Wednesday night the Student Senate had their longest meeting of the year and achieved many of their goals in the process.

According to Kelli Rogers, Student Senate president, nine people were appointed to the Senate and all were confirmed.

‘There were a lot of seats open since many people didn’t have the time to commit,’ Rogers said.

She said it has been challenging filling the seats and the Senate is still looking for graduate students, education and a few engineer candidates.

Overall there are 64 seats in the Senate and Wednesday night 52 were filled, leaving only 12 vacant.

After new senators were appointed, among the many issues discussed, the most notable dealt with dining hall carry-out.

‘We have been researching and working with the University and OIT about allowing students to carry food out of the dining hall,’ Rogers said.

Stephen Kouba adopted the idea last fall and the Senate began researching ideas on how to make it possible for students to eat comfortably within their own schedules.

According to Rogers, the Senate is fairly confident the program will be implemented.

Students will obtain reusable dining trays that will serve as takeout boxes and will be sustainable for many uses.’

In the process of obtaining carry-out food, students will swipe their campus ID and will then have 10 minutes to put food in their carry-out boxes.’ After they are finished, they will have to swipe when exiting to ensure that they did not go over the 10 minute period.’ If so, then they will be charged for another meal.

The carry-out plan will be equivalent to one meal; students will not be able to eat in the dining hall though.

Before the program is implemented a test trial will take place some time later in the semester.

‘If students abuse the program, the University will pull it immediately.’ We are hoping students will be respectful of the program, because we need it to alleviate over crowded dining,’ Rogers said. ‘We hope next fall it will be a solid program.’

Another issue that was up for debate was GLBT History Month.

The Senate decided to support GLBT and passed legislation that October will be recognized by the University as GLBT History Month.

The Senate is also working on a Pedestrian Safety Act, to help prevent students from being hit by bikers and to help reduce the number of bike accidents around campus.

Also, the Senate removed of the student body public defender position.’ This position was created with the intentions of representing students going into student conduct in 2006, but the position’s need was slim.’