Minutes of the Discussion on the Student Council (SC) Constitution Draft

The discussion started with the greetings of the SC President, after which he presented the purpose of the meeting. Then, he explained why it would not be possible to have elections in this month: “As the Constitution is not yet adopted, according to which the new elections of the Student Council should be organized in the month of November, these elections are not possible to have now.” He encouraged all the present students to ask questions, if there will be any during the reading process of the Constitution that he started to read one-by-one. No comments were given on the Preamble and the Article 1: Name. The Article 2: Purpose and Duties was commented by Atken Armenian, who asked about the usage of the phrase “governmental affairs” in this Article: “I wonder whether the student should be given an opportunity to represent the interests of students in governmental affairs.” One of the 1st year MBA students responded that, in case of a strike, for example, this phrase would give more weight to the Student Council. This idea was agreed upon by a PS 1st year student: “More weighty significance.” Thus, the SC Vice-President mentioned about this role related to external policies. In result, Atken Armenian explained that by “governmental affairs” he understood interference into any affairs of government. The SC President responded that that phrase was used in the meaning of “state affairs.” In addition, the SC President said that the Constitution included several limiting scopes in other Articles. The SC President presented an example of further growth of the Student Council that aims at being included in the Inter-University Cooperation Coalition and said that this growth implied more importance that the SC should have. However, Atken Armenian suggested to use “national and educational issues” instead of the “governmental affairs.” The SC President asked about what should be done in case of cultural and sports issues, and whether the change of the name, its reshaping would help. Atken Armenian proposed to replace it by “education and culture issues.” However, the SC Vice-President said that it would be better to leave as it was, so that the SC had that opportunity of voicing out.

Another comment of Atken Armenian was about a purpose of the SC Constitution: “promote cohesion within the student body, recognizing the rights of students from diverse backgrounds.” He suggested adding “the rights and responsibilities” as it is generally accepted. Moreover, Atken Armenian proposed to add one more purpose of the Student Council: “promote integrity and ethical behavior by all members of the University community” to prevent unethical behavior of any member of the AUA community. These suggestions were agreed upon and accepted.

Later on, the SC President started to explain the main ideas of the next Article: Article III. Authority and Powers. Thus, he specified why the phrase “delegation by the President of the University” was used in the beginning of that Article. According to him, this Constitution is supposed to be, first -- after considering all interested parties’ recommendations and suggestions (including the AUA President’s) -- approved by the students themselves, after which it will be presented to the AUA President for the final approval. Therefore, as the SC President claimed that Constitution would have a more important role, if it were approved by the AUA President also.

After presenting the Section 1 of Article III of the Constitution that was given no comments, the SC President presented the Section 2. Here, several comments were given. Thus, a MBA 1st year student asked what the verb form used in the first sentence of the Section 2: “shall have” implied. The SC President answered that it implied not having the power to do, but giving recommendations, if the students have asked about, for instance, calling a direct meeting of the Student Body. In addition, he put out that, in case of communication, there should be an access and possibility to ask whether the students agreed or not on any kind of issues.

The last sentence of the same Section was commented by Atken Armenian: “The Student Council shall have access to all records pertaining to these resources.” He presented such an example: “When a benefactor makes a donation and does not want that his or her name is revealed, what should be done? Does the phrase “shall have” imply knowing also the Oakland accounts that me too, I am not aware of?” There was a suggestion to change it into “may request.” But, the SC President answered that, in this case, that phrase might become meaningless. However, Atken Armenian, while emphasizing that “funds” meant “money,” suggested taking this part away. In response, the SC President explained that the students, while being in the center of the AUA, should be considered as customers, and they should know about contributions, for what purposes they were made, etc. This question remained open, although a SC Member suggested to add such a phrase: “if not confidential.” Another suggestion was “if not strictly confidential.”

During the discussion of the Section 3 of the same Article III: “Affiliation” the following suggestions were made: Atken Armenian proposed to add such as phrase: “confers all the rules and regulations,” meaning “does not contradict the general rules.” A MBA 1st year student asked with what kind of organizations the AUA SC shall have the power to affiliate. The SC President replied that new SC Constitution shall not contradict all rules and policies of AUA, in other words, AUA Constitution.

The main comment on the Section 4 of the same Article: “Organization and Self-Governance” was given by Atken Armenian who claimed that it would make sense to compact that section since the English version of that section included a lot of bla-bla. The SC President answered that it would be condensed. Then, Atken Armenian suggested adding that, in case of a student having his or her GPA decreased below 3.0, he or she should not have the right to vote during elections. However, this suggestion was not accepted since, as one of the SC Members claimed, it would lead to discrimination of students. Next, Atken Armenian said that the word “malfeasance” was not used appropriately in that Section and suggested to replace it by “activities inconsistent with this Constitution.” Here again, Atken Armenian suggested to add “conditions that don’t contradict this Constitution.” However, that suggestion was not accepted since it was considered that it would make sense to use it once and not repeat every time. Another suggestion was made by a MBA 1st year student: he suggested to add in the final part of that Section, where the idea of fund-raising campaign was introduced, “contributions from the American University of Armenia, other Universities, different organizations, NGOs ………and individuals.” Moreover, as one of the Academic Preparatory Program (APP) students was not aware what the abbreviation “NGOs” implied, it was said to spell out that word in the text.
Then, the SC President explained the new position that it was intended to introduce in the end of the same Section: President Emeritus. According to him, it was a newly created position the holder of which would have a right of the consultative voice. As he explained, this President Emeritus would be elected once per five years. The SC Vice-President added that no other University, except the Yerevan Medical University, had that position, which implied exchange of experience by already experienced Presidents of the Student Council to new ones. The SC President supplemented that, if a President was working well during his or her Presidency, he or she would help later on. However, he added that it did not imply that, in case of another President Emeritus being elected, the ex-President Emeritus did not anymore hold that position. Moreover, as the duties and responsibilities of the President Emeritus were not specified in the Constitution, the SC President said that they would be worked on, for sure.

The further discussion was on the Article IV: Membership. Here, the main point was the number of the SC Members that was specified in the Section 1 of that Article: Council Composition. A MBA 1st year student asked why not have 17 members of the Student Council. Moreover, Atken Armenian said that the number of 13 members that was given in the SC Constitution draft was an overestimated number, and that 5 members were sufficient to fulfill the duties and responsibilities of the SC. But the SC Vice-President argued that as the vision of the AUA was to become a regional institution, 5 persons were not enough to represent so many students that the AUA intended to have. Then, the SC President continued that even now, when there were 400 students, 11 SC members were not sufficient since, MBA, for example, had no representative in the Student Council, except the SC President himself. According to him, such representatives, united and elected by the department itself would lead to successful work. Then, he added that currently there were so many positions that the Student Council should perform, new positions such as Webpage Editor that should edit all the new information, work on the forum of the website, and they would be more extensive, such as the external affairs. Therefore, according to him, the duties and responsibilities of the Student Council would become more extended internally and externally. In addition, as one of the SC Members mentioned the learning process would be more and more complex, time-consuming, and it would not be possible to hold several positions at the same time. However, Atken Armenian was still afraid that this number of the SC Members would lead to bureaucratic practice.

Another suggestion was on the Section 2: Qualification of the same Article. Atken Armenian suggested to add the phrase “on good standing” for the students who could become members of the Student Council.
The further deliberation was about the election policies of the Student Council. First of all, the SC President presented the purpose of the Elections Commission, which was supposed to follow the elections results. He presented who should be included in this Commission. However, Atken Armenian argued that in order to be impartial, this Commission should have only one student representative there, and that student should not be running the elections. Besides that student, 1 representative from the Administration and 2 Faculty members should be present in that Commission. However, the SC President answered that, as the students elect their representatives, they should have the power to monitor and supervise the elections. Then, he added that, in case of appeals by students, the students themselves should make decisions on those appeals, and, as the voting would be electronic-based, the Webmaster also should be included in that Commission.

There was also another comment on what number of votes is necessary for any member to be elected. Thus, the SC President said that, first, it was discussed to have 50% or 25% of votes to be considered elected; later on, it was decided to leave: “a plurality of votes.” However, Atken Armenian suggested to take that second part: “a plurality of votes cast for the position is required” from that sentence away and just leave “There is no minimum number of votes required for election.”

The last comment for the Constitution was on the Article V, Section 2, where Atken Armenian suggested to add the dates for the APP representatives serving their terms: “from March to November.” However, the SC Vice-President argued that the current situation might change, and the dates would be no more representing the reality.

Then, the SC President started to present the innovation of the Student Council: the idea of E-voting. During that presentation, where all the steps necessary for electronic voting were presented, a PS 1st year student experimented that innovation and could test it successfully.

However, as the whole Constitution was not yet discussed during that meeting, the SC President presented the SC Proposed Plan of Actions by a PowerPoint presentation. According to this plan, the Constitution should be finalized and sent to the AUA President until the end of December 2002, so that this Constitution was adopted by the student body in the month of March 2003 and the new SC elections became possible in the Spring 2003.

Although Atken Armenian suggested to meet in late February to continue discussions of the draft on Sc Constitution, the present students agreed with the proposal of the SC President to meet as soon as possible (most probably on 29 November, 2002) and finish the discussion of the draft. After that to send the final version of the draft to the AUA President. Atken Armenian gave his e-mail address, so that comments are dropped by his mail. The SC President reminded the SC e-mail address for the same purpose. The meeting was over.