Blake, Stone Seek to Connect Council, Campus

Undergraduate Council Presidential candidate Trevor S. Blake '00 and vice presidential candidate Nicholas J. Stone '00 don't blame students for not showing much interest in this year's council elections.

"I can understand the general apathy because students don't see the U.C. as a representative voice and don't feel as connected to it as they could be," Blake says.

While their platform includes changes in academic requirements, advising and student services, the Blake-Stone ticket's focus is on improving communication on campus--especially between students and the council.

"We'd like U.C. representatives to serve as liaisons to the House committees and student groups, to get in touch with them at least once a week, and to attend their meetings about once a month," Blake says. "We want contact info. for all representatives to be posted in the Houses, and we plan on holding office hours in the Science Center each week."

Blake and Stone say that this is vital to the council regaining its position as the representative body of Harvard students--a position they believe has been lost over the past several years.

"The U.C. is viewed more as a clique that purports to representative views," Stone says. "Rarely do [students] know or have real input into what the U.C. is doing."

Blake is a third-year council member, who was the co-chair of the Campus Life Committee last year, and Stone is a second year council member.

Both say they want to increase the amount of funding available to student groups and House committees. They are currently working on a proposal for a direct deposit from the donations to the College to the Council's budget to provide for this increase in funding.

"If College fundraisers could tell people, 'What you give now will be used directly for students,' it would provide an added incentive for people to give money," Stone says.

Blake is also working on a proposal that would do away with academic requirements during shopping period. Blake feels that this will allow students to choose the classes they are interested in, and not the ones that give the least work during shopping period.

"We anticipate the most opposition to [this proposal]," Stone says, "But if we [convince] some professors and House advisors, attacking the issue from several sides, we should get enough support for it."

The Blake/Stone platform also includes several less controversial plans--such as an ATM in the Quad, an advising fair for first-years and students who may change concentrations, and a used book sale at the beginning of each semester.

The two candidates are co-chairs of a committee to investigate the possibility of putting sourcebooks on the Web.

"We'd like to reduce costs to students--by putting sourcebooks on the Web, by holding a used book sale, and by not raising the [student activities fee on the] term bill," Blake says.

While Blake acknowledges that his platform is centered on student services, he says he'd also like to see the Council discussing more controversial and political issues.

"We need more of a discourse and division on the Council. The council is so complacent," Blake says. "We haven't had a meeting that lasted more than an hour--even our budget meeting was only 40 minutes long," he adds, referring to meetings chaired by current President Beth A. Stewart '00.

Blake and Stone say that, if the lines of communication are opened up between students and their representatives, then more controversial issues will reach the Council.

"Under Beth Stewart's presidency, individual representatives have not felt empowered to bring up their constituents' views," Stone says. "We want to focus on the little things immediately...[but] we do need to bring down the iron curtain on political issues."

Blake, as co-chair of the committee that plans Springfest and other campus-wide social events, would like to see the Council's role in planning such events changed.

"We should invite student groups into the process [of planning Springfest] earlier," Blake says. "We should take some of the money we've earmarked for Springfest and give it to student groups and house committees, who are better at organization and execution," adds Blake, who is also a member of the Committee on House Life.

"The U.C. has proven itself ineffective at sponsoring social events," he declares.

While Blake's and Stone's proposals amount to redefining the role of the Council on campus, the candidates are opposed to any structural changes in the body.

"The worst thing we can do is to do anything that will make people doubt the representative ability of the Undergraduate Council more than they already do," Stone says.

"We want people to feel that this is the right forum for any issue," Blake stresses. "We want Council members to choose from these issues and work on them--to be more than figureheads."