President Ghufran Salih and Vice President Kyle Rosenblum addressed last weekend’s controversial “Cuse Can!” event during Monday night’s Student Association meeting.

The event featured two panels, a performance by comedian Tiffany Haddish and a concert with Pusha T and Flipp Dinero.  Salih said both Haddish’s show and the concert were well attended. The diversity panel did not have a large crowd, she said, but students who attended were interested in the discussion.

Prior to the event, SA representatives expressed disapproval of the “Cuse Can!”’s content and criticized the event, saying it was not inclusive to LGBTQ students.

Salih said that Haddish made insensitive comments during her stand-up set at “Cuse Can!” She said she and Rosenblum were not previously aware that those comments were part of Haddish’s act.

“The event was still very powerful, and we had a lot of students come up to us afterwards and talk about what it meant to them,” Rosenblum said after the meeting.

Members have also said they were frustrated that they were not included more in the planning of the event. Salih, Rosenblum and Comptroller Ambrose Gonzalez approved $242,000 for the event. The money came from SA’s rollover fund, which is not subject to approval from SA ’s Finance Board.

“We had a lot of members that sat down with us, talked to us what they were concerned about,” Rosenblum said after the meeting. “That was so helpful because it allowed us to improve what we could improve before the event.”

SA also passed a motion to amend its bylaws to ensure that all assembly members are taking part in improving the undergraduate student experience. The amendment stated that each member of the assembly must attempt to help students through an initiative each semester.

Representatives Drew Jacobson and Joshua Shub-Seltzer introduced legislation to make committee chairs elected positions. The proposal is meant to give committees a leader who has relevant experience within the committee, according to the text of the bill.

Other business

• Marianne Huger Thomson, SU’s new associate vice president and dean of students, introduced herself to SA and discussed her ideas to build a better relationship between students and administration. She spoke about focusing on persistent issues and their root causes, rather than providing a superficial solution to problems. SA and the Office of the Dean of Students can develop ideas and strategies together to solve issues, Thompson said.

• As of Monday night, 8.8% of the SU student body had voted in this year’s SA elections, Torre Payton-Jackson, co-chair of SA’s Public Relations Committees, said.

Published on April 9, 2019 at 12:06 am

Contact Hannah: hagraf@syr.edu