The Hamline Undergraduate Student Congress (HUSC) hosted a historical public forum between Hamline’s Board of Trustees and the students of Hamline in the Anderson Center on April 21. President Dr. Linda Hanson also holds a seat on the board, and was joined by Chair of the Board Bob Klas and Trustee Nneka Morgan. 

After introducing themselves, Klas, Morgan and Hanson opened the floor for questions, which mostly had to do with future plans for Hamline. 

“Our hope was to give students a chance to meet some of our trustees, to allow students to ask questions of the trustees and to help trustees learn more about the Hamline student experience,” HUSC President Lucas Dolan wrote via email. “We were a bit disappointed in the attendance. Despite using the same advertising methods that had led to successful turnout for earlier events like our diversity forum and the open meeting with President Hanson back in early December, this time we didn’t get many bodies in the room.”

The audience for the Board of Trustees meeting was quite thin, with less than a couple dozen students and faculty in attendance. “To improve the event, I would suggest working further in advance with President Hanson and the Board of Trustees to find a date during convo hour that works for both students and trustees, or to do greater outreach toward faculty and encouraging them to allow students to miss class for this important event,” Dolan wrote.

The idea of holding an open meeting between the Board of Trustees and the student body was first entertained back in mid-December when President Hanson attended a HUSC General Assembly (GA) meeting. Dolan, along with HUSC Vice President T. Corbin Concliffe, had met with Chairman Klas and President Hanson prior to the GA to propose the possibility of having student representation on the Board of Trustees, the result of which was the open meeting between the Board and student body. “President Hanson and the trustees present at the event seemed committed to doing a similar event again next year, and perhaps making it a more regular occurrence,” Dolan wrote.

To help bolster the number of attendees at future meetings, HUSC has outlined some tactics to hopefully get more students and faculty to show up and give their support. “Our strategy right now has been to try and find as many ways as possible to communicate information to the trustees and to give students an opportunity to get in contact with them, but we need students to show up for these type of things to make a statement that it is something we think is important, and to let the Board know how much students care,” Dolan said.