On Thursday, March 13, Macalester College Student Government (MCSG)’s Legislative Body (LB) met in the Weyerhaeuser Boardroom to hear from guest speakers and discuss budget and fundraising updates.
Abbey Kamin, associate director for the Outreach Center, kicked off the meeting with a presentation about Give to Macalester Days. The annual program, which will take place from April 2 – 4, raises money for the Macalester Fund. This fund provides financial support for a wide range of Macalester programs, from scholarships to athletics to Mac Explore trips.
“Philanthropy, for any institution, is important,” Kamin said. “Tuition only supports, for Macalester, 65% of the funding of the entire institution and … the Macalester Fund and the endowment is the other 35% of our budget.”
Kamin encourages all members of the Macalester community to donate to the Macalester Fund during Give to Macalester Days. Donors can designate a specific recipient for their money, such as the open pantry, or can send their money to the “Support It All” section. In addition, the fundraising campaign will feature a number of matching grants. For instance, the Board of Trustees (BoT) will give $100 for every $5 donated by a Macalester student.
Give to Macalester Days is part of the Brighter campaign, but does not bill itself with the Brighter logo so as not to tire community members with Brighter-related communications.
Kamin was succeeded by another presenter: Paige Olowu, the project director for the Department of Justice Office on Violence Against Women grant. Olowu explained the grant and the programs it is funding.
The grant provides $300,000 over a three-year period. Macalester received the funds in 2021 and renewed them for a year on Sept. 30, 2024. In addition to the $300,000, the grant funds one 0.75 FTE (full-time employment) professional staff position and calls for the creation of a team of students, faculty and staff that works to prevent sexual violence.
In September 2023 an advocacy program supported by the grant was launched. This program provides free, confidential victim service assistance for a total of 11 hours a week, spread out over four days. Its services include crisis counseling, safety planning, support with paperwork and medical care and referrals to housing, financial and transportation resources.
Students seeking services can access them in from OutFront MN on Mondays from 12:30 – 3:30 p.m., from the Saint Paul Intervention Project on Tuesdays from 2:30 – 4:30 p.m., from Ramsey County SOS on Wednesdays from 1 – 4 p.m. and from Isuroon on Thursdays from 2 – 5 p.m.
The grant money has also gone to the creation of emergency spaces: furnished rooms in which survivors of sexual assault and students experiencing housing problems, such as roommate conflict or mold, can stay temporarily. These rooms are available to students living on or off campus. Although the rooms are designed to be temporary, there is currently no time limit restricting students’ stay.
“The role of this program is to decrease the barriers to disclose information and provide a coordinated response to sexual misconduct,” Olowu said.
To get access to an emergency room during business hours, students can contact Residential Life. After hours, they can call Public Safety.
Financial Affairs Committee (FAC) Chair David Christenfeld ’27 then introduced an FAC request from BIPOC Athletes for the upcoming Scot Ball on April 4. He noted that FAC had amended the request from $6815.57 to $4018.07, removing two requests for bandanas and cowboy hats because they exceeded the spending limit for gifts.
When asked to contextualize the request within the remaining budget, Christenfeld explained that this will likely be the last large request of the semester, and he isn’t concerned about their ability to operate for the remainder of the year.
“I think we’re pretty healthy for where we usually are in the budget,” Christenfeld said. “We have a lot left. We haven’t dipped into our reserves for anything.”
The Scot Ball request was approved with 26 in favor and 1 abstaining.
Next, President Joel Sadofsky ’25 presented updates from the Matched Fundraising Working Group. He explained that as part of the BoT’s response to the Mac for Palenstine’s divestment proposal the BoT had pledged a $50,000 matched fundraising offer for aid in conflict zones, and announced that the fundraising had been finalized and approved.
He explained that they wanted to create a digestible fundraising split and prioritize direct humanitarian aid and refugee resettlement. The Matched Fundraising Working Group avoided funding military escalation, and focused on organizations with lower philanthropic exposure and low administrative costs.
“We wanted to include the orgs with less philanthropic exposure,” Sadofsky said. “There’s lots of organizations that are affiliated with the [United Nations] or the Red Cross, who are all doing great work, but we also want to try to include organizations that don’t get as much visibility from major donors.”
52 percent of the final fundraising split will go towards Palestinian aid, with 26 percent going to Cooperative for Assistance and Relief Everywhere’s Middle East Crisis Fund and 26 percent to Ghassan Abu Sittah Children’s Fund. The other 48 percent will be split three ways between Sudan Relief Fund, Nova Ukraine and Action Kivu, each receiving 16 percent.
“We wanted to include multiple important causes and several major conflict zones of the world, but we also wanted to center aid in Gaza and the West Bank as a primary benefactor, due to the severity and escalation of violence in Gaza, and also due to the activism that led to this matched fundraising offer,” he said.
Sadofsky told the LB that the fundraiser would be able to go live sometime after spring break, noting that they’re hoping not to overlap too much with Give to Macalester Days in an effort to avoid fundraiser fatigue.
Vice President Ryan Connor ’25 then described changes to the MCSG proposed bylaws, explaining that they “removed a lot of redundancies” and “added some processes that we do that aren’t actually written down anywhere.”
He highlighted a new section codifying the process for unexpected vacancies, removals and position changes. Cabinet Chair Philomena Shuffelton-Sobe ’26 also explained that the positions of Residential Life & Dining Liaison and the Infrastructure & Sustainability Liaison had been split up and are now the Residential Life & Infrastructure Liaison and Dining & Sustainability Liaison.
“We think it’s going to be more effective in terms of what departments liaisons are working on because there’s more overlap between dining and sustainability than there is between residential life and dining,” she said. “We think this will make the work of all of the liaisons more equivalent.”
Connor also noted a change to the election code which now allows Executive Board members to endorse one other candidate for president or vice president.
During Cabinet updates, Residential Life & Dining Liaison Galjer Yangwaue ’27 went over efforts to add a fan and more anti-fatigue mats for Cafe Mac workers, as well as more toasters in the bagel station and a bowl of whole fruit at dinner.
Junior Class Representative Marina Moberg ’26 added that while Bon Appetit has improved their top nine allergen labeling, she is still working on getting them to label gelatin for Jewish and Muslim students. She also explained that, according to Bon Appetit general manager Amy Tomes, Cafe Mac didn’t have a concrete plan to accommodate students observing Ramadan this year because the Center for Religious and Spiritual Life (CRSL) didn’t reach out to them as they usually do.
“I told her that’s really not okay,” Moberg said, “We need to have consistent Ramadan programming. And so we made the decision to roll that into Galjer [Yangwaue]’s role, so hopefully that will be part of the job of the Residential & Dining Liaison, to work with Amy on planning that in advance and working with CRSL to make sure that we aren’t leaving our Muslim students behind as they’re observing Ramadan.”
During committee updates, the Communications & Engagement Committee announced it was planning an Executive Board Town Hall called ‘Scoop and Share’ on April 2 from 4:30 – 6 p.m. in the Weyerhaeuser Boardroom.
Sadofsky concluded the meeting by encouraging LB members to file for upcoming Executive Board elections and apply to be the new student liaison to the BoT.
