Senate established $5 printing credit, waiting for administrative response

By Jolie Vinh and Ayham Al-Ghoul     9/9/25 10:36pm

The Student Association unanimously approved a bill to provide students with $5 printing credits after it was amended to add a 10-day waiting period before the credit is made available to students. 

Under the bill, the funding will be transferred to the Office of Information Technology, which will set up individual credits while the money remains inaccessible to students for 10 days. The printing credit will be available for the whole year and will roll over to the next if not fully used.

Martel College President Nathan Calzat, who created the amendment, said he was initially an opponent of the bill due to concerns that it would take pressure off of Rice administration to take responsibility for funding the printing credits. 

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Calzat’s reasoning for this amendment was that it would allow for a period of 10 days to negotiate with the administration to see if they would be willing to come to a compromise, while not preventing access to a printing credit.

The SA will use the bill as leverage with hopes of the administration eventually funding the printing credit, SA President Trevor Tobey said.

“My issue with the bill … was it was going to diminish the efforts of the past by students to get a printing credit,” Calzat said during the meeting. “The Student Association shouldn’t have to provide these funds to our students, but we’re kind of forced to.”

However, with the SA now placing pressure on administration to respond to the bill, Calzat voted in favor.

Now passed, the printing credit will be funded from the SA’s own coffers. The SA’s funding comes from an $85 blanket tax that is included with every student’s tuition.

Hanszen College Senator Dorian Echasseriau, who originally drafted the bill, came out against the amendment, saying that it would just delay when students would receive the benefits without any meaningful benefit, as the administration was already ignoring them on this issue. 

Tobey responded by saying that he has already been in contact with Dean Gorman, and they seemed to be engaged in the process.

SA Treasurer Jackson Darr announced that applications are open for the Student Initiative Fund, which currently holds over $140,000 in funding for clubs and organizations. The SA has no current deadline for applications and clubs will receive a response within one to three weeks of their application.

“We encourage all individuals and people associated with clubs to apply. Staff funding is a little reduced this year,”  Darr said at the beginning of the Senate meeting. “We hope that all clubs come to the initiative fund to host their campus events.”

Senate unanimously voted to hold a “time-sensitive special election” regarding Constitutional Amendments No. 1 through 4, and will release the agenda on Sept. 15. In a special election, campaigning periods last for two weeks. Ballots are opened to the student body at the beginning of the second week.

Senate also opted to table discussions regarding the Bylaws Amendments until a later date and unanimously agreed to waive prior notice for Senate Bill No. 3.

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