ASG to train student group leaders on accessibility, inclusion

Shane McKeon, Assistant Campus Editor

Associated Student Government leaders announced Wednesday plans to train student group leaders on issues of accessibility and inclusion.

During the last Senate session of the year, SESP sophomore Matt Herndon, ASG’s vice president for accessibility and inclusion, said his committee will help pilot the program with ASG executive board members and senators in the fall.

“A lot of groups can remain exclusive to students of a lot of different identities,” Herndon said.

He said Michele Enos, assistant director for Campus Inclusion and Community, will administer the four-hour long program.

Senate also passed a resolution calling on the University to remove a $2,000 per quarter cap on donations to Points for a Purpose, a group that fights food insecurity in Cook County. Students can contribute their leftover meal points to the group during the last two weeks of each quarter.

Currently, the resolution’s sponsors said, Northwestern Dining stops accepting meal points once $2,000 is reached.

Weinberg junior Dean Meisel, one of the group’s co-founders, said the Points for a Purpose has grown from giving out peanut butter and jelly sandwiches to providing fresh produce and Thanksgiving meals. He said the fundraising cap prevents the group from continuing to provide those services.

Executive Vice President Christina Kim also said ASG will continue its attempts to put more students on a faculty task force examining undergraduate academic experience. The push follows Provost Daniel Linzer’s comments to The Daily that adding more students to the committee would be “counterproductive.”

“It is unacceptable that there is one student on it,” she said.

Senate also approved more than $18,000 in B-status funding for Fall Quarter 2015.

Of a $935 pool set aside for supplemental B-status funding, Senate allocated $250 to Vertigo Productions; $200 to A-NU-Bhav, a Bollywood dance team; $100 to Japan Club; and $300 to Stitch magazine.

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