Amherst College Student Athlete Advisory Committee

Amherst College Student-Athlete Advisory Committee Meeting
February 10, 2008

• Getting SAAC t-shirts
• Benson has made a few designs, one will be chosen
• Suzanne Coffey is funding everything
• National Girls and Women in Sports Day
• Very successful
• Whitney passes on a huge thank you to everyone
• One girl said “best day of my life”...awwwww
• Teammates really enjoyed working with kids in the community
• Offered an opportunity to be a part of the community where athletes might otherwise not have the time
• NESCAC SAAC
• Meeting cancelled due to inclement weather
• NCAA Post graduate scholarships
• Deadline coming up 3/20
• Cashing in against Cancer change drive
• All NESCAC schools competing
• One month period
• Twenty collection bins
• Team locker rooms, Val, Keefe
• Put tables up at basketball and hockey games to advertise
• Several members volunteered to campaign at games
• Penny war
• Penny’s are positive, silver coins are negative in others’ buckets
• Gudrun and Kelly taking charge
• Safety of buckets of change in locker rooms?
• Put a bucket at the front desk—there’s always a monitor there
• 1st seed in NESCAC men’s basketball, likely to host other sports as well
• We should do something as a SAAC at these games
• What we’re doing needs to be sportsmanlike, need to clear event with Dan Fisher
• We should form a committee
• Sarah Harper, Whitney, Sarah Johnston
• Spirit competition?
• 3-point contest during halftime of basketball games
• Half court shot
• Lord Jeff mascot tryout at one of the games to stage their skills
• National Student Athlete Day on 4/6/08
• Honoring students with a certain GPA
• Dinner for elite student-athletes
• Community Relations committee
• Funding options
• Discretionary funds through AAS (budget next semester)
• Program board, campus center, interdepartmental student funds can co-sponsor events
• CCE has community engagement funds
• Proposal due 2/21
• National Sportsmanship Day on 3/4/08
• Sportsmanship Committee
• Funding options
• Discretionary funds through AAS (budget next semester)
• Program board, campus center, interdepartmental student funds can co-sponsor events
• CCE has community engagement funds
• Proposal due 2/21
• ***Club budget for Fall 2008 due sometime in April
• CCE has a “Raising Our Voices” panel dealing with issues of intolerance across campus
• Coach Mills, President Marx will be on campus
• Athletes should attend
• Athletics liaisons from CCE
• Help bridge the gap between community engagement and athletics
• Help us with funding
• Help plan events
• Example: CCE paid for t-shirts we gave to girls at Girls and Women in Sports Day
• Sub-Committee Reports
• Community Service
• Athletes getting involved with pre-school kids at Woodside
• An hour or two working with kids in the mornings
• Very close to campus
• Sign-up for in advance
• Might require a CORI check
• Habitat for Humanity
• Women’s soccer went this weekend, got work done
• Men’s soccer went two(?) weeks ago
• Make sure you have ten people (minimum), pick up athletes from other teams
• Sportsmanship
• Trying to get t-shirts that incorporate “be loud, be proud, be positive”
• Trouble with funding, AAS would not give $$ until they first spoke with other funding sources
• Requested $2000 for about 300-400 shirts,
• Suzanne is going to help with this
• National Sportsmanship Day
• Ideas?
• Publicity
• Buddied up all teams
• Benson has a list, read off during meeting
• Tickers
• Administration has talked about it in the past
• IT director is getting a group of students together to get on this, we will heckle him
• Competition for New Lord Jeff
• Two people will have the job
• Haven’t yet decided on what the competition will entail
• Event in Johnson Chapel?
• Debate, speech, dance off, craziest person we can find
• Important to do incognito
• Speech—why they should represent Amherst athletics
• We could incorporate this into halftime at a championship game
• Amherst athletes should have a lot of say in who gets chosen
• If we can’t make it available to every athlete, we could film it, make it available on website, people can have a window for voting
• Could be a core part of NESCAC finals
• Two chosen Jeffs need to go to at least one event of every sport each season, as many NESCAC and national events as possible
• Paid position?
• SAAC doesn’t think it should be
• But it’s an enormous time commitment, would be more of an incentive to get paid
• Want to talk to Suzanne about funding
• AAS has certain procedures for paid positions
• Accountability—how are we holding them to this contract
• We need a certain level of dedication from mascot
• Keep going on the weekly flyers
• Community Relations
• Haven’t met yet, need to reconvene and chat about stuff
• Professor Sarat’s meeting last semester
• Access from Back of Building during the winter
• Suzanne followed up
• Policy is not changing
• Difference between walking to front door/walking to back door is about 50 steps
• Would make custodian’s job much more difficult
• More expensive for campus police to alarm, keypad, etc.
• Why is it seasonal?
• 50 winter steps are way worse than 50 fall/spring steps
• In the winter non-Amherst students are more likely to want to be in the building, there are always more in the building if we leave those doors open
• Front door swipe allows us to know who is currently in the building
• Some accountability at the front door, helps with security
• Why does someone sit at the back door?
• So the back door doesn’t get propped
• Death path that goes across memorial hill
• Lighting, safety on wooden steps
• Maybe more of a physical plant problem, Stan Adams question?
• Spotlight and handrail on steps?
• Jim Brasser, head of Phys Plant, has been contacted
• Suzanne is going to follow up on this
• AAS involvement
• Forces individual organizations to go to other sources force to mitigate costs
• CCE has a lot more money than AAS
• Sentiment on the BC—what is really important to spend money on?
• Can’t go against written Constitution
• Wants to know what kind of ideas SAAC has, and what funding will be like from the athletic department
• Athletic department tighter on money than CCE?
• AAS sees the SAAC as a group created by the athletic department, regardless of the fact that we are recognized as a club, worries AAS
• Meeting end: 8:06