ASUO Executives start work
during summer transition
Filling staff positions and beginning initial talks
about rollover meal points have been priorities
BY TYLER GRAF
FREELANCE REPORTER
The summer months have present
ed little respite for new ASUO Execu
tives Adam Walsh and Kyla Coy, and
the future will surely present more of
the same. From hiring staff members
to contract group disputes and ASUO
office reorganization to maintaining
platform promises, the transition from
Adam Petkun and Mena Ravassipour’s
administration to Walsh and Coy’s has
been a whirlwind education in leam
as-you-go student politics.
Relative newcomers to the ASUO,
Walsh believes that he and Coy
have hit the ground running and
haven’t lost sight of their overall
goals, despite the masses of paper
work littering their desks.
Walsh and Coy say they intend to
stay true to their campaign promise to
reform and restructure the University.
But some reforms are born
of necessity.
With the loss of Accounting Coordi
nator Jen Creighton, who moved to
Physical Activity and Recreation Ser
vices, a revamped and simplified ac
countant position has opened up. The
new accounting position will have a
narrower focus than the Accounting
Coordinator position, restricted to
overseeing and training the controllers.
Another familiar face will also be
leaving Suite 4 in the near future:
Brandy Ota.
Ota will remain the ASUO’s Admin
istrative Assistant until fall term, when
she will transfer to the Women’s Cen
ter to take over for Lori Brown, the cur
rent Office Coordinator for the
Women’s Center. The Administrative
Assistant position will change, in title
and structure, after Ota leaves. In a re
versal of roles, the new office admin
istrator will oversee the accountant.
The restructuring will also increase
the position’s salary; the position will
change from a classified position to
an administrative position.
Walsh and Coy have already hired
a number of staff members, includ
ing Cassandra Day as campus out
reach coordinator and Ty Schwoef
ferman as multicultural advocate,
but they still have positions to fill.
Elections Coordinator, a nine-month
stipend position in charge of over
seeing student government elec
tions, remains open, and Walsh and
Coy are actively seeking applicants.
One of the most recent hires is Brett
Rowlett, who will take over as Campus
Organizer — through a contract with
OSA — in August once current Campus
Organizer Courtney Height steps down.
Rowlett is not a student at the Universi
ty of Oregon, but he has had experi
ence in student government, serving
as the Campus Organizer for Lane
Community College.
Aside from hiring new staff mem
bers, Walsh and Coy have been work
ing on revamping the University’s meal
plan, which was a large portion of their
campaign platform. Under Walsh and
Coy’s plan, unused meal points could
rollover and be used in the future in
stead of going to waste.
“We haven’t forgotten about it,”
said Walsh.
Walsh said that initial talks with
Todd Mann, president of the
Residence Hall Association, have
gone well.
"It’s something that is feasible,”
said Walsh. “It may not come out
exactly the way we picture it, but it
is feasible.”
Walsh cautioned that a revised
meal point program is a long-term
plan, and the earliest institution of
such a program would not happen
until fall 2006. Walsh and Coy still
have to discuss the plan with the
Office of Student Housing.
Complicating the transition of
power has been contract disputes
between the ASUO and Sexual As
sault Support Services, a non-profit
agency dedicated to ending sexual
violence and oppression. The dis
pute is a a hold-over from the
Petkun-Ravassipour administration
and centers on “double paying for
services,” as there are a number of
other student groups that already
offer the same services as SASS.
According to Walsh, the budget
process is a top priority.
Walsh said he plans to work on
executive recommendations for stu
dent group funding soon in order to
have them ready by November.
“In the past, executive recom
mendations have come pursuant to
the PFC (Programs Finance Com
mittee),” said Walsh. “In reality, it
should be the executives’ own idea,
their own recommendation.”
In the past, executive recommen
dations have coincided with budget
work done by the PFC. Separating
the two processes will maintain
checks and balances within the
ASUO, according to Walsh.
“The executive recommendation
should be a starting point for the
process,” said Walsh.
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Nitrogen: Discovery is a step
closer, but not the solution
Continued from page 1
While Tyler said they are not ex
pecting any commercial uses from
this discovery for 5-10 years or
more, it is a significant step that
can be used by other researchers
in the future.
“We’re building on advances
achieved during the last 20 years.
A lot of hard thought went into
this, not only by me and my stu
dents, but by other researchers
who came before us,” Tyler said in
a press release.
Greg Bolt of the Register Guard
quoted Tyler as saying, “in the eyes
of chemists, the conversion of nitro
gen to ammonia in water ... is the
‘holy grail’ of nitrogen fixation” (RG
July 6.) Tyler says that in reality he
said that the ‘’’holy grail” is the
problem of finding a reliable and ef
ficient way of producing ammonia,
^ L
a
while the conversion of nitrogen is
a step in the right direction.
Graduate student John Gilbert
son said that this process is “only
one turn of the cycle.”
“What we did scientifically was
very difficult, but we really
haven’t solved the problem yet,”
Tyler said, “we still have some
kinks to work out.”
The National Science Founda
tion provided the funding for this
research in a five-year grant. It cre
ated research positions in Materi
als Science through the IGERT (In
tegrative Graduate Education and
Research Traineeship) program.
An article with the details of the
discovery will be published in the
Journal of the American Chemical
Society on July 27, and can cur
rently be found at: pubs.acs.org.
nwilbur@dailyemerald.com
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