Student Senate

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Student Senate

Student Senate

Senate President	Ashton Charles
Senate President Pro Tempore	Naadira Renfroe
Majority Leader	Joseph Regalado
Opposition Leader	Emily Hunt
Members	100
Unite Party seats	89
Orange and Blue Party seats	2
Progress Party seats	7
Independent seats	2
Last election	September 29-30, 2009
Meeting place	282 J. Wayne Reitz Union
Meeting day and time	Tuesday at 7:30 PM

The Student Senate is the legislative branch of Student Government. Its composition, powers, and procedure are established in Article III of the Student Body Constitution. The Senate is comprised of 100 Senators, with half elected in the spring and half elected in the fall. Senators elected in the spring represent the various colleges and independent schools as well as freshmen, sophomores, and graduate students. Fall Senators represent the on-campus residence halls, family housing, and the off-campus districts based on zip codes.

The Senate meets in Room 282 of the J. Wayne Reitz Union every Tuesday night at 7:30 PM (7:00 in the summer semesters).

[edit] Membership

[edit] Qualifications

The qualifications for Student Senators are the same as that for holding office in any other registered student organization. They must be full-time students with a 2.5 cumulative GPA (3.0 for graduate students), have no outstanding debt to the university, and be free of conduct probation. The Dean of Students Office checks these eligibility requirements every term and informs the Student Government staff if any Senator fails to meet these requirements.

Senators in the fall class must reside for a majority of the time within the districts they represent. The only exceptions are if a residence temporarily becomes uninhabitable or if Senators move to a different area for the summer semesters. Likewise, Senators in the spring class must be enrolled in the college or classified as the academic group they represent. Senators representing freshmen and sophomores must have under 30 or 60 hours at the time they take office.

[edit] Term and elections

Senators serve one-year terms, with the Senate divided into a fall and spring class, each class elected at those times. The fall class represents the 12 on-campus residence areas, family housing, and the off-campus areas, which are divided into five districts based on zip code. The spring class represents freshmen, sophomores, juniors or higher based on college or academic unit, professional schools, and graduate students.

Article VI of the Student Body Constitution provides for fall and spring general elections, held on the sixth week of the fall semester and on the week of the last Tuesday of February respectively. Elections are held for two days, with voting on Tuesday and Wednesday during each of these weeks. Senators are elected with a plurality vote, with the only runoffs in Student Government elections being for the executive races. Polling locations are determined by the Student Government Elections Commission, and a paper ballot system with optical readers is used in all races.

Parties choose their candidates in a process referred to as slating approximately three weeks before elections. Potential candidates come to the Reitz Union and complete a qualification process with the Supervisor of Elections, at which time they are given a carbon copy of a qualification form. At this point, potential candidates can choose to either run as independents or can interview and give their form to a political party. A potential candidate is said to have "slated" with a political party when the party receives his or her form. After the qualifying period ends, which is at 5:00 PM on the Tuesday three weeks before elections, parties hold internal primaries to select their candidates.

While some Senators represent single-member districts, most come from multi-member districts either representing large residence areas or academic divisions. Electors vote for any number of candidates up to the number of available seats, with the candidates receiving the most votes winning the race. This election method is very disproportional, allowing parties to sweep up to 13 seats even in extremely close races. This election method was successfully challenged as being unconstitutional, which led to the Constitutional Crisis of 1994 and a temporary halt of Student Government elections. However, with the resolution of the crisis, the same plurality voting method is used to this day.

[edit] Apportionment

The Senate conducts apportionment every fall semester, with the changes taking effect in the spring. While the size of classes can range from 40 to 50 members, a recent trend has developed to keep the size of each class at 50 Senators. There are no constitutional requirements on the methods for apportionment, which has led to apportionments being used that do not mathematically reflect student populations.

The current apportionment of the Senate is as follows:

[edit] Fall Class

Beaty Towers: 1 seat
Broward Hall: 1 seat
Family Housing: 2 seats
Graham Area: 1 seat
Hume Hall: 1 seat
Jennings Hall: 1 seat
Keys Residential Complex: 1 seat
Lakeside Residential Complex: 1 seat
Murphree Area: 1 seat
Rawlings Hall: 1 seat
Reid-Yulee-Mallory Area: 1 seat
Springs Residential Complex: 1 seat
Tolbert Area: 1 seat
District A (32601, 32609, 32641): 8 seats
District B (32603, 32605, 32606, 32653): 8 seats
District C (32607): 6 seats
District D (32608): 13 seats
District E (all other zip codes): 1 seat

[edit] Spring Class

Accounting: 1 seat
Architecture: 1 seat
Agriculture and Life Sciences: 3 seats
Building Construction: 1 seat
Business Administration: 3 seats
Dentistry: 1 seat
Education: 1 seat
Engineering: 3 seats
Fine Arts: 1 seat
Graduate Students: 7 seats
Heath and Human Performance: 1 seat
Public Heath and Health Professions: 1 seat
Journalism and Communications: 2 seats
Law: 1 seat
Liberal Arts and Sciences: 8 seats
Medicine: 1 seat
Nursing: 1 seat
Pharmacy: 1 seat
Undergraduate Freshmen Class: 4 seats
Undergraduate Sophomore Class: 7 seats
Veterinary Medicine: 1 seat

[edit] Officers

[edit] Member officials

Article III of the Student Body Constitution establishes the offices of Senate President and Senate President Pro Tempore. The Senate President presides over most sessions of the Student Senate, and is assisted by the Senate President Pro Tempore, who also presides in the Senate President's absence. The Senate President and President Pro Tempore, along with committee chairmen, almost always come from the majority party. Other titular positions, such as Sergeant at Arms, are also typically given to members of the majority.

Each political party with seats in the Senate elects a party leader, who serves as that party's spokesperson in the Senate. Parties can also elect an assistant party leader, and sometimes have whips and other party officers if the party's caucus is large enough. If a party has eight or more seats, or forms a coalition with eight or more seats, the leader of that party or coalition also sits on the Replacement and Agenda Committee.

[edit] Non-member officials

The Senate's chief non-member officer is the Senate Secretary, who maintains the records and assists in the administration of the Senate. The Secretary attends meetings of the Senate and records the minutes, or the official record of its meetings. The Senate Secretary is a non-student employee of Student Government. The current Senate Secretary is Glenda Frederick.

The Senate Parliamentarian is appointed by the Senate President, and advises the presiding officer and other Senators on the procedures of the Senate and parliamentary law.

The Senate also has several liaison positions, serving as a link between the Senate and the cabinet, judicial branch, and finance division. These liaisons can sometimes be Senators, but can also be non-members as well.

[edit] Procedures

[edit] Meeting procedure

Meetings of the Senate are governed by the Rules and Procedures of the Student Senate and Robert's Rules of Order Newly Revised. Meetings follow an agenda set by the Replacement and Agenda Committee comprised of officer and committee reports and readings of legislation. All meetings of the Senate are open to the public, and the agenda always includes a public debate time giving students one minute each to address the Senate.

Debate on legislation and other matters follows a pro-con structure with three rounds of three minutes each, followed by a fourth round of four minutes each. This debate follows five minutes of presentation and five minutes of technical questions about the legislation. Some questions do not follow the pro-con structure, in which case each Senator may speak for five minutes twice on every question.

Most votes in the Senate are conducted by voice, but votes have been held by rising vote or hand vote as well. On the demand of one-fifth of the members present, a roll call vote is conducted, in which case a member of the Rules and Ethics Committee calls the roll and records how each Senator votes.

The Student Body Constitution provides that a majority of the Senate, or 51 Senators, constitutes a quorum to conduct business. If less than that number are present and a quorum call is conducted, the Senate typically adjourns.

Senators wishing to speak must be recognized by the presiding officer, who is referred to as "Mr. President" or "Madam President". Under the Senate's rules, speeches are supposed to be addressed to the presiding officer, but this is rarely followed in practice.

[edit] Legislation

Legislation submitted to the Senate is due every week by Friday at 5:00 PM. Once submitted, it is referred to the appropriate committee (usually Judiciary). After being heard by the committee, it is sent to the Senate floor with either a favorable or unfavorable recommendation, and sometimes with amendments brought by the committee.

Bills must be passed on two separate readings to become law, while resolutions and special requests for allocations only require one reading.

[edit] Attendance

Senators are required to attend meetings, and failure to do so adds absences to a Senator's record. With roll calls at the start and end of each meeting, every roll call missed counts as a half absence. Additionally, missed roll call votes and quorum calls count as half absences, but a Senator can only receive one absence per meeting. Absence excuses are heard by the Rules and Ethics Committee and are classified as either excused or unexcused. Senators are allowed three unexcused absences and 4.5 combined excused and unexcused absences. Once either of these levels are met, a Senator automatically resigns by non-attendance.

[edit] Committees

A large amount of the Senate's work is conducted within committees. While most of the work occurs within the six standing committees of the Senate, the Senate can also create select committees by resolution and the Senate President can charter ad hoc committees that conduct specific and usually short-term work.

The membership of the other standing committees is recommended by the Replacement and Agenda Committee, whose membership consists of the Senate President, President Pro Tempore, two members elected from the Senate at large, and the leader of every party or coalition with eight or more members. While the size of the Replacement and Agenda Committee varies based on the number of qualified political parties and coalitions, every other standing committee has nine members.