by Heather R. Gabel
ASUNM Vice President
and Charlene Sevilla
ASUNM Senator
I would like to start this column by reminding all members of the undergraduate student body that the ASUNM Elections Packets are due in the ASUNM Office in the Student Services Center, Room 262, by 5 p.m. today.
If you have ever been interested in running for one of the elected positions such as ASUNM president, vice president or senator, now is your chance.
Spring is finally here and we will be sponsoring various events in the next couple weeks to mark the occasion. Some of these include: ASUNM’s Student Special Events presentation by Gil White on “How to travel Europe for only 84 cents a day.” So anyone looking for an adventurous summer vacation in Europe make sure you are at Dane Smith Hall, Room 125, on Wednesday, April 2 at 12:30 p.m. for a great speaker and free pizza. SSE will be sponsoring various groups during “Live at Lunch” near the Duck Pond on April 3, 4, 7 and 9 at noon.
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On April 7, ASUNM will be hosting an open house at the Duck Pond, please come by and see what we are all about! Spring Storm is coming on April 12 and we have over 800 volunteers signed up for this event! If you signed up a group for Spring Storm, please make sure you have at least one member at the group representative meeting held on Friday, April 4 from 1-2 p.m. in Dane Smith Hall, Room 120. ASUNM has a lot of exciting events in the next couple weeks and we hope to see you there.
In previous articles this semester you have read about the ASUNM Senate’s goals for the spring semester and the respective ad hoc committees that were formed to accomplish these goals.
So far, you have been able to read a detailed column about one of these committees, the Recycling Committee. Today, you are going to read about the activities of the Safety Promotion Committee.
The Safety Promotion Committee was formed to complete the ASUNM Senate goal of increasing “awareness and prevention of sexual assault on campus through increased campus security, comment boxes, distribution of pamphlets, and hosting of workshops.”
The committee has met with groups both on and off of campus in hopes of accomplishing this Senate goal. Some of the groups that the committee has been able to meet with include the University of New Mexico’s Campus Safety Committee, the Albuquerque Rape Crisis Center, SEPAS and Campus Watchers.
The Campus Safety Committee and the ASUNM Safety Promotion Committee have set a tentative date of April 23 to sponsor a Campus Safety Walk. We will be having a full Senate meeting on that Wednesday, April 23 at 6 p.m. in the Kiva Lecture Hall and would like to have the Campus Safety Walk directly following. We encourage all students who are concerned about their safety on campus to join us for this meeting and walk the campus that night to note any safety concerns.
With the help of the Rape Crisis Center, the committee is in the process of writing and distributing a pamphlet that explains what can be done if a person is sexually assaulted. This will be a great resource but the best thing we can do as a Senate is to address sexual assault prevention. We plan on doing this through an educational workshop co-sponsored by ASUNM, the Albuquerque Rape Crisis Center, SEPAS, the Interfraternity Council and the Panhellenic Council.
The tentative date for this workshop will be on Sunday, April 27, with the time and location to be announced. The purpose of this workshop will be to educate students on sexual assault. The goal of programming will be aiming to dispel myths about sexual assault, provide concrete legal definitions of rape and to explain the emotional and legal ramifications of sexual assault to members of the UNM community.
Possible guest speakers will include members of the Board at the Rape Crisis Center and associates of the Albuquerque Police Department.
If you or an organization you are involved in would like to attend the above workshop, help as a sponsor, or get involved with any of our other projects please feel free to contact a member of the ASUNM Safety Promotion Committee.
The committee is being chaired by Senator Sevilla and includes Sens. Chavez, Cisneros, Conrad, Giron-Carpenter and Torres. You can find their contact information and office hours on the ASUNM webpage located at www.unm.edu/~asunm.
Or you can speak to the Senators at our next ASUNM committee meeting this Wednesday, April 2 at 5:30 and 6 p.m. Call 277-5528 for locations.
