SGB summer activities

While the bulk of Pitt’s student body is focused on landing a last-minute summer job or… While the bulk of Pitt’s student body is focused on landing a last-minute summer job or picking a vacation spot, its student government is busy divvying up money for sports clubs and periodical subscriptions.

The board has allocated more than $12,000 since the end of the spring semester, splitting the money between five athletic clubs as they prepare for their fall seasons.

Organizations that received funds so far include Pittsburgh Club Baseball, Men’s and Women’s Ultimate Frisbee clubs and Shotokan Karate Club.

One application for funding, from Panther Field Hockey, is still pending. So is a decision on whether to bring The New York Times and USA Today college readership programs to campus.

The original proposal made by the publications was to bring 500 issues of each periodical a day for the fall and spring semesters, according to an e-mail sent by SGB president Charlie Shull.

In addition to the papers, each publication would regularly bring journalists to campus for lectures and workshops at no additional cost. The publications would also host Jeopardy games “to challenge the world knowledge of Pitt students,” all for a price tag of $60,000.

Shull said the board felt the original proposal was too expensive and asked for a new deal, which would reduce the number each publication delivered daily to 300 — nearly cutting the cost of the program in half.

The second deal is still under debate, Shull said.

Other activity from the board during the past weeks include a revamping of the Student Vote Coalition, piloted by the governmental relations chairwoman Alexa Jennings, and meetings with representatives from Pitt’s GPSA, Duquesne’s Student Government Association, Carnegie Mellon’s undergraduate and graduate student government and Point Park’s United Student Government.

At the meetings, Shull and other board members sought to continue work on a constitution that would create the Pittsburgh Student Government Council. Shull said the groups would convene for a third time in July to finalize the document and begin ratifying it before fall semester.