Chelsea Kennedy, senator for the College of Public Health, proposed a Tobacco Free Campus resolution at Undergraduate Student Governments’s second meeting this semester.

The resolution, which has been in preparations since winter break, would ban any cigarettes, electronic cigarettes, hookah smoked products and oral tobacco to be used on campus. Some university campuses in Ohio are already tobacco free and many others are smoke free.

“Smoke-free focuses more on the secondhand smoke that a passerby would receive from somebody else smoking and tobacco-free focuses more on the whole person and overall health of everybody on campus,” Kennedy said.  

It was decided that conversation on the topic would continue at the next meeting. Passing a resolution does not make it immediate campus policy, but would show USG support for the policy. 

Natalia Roman, senator-at-large, also proposed a resolution to change the name of one of the three senator-at-large positions to Senator for International Students. One of the positions currently oversees issues regarding international students, which led to the name change proposal. The proposal, however, did not receive the required two-thirds vote to pass. 

“I plan to draft some guidelines and specific responsibilities that the senator-at large in the future can have to make sure that the international students are always being served,” Roman said. 

Finally, USG approved changes to their charter, as well as passing the syllabus resolution proposed at the last meeting.

Anthony Calvaruso is a student politics reporter for The Kent Stater. For more information contact him at [email protected].