to these centers would reflect that. Instead, the lack of diversity meant the opinions and experiences of the many students that use ethnic centers were not heard. Had they been heard, it is likely the current allocation of dollars would be different.
There is a systematic problem at UNM - people speak of diversity but do little to put it into practice. In the past, the SFRB was used by some presidents of ASUNM to advance their own careers.
During the 2006-07 SFRB process, we were informed that a deal had taken place between the previous ASUNM president, Kevin Stevenson, and Athletics Director Rudy Davalos to secure $1.5 million in student fees for the Athletics Department by the 2007-08 school year. This is a serious conflict of interest, when one student makes decisions without consulting the entire student body.
The SFRB hearings, although public, were not publicized. The schedule was supplied only to departments requesting funding. Many students and departments were not aware they were allowed to attend other departments' hearings. This needs to be changed.
The principal concern, however, are the deliberations themselves. The time and location of the deliberations were not made public, and this long-standing practice left departments and students unaware that these meetings were indeed open. Next year, as the chairman of the SFRB, I will require hearings, meetings and deliberations to not only be publicized, but also to be held in an open, public setting. This will ensure transparency and accountability among administrators, advisers and, most importantly, the board itself.
Joseph J. Garc°a is a UNM graduate student and president of GPSA.
