Bylaws

Overview

The Computer Science Graduate Students Association (CSGSA) is a student organization run by and for graduate students from the Computer Science Department at CU Boulder. Its main goal is to foster community amongst graduate students in the Department of Computer Science and other affiliated departments/institutes. To encourage such a community, the CSGSA will arrange social events, and serve as a central forum of representation for graduate students, representing graduate students’ interests to the department and broader university administration. In addition, the CSGSA will inform and support graduate students throughout their program of study.

Responsibilities

The CSGSA has the following main responsibilities.

Social

  • The CSGSA arranges and promotes events each semester in coordination with department leadership.
  • Events will be varied and appeal to a variety of audiences.
  • Members will be notified of events with plenty of notice and guidance given as to the expected atmosphere (e.g. family friendly).
  • Promote awareness of CSGSA activities to current students.

Graduate Student Representation

  • The CSGSA shall appoint representatives to the Graduate and Professional Student Government (GPSG), Computer Science Executive Committee, Computer Science Graduate Committee, Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility (DEIA) Committee, and other organizations as appropriate.
  • The CSGSA shall act as advocate for the views and opinions of its membership.

Personnel

Executive Committee

The CSGSA has a four person executive committee: a Chair, two Vice-Chairs, and a Treasurer. The responsibilities of these members are outlined below.

  1. Chair: This position is in charge of upholding the CSGSA goal of advocating for student concerns, as well as providing leadership to the CSGSA executive committee internally. Duties include:
    • Scheduling, arranging agendas for, and running CSGSA meetings
    • Representing graduate students to the department and university where appropriate
    • Advocating for members in inclusion and equity issues and providing input and feedback to the department, college, and/or campus as appropriate. As best practice, this should include a mechanism for students to report microaggressions or other problems in a way that is safe for the student.
    • Evaluating current CSGSA operating procedures and bylaws to ensure they are relevant, appropriate, and up to date
  2. Co-Vice Chairs
    • Communicating with students (announcements, email, slack moderation, etc.)
    • Planning (or delegating planning) of events including events targeted towards the goal of making the CU Boulder CS graduate department more inclusive and proactively anti-racist (in continuity)
    • Stewarding student survey data (especially fair dissemination of anonymized data) and providing support for department Town Hall events
    • Running CSGSA meetings in the absence of the Chair
  3. Treasurer: This position handles any and all financial matters. Duties include:
    • Applying for funding each year from multiple sources
    • Submitting reimbursement forms when needed
    • Reporting regularly on the financial status of the organization
    • Keeping minutes during CSGSA open meetings
    • Delegating tasks to ensure proper maintenance and order of digital records (on OneDrive, Google Drive, github, etc)
    • Creating & maintaining documentation regarding procedures and timelines to be followed with funding organizations (CSTeam, Student Organization, etc.)
    • Holding CSGSA accountable for actions planned or taken towards community inclusivity

It is the duty of ALL chairs to advocate for graduate students in issues of inclusion and equity, as well as to critically examine CSGSA activities to ensure inclusivity.

It is the duty of ALL chairs to delegate and accept additional duties in order to distribute work evenly throughout the executive committee.

It is the duty of ALL chairs to attend the department’s regularly scheduled leadership sync-up meeting. It is also the duty of the CSGSA executive committee as a whole to make good-faith efforts to coordinate with student leadership (DEIA reps, exec comm reps, grad comm reps, GPDC leadership, GPSG rep, CEAS Graduate Student rep, and any others).

The executive committee should be elected no later than the last day of classes in the spring semester. The elected term begins the day after the last day of spring semester. It is the responsibility of the outgoing CSGSA executive committee to provide mentorship and advice to the incoming CSGSA executive committee during the summer and fall terms.

Typically, potential candidates self-nominate before an election. If there are no nominations for an executive committee position, if a member is given a vote of no confidence, or if a member of the executive committee is unable to complete their full term, the incumbent CSGSA executive committee may take reasonable actions to include:

  • Suspending or reducing CSGSA operations until a suitable candidate can be found
  • Holding additional election(s) outside of the voting timeline established in the bylaws as long as the election occurs while Spring or Fall semester is in session
  • Appointing an interim executive committee position to an un-elected CSGSA member or extending the term of an incumbent CSGSA executive committee member until one or more suitable candidates may be found for the unfilled position and an election may be held

The CSGSA may take similar actions in helping other organizations to appoint interim student representatives or hold additional elections if this is requested by the organization (e.g., Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility (DEIA) Committee).

Note that while all CSGSA members are eligible to run for an executive committee position, students who are not enrolled in the CS grad enrollment stack (such as BAM students that have not yet matriculated into the grad program but have received CSGSA membership through special arrangement) may not be eligible for the compensation the department may traditionally award to executive committee members.

Volunteer Coordinators

The CSGSA executive committee may appoint student coordinators to help run CSGSA activities. Coordinators are expected to work with a level of autonomy, but the CSGSA executive committee is responsible for supporting these positions. The CSGSA executive committee and the coordinator should come to an agreement for coordinator responsibilities through the existence of a handbook document made available to the coordinator. It is the joint responsibility of the coordinator and the CSGSA executive committee to keep handbook documents up to date. It is the responsibility of the CSGSA executive committee to ensure a smooth transition when a new coordinator is appointed.

Coordinators should be publicized on the CSGSA website pending the permission of the CSGSA member fulfilling that position. Open coordinator positions should be advertised to all CSGSA members via the Commonly Accepted Public Forum (CAPF) so all have an opportunity to volunteer. Any CSGSA member is eligible to be a coordinator. Coordinator selection is done at the discretion of the CSGSA executive committee. The following coordinator positions can be changed without bylaw amendment:

  • Web Developer(s)
  • Tea Time Coordinator(s)
  • MS Recruitment Ambassador(s)
  • PhD Recruitment Ambassador(s)

Committee Representatives

There are representatives to external organizations who will also be elected by the membership of the CSGSA. These organizations include, but are not limited to:

  • GPSG representative
  • CS Department Executive Committee representative(s)
  • CS Department Graduate Committee representative(s)
  • CS Department DEIA Committee representative(s)

Operations

Membership

The following will automatically be considered as members:

  • A graduate student in the Department of Computer Science (this includes BAM students who have matriculated into the graduate enrollment stack)
  • A graduate student in an affiliated Department/Institute
  • A graduate student working in a Computer Science or affiliated Department/Institute lab

Those who don’t meet these criteria (such as admitted BAM students prior to matriculating to the graduate enrollment stack) may become members by arrangement with the Chair. As general guidance, special arrangements for membership should be granted liberally to a requestee under the following conditions:

  • The requester is enrolled by CU Boulder in a program that will grant a CS graduate degree (note that Coursera enrollment does not meet this requirement at this time);
  • The requester is involved in computer science graduate coursework at CU Boulder; AND
  • The requestee took the time to personally request membership.

A requester who is denied membership may request a justification for denial (given in writing) by the CSGSA executive committee. This justification should be supplied within four academic weeks of the justification request. This timeline gives the CSGSA executive committee the opportunity to propose a bylaw amendment to support their denial if needed.

Note that increased administrative burden on the CSGSA executive committee is not a sufficient reason to disallow membership for a student or class of students; if the administrative burden becomes too great, that would be reason to propose and pass a bylaw amendment limiting membership officially. If the CSGSA executive committee needs to employ calendar RSVPs + guest lists, card readers, email verification, etc. to support a diverse membership, the CSGSA executive committee should do so.

Procedures

  • Meeting Frequency: The CSGSA shall hold regular, biweekly meetings during fall and spring semesters. Meetings will be open to all members.
  • Meeting Details: The Chair shall distribute a meeting agenda to members at least 24 hours prior to the meeting.
  • Social Events: It is expected that at least two social events shall be held each semester and the events be diverse in nature.
  • Anti-Racism and Inclusion Events: It is expected that at least two events targeting inclusivity, education and/or discussion on anti-racism shall be held each year.
  • Commonly Accepted Public Forum (CAPF):
    • Currently slack for discussion and email + slack for announcements
    • This can change in future terms. This can be changed without a bylaw amendment but changes should be publicly advertised as well as possible to all CSGSA members.
  • Bylaw Amendments:
    • Directly Responsible Individual (DRI): here shall be the proposing member(s) of the executive committee and any proxies designated by these proposing member(s)
    • Proposals: Changes to the bylaws may be proposed by the CSGSA executive committee at any time. The DRI(s) must be listed on the proposal. The proposal must be published to the CAPF.
    • Discussion period: The discussion period for any proposed change is 2 academic weeks during a fall or spring semester. During the discussion period, dissenting opinions by CSGSA members must be published to the CAPF, then the DRIs are encouraged to discuss the dissent and consider modifications to the proposal. A change to the proposal triggered by dissenting opinion does not require a new discussion period (however it may be chosen by the DRI(s) at their discretion).
    • Voting period: Once the discussion period has ended and proposal modifications are complete, then the online voting period may begin. This will take place over one academic week with a verified voting process using surveys or other acceptable online tools distributed to all CSGSA members through the CAPF.
    • Voting conditions: Quorum is not required, however a simple-majority of submitted votes must agree with the proposal.
      • Background note: quorum is not required as we have never seen quorum met on any survey of our members
      • Background note: hyper-majority is not required as a simple majority is believed to be sufficient in allowing the CSGSA leadership to execute policies effectively while giving the members a voice
    • Ratification: Once the voting period ends, the CSGSA chair shall review the results of the vote. If voting conditions are met, then the CSGSA chair shall ratify the change within two weeks. If voting conditions are not met, then the proposal is rejected, and can be reconsidered at a later date. CSGSA members should be notified of a successful bylaw amendment using the CAPF.

Voting

All votes will be conducted online and published to the CAPF, and voting will be open for one week.

  • Elections for representatives to the CSGSA executive committee, GPSG, the Graduate Committee, and the Department Executive Committee will be held annually, during the spring semester.
  • The self-nomination phase should take place over a period of two academic weeks; the voting should take place over one academic week shortly after.
  • Bylaw updates, as described above, will also be conducted online for one week.
  • A vote of no confidence can be initiated by a member at a CSGSA meeting.
  • Voting should only be open to CSGSA members; the CSGSA executive committee may take steps including email validation when running the election to ensure this condition is met. The CSGSA executive committee may only share voter information in order to ensure the validity of the vote - data on individual voters should be used or disseminated for no other purpose.
  • In the event of a tie in an election, the CSGSA executive committee has jurisdiction to decide a method of breaking the tie, such as ranked voting, history of volunteership, a vote of current/future student leaders or department staff, or other methods. It is best practice that the mechanism used to break the tie should be made public when the winner is announced.