The External Affairs Committee shall aid the Vice President for External Affairs in studying and making recommendations to the Delegate Assembly on issues and developments of concern to graduate students on the local, system-wide, state, and national levels. It shall also assist the Vice President for External Affairs in organizing, recruiting, and planning efforts that are the responsibility of the Vice President for External Affairs.

Committee Reports

The external affairs committee met last month and discussed the long range plan for the semester which includes research for our national, state and local lobbying campaigns. Our most pressing item is research on the supporting documents for the second action item for the coalition of Student Advocates for Graduate Education (SAGE). The EAVP attended the UCSA board of directors January meeting and finalized the action items for the year: a) a system-wide health plan that includes dependent care and reciprocal services at all campuses; and b) an education campaign of the state legislature on the importance of graduate student education and funding for graduate student education. Lastly, we have been meeting with the office of Government and Community Relations with whom we are working in establishing an ongoing relationship.

Since our last meeting the External Affairs Team (EAVP and EACoS) has been active in a number of student items at the local, state and national level. The full details of all of our activities will uploaded to the EA webpage as part of the meeting minutes for our last EA Committee meeting. Briefly: We convened at a summit with other premier Public Graduate Universities to strategize the direction of a federal lobby core; attended the Governors Climate Change Summit; participated at the Regents’ meeting; attended the UCSA BOD meeting to continue setting UCSA’s Action Items; attended and helped facilitate the Student of Color Conference at UCLA; and held our monthly committee meeting to strategize our next steps. The three main items the committee is working on are: 1.) Federal and State Lobbying and action item research 2.) Organizing and preparing for this year’s Lobby Conference at Sacramento, and 3.) Community and local government engagement. Please contact me eavp@ga.berkeley.edu, or the EA Chief of Staff eacos@ga.berkeley.edu if you would like to be involved in or learn more about any of these items. Announcement— Lobby Conference is taking this year is from February 28 to March 2nd. The conference is designed to teach students about lobbying and the main issues we are facing this year. After the Saturday and Sunday training, we will be meeting with our corresponding Senators and Assembly members to lobby on behalf of all students of the University of California. Please contact us if you are interested in attending.

The External Affairs Committee met on Wednesday October 15th. We discussed our current status on the projects and tasks set in the previous meeting as well as our role with UCSA’s Graduate Action item. We also briefly discussed the Graduate Assembly’s Action Agendas proposed during the October Delegates’ meeting. We have not had a UCSA meeting in the interim time and have nothing to report. Our principal current projects are: working with administration on local government relations and involvement, UCSA’s graduate action agenda, the system-wide sustainable food services policy, planning and funding for the 2009 UCSA Lobby Conference in Sacramento and general involvement in keeping informed on the effect of the budgetary crisis on graduate student education.

The External Affairs Committee (EAC) met in September to discuss the scope of issues pertaining to the committee, current work taking place in the EA office, and other areas of interests that the committee is not currently addressing. Tasks were assigned to the different members. The EAC did the assigned analysis on the Action Agenda resolution The meeting minutes will be posted on the EA web-page within the GA site within the next week where all tasks are detailed. Additionally, the EA Vice President and Chief of Staff attended the UCSA board meeting in San Diego where the year's action agendas and other system-wide student issues were discussed. Lastly, the EAVP attended the yearly UC System-Wide Sustainability Steering Committee Meeting, during which certain sustainability goals' standards were raised and all campuses were tasked with forming a Sustainable Foodservices Working Group/Steering Committee for the implementation/comment of the UC System-Wide Sustainable Foodservices Policy. Our next meeting will be in the afternoon of Monday 13th, Tuesday 14th, or Wednesday 15 of October from 4 to 5pm or 5pm to 6pm at Anthony Hall. The date is still to be determined, but will be announced during the Delegates' Meeting, an email reminder will be sent, and will also be posted on the University's Calendar.

• There are four UCSA-affiliated Whiteliners at each day of the University of California Board of Regents meeting.  Whiteliners are provided direct access to the Regents - they get to go past the line that separates the approved guest from the audience that must sit in back.  Whiteliners therefore have the opportunity to speak directly with the Regents and meet with them in informal situations such as breaks and meals.
• The responsibility of a UCSA Whiteliner is to advocate UCSA's positions on issues the Regents will be considering and to build relationships for UCSA with as many of the Regents as possible. This is also one of the few times students have the opportunity to tell the Regents about our priorities and our action agenda.
• The UC Office of the President provides funding for travel and meals for the day you are whitelining. Students are generally only appointed to whiteline on one of the two-days and you must be available for the full day in which you are selected to attend, normally 8 AM to 5 PM

• If you are not available to attend a regents meeting for the entire day but would like to address the Regents on an issue relating to the University or UCSA priority item you may request to be added to the list of speakers during the Public Comment period. The Public Comment section of the meeting usually begins at the start of each meeting at around 8:30 AM and each speaker is allotted 1-3 minutes to speak to the regents on their specific item.