By ABIGAIL SHEARER
Tiger Media Network
On Thursday, the Student Government Association hosted an Open Forum with four guest speakers, General Counsel Joe Bain, Vice President for Administration and Finance Wesley Wintch, Vice President for Student Affairs Joey Linn, and Provost Jill Arensdorf.
Wintch was asked about a tuition increase.
”Most universities are talking about a 3-5% increase in tuition”, Wintch said.
He said more information will be available next week and should be passed in June.
Later the speakers were asked about the pressures that come with recent policies surrounding DEI.
Bain said there is a lot of pressure at both state and federal levels.
“We have programs that are not segregating, separating, excluding or preferring people based on their race, ethnicity, gender, we should be in pretty good shape legally,” Bain said.
He said that because it is so unknown to look out for bills and monitor them.
Arensdorf said there is no consistent definition of what DEI is, which is a huge challenge.
“We all use the same words and everyone’s interpretation is different,” she said.
She also explained that finding a way for both students and staff to feel included and have a sense of belonging is challenging in many ways.
Later they discussed the university’s thoughts behind the Kansas Legislature’s anti-tenure bill.
Arensdorf said the university has consistently opposed the proposal.
“The university was not in favor of it and still is not in favor of it,” she said.
Bain said the bill came as a surprise to the university.
“It may come back up next year, and the best thing to do is to monitor this bill,” he said.
Other topics that were discussed included the personal goals of the speakers.
- Arensdorf’s goal is to help bring both on-campus and online students closer together.
- Bain’s goal is to help innovate the university.
- Linn’s goal was to have a student success center, now that it is completed, his goal is to get students more involved.