Student Government President Colorado Robertson led college council, student organization and executive leaders in a discussion on student life initiatives, Saturday classes and other issues during his President’s Cabinet meeting Tuesday afternoon.The meeting, held in the Student Union, was the first of its kind in nearly four years, Robertson said. Student leaders exchanged ideas and gave updates on the directions their organizations are taking.”This is an opportunity to call everybody that moves and shakes things on campus together in one group,” Roberston said.The upcoming Saturday classes were addressed.At the last Senate meeting, a resolution was passed to cut the four Saturdays originally scheduled for classes down to two. The proposed dates to keep are Oct. 4 and Oct. 18.Oct. 4 is scheduled as a football bye week, and Oct. 18 is the South Carolina game, of which the least amount of student tickets were requested, said Ben Clark, SG speaker. Approval by Chancellor Michael Martin is needed for the change and should be decided within a couple of days. Eric Monday, interim vice chancellor of Student Life, attended the meeting and discussed Student Life’s initiatives to push for higher retention rates at the University.One of those initiatives is the recently created department called First Year Experience, led by Darrell Ray, assistant vice chancellor of Student Life. Monday said that recently, only about 85 percent of students returned to the University after their freshman year.”Darrell is building an office … that is focused on how we build programs and services to acclimate students quicker to [the University] and in a better way,” Monday said.  About 90 percent of students that attend STRIPES, a retreat for incoming freshmen to learn about the University’s history and traditions, return to the University after their freshman year, Monday said.He said students who live on campus or participate in Greek organizations also have higher retention rates. “Small groups are key,” he said. Monday used the meeting to let the many student leaders who attended know they should expect a greater level of involvement and response from the division of Student Life.SG updates were also given during the meeting. Chris Cummings, chief justice, said his goal this year is to avoid unnecessary and controversial court cases that come up during the SG election season.”Every year, we run into the problem where we see people thinking that SG is just creating chaos,” Cummings said. “We shouldn’t have SG leaders attacking each other in court — we should have them coming together to cooperate.”Christine Cangelosi, president of the College Council for Arts and Design, said the meeting was an  “extreme success.””The more communication we can have with strong student leaders is vitally important in pushing the Flagship Agenda and any other LSU initiatives,” Cangelosi said.—-
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