By Joseph Altman Jr.
Arizona Daily Wildcat
The Associated Students are in the process of approving a "Students' Bill of Rights."
After debate, the Undergraduate Senate passed the bill by a vote of three for approval and two against, with two abstentions. The legislation was transferred to the Graduate and Professional Student Council last Wednesday for its approval.
The bill, created by the Student Senate at the University of Southern California, is in the hands of 20 student governments at universities across the nation in an effort to adopt it nationally.
USC Student Senate President Jimmy Moye said that at last count, five schools have approved the document and five or six more have it in front of their senates.
"The plan behind it is for all schools to have something in common and all student governments to have something we're all working for," Moye said.
"Some have more conservative or liberal views but we want to set out 10 things every student council can agree on."
Undergraduate Senate President Brad Milligan introduced the document with Sen. Jennifer Haber and said they are working at fulfilling its goals.
"Everything here is part of the college experience. We're here for a lot of different reasons other than education. This is a good step to fulfill that and work on it," Milligan said.
But Sen. Dave Bizak, who voted against the bill of rights, said although the bill lists good ideas, those ideas are not inherent rights.
The bill states, "Every campus should have a student union dedicated to students, and run by the student government." In a memorandum, Bizak states, "Granted that it's a great idea to have student input in areas such as design and policies of the union; however, I would contend that it is not an inherent right for the student government to run the union."
Milligan said he believes the 10 items on the document are important rights students are entitled to.
"These are things we're striving for," Milligan said, adding that some of the 10 basic rights have already been fulfilled at UA, and the others will serve as goals for ASUA and student governments across the nation.
But Bizak states in his memo, "It is my belief that the drafters of the 'Student Bill of Rights' do not understand the importance and impact of titling a document the 'Bill of Rights.'"