February 13, 2000

Honor Council Minutes

*no quote. power outage.*

Present: Katie Brinner, Koby Feingold, Lev Miskoen, Mike Ranen, Audrey Ference, Randy Ko, Lucy Lyon (Co-Chair), Noel Pacheco, Scott Burau, Sarah Domby, Jenn Louie, Ari Worthman, Hannah Dickinson, Mike Freedman, Celeste Moore

I. Moment of Silence

II. General Discussions

Welcome back for another fun semester. Because this is a brand new Council, we did introductions; some folks shared individual & group goals that they had. Jenn & Lucy handed out intro folders to all members, which included a copy of the ‘Huebner Guide to Being a Council Member’ and some other essentials. We are currently lacking one Council member because the option no vote won out for one of the positions in the freshman class. This election will be rerun.

To start things off right, we volunteered for various committees/projects that will be in action this semester: JSAAPP, the HC Board, Admissions, Faculty Relations, and Customs/HCO relations among others. If anyone has any suggestions or concerns for something that they would like to see in action, please contact any Council member (or call and leave a message at 896.2917).

Jenn & Lucy put out feelers (what a phrase) on the retreat that Council will undertake. In accordance with the Code, Council will undergo diversity training and will work on efficient and unbiased decision-making. It is most likely that the retreat will take place on the weekend of February 25. We’ll keep you posted on what happens.

We discussed the possibility of Code ratification online via the magical technology we have been using to vote in general elections and to complete surveys. Lucy read from the Code about the process of ratification. Jenn said that one positive to this method would be the ease of reading responses, while Ranen reminded us that the resolution that allowed online voting was precisely for that and not ratification. Sarah said that doing it online without a resolution that states such would be sketchy, but Audrey said it doesn’t seem to go against the spirit of the Code. It was ultimately decided that we will do a survey to see how the Community feels about it but will concern ourselves with actual online ratification in the future.

We briefly discussed what we can say when we are sitting at the table during ratification days. Noel explained that last year there were community members that were unhappy with what appeared to be pressure to ratify the Honor Code. Honor Council members are there to answer questions, not to rush a personal, thoughtful decision, they argued. We will post around campus reminding folks to turn in their cards. For those that aren’t familiar with the process, we hope to make it clear at Plenary and during that following week. If you have any questions, please contact one of us or email code@haverford.edu.

On a final note, certain Council members will be meeting with UPenn’s Honor Council to discuss Code-related issues at both schools. As we saw at the Haverford Leadership Conference, it is interesting to see how honor codes work at other schools.

PLENARY will take place on Sunday the 20^th. Doors open at 7.00 PM!

The Code & the Constitution are up, so be there!

III. Confidential Portion

IV. Moment of Silence

Read my lips: these minutes are not necessarily the view of Haverford College. Say, you missed a good time if you didn’t make it to the Spectrum to see the Monster Truck Rally. We were even back in time to shake it at the Hard Hat Party – bravo to the event organizers this weekend. We lost the gate arm though – boo hiss.