Every few weeks, your elected student government meets on a Wednesday night to talk about issues concerning the AMS. Agenda items can seem long, mysterious and confusing without the proper background, making it difficult to see how these issues affect students. Here’s what to watch out for in the upcoming AMS Council meeting on May 18:
New council
With the AMS and undergraduate societies having turnover in April and May, this will be the first meeting of the newly elected AMS Council. With fresh faces, it will be a meeting for summer committee appointments for both councillors and members at large (a.k.a. students who are not involved with the AMS). This year, the voting for councillor appointments is happening outside of Council, meaning that the appointment meeting will be much shorter and leave more room for members at large. If you’re interested in joining an AMS committee as a member at large, go to this link to find out more and come to AMS Council on Wednesday at 6 p.m.!
Committee appointments
You may be wondering why we have so many committees in the first place. AMS Council is big — really big — and it’s impossible to discuss everything as a large group. AMS committees give some of this work to a smaller group of councillors and students at large. Member at large positions give Council the opportunity to hear from new voices and is an accessible starting point for students that want to learn about and get involved with the AMS. Committees have specific issues they deal with, ranging from the AMS budget, sustainability, and university relations, all the way to hiring, AMS code and even a brewery! The appointments will be for the length of the summer and then Council will go through all of this again in September.
Governance
One specific committee of interest — the only new committee this year — is the Governance Review Implementation Committee. Created at the last Council meeting, this committee will take the approved recommendations of the AMS’s governance review and create specific implementations for the society. Having only four voting members, this committee will be key in shaping the AMS’s structure for future years.
Ian Sapollnik is a third-year economics student, a member of the UBC Vancouver Senate and a member of AMS Council. The views presented are his own.