USG evaluates recent mental health initiative and newest TigerApp

Easop did add that the guest lecture by Dr. Oz was popular, however. In total, Easop said that Mental Health Week would have been strengthened by earlier advertising.

“In the future we should focus on how we package the information,” Easop said. “Some students said the week could have been considered as if we were being critical.”

USG Senate members also brought up the concern that the timing of some of the events early in the morning or late in the afternoon could have conflicted with students’ schedules.

Overall the week cost the student government $300, mostly towards sponsoring fitness classes and paying for advertisements.

Easop told the Senate that the release of the new Prospect Avenue Map had already generated positive feedback, garnering over 2,700 views since being released on Saturday. The application is a TigerApps online website developed by the USG which tells users details about which eating clubs are open on a given day of the week.

USG campus and community affairs chair Carmina Mancenon ’14 demonstrated the next TigerApp to be released, called TigerDeals. The website, which is modeled after the website Groupon.com, gives a new deal daily to students for purchases at stores in town.

Mancenon noted that the store Fruity Yogurt on Nassau Street already agreed to sell products to students at a 50 percent discount every Monday.

The website will also aim to produce a short video showcasing the store carrying the discount and the owners, Mancenon said.

Mancenon added that the website will focus on apparel and merchandise from local stores in addition to restaurants.

USG community service chair Brett Diehl ’15 outlined the plan for the USG’s “Month of Service” in April. Diehl noted that the plan is to “set a tone of community service being important on campus.” He also stressed the need for residential college involvement in the project as well as displays of the program during Princeton Preview.

To that end, the USG will heavily publicize its Campuswide Community Challenge website. The website was created by the USG last year but according to Diehl was heavily underutilized. On the website, students — and their affiliated organizations — can log their community service hours.

During the month of April, a “Clash of the Colleges” competition among the residential colleges will be run through the CCC website. The winner of the competition will be given a prize.

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Diehl also mentioned that the Community Service Committee has discussed having a high profile speaker be linked to a future USG community service initiative, similar to a program at George Washington University that involved a speech by First Lady Michelle Obama ’85.

At the end of the meeting, USG IT committee chair Josh Chen ’14 informed the Senate that OIT is seeking a recommendation about whether it should switch email clients from Microsoft Outlook to Gmail as well as whether to provide alumni with email accounts. OIT and USG are currently running a pilot program to test Gmail and Microsoft Office 365 as potential WebMail replacements.

Other peer institutions, such as Cornell, currently offer lifetime email accounts to alumni. Chen noted that OIT is willing to switch email clients in conjunction with USG.

Correction: Due to a reporting error, a previous version of this article misstated the USG Community Service Committee's interest in linking a high-profile speaker to a campus-wide initiative. Michelle Obama '85 was discussed because of a similar program she supported at the George Washington University, not because she was invited to participate in a Princeton program. The 'Prince' regrets the error.