GRAND VALLEY
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GOVERNANCE
Student senate working on textbook grant for faculty BY SARAH HOLLIS SHOLLIS@LANTHORN.COM
while until the new administration made decisions on funding. “Given that, we’re quite excited and thankful to the people in Washington who helped with this. Bill Huizenga was helpful in guiding us through the bureaucracy, talking to the right people in the right offices and keeping them focused on this project.” The project will cost around $70 million, with more than 80 percent of the costs being covered by the recent federal grant. The Michigan
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, college tuition and fees in the U.S. have risen 63 percent since January 2006. Many factors have contributed to this increase, one of which is rising textbook prices. To help lower the cost of textbooks for students, the Grand Valley State University student senate is partnering with faculty to create a committee that would work to fund a stipend to encourage professors to use or create open textbook resources. “We put together a small working group; we’re going to be building the charge that we then propose to ECS (executive committee of the senate) through our representative, the student senate president,” said Eric-John Szczepaniak, chair of the student senate educational affairs committee. “Hopefully within the month we will have come up with a charge for whatever we want this committee structure should be and our recommendations of who should be on the committee.” Based on how this system works at other universities, the grant/stipend will most likely be available to professors at GVSU on three levels. “The specifics of the grant will be made in this university committee, but how it has worked at other universities is there are a few levels of what this grant entails,” Szczepaniak said. “The first level is paying faculty somewhere between 200 and 500 dollars just to review a textbook. That gets them acclimated to the idea of open educational resources, and they’ve actually helped that textbook get closer to being used in a classroom somewhere across the country. “The second level would be adopting one of these textbooks to use in your class. So, if we had this grant in place, it would literally pay the profes-
SEE BUS | A2
SEE GRANT | A2
RAPID: A trio of buses lines up outside the Kirkhof Center on Tuesday, Feb. 13. The Laker Line initiative recently earned a substantial grant from the federal government, which will spark the start of construction as early as this spring. The project is expected to be completed in spring of 2020. GVL | HANNAH HILL
Laker Line gets federal funding New busing system to streamline transit between Allendale, Grand Rapids BY DEVIN DELY DDELY@LANTHORN.COM
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evelopment is officially underway for a new transit system between Allendale and Grand Rapids. The Laker Line initiative received federal funding on Friday, Feb. 9. This latest project is meant to improve transportation between GVSU’s Allendale and Pew campuses. D. Scott Richardson, retiring acting vice president for finance and administration at GVSU, said this
project has been a long time coming. “This is a project that’s almost five years in the making,” he said. “In particular, it’s going to have an impact on students who need to get from this campus (Allendale) to the health sciences building. It’s going to streamline and shorten the run.” The new bus system will replace the 50 route, which currently connects the two campuses, and will run 16 buses, all larger than the ones being used now. The 50 seats about 40 passengers, while the new buses will seat 60 and have the capacity to
carry up to about 80 people. Despite the good news of the project receiving the funding it needs, many are still wondering why the approval took so long. According to Richardson, national politics may have played a role in the delay. “I think for one it’s a significant project,” he said. “But also, there’s lots of financial discussions that started happening with the new president and new administration on tax relief, government structure and funding programs for things like this. Everything slowed down for a
HIGHLIGHTS
GV Formula Racing Team prepares for May competition BY DREW SCHERTZER DSCHERTZER@LANTHORN.COM
In 2014, a group of Grand Valley State University engineering students created the GVSU Formula Racing Team. What started as a small number of students with a vision is now flourishing into a robust machine. Nicholas Baine, faculty adviser for the club, has been there from the start. He believes the team will see much better results this year at the Formula Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) competition coming up in May. “Each year we have seen big improvements,” Baine said. “The first years we were in a position where we were scrambling just to pass inspections. Now we have the car designed a year in advance so that we are just making tweaks to improve our time.” Baine said the team initially had a tough time getting on its feet. The SAE rulebook is hundreds of pages long, so it took awhile to get accustomed to the rules and even longer to get fundraising. Now, Baine believes the team will be able to surpass half of the 120 competitors at the SAE competition in May. The team has gone from a handful of students to 30-something. Initially, it was comprised of just engineering students. Now, a plethora of students from different majors are coming together. However, Trevor Looman, assistant chief engineer, said there is still cause for concern. “The biggest challenge right
now is getting things reorganized,” Looman said. “Budgeting, materials to order for a new fuel system, and soft and hard dates must be met.” Looman explained the complex dynamic of the team: Some members work on the design of the car, while others work on marketing and on the business side of things. He said his job is to coordinate a group of about eight other students to make sure that everything is running on time for a new gas tank and radiator. Nigel Armstrong, chief engineer of the GVSU Formula Racing Team, is hopeful about the outcome of this year’s competition. He also believes the club has more to offer beyond racing. “With this club there are a lot of learning opportunities,” Armstrong said. “Everything is so hands-on and fast-paced, and (it) is the best way to learn engineering and business in the real world.” Armstrong hopes the team can bring in new sponsorships this year to expand the organization. He said that companies, even small businesses, will go to the events and often sponsor a team. Larger corporations, such as SpaceX and Ford, are also known to make appearances. This is crucial not only for sponsorships, but also for creating exposure to potential future jobs for participating students. Funding continues to be a problem for the team. Baine said other teams have budgets of more SEE RACING | A2
MASK OFF: A member of the GVSU Formula Racing Team works on Friday, Feb. 9. The Formula Racing Team is participating in the Society of Automotive Engineers competition at the Michigan International Speedway in May. GVL | SPENCER SCARBER