SGA talks Wi-Fi and mascots

Colonel Tillou’s latest redesign and school-wide Wi-Fi complaints were among the main topics discussed by members of the Student Government Association at the organization’s meeting yesterday afternoon.

Discussions surrounding changes made to Colonel Tillou arose when Senator Kaitlyn Mistretta said that
several students had approached her and asked about mascot’s new design, which the university
unveiled at last Saturday’s homecoming football game. She said that the students noted that nobody
knew about the redesign.

“A lot of students [thought] it came out of nowhere,” said Mistretta. “I think that’s what a lot of
students are upset about.”

President Tommy Thibodeaux said that a meeting took place last semester to collect ideas for potential
redesigns, but he is unsure of how the final decision came about. He was unaware that changes were
going to be officially made.

Peyton Chiasson, director of student rights and grievances, said that he personally does not see an issue
with the mascot and believes the university intended for the redesign to be unexpected.

“I think the angle that they were coming from is that they wanted it to be a surprise. None of it got
leaked, and I appreciate that. I think they did a good job,” said Chiasson.

Thibodeaux said that he will seek out answers regarding the matter.

Additionally, Chiasson said that complaints about the university’s Wi-Fi have been circulating
throughout campus. These problems arose from the number of devices utilizing the Wi-Fi, since many
buildings on campus are still using access point configurations from 2005.

“In 2005, they had 100 people at a time connecting to access points,” said Chiasson. “Now, there’s 6,000
unique devices.”

Two years ago, SGA spent a great deal of money to replace the university’s old servers and firewalls. To
Chiasson, this was not an item for which students should have had to pay.

“We have been buying a lot of operational things for the university. We’re doing that because that’s
where the students’ needs lie,” said Chiasson. “We bought the firewall. We just bought new access
points for the student union and cafeteria, and those are just things that I believe we should not be
paying for. There are things like that where we don’t mind helping, but we should not be fronting that
bill.”

There is no recurring money that the university’s IT department can budget to fix Wi-Fi yearly, so the
organization is looking for a way to provide constant funding for improvements.

“I think that the university needs to get a perpetual line item together that’s going to fund these things
in the future,” said Chiasson.

Thibodeaux announced that the presidential search is “moving along” with applications for the position
set to open on Oct. 20 and the next search committee meeting set to take place on Oct. 25. He said that
some people are already trying to send in applications.

“There is a lot of high demand for the position, so we should have a good group of candidates to look
through,” said Thibodeaux.

The organization’s biggest event, SGA Day, will occur on Nov. 15, replacing the previously scheduled
town hall meeting. Director of public relations Josie Graham said that SGA will set up a way for students
to write down items that they want to discuss. The organization will revisit that feedback at the town
hall meeting in the spring.

In addition, the organization passed a motion to sponsor five history students at $50 each to attend the
invite-only 2017 International World War II Conference in New Orleans, as well as a motion to allocate
$300 for two students from the college of business sales team to attend the International Collegiate
Sales Competition in Orlando, Fla.