2003-2004 SBA Retreat

August 26th, 2003

MINUTES

 

I.                   Welcome/Dinner

II.                President’s Report

a.      New Office

                                                              i.      Door Code – 54897; Conference Room and office codes, I’m working on

                                                            ii.      Phone number – same (202/994-7150)

                                                          iii.      Fax- don’t know if its working because its old.

                                                          iv.      Printing – upstairs

                                                            v.      New computers – working on Dean Young and Morrison

                                                          vi.      Filing – cleaned out old files; need better record keeping – please make sure to put dates on ALL documents and make a printed copy as well as saving on disks

b.      Good news from last year – tampon machines are in;

                                                              i.      Corrie has the keys; probably should be student services domain – (talk to Matt about his committee getting tampons and pads; putting them in and then periodically checking for money and needed replacements)

c.       Graduation Date Change Status: Jaclyn spoke and mentioned pros and cons.

                                                              i.      Pros: Would be with rest of school, would be able to take advantage of travel/hotel deals, we would still have it in the same hall (kicking med students out), would only be one week after exams so higher attendance at “senior week” and a week off before BarBri courses start.

                                                            ii.      Cons: DC is crowded (but on Memorial Day weekend it is as well), unsure whether we would get our own graduation speaker, grades would not be finalized

d.      Discussion with CDO

                                                              i.      Do we want a student committee to work with them

                                                            ii.      The “what did I do last summer” programs for 1Ls – coordinate with CDO (will help us with scheduling but let us do the panels just as Laurie did)

                                                          iii.      Asked that CDO (Jim Loveless, Fred Thrasher) be cc’ed on all emails regarding career services related things such as these programs

                                                          iv.      Break out session à people thought it would be a good idea.

e.       Business Entrepreneurial Workshop – do we want to co-sponsor this?  VOTE or we can discuss after strategy session

                                                              i.      Friday, November 7th; an alternative to the law firm career;

                                                            ii.      Presentations by small to medium business owners in the DC area on various topics: technology, networking, belief that relationships build business

                                                          iii.      Keynote speaker: either Dan Pink (Agent Nation) or Steve Shapiro 24/7 Innovation)

                                                          iv.      Advantages to our involvement: Open to 75-100 people – will hold 10 spots for free for students if we do this; presenting something else to students; free lunch; networking; they pay for everything

                                                            v.      What we have to do basically: reserve room and help advertise

                                                          vi.      We voted to do this

f.        We will be filling faculty-student and SBA-student committees very soon;

                                                              i.      Need each director to let me know how many students they want on each committee

                                                            ii.      Need volunteers to help put out info., collect apps., and interview : Email Corrie to help

                                                          iii.      Alumni Relations committeeà may want to think about combining the mentor program with the 1L one. More money for events this way.

g.      Also, be having 1L Day, Eve. Elections mid-September

                                                              i.      Do we want LLMs this year?

                                                            ii.      We put this off b/c it is a constitutional issue that will be dealt with at a later time

h.      Encourage postings on the website – if you need to post something, forward to Corrie.

III.             Sec’s Report

a.       Collected updated contact information

b.      Office hours: will figure out at a later date

IV.              Treasurer’s Report

a.      Ad Hoc Requests: Nota Bene

                                                              i.      We have not received allocation from Dean Young

                                                            ii.      They asking for $10,375: 7 issues @ $700 + editors pay

                                                          iii.      We had a lot of discussion about whether Nota Bene should be allowed to pay editors. We voted that yes and then approved the full amount.

V.                 A Few Reports

a.       Just to begin – two new officers (Amy – Academic Affairs; Carolyn – Alumni Relations)

b.      Orientation: All went well. $4000 still left in budget. During orientation week went to a comedy club, party at 3rd Edition and Community Service.

c.       ABA Conference: Corrie Westbrook and Eric Menhart represented the Law School at the American Bar Association Annual Meeting in San Francisco in early August. The Law School Division of the ABA convened to vote on several resolutions, which were designed to direct the sense of the Law School Division to the House of Delegates of the ABA on certain issues. Resolution 113 encouraged various sectors to implement programs which would reduce the financial burden on law students to encourage public interest and non-profit work. The resolution passed comfortably. Resolutions 119A, 119B, and 119C were generally designed to relax the attorney client privilege rule and give attorney's more opportunity and freedom to report violations of law to higher authorities under certain situations. The Law School Division did not adopt the resolutions, but the ABA House of Delegates chose to adopt similar resolutions. Resolution 120 encouraged law students and schools to incorporate education about domestic violence into their respective curriculums. The resolution did not pass primarily due to concerns about political motivations and questionable drafting. Finally, the Law School Division elected three representatives to the ABA House of Delegates to serve one year terms.

d.      Commencement: 3Ls voted on grad speaker and now up to Dean Young. Administration wants to change date: see above.

e.       Student Services : WHERE IS THE LOCKER BINDER???

f.        State of Community Service: decent turnout at 1L event. EJF sponsored by providing water – if other groups want to do this please contact Jocelyn. Other events in the works: will be having another park clean up day on Saturday, September 13th.  We are also looking into having a sky dive event this fall.  October 2nd is the Light the Night Walk to raise money for leukemia/lymphoma research.  We will also try to have another park clean up day in October.  For November, we are planning a canned food drive for immunity and hopefully raise money to participate in the angel tree program.

g.      Alumni Relations: combining 2 mentor/mentee programs à see above

h.      Constitution Overhaul: commended everyone, we need a complete overhaul. Voted on giving Jason and Corrie the power to have a committee to overhaul the Constitution.

VI.              Break out sessions

VII.           2003-2004 Planning – 45 minutes

a.      Ski trip this year: perhaps a spring break trip instead.

b.      Journal research: we need more research, another journal is needed. Environmental Law Association is working on some research, email neddy@law.gwu.edu for more info on that. We should find out whether the students even care before going forward.

c.       Free printing research: definitely need to work something out with the administration

d.      Student Committee with CDO: Good idea

e.       We need a revised method of debate to make meeting more efficient.