USG discusses COMBO and summer storage

The USG discussed the upcoming report of the Committee on Background and Opportunity and the summer storage initiative at its meeting Sunday night.

Members of the USG discussed the questions that will be asked in the forthcoming COMBO IV survey and the fact that students will be hired to complete the data analysis. The survey, like its predecessors, aims to gather information on broad social and academic trends at the University.

The questions will be very similar to those asked in the COMBO III survey, but the questions regarding demographic information will be moved to the end of the survey in order to avoid causing survey respondents to be influenced by racial stereotypes.

U-Councilor Elan Kugelmass ’14 pointed out that the “perennial delays” that the USG encountered with COMBO III had to do in part with the fact that students were completing the analysis, so he wondered if it would be more efficient to get professionals to complete the analysis.

“One of the reasons why we like to have undergraduates crunch the numbers is because we want COMBO to be a fully undergraduate-written, undergraduate-run, undergraduate-analyzed survey,” U-Councilor Zhan Okuda-Lim ’15 said.

The COMBO IV survey is scheduled to be released on Dean’s Date, and students will be able to submit responses to the survey through the first week of summer. The report should be released in the fall of 2013, USG president Shawon Jackson ’15 said.

Class of 2016 senator Ella Cheng presented on the Food Committee’s initiatives with special attention to the feedback the committee received from its recent meeting with Executive Director of Dining Services Stuart Orefice.

Cheng is a staff writer for The Daily Princetonian.

The discussion focused mostly on reducing traffic at the Wu-Wilcox dining hall and the Center for Jewish Life as well as the possibility of offering late meal to residential college advisers.

In order to lessen overcrowding, Cheng asked what initiatives could be launched in order to avoid the problem. Cheng said that Orefice considered implementing a take-out system at the Forbes College dining hall, but Cheng said she liked the idea of having it at the Rockefeller-Mathey dining hall instead.

“Having take-out containers in maybe only some of the dining halls might encourage people to go to the other dining halls,” class of 2016 senator Eduardo Lima suggested.

The committee is also looking to offer late meal credit to RCAs so they can have another opportunity to eat with their advisees.

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Class of 2014 senator Charissa Shen, who is also an RCA in Butler College, said the initiative is “definitely worth pursuing” since her 'zees go to late meal often and it would be easy to set up one-on-one conversations at late meal.

The Food Committee will write a proposal for these changes and others, including academic break guest swipes and vegetarian options, using the feedback from the Senate.

The USG also discussed the Summer Storage Initiative, which provides an inexpensive means for students to store their possessions during the summer.

According the USG’s agenda, students will be able to pick up empty boxes in the USG office between May 1 and 3. Students will then be able to drop off boxes for storage May 16–17 and May 23–24.

“One thing that was difficult for me when I was either dropping off or picking up my boxes was actually bringing them to the site, just because I live down campus from where they were being picked up,” USG social chair Carla Javier ’15 said. She suggested that it might be helpful to have a way to organize or evenly distribute the orange carts that can carry boxes to the site and encourage students to team up to bring boxes.

Javier is a senior writer for the ‘Prince.’

According to Class of 2015 senator Deana Davoudiasl, USG’s SSI did not lose any boxes last year, while the Moving and Storage Agency, which is part of Student Agencies, misplaced 10 to 15 boxes last summer.

Projects Board co-chair Jared Peterson ’14 also attended the meeting to request $3,091 for the Colosseum Club’s upcoming dodgeball tournament. The money will be used to pay for pizza and referees at the event.